Less is the New More

My yoga teacher said "Less is the new More" to us once, quite some time ago, and it has stuck with me ever since:  More is not necessarily better.

I've known for quite a while that for me, more is not always better.  

• It's why I decided to stay home full time when our children were born.
• It's why I eventually returned to work in a half time aide position.
• And it's why I returned to certified teaching in a part time position when a full time German position was also available.

Since I started teaching two classes of German at Bloomington High School North in 2013, my school's German program has grown, and with it, so has my teaching load.  From 1/3 time to 2/3 time to 5/6 time, and finally, the past two years, to full time.  

I'm proud and pleased that our German program has grown, but the increase in my teaching load has been faster than I had expected, planned, or wanted.  From the outside, it probably looks like a perfect progression, but from the inside, it's been too much.

During the six years that I've been there, my school has had four different prinicpals, and one position in my department has been held by six different people.  There's a lot of tension and turnover in public schools currently, and my school is not immune.

For the past three years, I've requested to return to half time teaching.  Last year I tried to move to a middle school math position which was half time.  Nothing worked out, so I tried to keep going.

I blogged very little this spring because I just didn't have energy or words anymore. 

I thought about taking a year off, returning to an aide position, or leaving the profession entirely.

Finally though, this year, things have worked out so that I can continue teaching German at my current school but half time.

I am so, so thankful.  

I can feel my energy, joy, and love of teaching begin to return.  

I spent a week in Germany with my closest friend and got to attend the Deutscher Evangelischer Kirchentag in Dortmund with her.  It was the best professional development I could have imagined.    

Yesterday I saw the people at Target setting out the school supplies, and I felt quiet excitement, rather than dread, at the thought of the new school year.  

I'm currently scheduled to teach two sections of German 2 and one section of German 1, and I couldn't be happier.  I know that this slower, less is more pace is right for me.

März Musik Winner

And the winner is...

Happy Birthday, World Wide Web... and thanks!

The World Wide Web celebrated its 30th Anniversary March 12, which makes me feel rather old, but also grateful.

On the day before Spring Break, I was pondering what to do with my students on the first day back from break, and I was drawing a blank.  It's more difficult since it is the second day of our block schedule, and on the day before break, I had a lot of students gone, so it was mostly a catch-up day / make-up day.  I don't really want to come back from break to that, so what do I do with my sleepy students who will claim that they've forgotten all their German?

I glanced at my blog reading list, and suddenly I had two good ideas:

For German 1, from World Language Classroom, a "Who is it?" minibook:

The post does not contain a template for German, but I've done minibooks before, so it was quite easy to make my own template.  

I made one following the model from World Language classroom:

https://drive.google.com/open?id=1_4HTdBgY-_ghly6tO_DyMfYZd4HSCdmE 

and modified it a bit for my students:

https://drive.google.com/open?id=1XqxS5cBz0lNg1k_TBDlAtOYD_xvEEGjH

Rather than doing a selfie, I plan to number students' books when they finish writing so that they can read each other's books and fill in a guess on a chart:

For German 2, from The German Sector, a March Madness-style German video competition:

I am very, very grateful to Ashley for selecting, previewing, and sharing the 16 German music videos because I'm not very knowledgable about German pop music.

A quick Google search led me to this great March Madness bracket from Plexkits: https://plexkits.com/march-madness-bracket/  

I deleted the parts of the bracket that I didn't need, and Rick very kindly added a winner box for me.  I added hyperlinks to the bracket so that students can click and view the various videos.  

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/138BiHAN3nwxLbM9Ojbyx7eYRNGs_CQRRy52AmAYu5_Y/edit?usp=sharing

This is definitely something that I couldn't have come up with on my own, and I'm very grateful for all the people who shared resources with me.  I hope it will energize my students next Monday morning!

Eins, Zwei, Drei Tier Video

This weekend I found a great video from Die Sendung mit der Maus to use as enrichment with my German 1 students for this unit:  

https://www.wdrmaus.de/filme/lachgeschichten/eins_zwei_drei_tier.php5 

Students have been working with adjectives and adverbs in opposite pairs as well as Haustiere recently, so it's a great fit.

You can turn on subtitles in German (UT), so students can see what they're hearing.  

I've created a short worksheet to go with it so that students can view the video independently while I am helping students who need reteaching.

 

Here's the file if you'd like to try it with your students: https://drive.google.com/open?id=1JtvQJ6yr-t8oAoAUfgvXmGfeTdvPLqZ8

Oktoberfest 2018 - A Mixed Review

My German 2 classes have been studying Oktoberfest the past few weeks.  It fits in wonderfully with our first two units about Feste and Kleidung and out first Landeskunde region of Bayern.

So, after the success of our Apfelstreuselkuchen baking, I decided to schedule a tutorial to celebrate Oktoberfest on October 5.  

My review of how it went is certainly influenced by the fact that it was the Friday before our 4 day October break, and everyone (including me) was tired and ready for a break.  

Added to that, our building was short 9 subs, so I was called in at the last minute to sub during my prep period.  For an introvert like me who desperately needs to sit alone in a quiet room and not talk to anyone for a while after celebrating Oktoberfest with 41 students, this was rough.  

It seems unfair that when we're short on subs the day before a vacation, the teachers who are in the building trying to do some teaching with wound-up students are required to do even more than normal.  This doesn't happen in other schools in my district, so in my opinion, this is a leadership/administrative issue, and I'll leave it at that.

So, keeping in mind the circumstances, here's the review.

The good:

• 41 students signed up for the tutorial.  I got to meet some of the German students who are in my colleague's classes.

• 3 of my students who are in band came up with the idea all on their own to play for our Fest, got permission to take their instruments out of the band room, and played for their appreciative peers.

• I brought in frozen pretzels that needed to be baked in the oven for about 10 minutes, and 3 hard-working students took over that job and completed it like pros.

The bad:

• Of the 41 students who came, only 1 (who was also in the band) brought food in addition to me.  I am really big on doing things with my students, not for them, and this felt like I was doing most of the work.

• Students weren't especially good about making sure everyone got served before going back for seconds.  They acted more like hangry teenagers and less like the thoughful young people I know they are capable of being.

• We were rushed for time, so I wasn't able to have students wash their own dishes.  That meant most of the cleanup was left to me, but I had to cover another class.  I did eventually get to it and actually enjoyed being alone with the dishes (an introvert's oasis!), but this is again not really ideal for helping to develop thoughtful, appreciative young adults.

The future:  

I'm not sure about doing something like this again.  Parts were fun and students enjoyed it, but it was too tiring for me on a very tiring day.  Maybe we'll do it during class time so that I have more control about who is there and there is a limit on numbers.  We'll see.  Right now I need a long weekend with my family, crochet, Call the Midwife, and rest.

Friday Fun: Speed Dating, 4 in a Row, and Quizizz

We're really into the semester now, and both German 1 and 2 have some big quizzes and tests coming up, so Friday was dedicated to fun ways to get students reviewing and practicing.

German 2 tried Past Participles Speed Dating for the first time  

and played 4 in a Row

Both activities got thumbs up from students and got them actively practicing past participles, kennen, and wissen.

German 1 has their next unit test coming up, and we played Quizizz to review:

All in all, it was a good Friday.

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Backe, backe Kuchen

I love to bake!  And I really enjoy doing it with my students when we have the chance.

This year one of my sections of German 2 is Block 3 with C lunch, which means that class is from 11:35 - 12:55 with lunch at 12:55.  Which means that we are all hungry during class.  Which means that we talk about food a lot!

I promised this class that sometime soon I would schedule a baking tutorial so that we could bake in tutorial and eat in class. (Tutorial is our intervention/enrichment period, which meets right before Block 3 for 40 minutes.)  Naturally, they were all in.  

Of course we had to sing "Backe, back Kuchen" for the students who hadn't learned it last year.

Most of the students who participated were from the section of German 2 which meets right after tutorial and before lunch, but it was open to everyone, and some German 1 students and students from other sections attended.  

Since the cake wouldn't be done until after tutorial, I promised students who weren't in my Block 3 class that we would save them a piece of Kuchen that they could pick up before Block 4.

We used a very simple recipe for Apple Streusel Cake, which I found online: https://platedcravings.com/wprm_print/4265 

I divided the students into three groups: one for the dough (it was Throwback Thursday for Homecoming week)

one for the apple filling

and one for the crumble topping. 

And they really took it from there - I didn't have to do much more!  

I even had two very enthusiastic dish washers!  

The cake was done baking during Block 3 and cool enough to eat by the end of class.  Delicious!

It was a definite success, and not especially stressful or tiring for me - also a plus.  

Students asked to do this every week.  I don't think I'll be able to pull that off, but we definitely will do it again!