Breathing as a Form of Classroom Management

After an amazing maternity leave of 9 months off with my second born child, I, for the third time, entered the classroom in the middle of the year. I was warned that my class was very difficult and at times unruly. Striking fear into the heart of a teacher that was new to the building (I transferred from another building after being furloughed), I had to come up with a plan of action. My LTS, who was a former colleague that I previously worked with on two different occasions, has a very different teaching style and personality. This was going to be an extremely difficult transition for an already unruly group. After days of deliberation, I decided that I needed and they needed to use mindfulness breathing to focus on being less reactive and more focused on the decisions and impulses they were making. Years ago, before I had two beautiful children, I went to yoga classes and I remember feeling an overwhelming sense of peace after many months of learning to breath deeply and purposefully. Oftentimes, I found myself letting my thoughts run away with me, being too reactive, and honestly, just "on" all the time. Deep breathing has allowed me to slow down, be mindful, be relaxed, calm down and be less reactive, and eventually it allowed me to become more reflective as a person.

Once I decided to bring deep breathing exercises into my classroom, I did a little research and found that of course it was beneficial to adults but little research was done on the benefits of children until recently. I read a few articles and became intrigued on how deep breathing exercises have spilled into low SES districts as a means of helping students become less reactive and instead of detention helps students stay focused and be more reflective of their actions and behaviors. One district even had a room where students can meditate if they need time to calm themselves down. Another district replaced detention with mindfulness and deep breathing exercises. I found this enlightening, relate-able, and more importantly doable.

I anticipated students being resistant at first and not understanding of deep breathing exercises. At first, they mocked it, some laughed, some made "oom" noises, etc. But I was persistent, calm, and routined. We did this twice a day; once when they came in in the morning and again after recess/lunch. I had open discussions about the benefits, misconceptions, and eventually had them buy into deep breathing exercises. Some said they didn't like it or refused to do it and at the beginning that was their prerogative, but they must remain quiet. If they were being silly and breathing too quickly and laughing, we would focus on zoning them out and we would do it over and over until they either joined or became silent. Usually when they were breathing too quickly, I calmly reminded them that they were not in true control of their body and by deep breathing, it would help them become focused and in control of their own body.

As time passed, they became accustomed to deep breathing and when my CD Player broke with relaxing sounds, I turned to GoNoodle for breathing and mindfulness exercises. At first they were resistant even with that slight of change. But with persistence, they eventually gave in and realized the benefits of  being focused, calm, and in control of their body. It got to the point that my nonverbal cue was simply to put my finger up in the air and deep breath with the ones who needed to focus or become more in control of their own body. I'm hoping to continue this practice next year and possibly add "oom" and maybe yoga exercises for brain breaks throughout the day.

Connecting Support Class Strategies into the General Education Classroom

Oftentimes, I found that there is a disconnect between what is taught in support classes and what is taught in the general education curriculum. For instance, when I was a Literacy Interventionist teaching SpellRead, teachers were not aware of the strategies I used in my classroom. After careful reflection, I realized that during our grade level meetings, I needed to educate my team of teachers on what strategies I use during SpellRead and see if we could incorporate those same strategies into their general education classrooms. I feel there would be a more cohesive flow and better retention if the skills they were learning in SpellRead spilled into their classrooms in various content areas.

Shortly after my first attempts at bridging this enormous gap, I was furloughed and shortly hired back a few months later as a fourth grade teacher. This is not my first time teaching fourth grade. I taught fourth grade prior to taking the Literacy Interventionist position. However, I was more equipped to help bridge that gap for those students of mine that were in SpellRead. Since I previously taught SpellRead, I knew what students were supposed to be doing and what strategies they were supposed to utilize during instruction. Sometimes we expect students to simply apply those strategies on their own rather than teaching them how to use those strategies in any situation they are in whether it is reading in the classroom or reading a book at home. My poor students could not get away with much. I knew they had a Speed Reading Chart and after meeting with the Literacy Interventionist Specialist in my building, I obtained copies and had it in their desks ready to practice at any moment. I also utilized the same eight strategies in the classroom when applicable. I was only able to do this because I was previously in that position so I knew what to expect and how to incorporate it into my classroom to support those emerging students.

With collaboration cohesion is possible!

Finding Finch

Around PSSA time, I find out that we have Finch Robots in our possession. Being new to the world of coding and robots, I figured why not try it out. As anyone diving into the unknown knows, sometimes you just have to try it out and see what happens.

At first, I unknowingly cheated using the expansion pack to make the Finch Robot draw and easily hooked my students that way. Later after Bambi, Curriculum Director at BirdBrain Technologies, came into my classroom to demonstrate how to teach students to explore programming the Finch Robot; I find out I was not supposed to use that feature!!! We learn by doing and we learn from our mistakes we make. 

I now know to use the Scratch Finch Basics on http://www.finchrobot.com/teaching/scratch-finch-basics. This is like a jump start guide to using Scratch and Finch to learn the basic functions of what the robot can do. For instance, they learned how to make the Finch robot move, change its beak color, and play sound.

Below is a quick video clip of students using sound and changing its beak color to the beat of the short sound clip! I was very impressed because this was only the second time they played with sound and the color features of programming the Finch!

Why did I decide to start blogging?

Why did I decide to start blogging?

That is an excellent question!  After entering back into the mainstream of teaching 4th grade for the second time after a five year period in between of being a reading specialist, I found other saying "a lot has changed since you were in the classroom last."  Indeed it did!  From PVAAS teacher evaluation, Common Core, and backward design lesson plans, a lot has changed.  I figured blogging could help me through this process and help me to refine and reflect on my teaching practices and lessons.

Here goes nothing...