Moneymoneymoneymoney

My students worked with money today. It was kinda neat-- we put a lot of coins on a tray and gave one to each table (I won't even tell you how much change Ms. Lee has in her closet). They were to sort the coins, look through them, become familiar with the different types, their characteristics, names, how much they're worth. Then they partnered for a game where they had to close their eyes and match the coin their partner gave them by feel. It was a good sensory experience, I think.

Interestingly, I had designed a place-value game called heads or tails that I did with the class a bit earlier this semester. It used 20 pennies, but for more advanced students I gave them 20 nickels or 20 dimes and let them count the value of the coins. They didn't seem to have a problem doing this, so I just assumed they had already learned about money.

For that lesson, and for this one, they were quite excited to be playing with real money and were VERY engaged. I partnered with one girl whose father is from Africa and mother is European, and they spend summers overseas. She and I played on the rug, near where the values and names of the coins were displayed. She clearly was not familiar with what they were called or how much they were each worth. We have several kids in the class who are expats, and I wonder whether they, too, only have a vague notion of US coins?

It would not surprise me. I grew up in Japan and I remember learning about US currency in a math workbook at school. It mystified me for a long time why a nickel was bigger than a dime. Made no sense.

Anyway. They loved it. I guess enthusiasm for math is good at any price (even the price of possibly fostering an obsession with money!) so I have noted this: math games with coins are sure to be a hit.

Noticing

Disclaimer: this post  has nothing to do with teaching. I had a very interesting moment this morning. Went into the deli across the street which is run by Arabic-speaking people. They had a radio tuned to an Arabic-language station, as they often do, and there was a news broadcast. I couldn't understand it, of course, but for three words: Tel Aviv, Jerusalem, and jihad. 

In front of me were two women making purchases. One was telling the other about how she'd just had another baby, how it was 5 months old but only 7 lbs 5 oz (to give you some perspective, my child was 15 lbs at 5 months) and the father is in jail. 

All judgment aside, all political or social opinions aside, this is why it's so interesting to live here: you can't escape the world and its pressing issues, writ large, writ small. It's all around you; it's your neighbors and the people you  do business with. 

I don't intend at all to start a discussion about single motherhood, overcrowding in jails, or the Israel-Palestine conflict, which, sadly, has flared up again. Just, as we say in education, noticing. 

On the Same Team

Just had a great parent-teacher conference today. I didn't participate in many, but Ms. Lee was awesome about letting me give input and talking about the process of grading and so forth. She asked me to be present for the one today, because I had been working very closely with this student, who has a hard time working independently. 

The student had been in another class for first grade, and we'd gotten the impression from his previous teacher and special education coordinator that they were perhaps resistant to evaluation for possible services: the family doctor could find nothing wrong and said that perhaps the teacher "didn't know how to deal with boys." We were apprehensive, to say the least. 

Ms. Lee's method is to let the parents speak first. The mother said that they would begin the evaluation process in early December, and she had found a doctor that would take their insurance. I suspect that this may have been one thing that prevented them from doing it before. I didn't know that insurance would even cover such evaluations. File that away. 

Long and short of it is, they were very afraid that their child would have to leave the school, depending on the outcome of the evaluation, and were relieved that this was not the case- there are inclusion classrooms at every grade level at PSOhNo. 

They also seemed to feel that previous discussions had not been very collaborative. Both we and they shared the things we'd noticed, and we talked about the ways we were working with their child, what was working, and what the plan was going forward. The parents were quite obviously a. grateful that we were trying things and b. willing to take time and find ways to support this student's development in working independently. 

They hugged us both at the end of the conference and thanked us for being so open, and I think both Ms. Lee and they felt it was a best possible outcome for the conference. I am really proud of how well it went! It was the only conference we were at all concerned about, and it was a slam dunk. 

Democracy in action

Today was our first day back at school after the hurricane. The neighborhood around PSOhYes is completely normal, except shops extra-full of people who can't get to Manhattan, but of course we all know that not far away, things are terrible. 

I was very impressed with the all-hands meeting the principal held today. It went for about an hour, and she led a quite democratic process of soliciting ideas and discussion about what we should do on a number of fronts, including what the staff would like to do about helping affected colleagues (everyone was in favor of immediate cash collection), what the greater school community, including families and the PTA can do for the broader relief effort, how teachers can talk to students about what has happened and perhaps teach into some aspects of it, and what kinds of aid activities the students can get involved in right away to help out. 

Long story short, there was a read-a-thon planned that will now be devoted to the relief effort, and will be promoted as such as soon as it can be arranged. That, along with helping affected colleagues right away, were the "now" action items. Other initiatives to follow. 

The principal really gave people a chance to be heard while still being very much in charge and keeping the meeting on track (it could have gone on all day). Many teachers were also aware of the fact that immediacy, while not the primary concern, is important: when it takes a long time to decide what to do, the message they get is "something terrible happens and we do something, sometime, maybe." I thought this was an important point to note. 

My daughter took away from this that "the train is closed" and now we take the bus to school, but she's only four. I'm interested to know what my students think about what is going on in New York right now...