La PiXie...

...is Sandra Posadas!

ITS AGAINS THE LAW!!!!

Quite literally WOKE UP from a haze this morning! It’s Sunday morning and I'm having "ME TIME" in bed, mulling through thoughts and my mental To DO lists. I reflect upon a conversation I had with a lady yesterday that went something like this:

Lady: "...So what do you do?"

Me:  "I'm a bilingual teacher.”

Lady: "So, you teach them English.”

Me:  "Not really, they mostly know English..."

Lady: "So then why are they Bilingual?"

Me (in my brain): "?"

I've been teaching for 13 years. I am a bilingual teacher and I am EXHAUSTED. To expound on the logistics of bilingual education is to have a 90 minute sit-down conversation to explain the in's and out's of BICS, CALPS and the the Language Acquisition Theory as well as the concept behind The Moving Target Theory.  People think its like "Hey learn English in 1st grade then move them out!" NO!

As Bilingual Educators we have to be up on current research on everything bilingual as well as all the new trends and research that are taught in the regular, monolingual classroom in ALL the content areas. Then, we have to figure out how to accommodate all these new trends that have very little. Inadequate or now accommodations for Second Language Learners. 

Example, I am implementing writer’s workshop via Lucy Cawlkins. She has a 6 set of books expounding play by play lessons on how to teach writing to early childhood learners’ k-3rd grade. She dedicates 2 pages to structuring it for second language learners…WTF??(Yes teachers curse especially when defending their students). This current methodology is being implemented throughout a multitude of states and yet, in that 6 volumes set, there are only 2 pages of Second Language Learners. 

I'm not bitching. I'm reflecting. This is my life and if I don't like it I can definitely go sells insurance or something ...I love what I do but it’s getting more and more difficult with the STUPID mandates. Now, all Second Language Learners and Special Needs students MUST pass with an average stanine or the school doesn’t meet annual progress goals. What does this mean? It means that any child within a public school who has a disability from autism to Down syndrome, and students who just arrived in the U.S.  must meet the grade level standards on state wide tests. If not, the school gets castigated. WHAT THE STATE IS DOING IS AGAINST THE LAW…!!!

Why doesn’t anyone do anything? Because teachers’ voice don’t count. The parents have to take action, but if they don’t understand that they have power or who to call then  very little can be done..) After 5 years of not meeting the state goals in scores, the school could be put on probation  or worse...get restructured. This is where they fires everyone. Teachers need to resubmit applications and re interview. The  chool board picks those "worthy". The thing is that the numbers have been set SO high that is impossible for ANY school to meet 100%. Basically EVERY student in EVERY school in the state should meet or exceed the standard, regardless of socio-economic factors, health issues, or language issues. DOES THIS MAKE SENSE? 

  On my part...I'm just tired. We are busting at the seams. We are over crowded. I have 30 students in 1st grade. My friends over in 2nd grade are up to 32. NO CLASSROOM AIDE BY THE WAY! Then, everything has to be done double. Two word walls- one in English and one in Spanish. All the posters that go up on the wall. YUP! One in English and one in Spanish. I have to keep track and monitor progress as children transition form Spanish into English. I have a pretty rare classroom where my students already come into 1st grade reading in their native language-Spanish, L1(Language 1). My goal is to move as many as I can into the second language-English, L2 (Language 2). Mean while I have 16 varying degrees of language proficiency going on... I have students whose parents have minimal education. I have students whose parents are 2nd generation immigrant so they went through the school system and bilingual education themselves and have their own children (my students) who are caught between 2 languages and 2 worlds and are  muddling through. These kids (as will ALL the kids) will learn English regardless what statistics say, what the Extreme Right believes as they expound their own version of "the 'truth" via their think tanks. I have faith in my kids and their families. They have a lot more than I had; starting with teachers and an administrators who cares about them and their progress. It is top down and luckily my boss cares and goes the extra mile to help the kids succeed. She knows the importance of Bilingual education especially when students are acquiring language in general. She knows that in order to successfully transfer from one language to another we must fortify the native language. We must support the learners as they move on.  We aren’t perfect at my school but we try and success is not measured in scores … it can be measured in the fact that our kids feel good about themselves, about maintaining their language about being validated as  bicultural and bilingual people.

P.S schools still exist where children are castigated for speaking their native language in the classroom and where BIG BROTHER checks up on bilingual teachers to make sure that they aren’t speaking Spanish.

Definantly WON'T be Keeping Up With the Kardashians

So, I'm on Christmas Vacation; 3 blissful weeks of NOTHING TO DO! I decided to  catch up with the cable shows and out of curiosity I saw my first episode of Keeping Up With The Kardashians....What the hell? I got so angry with the show I turned it off! The Kardashians are the most whiney, self-serving, spoiled people I've EVER seen! I was utterly disgusted with their individual attitudes about work, family, and material wealth. Their way of being, their issues, their lifestyle... it all goes against everything I believe in which is basically the premise of achieving everything through HARD WORK! A pretty face will only take you so far...Who am I to judge ?  Someone who has worked for EVERYTHING I'VE EVER OWNED!The mother is an enable to her whiney girls and son. Is that supposed to be the real lifestyles of the rich and famous? Seriously, how can real everyday people be  in awe of peple like that?

What gets me is that people EAT THIS CRAP UP!   Kids are impressionable and this is how they believe real people act? Pout, cry, and whine when you cant get the mansion you want? Its just disgusting....and society wonders why other countries hate us? Well there is a prime example of of self serving Americans right there on the t.v.!

DAY 7

I keep my identity pretty vauge because I don't want to blog about things that are personal..politics, society..etc.  But I think I'll open myself up to you a bit..We'll I've been blogging a lot lately because I'm bed ridden for 6 weeks .  I've had major surgery.  It doesn't seem like major sugery but it is. I am 37 years old and I've had a complete hyserectomy. Today is Day 7 in the process of surgery and recovery. 

I've been researching  about this process. I probably should have researched when my doctor told me what "might" happen during my exploratory surgery.  My husband and I were "ready"for the prospect of never being able to have our won natural children. My girlfriends' and  my view was "Hell! If it ain't working take it out!"  The know I was unable to have children.But, yesterday...yesterday, Day 6, was when it all hit me. My uterus and overaries are gone! Everything that helped make me a girl is missing.  My body is adjusting to the hollow space inside. Organs are rearranging and accomodating themselves now that on third of my internal torso is GONE . I'm waitng for menopause to come.  It might already be here and I have no clue because I feel so crappy to begin with I dont know if this trauma to my body and the pain that is associated with major surgery is including the permanant change. It really sucks!

However, I am very grateful for this having happened.  I strongly believe that everything that happenes; the anger, the anxiety, the worry,  the hate manifests itself through the illness that we undergo.  I grew up with a lot of disfunctin in my childhood and youth. My adult years have been a time of recovery from my childhood. I've held on to much anger, hate, and resentment.  Then, 6 -7 months ago,  I said it to myself;  I said."I'm not angry anymore" and then when I said it aloud, I began to change my life, my diet, my exercise regiment. Soon after I began to feel pain. Nothing serious...maybe gas, maybe the effects of too many crazy yoga positions on a maturing body...maybe just plain age!The pains came and went throughout the months until  a doctor had enough sense to send me for an MRI and a CT scan. He saved my life.  It was a tumor the size of cantaloupe!

I went to the appropriate MD's and here I am recouperating.   In the end, your emotions  could do more damage to more than just your psyche.