Alex

This boy is my sidekick. He's still young enough to want to hang with mom and dad on our Friday night dates. He's quick to run to the storage room for a much-needed food item. He's patient and kind and loves to help his dad solve daily word puzzles. And he's good. He can glance at some letters and tell you very quickly what the word should be. He's got a pretty large streak going on Duolingo as he is trying to learn Russian, and he's a mean pickleball player. I would love to get a few more points on him.

He also had a birthday. For his birthday he wanted nothing more than a trip to Lagoon and Texas Roadhouse with his cousin Ian. I told him he might need to pick one of those two, but dad is a softy and we did both.

In addition to a birthday, he's also graduated from elementary to junior high, won the schoolwide spelling bee, and got some swag from Kangaroo Math (an online math competition he's been doing for a few years).

The day after his birthday we finally made it to the temple for the first time to do baptisms for the dead.

I couldn't ask for a better child to bring up the rear.

“While our generation will be comparable in wickedness to the days of Noah, when the Lord cleansed the earth by flood, there is a major difference this time: God has saved for the final inning some of His stronger and most valiant children, who will help bear off the kingdom triumphantly. … You are the generation that must be prepared to meet your God.”

“The final outcome is certain—the forces of righteousness will finally win. But what remains to be seen is where each of us personally, now and in the future, will stand in this battle—and how tall will we stand?” (President Ezra Taft Benson)

This boy of mine stands very tall. He knows what is right and he does what is right. He is good to the very core.

Backlog

I don't even know where to start. 

I had a birthday. A winter birthday. Winter has shifted and taken over my birthday. I always thought I had a spring birthday but not anymore. We hiked Black Rock. Ash and Erik are at the top.

Ash had a birthday.

Ashlyn's birthday happened over spring break AGAIN. Our birthday spring break wouldn't be the same without a Ding Dong "birthday cake."

Spring break to Kanab. This trip was a little pricey. Bald tires + very bumpy road = BAD IDEA. BUT that slot canyon was worth the extra day delay and set of new tires. Buckskin Gulch was spectacular. Belly of the Dragon and Sand Caves were pretty cool too.

Ash got her wisdom teeth out. She's been the funniest so far coming off that anesthesia.

Nate is applying to BYU while on his mission. It hasn't been easy.

Alex had his early morning math competition.

I got to tour the new prison and brought my neighbors along.

I snagged tickets to the Sunday afternoon session of conference. Alex, Kiersten, and Jason tagged along.

Chickens hatched in my classroom, and this year we got to actually watch one hatch out. The other I had to help out after he struggled for more than a day.

This is basically what we did all day, every day for a few days. Watched chickens. My students were mesmerized.

I sent them home this past week and didn't realize the suffering that would cause to one student in particular. He had grown quite attached over the week and when the day came to give them away, he cried and cried and cried. His mom also moved out at the beginning of the school year, so it's been a rough year anyway. And then to "lose" his chicken. After school dad took him to the dollar store. That didn't help. Eventually they made it to Tractor Supply where he got his own little chick.

And that's a wrap for now. I'll sign off with one last photo of Ash and her prom date.

Good Things Happening

Well, it's officially March by about 6 days and this is how we got to spend our Sunday morning.

Church got cancelled which doesn't happen too often. Alex measured 14.5 inches in our backyard.

Kiersten and Jason
Kiersten and Jason have moved back to Utah and are living in Herriman. Jason is working for the Walmarts in Utah County being their maintenance guy. Kiersten has joined a research group at the University of Utah where she meets with them once in awhile but mainly does a lot of virtual conferencing. She is hoping to get into grad school in the next few years. Oliver is growing and learning lots of new words. He gets to hang with daycare kids at Great-Grandma Laura's. AND . . . there is a new baby coming to their family in August.

Erik
Erik is at Utah State majoring in marketing. He found himself cute Ally Moss to date who loves to play board games as much as he does. We've met her a couple of times. Once when a group of them came home to quarantine for a weekend and another time when they came for a Super Bowl party..

Nathan
Australia finally opened up to missionaries again but a tad bit late for Nate to make it there. He also was moved to new area after being in the Sloan Lake area for quite awhile. He's not one to call a lot or write a lot, but thankfully his Grandma Laura has a cousin serving as a senior missionary in the same mission. SHE keeps me updated on how Nate is doing and will make sure I get those pictures. Sister Diane Ladwig tells me, "He's been a zone leader since he was with Elder Roberts. He is a humble, very hard working missionary, and his previous comps love him. He is making a difference here!"

Ashlyn
Ashlyn is a junior and working to keep her head above water while she holds a job and completes school and has an extensive social life. She was working at Fiiz, a local drink shop, but quit to work at Cold Stone.

She pops into my classroom once in awhile which my students LOVE. They love when big people come.

She's been to another dance and got asked to prom.

Alex
Alex came home with a Student of the Month sign which I'm afraid is buried under some pretty deep snow. We'll recover it one day.

He's been attending early morning math since October and his competition is this Tuesday. One day I discovered a photo of him at his 6th grade Valentine dance all hooded and masked. That was the last day I allowed him to wear his mask to school or wear his hood in class. The poor teacher probably had no idea who he was. Covid has sure done some funny things to kids. I think he felt comfortable hiding behind that mask.

He also completed basketball where his little team only lost one game. Alex managed to score a few baskets every game and has progressively gotten better. 

He's passing the sacrament in church and attending young mens. Where did this baby of mine go?

And for the rest of us . . . my little blog has suffered at the hands of mandatory LETRS training. I'm getting paid to do it, but it doesn't leave me with a lot of time. Tyler completed his year as the Tooele County Master Gardeners Association president, and during that time they severed ties with the Utah State Extension. This means that little gardening group (which is growing bigger) is figuring out a new identity with new goals and projects.

Covid is finally winding down, our temple is making progress,

and Wordle has taken over the family group chat every morning.

The Data Doldrums

I began the school year with 24 students. 58% of those students were not reading on grade level and needing major interventions (my reds).

I had my work cut out for me before we tested again in January.

I made reading goals for each student and taped it to the corner of their desk. I created a form that went home to their parents outlining what they could do at home to help their students improve.

I knew together we were going to make some progress.

These students haven't known what a normal school year is like. Their kindergarten year got shut down. First grade was all about masks and really only a 4-day-in-person school week. Some of my students have HUGE learning gaps, and it's become my job to fill those gaps and get them reading on grade level.

Second grade is a crucial year. Data shows that if a student is not reading on grade level by the end of second grade, it is much harder for them to catch up. The reading just accelerates. 

We made a class goal: If 60% of my students could reach the goal on their desk, we'd have a rootbeer float party. That meant at least 16 of my students had to achieve it at testing time in January.

My district had a different goal in mind which was we would achieve 5% proficiency. That meant of the roughly 100 students we have between us, 5 of those students would move from below-grade level to on-grade level or above.

Our testing day came. I was super excited and super nervous. I wanted them all to do well. AND we did!! My number of reds went from 58% to 50% and 18 of my students made their goal. I chose to not include my new students because that wouldn't have been fair to throw them into the mix when they hadn't been with us all year. However, had my new RED students been taken out the data the district shared, I would have been at 46%. That's a 12% drop. That percentage drop means that some of those reds moved into yellow status which is not quite reading on grade level but making progress.

One student went from reading 4 words per minute (wpm) to 42. Another went from 14 to 52. And yet another read 34 at the beginning of the year and read 88 wpm on her test. I couldn't have been happier. All made growth. Some more than others, but no one went backwards.

We celebrated.

We partied.

And then the district people came to discuss our district goal and data.

I felt pretty confident going in to the meeting until they told me I had pretty much stayed the same. Two of my colleagues grew by 4% proficiency (this means they had 1 or 2 students move to on-grade level.). 

Here's the kicker. In that meeting they only seemed to care about who was and who was not on-grade level. I can go down my list and tell you that in 10 seconds. There were no deep dives into what the numbers really meant. There was no looking to see who was super close to moving over that threshold. AND it certainly did not take into account one of my high students who moved in October and the 3 extremely low students I had move in during those few months. Just that kind of movement is going to skew the numbers and disrupt the balance. My colleagues got lucky with their new move-ins.

My grievance is if you're going to use data for measurement, make sure you are looking at the numbers correctly. Don't just look at something and assume you know what is going on. Had my high student not moved and had I not had 3 low students move in, my numbers would have been on target.

I told myself that I need to remember that when we have these little data meetings, I know way more of what is going on with the numbers than they do. I can do math, and I can certainly play the numbers game to interpret what is really going on.

We set more goals for this next half of the year and taped them to our desk. This time we are working for a pizza party. I know they can do it.

They are going to make me proud again. I can feel it in my bones.