2016-2017 Classroom Champions Corner (Blue)

It has been an awesome month in 2G! The students have hit the ground running with setting goals/new year's resolutions. We have also reflected a great deal on our goals from September. The process has been incredible as my students have made adjustments, celebrated and re-evaluated what was important to them at this point in the year. They are all celebrating great successes in the areas of reading and/or writing and/or math. This has been a great segue into perseverance, which had us as a class, breaking down what it took for my kids to meet and surpass their goals. Students began identifying character traits that are needed to succeed like, hard work and determination. Once watching Arianne Jones’ video on perseverance, my kids experienced an “a ha!” moment, where the term perseverance, encompassed what it took for them to achieve their goals.

Moreover, upon watching Arianne Jones’ video on perseverance, my students were in awe of her story, where she broke her back. A month later, and my students are still talking about the degree of perseverance and hard work it took for her to recover and find herself on the podium. Her message has significantly permeated our classroom and I find myself hearing my students continually using positive self talk, sharing words of encouragement and have them telling me stories of how they are now using perseverance in their daily lives to attempt and complete difficult tasks.

Outside of the classroom, my students continued to put their perseverance to the test when on a field trip skating at the local arena. My class is divided trifold with hockey players, figure skaters and non skaters. The degree of determination I witnessed on my non-skaters faces when they went out skating on January 17th, was like nothing I had seen before when we have gone skating. They kept saying if Arianne could fix a broken back, they could get up when they fell down. Also, the degree of encouragement and empathy on behalf of the other classmates was truly inspiring.

Lastly, my students met Arianne Jones’ challenge of the month head on, by talking with their parents about a time they showed perseverance. Students shared these stories at circle time. It was neat to hear these stories and to see the looks of pride in their eyes as they spoke of their parent or guardian. Some of these stories were of going back to school, changing careers and others were of stories of their parent (s) youth. My students then took their journals to write about why perseverance was important to them and a time they showed true perseverance.