SSR and Wicket
My students have been begging for me to let Wicket bounce around the room for a while now. But I have been fearful for his safety. Fifth graders jump around a lot when excited and he is a small guy that can be downright hard to catch. He is a very skittish animal and he just likes to take his dear sweet time being curious. He does enjoy his explorations and he needs the out-of-cage-exercise. I have had a hard time seeing how these two seemingly conflicting needs could be met. But today I came up with a great plan. I decided to get him out of his cage during our Silent Sustained Reading(SSR) Time. The kids are extremely quiet (and still) then and they would be occupied enough with their reading to not be too focused on(and/or bored by) his reclusive, skitterish, nocturnal tendencies.So with some careful introductions and some longer than normal "settling in" time we were ready for Wicket's release. All went wonderfully. It was so funny to watch him explore and then he would come running back to me whenever he was startled. I thought that this was particularly interesting since he has previously ignored me when I let him out. But I guess I was his point of reference for today. Hopefully more such successes will be made in this area in the weeks to come.
BTW only three weeks and four days (one of which is a half day) till school is out for the summer! It seems too good to be true. I love teaching. I love summer. Now is a good time to be me.
posted by Trisha @ 9:35 PM
