What has worked and what hasn't

          For any new teacher, is very important to have established procedures. My table leaders procedure, my slant procedure, my hand signals for water, bathroom, materials, trash, are working pretty good. In 4th grade, it is my opinion that students should learn to be responsible of their own property, and keep up with their school work. All the way till 3rd grade I believe teachers manage the students' colors, crayons, markers, rulers, and scissors. When are they going to learn? I thought, if the teacher does everything for them. They are almost in 5th grade and out of Elementary school.
Growing up in Ecuador, I was taught to be responsible of my belongings from day one of  Kinder Garden. I knew when to use a pen, when to use a pencil, when to use colored pencils, rulers, scissors, and markers. Every supply had my name on it, and if I lost it or misused it, I knew I will be out of supplies by the end of the first trimester. By the time I was in fourth grade, I had 8 notebooks for different subjects, the cover pages, and the content was immaculate.
         For that reason I thought, students should be able to take care of their belongings this school year. The second week of class, I wasn't sure if I had made the right decision. To my surprise students had no idea of how to take care of their school supplies. They used the scissors, rulers, markers, when they were supposed to be paying attention. Most of the pencils, and erasers were already cut in pieces. Finally, I decided in order to help them I would tell them exactly what they needed to have for every activity. "The only thing you need to have on top of your desk is your reading book." If I could go back in time I would take the scissors and rulers away from them.
        I started the school year with 4 rows and 4 columns of seats with spaces in between. That was the layout of my classrooms when I was growing up. I changed into tables of four, when I realized they will be sharing textbooks. Another reason why I changed the arrangement, was that the last row wasn't paying attention. If I could go back, I would have it in U shape from the beginning of the school year.
Little by little, students are learning how to use their notebooks. I feel that by the end of the school they will have a better idea of the purpose of having one.

Two things that are going well in my classroom

It was my first semester as a teacher, and I couldn't wait to see my classroom, and to meet my students. After the meet the teacher night, I felt pretty confident of the upcoming school year. One of the good news was to find out that I had a small classroom, and cute loving students who gave me hugs from the first day they met me.  I am lucky most of the classes have more than 25 students per class, but mine has only 18. But things were not going so smoothly, at the beginning of the first week of work we found out that our dear principal had health problems and that we were going to have a new principal. Everybody was a little bit nervous, nevertheless we were fortunate enough to have a new wonderful addition to our team. Our new principal has been wonderful support, and advice to us.
The elementary where I am working is a very special place, since it has a foreign language immersion program, and I get to teach in two languages. Most of the teachers teach either in English or Spanish, however, I am one of the two lucky ones who gets to teach in both. It is a lot more planning and work, and I don´t have another teacher to share the same students, I am a single, and that call comes with more responsibility. Nevertheless, there are 2 other fourth grade teachers, and I have had the blessing to work with two very experienced teachers, their help has been tremendous, and we have a very nice team.
The first week of school was a success. I look back and I reflect at my students behavior, and it was remarkable, it allowed me to get in tune with all the school systems, programs, and look at the curriculum, the units of study, the textbooks, materials, etc.
Curriculum night went very well I did a presentation, and the new principal came to see me in case I needed support. She was surprised of my presentation and how I mentioned every topic we had planned in our grade level meeting.
As the school year progresses,  I have been increasing the load of work to my students. I have to admit two things going well on my class are Math, Spanish Language Arts, and Reading.  I have 4 tables that work pretty well and accomplish work easily. During the morning we get so much done. I have identified my students with difficulties. I have noticed that most of the behavior problems start after recess, after they socialize with each other.
My objective is to teach my students to love learning, and hopefully how to get along with each other in a respectful way. The best part of teaching are my students, I have realized teaching is not as easy as it seems, and it comes with a lot more things like training, meetings, planning, duties, classroom management, and in my case it comes with the teacher certification program.