Traditionally the MA TOY writes five "words of wisdom" as advice for new teachers that appear on bookmarks used for public relations. I struggled a bit with this but the first two were easy- "Bring your heart into your classroom" and "Ask your students what they think and really listen and learn from what they share – become a community of learners." The math, science, social studies, reading and writing will come but if the class does not come together to support each other, the job will be much more difficult. School culture is such a buzz word right now - what does it look like, what is it made up of? I recently asked my fifth graders what was necessary in our classroom community so we could all learn and be successful? They said, "We have to trust each other, people have to be honest, people have to care about each other and help each other out." I couldn't agree more. Our classrooms are microcosms of society. Of course we need to teach the state curriculum but as teachers we also have an opportunity to teach children how to be good people. On Wednesday, the day before school vacation, we did just that. The students in Community 27 and in other classrooms at Dunning School read for two hours to raise money for the Jimmy Fund. Students were reading just right books, calculating their hours read with multiplication and addition and there was even a little science thrown in as we talked about the cancer research being done at Dana Farber, but most of all they were all learning to be good people by giving of themselves. http://www.metrowestdailynews.com/news/x1045395257/Framingham-students-have-a-day-for-the-books
