Mom's Spaghetti, Testing, Tshirts & Break!

Welcome back everyone!

This week was a little different in regards to the scheduling due to testing, so we went with the flow and had some solid team bonding! Here is a photo of my winning team from period 2 where the kids competed for the tallest and most sturdy spaghetti tower made out of raw spaghetti and marshmallows. However, when the timer went off the kids had to remove their hands from supporting their structure and shortly after this photo it collapsed and they lost, lol!!! But they received honorary points for creativity and ambitious effort. Planning and communicating were both a huge part of this activity. It was awesome to see them having fun together and getting to know kids who they had not had a chance to speak to yet this year.

Speaking of teams, this week my classes all voted on the names of their classes. Here were the winners that will be featured on the back of our YESS ACHS shirts:

2nd block- Team Okurrrt

3rd block- Team Shullissa

4th block- Team Let's Get This Bread

6th block- Team That One Class

7th block- Team Snapples 

We also voted on T Shirt Designs. There were 9 finalists, all AMAZING pieces of art, but there was one that won the votes by a landslide:

Lastly, after PSAT testing, my senior adopted daughters were given candy and little Halloween cards I made them before break. I love my little children/soon-to-be-graduates! I can't believe we are already done with the first quarter of the school year... Before we know it it's going to be summer! Time really does fly around here. (plz see featured jack-o-lantern socks)

Stay warm! And have a restful break eagles.

Until next time,

Ms. C

Time Capsules & On Wednesdays We Wear Pink

Welcome back Eagles!

Last week got off to a spooky start with the kick off of my favorite month of the year! I am so excited about Halloween that I have started playing Halloween music and I am refusing to take off my pumpkin sweater and ghost socks. The kids definitely think it is weird but I enjoy being their weird teacher every chance that I get!

The week started off by finishing up last minute interviews from students who were absent the week before and then we moved into Time Capsules. We discussed the purpose of time capsules, which then shot off into discussions about aliens, time travel, and various conspiracy theories. They discussed what they would leave behind for someone in the future to discover about them and it was interesting to see what people thought would be valuable, whether that be bags of hot cheetos, cell phones, letters, or photographs of themselves... selfies. They had the opportunity to make thier own time capsules which would all fit into an envelope and be returned back to them on the last day of school. On the hand outs, they had the opportunity to outline what was going on in thier life at this moment in time and what they hope for the future. My favorite part was the last page where students were to include artifacts that were important to them, whether that be movie tickets, wrappers, photos, printed out screen shots, or necklaces. I am excited to see their faces when they open these at the end of the year because if it is anything like last year, it will surprise the kids as most of them forgot ever doing the project! I'm excited for that full circle moment although the scariest part is that the last day of school will be here before I know it!!!

In other news, October 3rd was National Mean Girls day and it totally made my year that so many kids in my 2nd period participated in the made up holiday by wearing pink to class! LOL

Here were some examples of their full and beautiful little time capsules.

Until next week,

Ms. C

Speed Matching & The March for Black Women of Denver

Last week was exciting and eventful from beginning to end.

We spent the better part of the week doing our Speed Matching sessions where students were stationed at paired desks around the room and were expected to interview each other for 5 minutes each. This week was important attendance wise because these interviews determined who they were matched with for the rest of the year. After each interview they took private notes on how their interview went and once every mentee interviewed every mentor, and vise versa, students were given a request sheet to explain why they would benefit from being paired with their chosen mentee. While students were out of rotation we played team builder games and played music to give the interviewers privacy... Christmas music, might I add :-D It was a blast.

The week was great but the highlight of the week undoubtedly related to taking my students to the March for Black Women of Denver on Saturday. The event outlined as follows:
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Join Black Women and Women of Color as we March and Mobilze Against Oppression. 

2018 Agenda sheds light on the impact if Youth Violence, Sexual Abuse, and Deportation on Black and Brown Women.

Guest Host Tish Beauford!

Come prepared to march! Hear from Powerful Speakers! Artists! Spoken Word! Musicians and more! 

Featuring: Jeanette Vizguerra - Kerrie Joy - Danette Hollowell - Benzel Jimmerson - Lady Speech - O'Neil Rudolph and more!
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My favorite speaker was spoken word poet, Kerrie Joy. I have seen Ms. Joy at many other Marches in Denver where she recites one of my favorites by her- I'm Rooting for Everybody Black. Here is a link to her poem as recited at the MLK march below:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HyzVW6XBtCM

It was inspiring to say the least, and watching my students listen intently while holding signs was truly a milestone in my career. They were engaged, they were passionate, and most importantly, they were showing up to make a change in this world- which is everything that not only YESS stands for, but everything my own personal soul stands for. The combination of youth activism and self-love is a beautiful recipe for radical change in this world.

After the march Lizbeth (sophomore) and Shalayah (senior) and I went out to eat at City O then went to a bookstore where we all picked up a copy of The Hate U Give which is about sixteen-year-old Starr Carter who is the only witness to her friend Khalil’s fatal shooting at the hands of a police officer. On top of dealing with the emotional aftermath of such an awful event, being at the scene throws her into the middle of the investigation. As the attention on the shooting grows nationally, what she does—or doesn’t—say, could change everything. The Hate U Give also deals with friendships in the face of subtle racial tensions, the struggle to keep family united in the face of differing views, and what it really means to pursue a better life for yourself and the ones you love.

I'm excited that they are so involved in Social Justice enough to spend their Saturday making their voices heard at a March and enough to pick up a book related to the issue to read in their free time. My faith is constantly restored in the youth when I am hanging out with my students, they are strong, resilient, and their voices matter. I hope whoever is reading this can feel inspired by them in the same way I consistently am.

Until next week,
Ms. C

Shared Agreements & SEL

Welcome back everyone,

We are officially in that part of the year where the newness of the school year has worn off and we are settling into our routines. With that being said, we have started digging in and developing our classroom culture before tackling our mentor/mentee pairing. Before pairing begins we established class expectations specific to each class outlining what they expect from themselves, from each other, and from myself. We outlined the things that we need to be successful in our individual roles (as seen below) and introduced the foundation of all of our lessons- Social Emotional Learning!

The kids split up into 5 different groups based off of the domains and came up with creative ways to define each one and use real life examples. This was a fun exercise as it got the students up and moving to interact with different students from other tables and each one of them had a role in the presentation of each poster. Some of them got really creative with it, I'm excited to decorate my room with their new posters!

Until Next week,

Ms. C

Spirit Week & Identity Presentations

Last week was the best week of the 18-19 school year so far! I wish every week was spirit week because it added an extra vibe of excitement and positivity to all of our classes and just the over all culture of ACHS.  I loved coming to school in 90's gear, dressing up for a skype interview (pajamas on bottom and business on top), and dressing out for the senior class color. The pep rally was awesome and so was the powder puff game! The No Place for Hate club stayed in my room for an hour every day after school last week to prepare for the homecoming parade, they put so much work into their float.

In regards to the lessons going on in C251, the kids wrapped up their Identity Tattoo projects and presented them on Friday. Throughout the week we did a variety of get to know you Question of the Day's as well as activities and warm ups to get to help them know themselves. I think that the amount of times that I heard students say "I don't know what to say or put because I don't know who I am," was really revealing to me as to how important this idenitity work is that we are doing at YESS. We also did an exercise where students were to answer a series of 4 questions and based on how they answered them, their subconcious responses revealed the way they feel about certain topics in life. For example:

Personality Test - Subconscious trick to help reveal more of yourself to yourself

-Pick a color that identify with, a color you could see yourself as. Pick it and describe why you would pick that color. Use description words.

-Pick an animal you most identify with and describe it. If you had a spirit animal or an animal you relate to what would it be

-Your favorite way to be in water (showers, ocean, pool), what way do you enjoy the most to be in water and why

-Picture yourself sitting in a dark room you’re sitting in a chair, since its dark and your senses are out of wack you don’t know how big the room is ( tiny closet or stadium, you can’t tell). You’re comfortable, not in pain, just sitting in the chair… but way off in the distance you see a light… you don’t know exactly how far away it is, you don’t know if it’s a lightning bug or a light bulb, but you’re sitting in a chair in the dark in a room looking at this light… how do you feel about this situation in this scenario? Picture yourself there and write how you feel

------------------------- Response Interpretation Reveal---------------------------------------

1.     How you want or how you feel others perceive you – what you give off to people (example - blue, an oura of being a cool chill guy) (green, unique, down to earth, fun)

2.     How you really are on the inside. Who you truly are

3.     How you feel about relationships

4.     How you feel about death and the afterlife – too many unknowns, uncertainty creates fear inside of you? What about death scares you? What about it makes you curious, does it make you feel alive?

Here are some photos from the week as well! The first one is from Era (90's) Day, Second is a photo after the kids got done presenting projects (more pics of those to come next week), and the third is a special moment where I helped a student surprise her boyfriend by asking him out to homecoming in the beginning of class. He had to check either yes or no on the giant heart to be her date and he checked yes, it was precious and everyone clapped and a few even cried! Gotta love high school!

Until next week,
Ms. C

Intro to Identity Tattoos

Last week went by in the blink of an eye with a Tuesday-Friday work week and the introduction of our first project- Identity Tattoos! It was also a milestone week because all of my seniors had the chance to meet Emily, our YESS College Navigator.

The Coat of Arms lesson has been modified for the high school level with a project that is more fit for their interests and age group. In this project they are exploring who they are and what is important to them. Some key terms that were broken down related to material and non-material possessions and students were challenged to explore what they are most passionate about and what they value most. They are to take these material objects and concepts and turn them into a composition that mimics that of a tattoo, complete with hidden descriptive words and their favorite quote/life motto in the banner. Luckily, I had many examples from last year to show them that you do not need to be an artist to have fun or to make a good grade on this project, you just need to put in some time and effort into expressing yourself creatively.

We also broke down the benefits of being creative! We took cues from this image I found online:

We ended the week with our first go at a meditation session as well. Some students were reluctant and I accepted that as a natural response and encouraged them to do what feels comfortable but that with time they will learn to ease into this new unfamiliar skill.

With a good chunk of the week being instruction, they were given this current week as well to finish their tattoo designs and will be presenting soon. I cant wait to see the kind of visuals they come up with to represent themselves! I encouraged going off the template and creating bigger pieces as long as they meet all of the requirements, I love that there is a lot of freedom and autonomy with this project and the kids seem to be taking advantage of that. 

For those wondering, No Place for Hate is getting off to a great start. We have been meeting every day after school- that's right... Every... Day... to prepare for homecoming week/BMX Assembly on the 12th/Homecoming Parade. As it turns out, running a club is a LOT of behind the scenes work. Spreading our club's message is so worth it, though!

P.S- We also have a class competition going on, but more on that in my next entry...

Until next week,

Ms. C

Community, Senior Adoptions, No Place for Hate

Welcome back everyone,

Last week was so busy and was definitely the first time that I truly felt that school was back in full swing. On top of talking about community with each of my classes we did many get to know you games and ended the week with the yard toss activity where we made a huge web across the room and shared out facts about each other. During our group activity surrounding what it means to be in a community I learned about the different communities they are a apart of and also realized that a struggle for them was critically thinking about the challenges of being a part of a community. We related community to our class, the school, commerce city, our country, and the world- the bigger picture of humanity as a community.

After school on Thursday was the very first No Place for Hate club meeting! We did introductions and recruited many new members of all ages from around the school. With homecoming around the corner, we really have to get a lot of planning done in regards to our float and fundraisers.

Last week was also Senior Adoptions after school Although I was here last year, this was my first time to participate as I had many seniors asking if I would be at the ceremony. I ended up adopting 19 senior daughters and sons! I am so honored to be chosen to be their senior mom, I held up one hand before signing the contract and promised to do everything in my power to support them during their last year here. Looks like I will be giving out many Christmas presents, lol!!!

Until next week,

Ms. Castro