When first started teaching third grade I was getting frustrated with how my class was set up. Before third grade I had taught fourth for a year and first since I had started teaching. In those classes I had a kind of theme that went through the class and was used for almost everything. First graders were Astronauts and our classroom was a space station. Fourth graders were test pilots our groups were called squadrons, it was a cool hook for the class. Please Note: This was before NCLB, Race to the Top or any of the standardized everything and massive amount of testing, back when teachers had some control over what happened in their classrooms (end rant). For third grade I had transferred to a new school and that first year was just trying to figure out the curriculum. So as I started year two I had decided I was going to turn my classroom into a movie studio. I checked out one of the video cameras and my students filmed almost everything. At the end of the year each student had a VHS tape (I’m old) of everything they did. For this theme, at the beginning of each year, I would draw a movie poster instead of just listing the names of my students on a paper outside my door. The first one was “It Came From Outer Space” and over the years I had done a number of them. One year I did “Teacher in Black” and for school pictures I wore a black suit, black tie, and black sunglasses. I thought it was great! The principal… not so much.
