Bronwyn Harris, Author

It was a crazy field trip full of misdirections to the library, kids who want to run in front of cars, and other third grade hazards. But look at the beautiful butterflies that come to two trees in one golf course in San Leandro each year! (Warren gets credit for the photos)

A wonderful wonderful person came to fix up the computers in my classroom last week. Nathan, someone Kathy knows, who had never met me or the kids before, came to spend a few hours updating the computers. Apparently there were 44 updates that were needed on one of the computers alone. I have no idea what he did to them, but there was some talk about spyware and viruses and updates... Now the computers don't freeze up or randomly close windows. It's awesome.

About a month ago, the district gave us a math assessment (I think all the elementary schools in the district got the same one). We were told to administer them in the next week. Then, after some people had already given them, we were told not to administer them because the answer key was incorrect, and the test covered chapters that we were not scheduled to teach yet. There was a big scramble to get a refund from the publisher and get all the tests back. They forgot to retrieve mine. This week, we got the new ones. This delay has created problems with scheduling as well as report cards, so we were all glad to administer the assessments. The smaller problem, the incorrect answer key, was corrected. The bigger problem, that the children are being tested on things not yet taught, remains. The test is exactly the same as it was before all of the efforts to fix it. No one in the district seems to think it's a problem that we're testing kids on things they haven't

If you don't know what an owl pellet is, it's worth checking out. One of the best things that our district does is the owl pellet kit. You can request a set of owl pellets and tweezers, along with a video that shows owls' eating habits and how they regurgitate the pellets. (The kids love it because it's gross). Then you dissect the owl pellets. It's pretty cool! The other thing about the owl pellets is that I've found the most efficient part of the whole district. Everything else takes weeks and months to happen. The owl pellet guy - he comes the next day. And he smiles. No one else in the district smiles.

See the caution tape in the picture? I was reminded the other day of the new playground we got at school about 4 1/2 years ago. It was nice and the best part was a big play structure with monkey bars, slides, ladders, poles to slide down, all sorts of fun things. Really really fun. Then, maybe a year later, maybe a little longer, the slightly spongy squishy stuff that goes under play structures started coming apart. They play structure was deemed unsafe and was slated to be fixed "right away." Eventually it was "fixed" and the kids got to play on it again, for about two days. Then it was unsafe again. For the last two years or so, the kids have had to look at this wonderful play structure that they're not allowed to touch. It's like torture for them, seeing this tantalizing hope of fun beyond what they are able to currently experience. They're reminded every couple of weeks over the loudspeaker that they need to stay off the play structure, and disciplin

Interesting article in the Tribune about a gun trade-in. Here's an essay that Shawn wrote last year, from the perspective of himself as an old man: When I was a little boy, Oakland was dangerous. They had gangs and they would kill you. In 2006, there was 34 that got killed.* My uncle he got killed because he was going to pay this guy but that guy had the money. I felt sad when I heard my uncle died. I hope that you live when you are old like me. When I was in 3rd grade, I like to do math. Math was my best subject. I got a math award. I like to write because people were jealous of my writing. My teacher was fantastic. She let us go on a lot of field trips. She let us have helpers. My teacher broke her ankle because she fell down the stairs. She was fun. ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------- *This was early in the year. I think the homicides got up to 115 or so last year. This year it's up to 141 or so and it's not even the end of

In the computer lab yesterday, "Lashay" mentioned that she didn't want to lose her money. I figured that she meant the $2 she pays for lunch (she is the only one in the class who doesn't qualify for free lunch), so I didn't pay much attention. A few minutes later, I heard kids asking her for a hundred dollars. Obviously, I became a bit concerned at this point. I told her to pass me the money and she handed me a thick envelope. I started worrying, thinking she had brought $50 or $100 to school. I started counting, and stopped when I got to two thousand dollars . (The girl is 8 years old). This is where administrators come in, because they get paid more than I do, so they can be liable for things like large wads of cash. I handed her to the assistant principal, who counted all the money ($3300), locked it up, and called Lashay's mom. I was impressed with the assistant principal, she only whispered, "Oh my God," over and over but kept a pretty good pok

It still caught me by surprise when I heard the announcement over the loudspeaker this afternoon: "Attention, teachers. New teacher support is canceled today. New teacher support is canceled." Of course, they meant that the new teacher support meeting was being rescheduled . But actually, the other meaning fits our district pretty well...

This is a song flute. They are ideal for young children learning music because they are cheap (about $3.50) and fairly easy. They also sound like a herd of dying and/or mating cats. At least when my class is playing them, they do. I feel bad for the music teacher, who is an actual musician. If this is hurting my ears so badly, I can't imagine what it must feel like to someone who really knows music. Painful.

As I'm looking through all these old emails (I decided it was silly to have six different email accounts so I'm going to get rid of the hotmail one; cleaning it out), I keep finding great stories from previous years at school. This is one of my favorites. There was this kid, "Tommy ." He was in my class in my first year, when I taught first grade, and also in my third grade class two years later. Although having a really really hard life which included an alcoholic mother, no father, an extremely abusive stepfather, and eventually getting taken away from his mother and stepfather because of this, he somehow retained some innocence. He would tell jokes like this: Tommy: "How many space boots did the cow have?" Me: "I don't know, how many space boots?" Tommy : (laughing hysterically) "Five: one for each foot and one for its tail!" Me: "Tommy, did you make that one up yourself?" Tommy : (proudly) "How did you guess?"

We're up to 141 homicides in Oakland now. We'll see if we set a record this year...

This is an email I got in 2003 that is (sadly) still quite relevant. Well, relevant in that we're still at war in the Middle East, and it's still a mess there. Also relevant in that violence in Oakland is worse than it has been in the last few years- with the 140th homicide for the year happening this weekend. (Remember, there are only about 400,000 people living in Oakland. That's a lot of homicides! They mostly take place in a couple pockets of the city, one of which happens to be my school neighborhood.) The email is not relevant in that the Raiders were once in the Super Bowl. They're not so close to that now. Al Davis had put together the perfect team for the Oakland Raiders. The only thing that was missing was a good quarterback. He had scouted all the colleges, and even the high schools, but he couldn't find a ringer quarterback who could ensure a Super Bowl win. Then one night, while watching CNN, he saw a war-zone scene in Afghanistan. In one corner