Dear "Gabby"

Giving advice is not always an easy thing to do.   Especially if it involves friends.  For your blog response this week, I want you to pretend that you are a famous advice columnist in a newspaper.  People write to you regularly to get advice about how to handle some difficult situations.

You have just received the following letter from a fourth grader in New York.  He writes:

Dear Gabby,

I am a fourth grade student and I have a problem.  There are two students in my class who are always making fun of other students in my class.  The things they say and do are very mean and hurtful.  The problem is that the only person they are nice to is me.  Now everyone in my class thinks that I am a bully too.  I'm afraid that if I'm not friends with them that they will be mean to me as well.  At the same time, I don't want everyone else to think I am a bully either.  What should I do?

Hoping for answers,
Not A Bully

Pretend you are "Gabby."  What advice would you give to this student to make this situation better?  What are your reasons for your advice?  Give this some thought before you post your response.  It may be helpful to write a rough draft in your journal first.

Anxiously awaiting,
Mr. Fletcher

Workshop Reminder

Hi Everyone,

I just wanted to take a minute to remind everyone that our first workshop will be tomorrow night (1/27/11) from 6 p.m. to 7 p.m..  This first one will focus on interacting with our class blog and then we'll take some time to discuss future get togethers.

Hope to see you there!
Mr. Fletcher

The Leading Men of Avatar

You may be wondering what this picture means, right?  Well, Mr. Fletcher and I made an agreement during our checkers game.  I had shaved my head and was a little worried that people might laugh at me, so I kept my hat on.  Mr. Fletcher said that if he won the game, I would have to take off my hat and be proud of my haircut and own it.  However, if I won, then he would shave his head to match mine.  It probably won't take long for you to guess who won.  And that's how we ended up like this.

Owning It,
Rory

You Down with P.O.V.?

As in Point of View.  Today in class I showed the kids a famous picture that many of you are probably familiar with.  For those of you who aren't, here it is:

If you have never seen this image before, it is actually pretty interesting.  Some of you upon first glance may see an old woman with a very pronounced chin, looking down to her left.  Others may see a young woman looking over her right shoulder.  What we focused on today in class, is that it doesn't matter which woman you see.  What matters is that once you know there are two women there, that you are able to see them BOTH.  We had a great time with this activity and as usual I was highly impressed  with the insight and thoughts the kids brought to this activity.
Coming at you from every direction,
Mr. Fletcher

"Are you 1, Are you 2....?"

I always get a kick out of hearing the kids immediately go into this chant after singing "Happy Birthday" to a friend.  The kids ask each number until the birthday person says "stop" on the number for their age.  Today, I thought about how funny it would be if the kids did this for me....all the way up to 35!  That's right, today is my birthday.  As always, I found myself looking for the little things along the way today that I could learn from.  There were actually quite a few.  For example, nothing is better than having your son sing Happy Birthday to you and then blow out all the candles on your cake so you don't have to.  I was also reminded of some great childhood memories today as my sister and I played the original Super Mario Bros. on my Wii.  In addition, I now know what it feels like to be on the receiving end of a re-gift, so I therefore will be sure to never do that to someone else.  Finally, I learned that I don't have to go out and do something wild and crazy  to be okay with being 35. 

A while back, during a conversation about upcoming birthdays, this woman asked me how old I was going to be and I said,  "35."  She replied with, "Well, you act like you're 10."  I don't think this not-so-nice person intended her response to be a compliment, but that is exactly how I took it.  So I guess that is the most important thing I learned today...it is totally fine to be 35, as long as I don't act like it!

Just another shooting star,
Mr. Fletcher