City Girl Resources

01/30/2023

A few weeks ago I posted I resigned from my job. Today I’m ready to share.

I almost left education for good. But I truly love the work. However, working in a severely toxic environment was taking a toll on me. So I resigned. But not without a job lined up.

Many people love teaching but don’t want to teach. It’s me!! I’m many people. It’s taking me forever to actually say, “I’m done with teaching”. Being done with teaching doesn’t mean you have to leave education.

I was PT Intervention teacher and PT MTSS Specialist at my old school. So I taught 3 small groups of intervention and then spent the remainder of the day during MTSS work and meeting on a teacher salary.

Today I am a full time MTSS Specialist in a K-8 building and it’s a leadership position. Which is how I got out of my intervention teacher contract in the middle of the year.

The workload is still heavy but I am so much happier and at peace. It had taken me years to finally put myself first!! I’m so glad I did. I deserved this.

You can step out of the classroom and still serve children in a different capacity. Allow yourself to grow.

10/12/2022

I’m super excited to try this sound wall with my 2nd grade intervention group.

We will use it for decodable sight words and other decodable words as we navigate through relearning the phonics skills necessary for them to read.

This was fun to make. Check this out in my TPT store. Link in the bio.

10/10/2022

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Hi! I'm Renee. I'm a veteran educator, Intervention Teacher, and MTSS Specialist.   I love creating reseached-based interventions that are fun, engaging, and great for all ages.

10/09/2022

Dear headache please go away.

08/08/2022

I sat in the African salon for 6 hours getting my hair done and came home and finished my daughters hair for her first day of high school. My first time and she let me help her. Soft locs

Happy First Day of School to all the kiddos in my district.

08/07/2022

My morphology wall was a hit last year with my 5th grade intervention group. It’s blowing up in my TPT store. I’ll share more throughout the year as to how I use it.

Link in my bio to my TPT store

03/23/2022

Yesterday I removed myself from a teacher group on FB because the negativity was draining and I was only reading it. Today I logged into FB and a very popular group posting yet another negative post towards the field.

I am not disregarding the foolery that I personally see in education. I am saying the work load has become ridiculous. I am definitely not saying that this year hasn’t been tough. As MTSS Specialist, you wouldn’t believe some of the things I have head and seen.

However, it’s all too much. I’m a huge believer in what you put into atmosphere becomes reality. What happens if you change the narrative? What would happen if we committed to posting one amazing thing that happened in your classroom or building today.

Change the narrative. I’ll commit for sure to posting one amazing thing that happened everyday until the last day of the school.

03/03/2022

I read this amazing Twitter post this evening and it warmed my heart. There’s so much bad energy these days in the field of education. Despite all that’s going on, there are still thousands of us who still love and want to do our jobs.

The answers on this tweet were real and genuine.

For me, 16 years in, I’ll say this. Staying doesn’t mean I agree with what’s going on. Staying doesn’t mean I’m always ok. However, after 16 years, I’m an expert in my field. While I’m no longer a homeroom teacher, intervention truly has my heart.

I have learned to let go of the things that I can’t change and the things I can’t control. Inside my room, I can still control a TON. I can control my energy, my teaching techniques, my level of engagement, and so much more.

I do believe we need US. One day I’ll coach, then I’ll head towards the district office and maybe that seat will help me begin to change some things. But for now, I’m ok with simply changing the narrative in my building, with the students I serve and with how we’re closing the gaps with our scholars.

I’m still counting down my 11 more Mondays but I’ll see those doors again the next year.

02/05/2022

I needed some letters for the wall outside my classroom. It’s going to say CURRENT EVENTS in Black History. I thought it would be neat to make some letters with a newspaper background.

I whipped up these letters in PPT, printed and laminated. Cost: $0

I’m hooked now.

11/09/2021

As a reading and math interventionist and the 3-5 MTSS Specialist, my days are super busy.

I usually have sticky notes everywhere but I’ve resulted to this. I tore the blank lined pages out of my old planner and use it as a running to do list. As soon as I think of something I write it down.

This works for me because I don’t see it, I won’t remember it.

Could I just write it in my planner? Yes. But reality is, once I finish the week and turn the page, I never go back. This sits beside me at my small group table.

Right now I have a 1.5 break to catch up some RTI duties. I just go down the list.

It’s not pretty. It works!

11/09/2021

Rounding can be challenging for students without a good foundation in number sense.

My group of Math intervention students had to start with rounding on the number line. Once they understood the concept on the number line, we moved on to the quick rules.

Today, we reviewed it to the ten thousands. Since they are 5th graders my goal is to always close their gaps, but also push them to grade level.

They did so well today that I let them engage with these clip cards I had from 3rd grade. They asked me to make a harder set. I will get on that tonight.

Tomorrow we tackle rounding word problems and the. We will finish the week with rounding decimals.

I’m so proud of them.

08/15/2021

I couldn’t wait for these books to arrive. I’ll share how I plan to use them in my intervention classroom.

Both books will promote a growth mindset. 5th grade intervention can be rough but setting the tone that there is no such thing as failure is important.