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Meet City Year Seattle’s Laura Giaquinto

Concord Int. Student Success Coach

7:00 am

At around 7:00 am I arrive at Concord International Elementary School in Seattle, giant iced coffee and breakfast sandwich in hand. Inside the school, I enter our small, but cozy City Year office. Chatting with my team members, I review my preparations for the day a final time.

7:30 am

A few minutes before 7:30 am, my City Year team of six heads downstairs to the school’s entrances for morning greeting.

Most of the ����ӰԺ walk to school, some take the school bus, and some are dropped off by their parents. Much of morning greeting consists of ushering ����ӰԺ to the cafeteria for breakfast, answering their questions about what they will be doing that day (they will be doing what they always do at school), and chatting about their still half-asleep thoughts. Letting the ����ӰԺ know that we are excited they are here, hearing about their weekends, and joking around with them helps set a positive tone for the whole day.

At 7:50 am the bell rings letting ����ӰԺ know to line up as their teacher comes outside to collect them. Every single morning my ����ӰԺ have the amusing routine of looking up to see the teacher walking towards them, and with surprised expressions yelling at each other “the teacher’s coming, the teacher’s coming!” as they hurriedly complete the challenge of forming a straight line to go inside.

7:55 am

The ����ӰԺ start each morning by writing in their social-emotional learning journals how they feel, and why they feel that way. I make rounds around the classroom reading that the ����ӰԺ feel excited because they have gym later or feel tired because they stayed up late watching a movie. On the days we have City Year Afterschool Programming, many of our ����ӰԺ write that they feel excited because they have Afterschool, and it always excites me to see that they are excited.

Next, the ����ӰԺ have a whole group math lesson, and I sit on the rug next to the ����ӰԺ who need extra support – whether that be support with solving the math problems or the ����ӰԺ just focus better when sitting next to a consistent adult. Then, we break into math small groups where I usually work with the same three to six ����ӰԺ.

9:45 am

At 9:45 am we take the ����ӰԺ out to morning recess. As City Year Student Success Coaches our job is to play games with ����ӰԺ. Students usually play tag, some play football, and some play basketball against the City Years.

10:10 am

After morning recess, we bring the ����ӰԺ inside for their reading and writing lesson. Sometimes this is a whole group lesson, or independent reading time for ����ӰԺ, or independent writing time. Depending on the day, I may sit in and help support specific ����ӰԺ during the whole group lesson, work 1:1 with ����ӰԺ on their writing, or work in small reading and writing groups.

10:40 am

At 10:40 am, my homeroom class transitions to their afternoon class, and our afternoon ����ӰԺ come to our class. Concord is a dual language school; ����ӰԺ whose families opt them into the dual language program are in English class (math and english) for half the day and Spanish class (science, social studies, and spanish) for the other half of the day. While most of our ����ӰԺ are bilingual, they are all at different levels in their English and Spanish speaking and writing. I enjoy seeing how my partner teacher designs her lessons specifically to support and include ����ӰԺ at all levels of their English comprehension. I feel very lucky to have a group of ����ӰԺ who are eager to help each other, and myself and my partner teacher, neither of whom speak Spanish, in communicating.

11:10 am

At 11:10 am we shuffle the ����ӰԺ down to the cafeteria for lunch. The role of City Years is not to supervise ����ӰԺ during lunch and recess, but to sit with and engage with ����ӰԺ. I make my way through the cafeteria chatting with ����ӰԺ about whatever’s on their mind. It is really nice to have time outside the classroom with ����ӰԺ. Many of my conversations with ����ӰԺ at lunch center around the off-topic thoughts I asked them to save for lunch during class.

We then take the ����ӰԺ out for recess, where a rotating group of City Year Student Success Coaches facilitate whole group games such as shark and minnows, red light green light, and foursquare. The rest of the City Year team spend time playing and talking with the ����ӰԺ at recess, and sometimes mediating student conflicts.

12:00 pm

After the ����ӰԺ’ lunch and recess their teacher and I take them to their specials – either gym or stem/art. Then, I head back to the City Year office to eat my lunch.

12:30 pm

After my lunch, the teacher and I pick the ����ӰԺ up from specials and the afternoon class begins, math and english. These lessons go similarly to the morning class lessons, with the teacher making adjustments based on differing needs between our morning and afternoon classes. Sometimes the afternoon class picks up a topic quicker and we move on faster, and other days we spend more time on a topic in the afternoon than we did in the morning. I support the whole class lesson and small groups similarly to the morning.

2:25 pm

At 2:25 pm the school day ends and my partner teacher and I shuffle ����ӰԺ out the door reminding them to bring their homework, backpacks, jackets, and all. Depending on the day of the week we may have a team meeting, prep time, or City Year Afterschool Club with a group of about thirty ����ӰԺ.

2:35 pm

Twice a week, City Year Afterschool starts with snack time and attendance. Our afterschool program is entirely run by City Year Student Success Coaches. With support from our Program Manager it is up to us to plan, organize, and execute our afterschool time. While at first daunting, it has been really exciting to implement what we have learned from our past experiences, partner teachers, and team to create a program the ����ӰԺ look forward to each week.

After snack, we quickly review behavior and homework expectations with the ����ӰԺ, and then take them out to recess. Again, we are playing with the ����ӰԺ: playing foursquare, racing the ����ӰԺ (a student favorite), playing ball tag (my favorite), or joining their game of soccer.

Next, we take the ����ӰԺ inside for them to begin homework/academic support time. Luckily for me my ����ӰԺ really enjoy math, so I typically bring math worksheets for them to practice. While some ����ӰԺ practice math, I work with small groups of ����ӰԺ or work 1:1 with ����ӰԺ who I noticed need a little extra support during class.

Finally, the ����ӰԺ have club time; we have art club, writing club, and theater club. Another Student Success Coach and I lead the writing club; currently the ����ӰԺ are making comic books. I love having the writing club because our ����ӰԺ have fun making up stories, drawing their pictures, and using their creativity all while practicing writing and objectives from their classes.

4:30 pm

As the sun starts to set, we lead our ����ӰԺ outside to dismissal. Usually our team informally debriefs Afterschool, before grabbing our own backpacks and jackets to head home.