Live the Conversation

Putting it in their words

2011-09-21T18:47:00.000-07:00

Kelley Tenkely tweeted this out today, and it totally fit what I was thinking about blogging!

I also wonder why the things we expect our students to know aren't always written in words they can understand. Students should understand what they are expected to learn, just like I am supposed to understand what I am evaluated on as a teacher.

Yesterday, we started discussion on our first Essential Learning in reading. This is the wording that is given on the progress report:

Use text structures to determine main idea when reading text consistingof multiple organizational patterns.

There are some big words in there that some fifth graders might struggle with, so we talked it out. We read through it, picked out words they knew - like text and main idea - and then took words they weren't sure about - like text structure, determine, conisisting - talked about what we thought they might mean, reworded them, and rewrote the Essential Learning in our own words.

Here's what we came up with:

It's not a huge change, but it is written in words that all of my students can read and comprehend.

What are your thoughts? Should our progress report statements and the Common Core be written in student speak?

Workin on the Chain Gang

2011-08-25T17:52:00.000-07:00

Building community continues to be important in our classroom. A few years back, I came across the chain gang activity. I really like it because it leads to conversations about how we are one as a class but all have our unique strengths. Try it with your class and hang the chain proudly so students can see how their individuality is important to our classroom.

Building Community

2011-08-18T19:03:00.000-07:00

I love how quickly community can be built in a classroom if one makes the effort. I'm at a new school this year and the teachers I work with in my grade level have made it a tradition that students bring a grocery bag with a few items about themselves to share. It's really a simple thing, but it has turned out to be a wonderful community builder. We just finished our second day of school, but it is amazing to me how quickly community has been built. Sure, by the 27th bag that had been shared, kids were getting a little weary, but I spread it out over the two days not listening to more than 4 students share in a row. The 27th sharer did get a huge round of applause when she was finished sharing!

I already know that I have a student who collects elephants, a few aspiring gymnasts, some avid readers, some painters, some crafters, a couple aspiring bakers, some sports enthusiasts, one who has 500 silly bands, and that family is very important to many of my students.

I also shared a bag about me. If you've seen very many of my photos of the day, you will know that I'm a crafter/sewer/baker. Today as I left, a couple students asked when I was going to wear one of the dresses I've made soon. After the second day.

We're building community, and I can't wait to see where it goes!

How do you build community in your classroom? How do you show your students that you want to know them as a whole person?

Lesson from the garden

2011-06-13T19:01:00.000-07:00

Tonight I was out weeding the garden. It's been raining cats and dogs here, so I haven't been able to get out there for a while. It was weedy! I was trying to yank handfuls of weeds out at a time and all I was getting was fistfuls of leaves, keeping the nasty roots to the weeds entact. It made me think about how this relates to life and my calling as an educator.

When I was trying to pull out tons of weeds at once, it was messy and unsuccessful. When I focused on one weed at a time, I was able to get the whole thing out, roots and all. There were/are maany weeds, but small steps make progress toward getting the job done.

In life and in my classroom, I have to focus on one thing at a time. Trying to tackle all many things at once can end up messing with many incomplete jobs. Focused, small steps get the job done well. This is huge for me to remember as I enter a new grade level and new school next year!

What lessons from nature have you experienced that relate to your life, school, or classroom?

Collaborative Writing with @jonathanferrell's Class

2011-05-23T09:45:00.000-07:00

My students recently worked on collaboratively writing fractured fairytales with Jonathan Ferrell's class in Kansas.

We skyped initially as classes to read some fractured fairy tales from The Stinky Cheese Man and Other Fairly Stupid Tales.

Skyping the first time with Jonathan's class

One student reading to both classes from The Stinky Cheese Man

We set up a group on Edmodo where we posted information and shared the links to the TitanPads (We chose TitanPad because it was available to Jonathan's students. Google Docs would have been a great place to collaborate, but his students don't have access to that this year.) the students would work on.

a screen shot from our Edmodo group

The students were so excited! We split them up into groups of two or three across classes. It was wonderful because we were also able to schedule it so that students could work on the document at the same time! I checked in on the TitanPads each day so that I could peek in on the group's productivity.

Here are a few screenshots of snippets of students conversations in the side chat box in TitanPad. Notice that they use text speak in their chats, and that's ok! Their stories did not include text speak.

One student hadn't heard about Paul Bunyon, so he went to learn about it!

pondering how to get started

making changes to wording and deciding how to share

The students collaborated for about 30 minutes each day for a week. At the end of the project, we Skyped again, and many student groups read their stories aloud to the classes.

a student reading his fairytale with his partner

Many of the students posted their completed stories on our blogs:

These links may not be relevant past June as I plan to take down my students' blogs in preparation for next year.

Afterward, I talked with my group about what they thought about the project. A few of there thoughts were:

It was fun to be able to work on the document at the same time.
It was hard to come up with an idea that everyone agreed on.
Some people took over the group and wouldn't allow others' ideas.

I was aware of this and tried to intervene to make sure all authors were a part of the story.

It was nice to have someone else to give ideas when I was stuck.
It helped having other eyes to catch errors I made.

All-in-all we came to the conclusion that it had similar drawbacks and benefits that we encounter with face-to-face group work, but it was motivating to work with students outside our building. It was a good end of the year activity because students were engaged when they were working on their tales together. It's definitely something I would do again with my students.

How could you apply this to your classroom? What collaborative projects have you tried?

Choice

2011-05-10T09:07:00.000-07:00

Image used from Flickr

Students appreciate the opportunity to be able to choose. Currently, my students are sharing their poetry projects. They had to research a type of poetry of their choice, find examples, write their own, and present it to the class in a creative way. I've been so excited to see what they have come up with. I've had a variety of presentation types: glogs, a blog, prezis, poems on our blog, books, slide presentations, and just students coming up and talking.

What sort of choices are you giving to your students? How can you make your content more open-ended for them?

humbled and uplifted

2011-04-20T19:09:00.000-07:00

Today I attended the Iowa 1:1 Institute. It was a wonderful day of learning and connections. I was very humbled and uplifted at the same time today. I had multiple people stop me to make the face to face connection from our conversations virtually on Twitter.

I was also reminded of that saying, "If a tree falls in a forest and no one is around to hear it, does it make a sound?" Sometimes I wonder if a tweet or blog post I write make an influence.

image used from Flickr

I was told by a few Twitter friends today that they had started using KidBlog in their classroom because they heard about it from me. One person thanked me for connecting with teachers at his school on Twitter. I have had a difficult last couple weeks personally and professionally. It was uplifting today to hear that what I do and share has made an impact on classrooms other than my own. Thank you to those of you who shared those tidbits today. It's the little things that make a big difference!

What can you do to uplift someone this week?

One time, at EdCamp...

2011-03-29T08:25:00.000-07:00

Who wakes up at 6 am on a Saturday to go learn about new stuff in education? This girl.

Last Saturday, Russ and I hit the road at 6:45 to head west to Omaha for EdCamp! We arrived a little before 9:00. Right away, I walked in and saw many unfamiliar, and a few familiar, faces. It was actually really happy to see many unfamiliar faces, because that meant I was going to make some new connections.

Most current education conferences focus on technology because that's the "new" thing most people are trying to implement in their classrooms. I purposefully (no offense to anyone) made it a goal to avoid sessions focused on technology. My technology plate feels kind of full right now. I view lots of links of new ideas on Twitter about what new website or app to try. When I come to a conference, I come for the conversations that stretch me.

All three sessions I attended were in the same "genre" of discussion: 21st Century Classrooms, Creativity, and Authentic Learning. I felt like the conversation built naturally on itself from one session to the next. Some of my take-aways from the day were:

We need to revive the learning spaces we have. They need to feel more natural, welcoming, home-like.
I'm not sure I'm a fan of grade-levels. My son walked at 13 months. Some kids walk at 9 months. Some don't walk until 15 months. Trying to cram all these kids in the same room and teach them the same thing just because they're of the same age isn't quite working.
To encourage people to do the arts, we need to make them a priority in our schools. Right now, we basically label some subjects as useful and some as useless.
Life is based on diversity. We don't want canned results, yet we treat all students as if they're on the college route.

Many times, students leave school not knowing what they're good at.
Talents aren't discovered because we get too focused on standards/benchmarks.
We need to give students time to explore things outside the "curriculum."

"Covering curriculum” is focusing on teaching, not on learning.

We're focusing on learning stuff instead of how to learn.

We need to be more of a "guide on the side" and not the "sage on the stage."

The big thing I'm struggling with after this is all the talk (which is what I came for). Where's the action? Where do I go from here?

More of the little things...

2011-03-02T19:48:00.000-08:00

I posted previously about the little things making a big difference in my classroom.

A few weeks ago, I learned about The Interlude Dance. It's another small "YouTube sensation." Students had just finished preparing their conference folders for student-led conference. Some were a little bummed about their grades, and I was not totally excited about being at school until 8pm. We just needed a little jam session to break free/let loose. I put the video up on the screen, we learned the dance, turned the lights out, and jammed through the song a few times. Everyone in the classroom, and I mean everyone (including me) just let go for a matter of 10 minutes. It was freeing.

We all need these freeing moments. We see the times on Gray's Anatomy where Christina and Meredith just dance their hearts out when life gets them down. How many times do we just let loose, turn the car stereo up, and sing at the top of our lungs to let it all out? We need to give students these freeing/let lose moments sometimes in school.

After the jam session, it took a little bit to wind down, but there was just a little different ambience in the classroom. The stress of conferences, report cards, and other stresses seemed to float away for a bit.

What sort of brain breaks/freeing opportunities to you provide for your students? What benefits do you see?

Be careful little mouths what you say...

2011-01-20T09:39:00.000-08:00

There's a song I sang growing up. It is called "Be Careful Little Eyes What You See," and it goes through verses about ears, mouth, feet, hands.

I had a conversation today with a colleague that brought this song to mind. She is struggling with some students talking back to her. We ended up going back to how she has talked to the kids and how that might affect how they talk back to her. We're working with sixth graders here, so respect is earned and lost from them quickly.

A few years ago, I was accused by some students for calling them stupid. I never directly called any of them stupid. I did, however, state to the class, "If you don't know your math facts this year, you will struggle."

It was twisted in their mind that I said, " Sally, you are stupid if you don't know your math facts." Now this incident was clearly blown out of proportion, and what I said was a true statement. If you get to 6th grade and are still relying on your multiplication chart, things like simplifying fractions, finding common denominators, and long division will be a struggle. But...

It just brings back to mind that when working with adolescents, we need to be careful what we say. We need to be careful about the tone we use. Their young, developing minds sometimes don't hear 100% of the things we say. Sometimes they hear things incorrectly. If we utter the word, "crap," sirens go off in their heads. They are prone to hearing generalizations and feeling like they are stated directly at them.

I've stated before that teaching is personal. Sometimes we teachers can take things a little too personally and go off. We must be careful about this. We are professionals. We must speak and act like professionals.

Do you have an experience where you needed to be more careful with your words in the classroom? What are some tips you would have for teachers who let their emotions get the best of them?

Teaching is personal.

2010-11-17T13:28:00.000-08:00

I don't often write about emotional things on my blog, but today I'm feeling emotional. Often, John Spencer's posts remind me of how I feel. Teaching is personal. One he posted today reminded me of that yet again.

I've cried two times within the past 24 hours in my classroom. One experience involved parents and another students. I was talking to Russ (the best husband in the world) about this last night, and he made a good analogy. Sometimes we as teachers are treated like customer service representatives (ya know, the people you call on the phone when your internet is down...we all love them so much...*sarcasm*). We hear snippets from parents and kids. We hear the negatives, often in quick spouts of anger or complaining.

Many parents and most students don't truly understand the passion, effort, and care we put into our craft. They cut us down because we made an error; they comment about how boring things are; they comment negatively on how or what we teach. It's rare that we hear how great we're doing. It's rare to hear appreciation for the passion, effort, and care we put into planning and facilitating the learning in our spaces. Just like customer service reps rarely hear that a product is awesome and meets or exceeds expectations.

Teaching is personal. We are blessed with the few outside our profession that notice this. I had an brushing with one of those today.

"Hey, Mrs. Goerend, I saw you crying in the principal's office yesterday. Are you ok?" - student
"I am. Thanks for asking." - me

It was a simple exchange but meant more than this student could know.

So I have a request for you. If you are a parent to a school-aged child, contact your child's teacher(s) to share your positive "customer service experiences." Teaching is personal to them, too, and I know they will appreciate you noticing.

Update: If you give kids a meaningful project...

2010-11-10T07:24:00.000-08:00

The AVerMedia project was a success, and we don't even know if we are in the competition for the company prize! The students learned so much about the products! I tried to get the AVerPens set up to film our commercial and was struggling with it, but many kids stepped up and helped solve the problem. Everyone participated in filming the commercial even if they weren't given permission by their parents to be IN the film. Those students were the videographers. We got all the filming completed for the video in just a few hours and the rest of the students were quiet and attentive while others were filming.

I'm so proud of them and how they well they did with this project. They worked amazingly in their small groups because they had a direct purpose - learn about the product and then create a short clip on a problem it solves.

Below is the final commercial. You'll see 5 small problem/solution segments. Each segment was put together by one of the 5 teams. Our commercial had to be 2 minutes or less, so it's quick, but I was able to get it edited together to be 1:58! Enjoy!

If you give kids a meaningful project...

2010-10-25T17:46:00.000-07:00

they will take off with it and amaze you!

Angela Maiers dropped off a bag of tech stuff from AVerMedia for my class. She told my students that they are to research it, learn about it, and teach her about it. There's also a lovely contest with the company that will be an end result.

My students are so excited about this project! We talked about how to go about it, they have divided themselves into diverse research teams based on their strengths and weaknesses, and plan to use their recesses and study halls to research.

The bag of tech includes a document camera, 4 student AVerPens, and 1 teacher AVerPen. There's also directions for the document camera, but no directions for the AVerPens. I haven't really given the kids any help besides showing them the company's website and being a guide in arranging times for the teams to work with the tech.

Today I was totally amazed! Two teams had worked with the tech so far. They'd figured out how to hook up the document camera and how to charge the pens. I challenged the 3 teams working on the project today to really figure out how the AVerPens work. They were getting caught up with trying to use them on the Promethean board we have in the room, so we had to talk about how the Promethean pens work just with the Promethean board.

We talked about how they needed an instruction manual for the pens. I simply directed them to the AVerMedia website and pointed out where the manual might be. They noted right away that on the downloads page there was also a link to software. We had a quick discussion about what software is and they started to connect the dots!

All three groups working on it today were digging into the instruction manual. They got the pens working as a mouse on the computer! I even had a student run up to the second floor to see how far the wireless signal of the pens can reach. The had some hiccups with downloading the software, but I think they'll be ready to go with it tomorrow.

This is kind of a rambling post, but it's just so exciting to see the project evolving in my classroom. The kids want to stay in at recess to work on it. They're in diverse teams (not necessarily with their friends) and are getting along. They know we may not get the "prize" but have a desire to learn/play/explore.

This is a true, real life experience, with reading comprehension! They are reading instructions and following them.

This is a true, real life experience, with writing. The students are recording their findings in a variety of formats. They are summarizing their work and making sure they can tell other groups what they have discovered.

This is true, real life, problems-based learning task.

I can't wait to share more as the project continues and as we record a video/commercial for AVerMedia.

What meaningful projects are you working to engage your students in?

It's the little things...

2010-10-15T13:04:00.000-07:00

I've been in a kind of a slump the past few weeks. School has been bumming me out. Frustration has been taking over.

I've done two little things in my room that have gotten me a tiny bit out of this slump. They both come down to one little word.

Choice.

1. During our study hall time, it can get loud. I get grouchy. So, I put together a Grooveshark playlist. I asked each of the students to tell me a couple of their favorite (school appropriate) songs and made a list. I now play that in study hall and it's lightened the mood. It's also a lesson in tolerance of everyone's music tastes.

2. My students share about their independent reading with me once a week. For the last three years, the students have turned in a letter written in their notebook in classic Fountas and Pinnell style. Now I have 3 options for the students. They can turn in their letter, record their response on our new Flip cameras from Digital Wish, or blog their response on our classroom blog. I've already had 3+ students blog their responses and two students record their responses on the Flip. I'm especially excited because the two students who recorded their responses on the Flip are students who usually have late letters. I think the writing aspect of it was hindering them.

This week, my burdens and feelings of burnout have been lessened. Choice can be a little thing that can make a big difference.

What are some little things you do in your classroom to encourage choice?

Why Blog?

2010-09-21T09:08:00.000-07:00

Below is from the mouths of my students when thinking about their blogs today. We will start writing on them this week.

Why blog? What should we use it for?

Share our writing
Get constructive criticism - improve your writing
Share writing with relatives
Comment on other people’s writing - improves their writing
Turning in assignments - easier for Mrs. Goerend (less paper)
Share your free writing - get feedback
Share pictures about what we’re doing

Get people’s opinion on something for a project.

Ask readers for feedback
Get ideas for specific parts of your writing (introduction, conclusion, etc.)

The Red Group

2010-09-16T09:38:00.000-07:00

First, some background:

Our 6th grade is departmentalized, meaning I teach my own students' reading, writing, and spelling. I then teach math to my own class and the two other classes. One of the other 6th grade teachers teaches science, and the other teaches social studies. This is the way it's pretty much been for the three years I've been in the district.

From about the second day of school I could tell that this group of 6th graders as a whole was pretty divided. We have a good amount of students who score low on standardized tests in math and a good amount who score high. There aren't a lot in the middle.

This week the students took MAP tests. The scores again showed quite the gap. There are many above and many below the math norms, but not a lot in the middle. I knew this was coming, so I decided to split the classes more or less by ability so that I can slow things down for the lower achieving students and really make sure they get solid on the essentials.

Now on to the real point of my post....

Today I was working on relabeling the folders where students hand in their assignments. To make it easier, I just labeled the classes red, white, and blue, since those are our school colors. Before I just called them Mrs. Goerend's class, Mrs. _________'s class and Mrs. ________'s class. The kids are used to this change happening because they've been divided by ability for math for the past two years.

One student saw me doing this and said, "The red group is the kids that are bad at math, isn't it?"

"No," I said. " It's actually not."

It was so sad to me to hear that. We all know the teachers who label kids red (low), yellow (medium), and green (high). Or there's plenty of other ways teachers label groups. I just have to label them SOMETHING besides by teacher's name because I have to label the hand-in folders.

When we tell the kids tomorrow what colored class they are in, they are going to know which is the low class (and it's not the red group). Kids aren't oblivious to who is better and who is worse at things. The other two are mixed among higher and medium achieving. I can about guarantee that some kid is going to say in the low class, "We're the kids that are bad at math."

How do you respond to this?

It's such a touchy subject. They just need it taught at a different pace. They may need additional practice. We may work with order of operations with just whole numbers and not decimals, so they don't have to think about two things at once.

Standards-Base Grading: What I've changed this year

2010-09-15T18:12:00.000-07:00

This year, I'm on my second full year of using standards-based grading in math. I've kept a lot of things the same, but am continually tweaking things. For one, I used to give completion points for homework, just 2 points per assignment. But, this year I'm not giving any points for assignments, which purifies the students' grades to just scores for standards. Instead, I am just tallying if the students complete their homework and turn it in. I hope that I can share this completion percentage with parents and students every so often so that they might see a correlation.

I've also added to the requirements of being able to retake a learning target. Students must either have a study session with me or turn in some practice problems they did before they can take a retake. I decided to do this this year because I would have many students in the past that would say, "Oh, I have to take a retake today?" It was obvious to me that students would not prepare for the retake and often make the same mistakes that they did on the original quiz. I guess I am forcing them to study, but they need to do some sort of studying to learn what they were missing the first time around.

If you are using standards-based grading, how is it going? Have you made any discoveries lately?

Reading Aloud to Students

2010-09-10T20:30:00.000-07:00

It's amazing what reading aloud to your students will do.

For the past 4 years, I have started the year off reading The City of Ember by Jeanne DuPrau. I teach 6th grade...and the book's reading level is a grade equivalent of 5.1. It's an independent level book for 75% of my students, but I'm still reading it to them.

We're nearing the end, and each day when I have to put it away, they are begging me to continue reading. Kids crave a good story. They will sit and listen. They enjoy it. It makes them think. They discuss the story and make predictions in the lunch line. They want to get caught up with what is happening when they've been absent and miss a day of reading.

I have one copy of the second book in the series, The People of Sparks, in my classroom library. The cover is not connected to the book anymore and held together by tape. I just ordered a second copy from BookMooch.com and am awaiting its arrival.

There's no technology involved in my reading aloud to the students. No flashy screens, cameras, or sound effects are attached to the book. It's just a good story.

No wonder my education professor, Dr. Susan Sherwood, stressed that you should read to your students every day. I'm a believer.

What have you read to your students lately?

Classroom Bloggers

2010-08-26T09:32:00.000-07:00

I gave my sixth graders a username and password for access to my classroom blog.

I now have two student "jobs" each day. One student is the blogger of the day and the other the photographer of the day.

I gave them 2 guidelines:
1-Take no photos of students' faces. I don't want to have to deal with permission for that yet.
2- Write something acceptable for your parents to read. This makes sense because all of their parents get an email of blog posts delivered to them daily via FeedBurner.

So far, it has been good! The 3 bloggers of the day have come at the end of the day with something to write about. The 2 photographers of the day have had a picture ready to share and a caption to add. It's been fun to see the photographers (and their friends) ponder what to take a picture of. We have even received a couple comments, one of which we have drafted a class response to.

Why am I doing this? Doesn't it take up extra time?
Sure it does! My goal is to teach my students through experience how to appropriately communicate online. Our class blog is a purposeful place for them to do this.

Check out what they are doing on our classroom blog!

Are you doing this in your classroom? If not, why? If yes, what suggestions do you have for how I could make this more purposeful?

I need Hans and Franz...

2010-08-02T19:13:00.000-07:00

I'm trying to get pumped up for the school year, but it isn't quite happening!

One thing I've been pondering lately is the thought of getting to know my students. Last year I had two classrooms of students I had to get to know, and this year there will be three classrooms. I feel like the starting activities I use aren't exciting. How do you get to know your students? There's always the ice breaker questions, the glyphs, the little write-ups to put on the bulletin board, even digital formats. What formats have you used most successfully? I really have no computer access with 2 out of the 3 classrooms of kids I will be working with.

Something else I have been dwelling on is my IWB. I will have a Promethan board this year complete with clickers and slate. I know there are so many people that bash IWBs, and maybe that's part of what is hindering me getting pumped up for the school year. I need to hear some good things about IWBs. It's how my district chose to use some tech money, it's installed in my room, and I want to use it to it's fullest. People with IWBs, how to you use them?

Share your experiences here. Converse with me. Pump me up!

P.S. If you don't get the Hans and Franz mention, you're missing some classic SNL!

Next Year...is just around the corner!

2010-07-28T08:38:00.000-07:00

Just two months ago, I blogged about developing a list of changes for the next school year. It's hard to believe that "next year" is almost here!

I report back to school for in service in just 11 days! I have added a few things to my list over the summer including having students be guest bloggers on my classroom blog and that students who sign up for retakes must come in for a help session or show evidence of extra practice before they retake an assessment. I'm also diving in to standards-based grading full on! My school decided to implement a benchmark report card for reading/LA and math. I'm THE 6th grade math teacher, so that's me! I will be working to develop a benchmark report card very soon!

What are some things you're going to change in your classroom this fall?! I would LOVE to hear your ideas!

What can you get at #iste10 for FREE?

2010-06-29T12:54:00.000-07:00

I'm not talking about the little giveaways from the vendors, friends!

I did not pay to attend any of the formal ISTE conference. Why? 1) It's somewhat expensive. 2) I have a 5 month old.

I did, however, come to Denver for some of the conference aspects that were free!

I attended EduBloggerCon. This was my first EduBloggerCon, and I was in love with the organization of the day. People just signed up for what they want to talk about on big sheets of paper. Then, people signed the papers to show their interest in the sessions. The sessions were organized into time slots and locations and off we went to discuss!

I had some AWESOME conversations with people and also did a great deal of just listening. I was involved in conversations about personal branding (which got me thinking about what happens when you google me, but that's a whole different blog post), best practices in student blogging (check out some notes from the session here), and probably the discussion that got the most people fired up was the conversation facilitated by Jon Becker about the term PLN.

I attended two tweet ups and got to meet many people I "know" from Twitter. A tweet up sounds like a silly thing, but it was awesome to be able to sit and converse with people who have the same nerdy/educational interests as me in an informal environment and in more than 140 characters! I mean, who knew I'd end up having a conversation Google Docs at Hard Rock Cafe at 9pm on a Sunday night?

Tonight I am headed to #edchat. This weekly conversation usually happens on Twitter each Tuesday night and the topic is selected by the participants. I don't even know what the topic is, but it is always great conversation! This week, people at #iste10 are getting together to have a live #edchat!

My FREE experience at #iste10 was FULL of conversations! I know I missed out on so much by attending the actual conference, but I already told Russ that we are saving up and both attending #iste11!

How I use the RT

2010-06-02T06:13:00.000-07:00

I really enjoy being on Twitter. I participate in many conversations, both education related and not. I love the amount of resources shared as well. I'm not on Twitter 24/7, and I don't think many of us can be. Sometimes I feel like I miss out on resources and conversations because I can't get back in the feed far enough...shoot..sometime I can barely keep up with what is going on in the present!

I've noticed a lot of people retweet things right after they are shared. This is a great method if you have a larger following than the person who RTed the post in the first place. I, however, probably have a smaller following than many of the people that I follow. So, I've taken a different spin on the RT. Lately you may have noticed that I'm RTing things that are old....days old...hours old...maybe in some cases weeks old. I'm trying to do this to benefit people like me who can't be on Twitter all the time. I've been taking posts that are of interest, favoriting them, and then looking back through my favorites each day and posting a few, either from earlier in the day for those that weren't on at that time or days earlier because some people can't be on Twitter every day.

So, if you notice I post something you tweeted out a while ago, I'm not really that far behind. It's not a glitch in the system. I'm just trying to help out others like me who can't participate all the time.

The Motivation Struggle

2010-05-27T18:23:00.000-07:00

Today I did something I don't like doing... I forced kids to stay in for recess. I said, "If you didn't understand the math homework from last night, and I can look at your work and tell that, you won't get to help with the lower elementary field day this afternoon." Slowly, after rewording that a few times and the students figuring out I was serious, they trickled over from the "go out to recess line" to the "stay in line."

I felt like I was holding them captive, against their will, (except for those few who decided to come in before I made the "threat") as we looked over the assignment again, I did some reteaching, and then students worked or reworked the problems. See, I give the answers to the math homework so they can get feedback automatically as to if they are doing it correctly instead of waiting until it's checked by me. They can see right away if they "get it" or not.

One might say that you shouldn't give students work outside of the classroom until you are sure they can do it on their own, and I agree with that. But I get this response from many of them in class....I actually have this Baby Blues comic posted on my bulletin board. We work problems on individual white boards in class, and they seem to get it. Does it just fall out of their heads when they leave? Retention is not the big question I'm struggling with here.

The big question I'm struggling with and have been for a while is: WHY DON'T STUDENTS CARE? Why won't they come in to get help? When is it my job to force them to come in so they get help? When is it their turn to step up and take responsibility for their own learning?

I know I'm dwelling on the negative here...I should celebrate the kids who came in on their own. Today I did not do that, and that is something I regret and will learn from...but with 8 days of school left, I'm kind of at my wits' end.

It only took until 7th grade...

2010-05-20T08:03:00.000-07:00

As I walked into school the other morning, I ran into a student who I had last year. This student was quite the challenge and we had our ups and downs, but he's a great kid and we really came to understand each other. I asked how math was going, since I know 7th grade math can be a challenge, and he said it was going ok...that he goes in for help a lot. Then he said something that really fired me up...he's been reading...a lot! Last year I BATTLED with this gentleman to read. I mean BATTLED...nothing interested him, books were dumb, reading was boring...

In 7th grade, the students study the Holocaust and WWII in Social Studies. This topic really interested this student and now he cannot stop reading about it.

It's just a shame that it took until his 7th grade year for this student to find a topic that interests him so much that he can't stop reading about it.

How can we reach these students earlier?

Next Year...

2010-05-13T11:10:00.000-07:00

As the year comes to a close, I think many teachers are in a state of exhaustion and reflection at the same time. I know I am. There are many thoughts in my head about what I will do differently next year. I've started a Google Doc that is a list of what I want to make sure I change, do for the first time, or don't do at all next year. I'm doing this so that I don't forget over the summer what I'm feeling in these last days.

A few things on my list are:

Use a Google form to collect kids' and parents' information.
Discuss what I expect from students when they return from being absent.
Make a video of a good literature circle and show students how it should work.
Discuss that I don't give extra credit.

What will you change, add, or drop next year? I encourage you to make a list. I feel like mine is growing every day!

Is equal ever equal?

2010-04-06T19:33:00.000-07:00

Here's an idea. I don't even know if I agree with it, but it's been on my mind the past few days...

Photo on Flickr by el_patojo

I interviewed at a smaller district a few years back and at the end of the interview, I was told that they wanted a commitment from me. They didn't want me to use their district as a "stepping stone" to get into a larger, better paying district in the area. Small schools are constantly dealing with a revolving door of new teachers who start there and then move on to greener pastures with better pay.

What if all schools had the same pay scale?

State-wide? Nation-wide? I know cost of living differs in areas, so maybe nation-wide is a stretch. What are your thoughts? I'm not sure what mine are...

"I didn't get it done..."

2010-03-23T05:50:00.000-07:00

Aren't those the words we dread from our students? I rarely talk to a teacher who doesn't have some problem with late or incomplete work. Usually, we get excuses.

"I didn't get it done because I forgot my book."

"I didn't get it done because my brother spilled milk on it."

"I didn't get it done because I had volleyball practice."

What if we teach our students to look forward instead of informing us about the past?

Let's teach them to replace the because with so. I really don't care WHY it wasn't done. I want to know what THEY are going to do to get it done!

Teach your students to say,

"I didn't get it done so I'm going to come in after school to finish it."

"I didn't get it done so I will get it to you by tomorrow."

"I didn't get it done so I will get another worksheet and get working on it in study hall."

Wouldn't you love to be done with excuses and see students taking responsibility? I'm returning to work from 8 weeks of maternity leave on Monday and I'm going to try this out! Give it a try and let me know how it goes! To me it's just a small change in mindset that can make a big difference.

Maternity Leave

2010-01-16T08:09:00.000-08:00

For any of you teachers out there that also wear the hat of mom, maternity leave is a two word phrase that can be scary, freeing, and overwhelming all in one. I'm due with our first child on February 8th...which is just 23 days away! From the middle of the summer when I notified my principal of the news, the process began. He was concerned with finding the right sub to take over my classroom because of the math content I teach. As you know, some elementary teachers are scared of math, but that's a whole different post.

The preparation for the sub taking over my room has really made me reflect on all that goes on in my classroom - a lot! Communicating with my sub about my standards-based math grading system including how I grade homework, score quizzes, and allow retakes was just one part of it! My students also write to me about what they're reading once a week, and I respond. They also use Google Docs and Blogger in the writing process! (Check out their writing at: http://mrsgstudent.blogspot.com and leave some feedback!) These are some of the major things. Then there's the, "This student may do this...." "This student is always reliable...." "Our morning routine looks like this..."

I have basic plans worked out until my due date, and my sub seems very capable of picking up and continuing wherever I leave off. I did have some thoughts in this preparation like, "Can she handle it all? Should I cut some things out? Will she grade the quizzes correctly? Should she just bring them to me so I can do it?" The answers to these questions have ended up being, "Yes, she can handle it. I will not cut things out because my students still need to be learning while I'm not there. She can grade the quizzes and just ask me if she has questions. No, I will not grade quizzes while I'm on leave."

My district wonderfully paid the sub to come in earlier this month and shadow me for a day so she can see how things run and where things are. I feel very confident that my class will be in good hands while I'm gone.

Will I miss it? Yes, but I can still see and interact with what my students are doing through their work on the blog.

Will I be where I need to be? Yes! That's a given.

Will learning continue while I'm gone? YES!

Book Bistro

2010-01-11T13:21:00.000-08:00

Last year I wanted to find a different way of doing the classic "book report." I do the First 20 Days of Reading from the book Guiding Readers and Writers in my classroom. This system of Reader's Workshop relies on reader's response letters and book recommendations. Some students really struggle with finding good books, so I thought a fun venue to share books would be a cafe-like atmosphere. Last year, we called it Book Cafe, but since some teachers have been implementing the Daily 5 and The Cafe Menu, I didn't want the two cafes to be confused. Thus, this year we changed the name to Book Bistro.

Our elementary operates on trimesters, so we have 3 rounds of Book Bistro. Each student presents one time per trimester. With my class of 22 students, we hold 4 Book Bistros per trimester so there are 5-6 students presenting at each. This usually takes up an hour of our morning, but it's definitely worth it. It helps the students presenting work on oral communication, and the listeners get to hear about some great books! The students have a list of ideas to choose from, but as you can see, they may also come up with their own idea and get my approval. We've had some great presentations this year including a newscast shot on multiple locations!

Because it is a cafe or bistro atmosphere, the students presenting bring in treats and beverages for the listeners to enjoy as they present. I've even had students bring specific food because it relates to their book!

At the beginning of the year, I held my own Book Bistro for the students. I brought the treats and modeled three different ways to present with three books that I enjoy. We also discussed proper "cafe etiquette" including not scarfing down your food, sipping your beverage, sitting quietly, and not getting up to throw things away when someone is presenting.

Students really seem to enjoy this venue for sharing books. It's fun to hear them tell me ," This book is GREAT! I think I'm going to share it at the next Book Bistro." Talk about motivated readers!

Wordle-now more than just a cool looking thing to my students

2009-12-13T18:10:00.000-08:00

I used Wordle in my classroom earlier in the year for collaboration and seeing trends in ideas for classroom behaviors and what ideal group work looks like. Students were "wowed" with the tool and some went home to make their own Wordles on fun topics of their own interest. Up until recently, they'd just seen Wordle as a "fun" thing to do.

Two weeks ago, the students composed descriptive essays. The major goal of this assignment was to work on "spicy writing" that encompassed the senses. After prewriting, drafting, peer revisions, and composing their second draft, I modeled to students how Wordle could be used to help with their word choice. I took a sample essay and pasted it into Wordle. We had a class discussion on the larger words in the Wordle. Students knew from previous use of Wordle that these words appeared more often in the essay. I then showed them the online dictionary/thesauraus Visuwords. Ooos and Ahs resonated around the room as webs appeared on the screen with suggestions for different words to use.

To make a long story short, some students really grasped the use of these tools and analyzed their own essays in Wordle. They then used Visuwords to find better words to use. Part of the essay rubric was that students showed evidence of changes in word choice. Many students made a couple changes on their Wordle to show that evidence. Here is a top notch example of the way one of my students did this:

This student circled common words and found a variety of more descriptive words to replace them with using Visuwords.

It may seem simple, but I really saw Wordle come to life in an applicable way for many of my students. They do still think it's a "fun" and "cool" tool, but they also see how it can be used to improved their writing.

Frustrated Part 2

2009-11-11T13:48:00.000-08:00

I had about a 30 minute discussion with each of my math classes today. I began by expressing my frustration at the time loss (of me creating/printnig the retakes) and paper loss occuring when student dont' show up. We also had a quick math lesson (since we talked about rounding fractions yesterday) about approximately what 9/20 (I misquoted this in my previous post, but it has been corrected) of the class showing up means. They concluded (yes! They remember what we did in class yesterday.) that is was about 1/2. I also discussed how it is sad for me to see that they aren't taking advantage of this opportunity. I gave them about 5 minutes to talk in their groups about what should/could be done about this.

Students in my first class came up with this list:

Keep them after school/at recess to compensate for Mrs. G's time
Have them do clerical work for Mrs. G.
They can't take a retake next time (some said this could occur after multiple offenses)
Write retake time on a sticky note and put it on desk or on accordion folder
Mrs. G chooses/assigns retake times
Write an appology letter for not showing up
Reward those who come
Start a student-led retake punishment committee

We went through the list and briefly discussed how some of the options still took up my time. I was surprised by that class's lack of preventative behaviors. They were focused on the punishment. We discussed for a few minutes the "reward" they wanted for showing up. They came to the conclusion that the opportunity to retake is a reward in itself.

The second class came up with this list:

If you don't show up, you can't take a retake the next time (or forever)
Detention for 30 min. or working with the janitor for 1 hour
Come in the next day
Post a schedule in my room and the other 6th grade teacher's room
Reschedule if you can't make it
Remind yourself with a sticky note (and a discussion occured as to the various places you could put the sticky note, including their forehead)
Write it down in your planner
No show = no recess for 1 week
Post a reminder in your locker
Take points off
Give them lots of homework
Help the teacher (to make up for her time)
Put the no show students' names on the morning announcements for embarassment
Write an "I'm sorry" letter
Write "I'm sorry" repeatedly

In this class, after since I had the time to process the conversation from the first class, we actually went back through the list and put a red mark next to ideas that still consumed my time. We also put green stars next to ideas that were proactive behaviors. I've noted that with the red/green text on their list. This class, when making the list, wanted to go a little overboard with "how bad of a punishment can I think of."

Overall, I don't think the students or I really came to a conclusion as to any punishment for not showing up. In both classes, they came to realize that any punishment would result in even more of my time being wasted. Also, we discussed how taking points off (2nd class's idea) doesn't go along with my s-b grading at all.

In both classes, we discussed how it all comes down to effort and responsibility. I told them that my brother, a high school math teacher (Matt Townsley), questioned if 6th graders were really responsible/capable enough to handle the retakes system. Both classes said they were. They said if people are showing up, it shows that anyone can be capable of showing up.

I ended the conversation with saying that I hope the next time they sign up for a retake, they keep this conversation in mind. Even though the 2nd class said posting a schedule would take up my time, I still might consider doing it to see if it helps at all. But, if they write it down in their planners and don't look at those, will they look at a schedule?

Frustrated...

2009-11-10T15:37:00.000-08:00

I talked a couple weeks ago about how I was very excited about my students' motivation for retakes. For some reason, that motivation has plummeted. I had 20 students sign up for retakes for the most recent quiz and 9/20 did not show up for their retakes. They choose the time to take it. I don't post the schedule anywhere, but I always tell students when their retake is if they ask. I'm not sure what to do next. Last year I "punished" students who did not show up for a retake and didn't allow them to retake for the next quiz. The punishment doesn't really fit with what I'm trying to do. I guess I could copy the retake schedule and post it somewhere, but I don't have time to hunt each student down and remind them of when their retake is. Any suggestions for helping this? I plan to talk to the students about it tomorrow, but I want to get my initial frustration out here.

I'll report back with what the students say.

It's spreading...

2009-10-22T17:36:00.000-07:00

I'm not talking about the flu or the first colds of the season, though they are spreading. I'm talking about my math grading practices! My principal did his first observation of the year on Wednesday (since this is my second year in the district). At the pre-observation conference, I shared my lesson with him along with the homework (with answers given for the students to check their work at the bottom) and my quiz that would assess this part of the chapter broken up into learning targets. I'd shared what I was doing with him when I first implemented it last year, but I don't know if he really understood what I was doing. He was blown away. He really liked how the quiz was separated into the objectives. I shared with him that I gave the objectives/learning targets to the students at the beginning of each chapter along with when the quizzes would happen. He said, "All our math teachers should be doing this."

Also, the teacher across the hall, who teaches 5th grade math, came over to ask me how I did retakes because she would like to try it out! She taught 6th grade last year, so she saw how I did things last year. She decided she's going to give her students an opportunity to retake a test they just finished!

Like I said, it's spreading! I'm excited!

"I can improve my grade by retaking a part of the quiz?"

2009-10-10T08:19:00.000-07:00

I've had some exciting student-self motivation going on in my math class lately.

Here's a little background on how I assess math:
I break up each math quiz I give into "learning targets" or objectives which the students are informed of at the beginning of the chapter. I score each "learning target" on a 1-4 scale (This is an example of what 1-4 means from something my students should have already understood at the beginning of the year). This is part of my standards-based grading approach I adopted for my math classroom last year (The link is a hand-out is one I gave to my students at the beginning of the year to explain it, so hopefully you can get an idea of what I'm doing.) . I hope to blog more about that in a future post.

I started a practice after the second math quiz I gave out this year that has shown to be very beneficial! Approximately two days after each quiz, I give the quizzes back to the students with the problems marked that they missed along with scores for each learning target. I have been pairing or grouping students in 2's or 3's with students who have strengths/weaknesses that complement each other. For example, a student may have gotten a 2 on learning target 1, a 4 on learning target 2, a 3 on learning target 3, and a 3.5 on learning target 4. I try (and usually am pretty successful) to pair/group this student with another, or two others who have a 3 or 4 on learning target 1, a 2 or 3 on learning target 2, and so on. The students then discuss the problems they missed and work them out with a pen on their paper or another sheet. Students are usually able to figure out their errors without my direction, and it requires much more involvement than me fielding questions from the whole class and going through selected problems on the board, or just handing back the quiz with written explanations/answers.

I also allow students to retake any learning targets they'd like (outside of class time) as long as they've turned in all of their "insurance" (homework) on time for the chapter up to that point. The reason I'm so excited about the peer post quiz interaction is that it has skyrocketed the amount of students who have the desire to sign up for retakes (thus proving they have actually learned the material)! I did not do this peer interaction on the first quiz of the year, and I was a little frustrated at the number of students who signed up for a retake. Now, after conferring with their peers, students almost automatically sign up to retake any learning target that they scored a 3 or lower on.

This does take more work and time on my part. I have to have a retake version of each quiz written up, customize them for the learning targets each student wants to retake (because they don't have to retake the whole quiz), copy them off, be present for students outside of class to retake them, check them, as well as change grades in the grade book (only if they scored better-I don't penalize students if they do worse, which they RARELY do.). It really doesn't take as much time as it might sound by that long list, but it truly benefits the students, gives them a chance to prove their learning (because isn't the goal that they learn it and we don't just allow students to do poorly on a quiz/test and move on?), and helps me in the future because the learning of math concepts is often sequential and requires a basis of past concepts to move on to the next thing.

Google Calendar with 6th graders

2009-10-02T19:30:00.000-07:00

This fall, I purchased the domain www.mrsgoerend.com from Google for $10 a year. Along with this now being the home for my classroom blog, I also obtained 50 user names for Google Calendar and Google Docs. These user names could also be linked to email addresses, but since my students are all under the age of 13 and I didn't want to open the can of worms of them having email addresses (which some parents might not be too excited about), I decided to turn that feature off.

It's been slow going this year with some limited class time and access to the computer lab because of testing, but each student in both of my sections has a user name (student___, fill in a number in the blank) and a password which he or she created using Password Bird. I went with student# as a user name for the ease of use for future classes.

We've spent the most time with the calendar so far. I share a calendar for my math and writing class with both sections because I teach those subjects to both sixth grade sections in our school. I share a reading and spelling calendar with my homeroom section because I teach those subjects to them. I update the calendar as I plan (usually a week ahead). It really doesn't take that much time to update. Last week I showed the students how to log in and really utilize the calendar. I'm excited to see that some students are also using the calendar for their personal activities! Hooray for organization through technology!

On the calendar, I post a short summary of the day's activity for the subject along with page numbers that students can refer to in their textbook. For math, I create most of my own worksheets, to go along with my standards-based grading system (which I will discuss in a future post), so I'm able to link the Google Doc of the worksheet to the math lesson's description. I found that posting a link on the calendar worked better than sharing the document with all 40 of my students' user names. Google Docs has a glitch right now with a maximum amount of contributors to a document, so sharing a document by a link gets around that problem.

Even though a few of my students don't have internet access at home, I've seen minor victories with this system. I've had two students who were sick on different occasions return to school the next day with their math homework completed because they downloaded it from the link on the calendar! The day I spent 30 minutes explaining how the calendar works and how students can access it at home, many students were VERY excited about it and kept saying, "This is so cool!" and "Have you tried this?" or even began adding their own activities to the calendar.

I plan to update more on how the Google Docs side of it works with my writing class once we dive into some more writing assignments. I can't wait to see its use with peer revising and editing and the sharing feature! I will also update more on the Google Calendar as new discoveries arise!

Starting Out

2009-10-02T19:09:00.000-07:00

I decided, with much encouragement from my husband, to start a professional blog. I'm not sure what direction to take, but I hope to let this be a place where I tell about what I'm doing in my classroom and why I'm doing it. Also, I hope to get feedback to improve how I teach! Please be patient with me as I begin.