Collaborative Writing with @jonathanferrell's Class

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.

• My class's blog
• Jonathan's class's blog

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

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

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...

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...

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...

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.

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.