Third Grade - Day 1

I survived!
It was so hard to plan this day since I had no idea what to expect from 8 year old students!  I am extremely grateful for all of the WBT materials I have been studying all summer.   As I thought, it felt like a natural fit in 3rd grade.  Did every student act perfectly?  Nope, but it was a great first day and start.

Since I teach math and science, I have two sections.  I had my homeroom class for the whole morning and then the other class for the whole afternoon.
My class did a fantastic job. We did class/yes, mirror words, teach/okay, scoreboard, 5 Rules and Star, and hands and eyes.  I have two definite beloved rascals in that class but they are not overbearing.

My second class really struggled with  the 5 Rules, LOTS of blurters.  They were not able to handle mirror words or teach/okay - I didn't even try it with them.  They do have class yes, but started to struggle right away with the Mighty Oh Yeah and Mighty Groan on the scoreboard.  I even let them do a "Mighty Dab" when they say Oh Yeah instead of clap, but that didn't get me the 100% I need.  Lots of beloved rascals in this class.  I'm probably going to start recess squad tomorrow!

So tomorrow the groups switch and I have the rascally bunch all morning and the other class in the afternoon.  I am interested to see how that changes anything, if at all.  I know students are usually a little more focused in the morning and "off" after lunch.

One thing I learned today is to slow down!  Even when I think I'm going slow, I need to go slower.  I can tell that if I don't get these routines down now it will be a rough year!    I feel pretty confident that we will work it out.  They are going to be an awesome group for the Super Improver Team!  Can't wait to get that started next week!

My New Classroom!

In general, I use a lot of exclamation points and this year it will probably get annoying, so I apologize!  I can't help it though, I am terribly excited about this new school year.  We have a lot of great new staff members on board and there is just such a positive vibe running through our school that I haven't felt in a while.  I am also really happy with my new classroom! So I wanted to post some of my hard work and also how some of it relates to my WBT journey.

Welcome!  Yes, I did the superhero theme.  Not usually a big fan of themes but found a new teacher store and went a little crazy.

My outside bulletin board waiting for some student work!

A view of the front of the classroom, calendar, my scoreboard, the WBT rules up top and the Super Improver Team board!  I will cover up the title for the first few days and build suspense until the second week. 

My word wall, or power pix wall, it will probably extend over the windows since I am doing math and science this year. 

Classroom jobs, there is a pocket to put a popsicle stick with the name of the student. Cute jobs like Super Sharpener, Captain Line Leader, etc. 

Close up of the Super Improver Board.  The colored strips have the titles of each level, they will be turned around next week once the board is totally revealed. 

My clock!

So there we have it!  I didn't show the back wall with the student cubbies, I want to go this weekend and buy some plants to put on top of them.  What are good plants for a classroom?

Happy New Year! 2016-2017

I absolutely love the beginning of the school year!  Its so much fun to have a fresh start full of so many possibilities.  I am really excited about this year because I am moving to 3rd Grade!!  I am a little nervous but as I am getting used to the idea, the excitement is truly replacing the nerves.

The thing that has me fired up the most is I that I finally feel 100% comfortable with Whole Brain Teaching!  I had a lot of success with it last year with my 5th and 6th graders as far as classroom management goes, and I am looking forward to seeing how it improves lesson delivery as I finally add in gestures, teach/okay, and the assessment strategies, etc.  I know that it is proven to be successful with older students, but it just seems like with 3rd graders it will be a perfect fit. 

In addition to having both books, Whole Brain Teaching for Challenging Kids and 122 Amazing Games by Chris Biffle, I am also going through the certification option on the website to make sure I know all of the ins and outs.  The first part is the Bronze Certification and it requires you to take quizzes based on the different levels and I've already passed the advanced level!

My 1st goal of the new year is to finish the Bronze Certification before the start of school!  

Almost Giving Up on This Blog

I've had a really discouraging year.  I can't really say why, but I don't feel that after 5 years of teaching I am where I want to be.  Now granted I have switched grade levels and definitely feel better about the content this year than I did last year, but still I am not happy with my performance.
Anyway... I saw this on Facebook today and it reminded me of a few reasons I started blogging in the first place. So as summer approaches I might not blog a lot but I will try to keep this a little more current.

Takis Friday

Today was a GREAT day... I bought a 25 pack of mini bags of Takis.  My students LOVE these!!!! They get a kick out of the fact that I love them too. LOL 

What I did was created a competition, since they love these chips so much I figured I would use it to my advantage.  

I cut up a bunch of construction paper into squares.  Every time I caught a student "doing the right thing" I gave them a square.

At the end of class they put their tickets into a bag and we had a drawing for the 6 bags of Takis for each class! It was awesome!!!

I have been using a stop light behavior system and one of the requirements was they could not be on yellow or red to participate.  

Will definitely incorporate this into the daily routine.  Tickets every day for appropriate behavior, then Takis Friday every week or every other week!

Any Questions? #EXPLOREMTBOS2016

This week we are to write about questioning.  I think that this is one of the most important parts of teaching.  I will never forget the time a math coach who observed my lesson typed up everything I had said during the class.  We reflected on how many and what type of questions I asked and I was pretty embarrassed by the results.  Thankfully that was an eye opener and ever since then I have been trying to improve my questioning skills.   I always start with anything I want to "tell" my students I will rephrase into a question.  I still need a ton of work on this and now I find that my lesson planning is most focused on the questions I'm going to ask.

I also noticed a big part of this is not only asking the questions but making sure everyone has an opportunity to answer.  In my classes I notice that there are 3-4 students who want to answer every single question and the rest of the class is more than happy to sit back and let them.  So I started doing all the usual tricks like making sure I wait long enough, using craft sticks to draw names, using the name picker on the interactive white board, etc.  But I noticed that those students who don't want to answer will just say any old thing to get it over with.  Also, it still doesn't help me to know if everyone understands the lesson.

My new strategy is a tracking sheet I've started using in the past few weeks.  It works like this: my students watch a video lesson in class, when they are finished or if a small group of them are finished, I confer with them and ask specific questions that I have prewritten and sometimes I generate others on the spot.  I then mark on my tracking sheet if I spoke with them and if they understand based on the questions I asked.  The nice part is spending a few minutes with each student or small group of 2-4 students really allow me to find their misconceptions early and help them understand the concept better.  I also like having the space on my sheet to write the questions down that I plan on asking them.   Or the room to write down their questions as well as any other comments during our conference!
Here is an example.  Its really low tech and I've thought about making it on a spreadsheet, but I think I like it best hand written because I can switch up groups at a moments notice if needed.


Sorry its sideways!  The circle next to their name means I talked to them and the line through it means they got it or answered questions successfully.

My Favorite #EXPLOREMTBOS2016

Without a doubt my favorite thing is my Hands On Equations class set.

I won this set at a math conference a few years ago when I was teaching 7/8th grade.  I used it the first year with my 7th graders, but since they had been exposed to algebra, they didn't really embrace this method and would get themselves confused.  But for younger students its almost like magic!

Here is my nephew and son when they were 7 and 8 years old.  They were blowing through two step equations and then multi-step equations like it was nothing! 

So last year was the first year I was in 5/6th.  At the end of the year I pulled out the Hands On Equations and we worked through the entire program.  It was amazing.  Some of my struggling students had success that they had never had before in math class!
The best part was this year in 6th grade I have referred back to H.O.E. when teaching opposites, simplifying expressions and solving equations.  It is great to be able to pull out the set and see their eyes light up with understanding.  In the past I would have more than half the class try to tell me x + 2x + 6 simplifies to 9x.  This year only 1 or 2 made that mistake!  In fact when I asked them why you couldn't add the six to the 3x they would tell  me "because the x's are the pawns that are unknowns the 3 only tells us how many unknowns we have!"
I can't wait for the end of the year to start up again with my 5th graders!