My husband says I'm a weirdo. He tells me I am one of those people who can't relax. Well, he is right. I don't know how to shut down. I have to constantly be reading, planning, doing something or I go crazy!
I can read for pleasure, but when I do, I usually devour the book like a box of cookies, and start looking for more (I blew through most of my summer pay last year on amazon.com-darn one click ordering Kindle app!) and I love listening to music, but most of the time I end up singing at the top of my lungs extremely off key, so my kids usually discourage that!
So I've decided to start appreciating all of the free time I have and not worrying about the fact that I'm not "relaxing" or using it the "right" way according to my hubby, who thinks I should be sleeping until noon and then sipping margaritas for whole month of July and August.
Here are some things I am thankful for right now:
1. Sleeping until 7 a.m. - I usually get up at 4:30 a.m.
2. Being able to lift weights at around 9-10 a.m. This is the time my body works best for this activity.
3. Being able to take some cool PD classes without having to worry about planning lessons/grading papers.
4. Having the time to read some good math books and participate in an online book study.
5. Even thought it's the 5th thing on the list it is probably the one I appreciate the most...spending time with my kiddos! So far this week we've been to our community theater's production of Les Miserables, took a trip to New Hope, PA and today will be going to see my niece and nephew in their summer camp play.
6. Teaching a student for 6 weeks who needs an extended school year. I am not great with saving money, so this will definitely help me relax and not feel so stressed out about running out of cash. It's only 2.5 hours a day so its not going to eat up a ton of time.
First week down, nine more to go!
Friday, June 28, 2013
Saturday, June 15, 2013
Year End Review
I can't believe the year is almost over! My 8th graders graduated yesterday and it was bittersweet. I am really proud of them. This class has grown up before my eyes. I am excited for them and their future and at the same time I am so sad to see them go.
Now the point of this blog was to reflect on my teaching and to grow as an educator and I need to get back to that. My blog began turning into a rant zone, which I thought would be helpful to get out, but since I really hate negativity I ended up avoiding my own blog!! So to get back on the right track here is a small review of this year, the things I liked, didn't like and goals for next year.
Flipping
This year I started out with recording screen casts of just my vocab and basic examples. I was pretty happy with the way it was working at first, most of the kids were able to watch the videos and they all kept up with their notes. I began to notice that some students were just copying from other kids notes and not watching the videos. At first I didn't mind since they were still doing the "work" of copying the notes, but I knew that I wanted to take these videos further then just basic screen casts and this started to irritate me because I knew that these kids would have problems down the road. How could this be changed? I didn't do a good job of teaching them how to learn from the videos and that is what caused that problem.
As we got closer to April (state testing time) I started to get really anxious about test scores and I didn't feel like my students were making progress so I stopped making my videos and went back to traditional lectures. Again, I feel that it was my fault for not managing class time as effectively as I could. So I don't think the videos were the problem with them not succeeding.
This year I am taking a free online course https://sites.google.com/site/flippedclassroomprogram/home and so far I love it! In addition to making more engaging videos that include me (YIKES) I am already learning some great things to do with them in class to differentiate. I am hoping to film most of my videos over the summer. It is a HUGE task, but I think in order for next year to be successful, it must be done this way. I am hoping to be able to go into my building to do so since the lighting is much better, but my plan B is to film them out in my garage. I've done 5 already and they pretty much suck! I have got to learn to jazz them up since I am so used to interacting with my students during my lessons and I use a lot of questioning instead of telling during my lessons.
Edmodo
I still LOVE Edmodo. We kind of got away from it when I stopped making videos, but the kids really loved it too. It seemed easier to share things with them on Edmodo than our school's SIS/LMS. Next year I want the students to use it more for interacting with the content instead of socially.
iPads
So my school has two COWS and I never ever use them because there is always issues such as power, connectivity, etc. We recently got iPads and they seemed to work much better! Since I don't have an iPad personally it was kind of hard for me to plan things because I don't know what works and what doesn't on them. The one thing we did try out was the app Socrative. It was really cool, but we just basically "played" with it like a toy. It has such potential in my room that I will have to really plan out productive uses for it this summer.
Circle Trackers
We started using these to track student's mastery of concepts taught this year. It is basically a spreadsheet with the students names and columns labeled with the concepts taught. As you observe the students you draw a circle for each concept and then start shading it in as they progress, so when a student fully masters the concept their circle is completely shaded. It sounds simple enough, but it really was difficult to implement. I like to carry around a composition notebook during class and record notes and things and it seemed like too much to also have to carry that with it and find the kids name and fill it in (it sounds silly when I write this but it is what it is!) Now something that I am really interested in and think might work better for me is a program called Mastery Connect. It is a website that automatically tracks students mastery by scanned bubble sheets. I could see myself having students complete 3-5 questions and having them scan their own sheets to collect the data. We played around with a similar program this year called Gradecam and it was pretty effective.
Six actual school days to go, now that I have sent off my 8th graders I am actually feeling energized about next year. I know that I will post more in the summer and my goal is to really make this a productive one!
Now the point of this blog was to reflect on my teaching and to grow as an educator and I need to get back to that. My blog began turning into a rant zone, which I thought would be helpful to get out, but since I really hate negativity I ended up avoiding my own blog!! So to get back on the right track here is a small review of this year, the things I liked, didn't like and goals for next year.
Flipping
This year I started out with recording screen casts of just my vocab and basic examples. I was pretty happy with the way it was working at first, most of the kids were able to watch the videos and they all kept up with their notes. I began to notice that some students were just copying from other kids notes and not watching the videos. At first I didn't mind since they were still doing the "work" of copying the notes, but I knew that I wanted to take these videos further then just basic screen casts and this started to irritate me because I knew that these kids would have problems down the road. How could this be changed? I didn't do a good job of teaching them how to learn from the videos and that is what caused that problem.
As we got closer to April (state testing time) I started to get really anxious about test scores and I didn't feel like my students were making progress so I stopped making my videos and went back to traditional lectures. Again, I feel that it was my fault for not managing class time as effectively as I could. So I don't think the videos were the problem with them not succeeding.
This year I am taking a free online course https://sites.google.com/site/flippedclassroomprogram/home and so far I love it! In addition to making more engaging videos that include me (YIKES) I am already learning some great things to do with them in class to differentiate. I am hoping to film most of my videos over the summer. It is a HUGE task, but I think in order for next year to be successful, it must be done this way. I am hoping to be able to go into my building to do so since the lighting is much better, but my plan B is to film them out in my garage. I've done 5 already and they pretty much suck! I have got to learn to jazz them up since I am so used to interacting with my students during my lessons and I use a lot of questioning instead of telling during my lessons.
Edmodo
I still LOVE Edmodo. We kind of got away from it when I stopped making videos, but the kids really loved it too. It seemed easier to share things with them on Edmodo than our school's SIS/LMS. Next year I want the students to use it more for interacting with the content instead of socially.
iPads
So my school has two COWS and I never ever use them because there is always issues such as power, connectivity, etc. We recently got iPads and they seemed to work much better! Since I don't have an iPad personally it was kind of hard for me to plan things because I don't know what works and what doesn't on them. The one thing we did try out was the app Socrative. It was really cool, but we just basically "played" with it like a toy. It has such potential in my room that I will have to really plan out productive uses for it this summer.
Circle Trackers
We started using these to track student's mastery of concepts taught this year. It is basically a spreadsheet with the students names and columns labeled with the concepts taught. As you observe the students you draw a circle for each concept and then start shading it in as they progress, so when a student fully masters the concept their circle is completely shaded. It sounds simple enough, but it really was difficult to implement. I like to carry around a composition notebook during class and record notes and things and it seemed like too much to also have to carry that with it and find the kids name and fill it in (it sounds silly when I write this but it is what it is!) Now something that I am really interested in and think might work better for me is a program called Mastery Connect. It is a website that automatically tracks students mastery by scanned bubble sheets. I could see myself having students complete 3-5 questions and having them scan their own sheets to collect the data. We played around with a similar program this year called Gradecam and it was pretty effective.
Six actual school days to go, now that I have sent off my 8th graders I am actually feeling energized about next year. I know that I will post more in the summer and my goal is to really make this a productive one!
Friday, May 24, 2013
The end is near!
Such a bittersweet time of year. I am tired, exhausted is more like it. Just got back from our 4 day 8th grade trip to Washington, DC. The very best class I have had so far. The kids were complete angels and we had an amazing trip. However there was girl drama like never before upon our return (one girl being accused of not showering for the entire time :eyeroll: ) and the students that were left behind did not even give the work I left an ounce of respect. It is so sad and disappointing to see extremely bright children just throw away any opportunities that might be available to them because of behavior and attitude. It makes me so sad.
However on a brighter note, I am excited to say that I applied for the Fizz Flipped Classroom Training program online and even if I don't get accepted to it, I will be using their one take video method this year. I started off the year with just posting screencasts of my notes for them to copy and I can tell that it was working well, but I need to take it further.
The next few weeks are going to fly by. I am excited and happy for my 8th grade graduates and sad to see them go. I am definitely looking forward to next year with my new students and can't wait to start planning for them!
However on a brighter note, I am excited to say that I applied for the Fizz Flipped Classroom Training program online and even if I don't get accepted to it, I will be using their one take video method this year. I started off the year with just posting screencasts of my notes for them to copy and I can tell that it was working well, but I need to take it further.
The next few weeks are going to fly by. I am excited and happy for my 8th grade graduates and sad to see them go. I am definitely looking forward to next year with my new students and can't wait to start planning for them!
Wednesday, March 27, 2013
The Grass is Always Greener
So, I have made a decision, if I stay where I am I want to move down to 5th and 6th grade. It seems where my students "mess up" is on the basic skills they were supposed to learn before they get to me. How do you fix this? I know that if I can't move down or if I get another job in another district (I'm applying to a district that has 6, 7, 8 available) I need to come up with a game plan.
I need to have a serious pre-assessment ready for whatever grade I teach. I need to make sure they have the prerequisite skills down before they learn new stuff...DUH!
I guess it is just so scary when you have that "curriculum that you have to get through" but it will be so much more difficult if they don't have the things they need to know down first.
Ok, lesson learned for this year of teaching.
I need to have a serious pre-assessment ready for whatever grade I teach. I need to make sure they have the prerequisite skills down before they learn new stuff...DUH!
I guess it is just so scary when you have that "curriculum that you have to get through" but it will be so much more difficult if they don't have the things they need to know down first.
Ok, lesson learned for this year of teaching.
Thursday, March 21, 2013
The Pen is Mightier than the Sword
Today I stumbled upon a pretty neat classroom management technique. I know this is probably so old and maybe even a "duh" type of thing, but sometimes self discovery is so fun. Anyway, I've had such a problem with kids not paying attention, side conversations, etc. that today I just got out a composition notebook and started jotting down notes here and there when students were not doing what they were supposed to be doing. No nagging or yelling just writing. When they asked me what I was doing I told them I was just "documenting" and when they asked about what or why, I simply shared that when a parent or the principal wanted to know why so and so didn't do so well on a test or concept, I can tell them exactly why. I told them they are all smart kids and the only reason they do not do well in math is because they do not take their class time seriously.
I had 5 of the best classes I've had in a long time!! It was awesome! I am excited to see how this continues...
I had 5 of the best classes I've had in a long time!! It was awesome! I am excited to see how this continues...
Friday, March 15, 2013
It's Time to Get Real
I spent the night grading our 4th benchmark exam..after a day of PD where are admin laid out for us the reality of our new renewal guidelines.
To sum it up it all comes down to test scores. My school may close and it could be all my fault. I'm not clear on if they are going to go off this year's scores or next, but I know that my kids did very poorly on this benchmark exam which I modeled very closely to the NJ Ask.
I'm not sure what I am feeling right now. A little bit of shock and sadness is the majority of it. I know that if our charter's renewal is not contingent on this years scores, as least hopefully I will only be the nail in one coffin (my own) instead of every teacher at my school.
This does not give me any relief though, I am extremely heartbroken. I love my job so much. I love the stress, I love dealing with the crappy teenage attitudes. I LOVE teaching math all day. However, I guess I'm not really teaching if they are not passing the tests.
I am so sad. That's just it, sad. I can make a million excuses, but how am I going to ever teach anywhere else when I've started my career with such failure?
To sum it up it all comes down to test scores. My school may close and it could be all my fault. I'm not clear on if they are going to go off this year's scores or next, but I know that my kids did very poorly on this benchmark exam which I modeled very closely to the NJ Ask.
I'm not sure what I am feeling right now. A little bit of shock and sadness is the majority of it. I know that if our charter's renewal is not contingent on this years scores, as least hopefully I will only be the nail in one coffin (my own) instead of every teacher at my school.
This does not give me any relief though, I am extremely heartbroken. I love my job so much. I love the stress, I love dealing with the crappy teenage attitudes. I LOVE teaching math all day. However, I guess I'm not really teaching if they are not passing the tests.
I am so sad. That's just it, sad. I can make a million excuses, but how am I going to ever teach anywhere else when I've started my career with such failure?
Friday, March 1, 2013
The KWC Chart
This week I was introduced to the KWC chart. For those who don't know, it is similar to the KWL organizer but a little different. The way it was explained to me is this, it an organizer for word problems:
K-What do you know?
W-What are you trying to find out, or what is the question?
C- Conditions or considerations
The first thing that stuck out to me with this, is that I've already after 3 days started using it like it is second nature. Not only writing it out with my kids when we do problems together, but informally when they are working independently and get stuck. I find myself automatically asking "well, what do you know? Whats the question? What do we have to watch out for?" I guess these are questions I've asked all along, but since we started using the chart I can see that there is hope that the kids will start asking THEMSELVES these questions automatically! Wooo hoooo!
K-What do you know?
W-What are you trying to find out, or what is the question?
C- Conditions or considerations
The first thing that stuck out to me with this, is that I've already after 3 days started using it like it is second nature. Not only writing it out with my kids when we do problems together, but informally when they are working independently and get stuck. I find myself automatically asking "well, what do you know? Whats the question? What do we have to watch out for?" I guess these are questions I've asked all along, but since we started using the chart I can see that there is hope that the kids will start asking THEMSELVES these questions automatically! Wooo hoooo!
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