Making Connections With Your LSC (Local School Community)

My school had a lot of teacher turn-over this year. Our junior high alone lost four of seven of their teachers with three new teachers taking positions and me moving up from fifth grade to take over the media lab. As you may understand there is a lot of stress involved for us. I have spent a lot of time the last few days talking to the new teachers and trying to get them to feel more comfortable around the school. I also want them to be able to know they have someone they can contact in our hallway if they need help or have a problem.

Obviously many of us spend a lot of time working on developing our professional learning communities, but at this time of year it seems important to develop our LSC (local school community). Is this as important to you as developing your on-line communities?

In the past we have had beginning of year social events for the teachers to go to and meet each other. We had one that worked pretty well last year, but the turn-over was not as large as this year. What kinds of things do you have at your school to welcome new teachers (besides the state mandated stuff)? How do you personally meet and great new teachers that you will be working with?

By the way, with my change in position I will have more opportunities to facilitate interactions between students in my grade 3-8 building and other schools. If you are part of my PLC be prepared, I may be soon looking to collaborate!

Something That Matters

I found this written at a wall on the campus of Louisiana Tech. I suspect it was written by a student, not one of the professors (although I might be wrong). Why would someone feel the need to write this graffiti on the wall? What is holding them back?

On Saturday I was on Grand Lake in Grove, Oklahoma. I saw over one hundred houses that had a market value of a million dollars or more. Is the drive for money the reason that keeps students from doing something that matters? If so, how do we convince students to follow their hearts, not their checkbooks?

Students Making Decisions: The Biome Project

Here is a post I wrote for my class blog, Mr. C's Class Blog. I am also posting it here because I wanted to share what my class has become. In the past I spent lots of time teaching content. I had my students do questions in their textbooks and lots of worksheets. Through my connections online with great teachers I evolved. I am a better teacher because of these connections. My students have a better opportunity to succeed because of these connections. In a few short years I have become less of a teacher and more of a facilitator for learning. My students are taking a responsible role in their own education.

My students are working on their biome projects now. Throughout this project they had to make choices based on what works best for them. Here are some vids of my students talking about what choices they made.

Here is Seth explaining what strategy he used to gather his information for the project.

Here Rosa talks about what strategy she used to gather her information for the project.

Here is Megan explaining what biomes she chose and which project she will do.

Here is Nathan explaining what biomes he chose and which project he will do.

Here is Parker explaining why he likes to be given choices with his work.

Allow Students To Differentiate With Vocabulary Strategies

As I become a more professional teacher, I become a more directed learner. Having read Marzano's Classroom Instruction that Works several years ago as part of a book study conducted in my building, I was particularly interested in the chapter on non-linguistic representations. Basically non-linguistic representations mean visual, but not verbal representations. For several years I have included doing as many of these in my classroom as I can. I even incorporated webbing into one of the note taking methods I teach my students.

Last year I was given A Handbook for Classroom Instruction that Works also by Marzano that our school used again for a book study. Last semester I was reading through parts of the book that hadn't been covered by the book study when I came upon a section on vocabulary. In that section there was a five step process that was recommended for teaching vocabulary. Basically, it asks the teacher to give an everyday definition of the word and then draw a graphic representation (picture aka non-linguistic representation) of what the word means to the teacher. The student is then directed to write the word's definition using their own words and draw their graphic representation. I required my students to not draw the same picture I drew.

A few months ago I noticed our reading class was getting stale. In fact, we were all bored. I decided I needed to do something different so I decided that I would add some extra work to the week. I gave my students an extra assignment tied to the story and added both skills and vocabulary options. Here is an example of a weekly reading cycle my students completed. Notice the vocabulary assignments.

Because I have been emphasizing students choosing what works best for them, I decided to allow them to choose two strategies they thought would be best for them. (We had extensive discussions about learning styles and what works well for the students before I implemented this.) Below are the choices I gave my students to use. I even allow them to use something not on the list if they ask me about it first. Every strategy here is used by at least one of my students!

• Create graphic representations of each vocabulary word
• Write definitions of each vocabulary word
• Create a flash card with definitions for each vocabulary word
• Use in graphic organizer as outlined in Skills section
• Create a word web with synonyms of the vocabulary words
  
• Create a word web with antonyms of the vocabulary words
  

Here is Gavin explaining what he does to learn the vocabulary words in reading.

Here is Megan explaining what she does to learn her vocabulary words for reading.

Here is Zac explaining what he does to learn his vocabulary words for reading.

Here is Slendy explaining how she learns her vocabulary words for reading.

This is an example of how students are becoming responsible for their learning. They are trying to choose the best strategies for them. Obviously, this is what we as educators should strive for, students that understand how they learn best using tools that best fit their learning.

I am sure you also noticed that two of the four students admitted they had not transferred these skills to other content areas. This is a big concern of mine, and I hope to address this very issue school wide next year. While the short term goal was to increase vocabulary in reading, the long term goal is to teach my students to become reflective learners.

Blog Check: The Practical Principals

I recently discovered The Practical Principals podcast. The podcast is a conversation between two administrators: Melinda Miller, @mmiller7571, and Scott Elias, @ScottElias. Mrs. Miller is an elementary principale in Missouri and posts on The Principal Blog. Mr. Elias is an administrator in Colorado and posts on Scott J. Elias.

I found the podcast through Twitter and decided to listen to a few of the shows. As a teacher that never intends to become an administrator, I have listened with fascination about the role of the administrator. Just like students have no grasp of the job a teacher does, I realized I had no idea what an administrator does.

Two of my favorite podcasts are #10 Your Hired, which gave me great insight into hiring practices, and #12 Welcome Aboard, which deals with starting school with new teachers. Frankly, I am fascinated by both of these processes.

Both Mrs. Miller and Mr. Elias are fun to listen to. They have a rapport that makes listening enjoyable. They are both very knowledgeable and, more importantly, they work to better themselves as administrators. I would love to have either one (or both) in my building.

To sum up, if you would like to understand the principal's role in school, and enjoy listening to podcasts I recommend The Practical Principals. They have become part of my PLN.

#Comments4Kids Wednesday

This post was supposed to be a rant on my perceived lack of support by the twitter education community in regards to student blogging. Not that they are against student blogging, that isn't the problem. The problem is many don't want to take time to comment on students' blogs.

As an adult, I love to get comments on my posts. It is important to me to know that what I say matters to others. I covet comments! Students aren't any different. They want to know someone cares about what they have to say too. Yes, they do get feedback from their teachers, but is that enough?

I tell my students all the time that blogs give them an audience they don't have with writing on paper and pencil. They have an audience that is theoretically as large as the world population. Do you think they want to put their ideas out for everyone to see? That is such a scary idea! How do you think they feel when they finally do it, but no one notices?

The idea came during a Twitter conversation with Carey Pohanka, @capohanka, a middle school teacher from Fredericksburg, VA. I had tried twice to get some fellow tweeters to post comments on her blog (see above), and she let me know that a couple (wonderful) teachers left some comments. Then she wrote this:

Then I get a message from Derek Smith ,@lovinteachin, a fifth grade teacher from Colorado Springs that said:
That was how #Comments4Kids started. Each Wednesday we ask for those of you that twitter to identify and tweet one blog post by a student that deserves to be commented on. It could be a student that posts something really awesome, or a student in your class that needs encouragement. Simply tag it as #Comments4Kids. Don't forget to do your part as well. If you see a link with that tag, click on it and leave a quick comment. Your time and effort will have a huge impact on the student that wrote the post.

Here is the link to follow the #Comments4Kids blog recommendations.

UPDATE

@jlamshed started a wiki for us to add our links. It can be found at: http://comments4kids.wikispaces.com/

Technology is Making Me a Better Teacher

While reading David Title's blog Gravity and Levity I came to a startling revelation. I realized that what I am learning from teaching tech use in my classroom is bleeding over into my non-tech teaching.

Students come to me with many schooly skills. They can find answers and fill in the blanks on worksheets. They can (usually) answer questions using key words from those questions. They can copy notes off the board. These are lessons students learn early in schools.

Each year I have new students that need to learn how to post blog posts, create Power Points, and similar things using computers. I have begun to realize that these skills actually don't need to be taught, they can be learned by allowing the students time to explore and create. Instead of focusing on teaching them how to use the tools, I am teaching them when and how it is appropriate to use the tools. Then I ask them to reflect on their learning. I have come to realize I should be doing this all the time.

For years I have taught students to take notes by copying them off the board. Actually, I wasn't teaching them to do anything except how to copy words. This year I focused on teaching how to take notes. I am evaluating their note-taking skills when I observe what type of notes they are taking and if the notes are helping the students learn the material. After testing I ask the students about their note-taking and if their assessment scores were improved by the notes. I want them to learn the skill that allows them to be successful regardless of the content.

To sum up, students need little help to learn the tools, but they need our guidance and practice to use them in a way beneficial to their learning. Technology taught me this.