2014 Birthday Guesses

For the past 12 years as a teacher, every time my birthday rolls around I have played a special game with my students. Typically, I ask students to guess my age by putting a number in a hat, and then write the anonymous guesses on the board. The 2nd graders guesses for the past several years have consistently been between 21-65!

Once the range has been determined, we play "Guess My Number" where students are challenged to guess my actual number in as few as guesses as possible.  As each guess is given, the range grows smaller and smaller, until students are left with the correct answer. Afterwards, I share a special birthday treat with them. 

This year I am not in my 2nd grade classroom, but I didn't want to break my streak, so I decided we'd play anyway.  I created a simple Google Form that I sent to my students and then compiled the data using a web-based program called ChartGo. 

Here are this year's guesses:

My college freshman are much better guessers than my second graders!

range: 28-42    mode: 42    mean: 36.5

Formative Feedback

This week I asked my university students to provide feedback on our class now that we have reached the mid-point in the semester. My purpose in this formative assessment process is to refine and improve my teaching methods, and create a better learning environment for my students.  I also want to model the importance of reflective practice for them.

 I created a Google Form that looked like this:

 I wanted students to be able to anonymously  provide their input without the fear that might surround potential handwriting recognition. 

I asked my student to identify:

2 positive things they appreciate or enjoy most about the class,

and

2 areas or ways in which I can help them be more successful in class. 

I didn't realize how vulnerable I would feel about this process until the first few responses began trickling in. Putting yourself 'out there' can be a difficult thing to do. Criticism, even when it's constructive can sting.  It is in my nature to initially become defensive; to make excuses.  But the real beauty in this process is the opportunity for change and self-growth.  I am already a better teacher because of it.  I will set a timer in class, so that my students know that I value their time as well.  I will provide a more comprehensive exam review.  And I will continue to share brain breaks with my students on a daily basis, because they love them, and they need them--even though they cut into my instruction time.  

To see myself through my students' eyes has been humbling, and heart-warming experience.  To have my students identify me as an, "enthusiastic, passionate, understanding, positive, caring, upbeat, happy, experienced, sweet, relate-able, credible, welcoming, engaging" teacher is everything I want to be for them.  I want those traits in the next generation of teachers. 

I entered all of the students' responses (22 out of 33) in Class Dojo and will share the results with the interactive pie graph tomorrow in class.  Here is a snapshot of what the overview looks like:

6 word memoirs

I recently participated in the first call-back day for the NIWP/Doceo Core Summer Institute I took this summer. It was such a powerful reminder of the importance of community!  I really love the diversity of my cohort, and was surprised at how easy it was to fall back into our familiar community.  One of my favorite takeaways from the day was an activity called the 6-word memoir. I've found myself thinking in 6-word phrases on multiple occasions since then.  The basic idea is to create a personal narrative using only 6 words.  You can view a YouTube video containing several examples of the idea here.  This is a national project that has been picked up by classrooms and individuals of all ages around the world. You can see more amazing examples on this website. Our class used a Google Slide document, with every member creating at least one page (with a background photo and text) in the group project. Here is one of the pages that I created following a road trip the day before:

Welcome home, worth the long drive.

Here's another that reflects my overall thinking of the moment:

No really, you can do anything.

Want to give it a try?  What is your  six-word memoir today? Click here to leave your memoir.

Creating Artist Statements Using Google Forms

One of the best things about my being on sabbatical this year is the opportunity to volunteer in my son's 4th grade classroom.  As a classroom teacher myself, it has been the very rare occasion that I have been able to be a part of his school day.  This year I will be teaching an art lesson in his classroom once a month. He and I are both very excited about this arrangement!

Our first adventure in art was a relief Leaf-Printmaking lesson that focused on the elements of texture, value and color. I was inspired by one of my favorite art sites: deepspacesparkle. Students choose a variety of leaves, and then printed them onto black paper with white ink using rollers and deckles. 

After the printing process was complete, students choose either warm or cool color acrylic paints to sponge in the background. 

The most innovative aspect of the lesson for me was the opportunity to try out using Google Forms to have the students create artist statements for their artwork.  I learned about the process here.  After creating this template,

I brought it up on each of the classrooms' five desktop computers.  As students finished their art, and cleaned up their workspace, they sat down at the computers and began to reflect on their work. 

The beautiful thing about using Google Forms is the spreadsheet that is automatically generated as students complete the form.  Instead of typing out each students work, I simply had to cut and paste their responses into a blank table.  After editing for spelling and conventions, I was able to print out & cut apart each artist statement.  This entire process took me less than 30 minutes from the time they walked out the door at the end of the day. 

Classroom Websites

This week I've been working on a couple of websites, one for my classroom and one for a presentation for my local school district.  I really wanted to become familiar with the format and functionality of a variety of different free options, so I explored Weebly, Wix, and Goggle Sites.  I have learned a lot through this experience and have pretty strong feelings about what I'd recommend.  I started building my classroom website through Weebly, and love how it turned out.  You can see it here. Right now it has a bunch of numbers as the URL, because I have not upgraded to include a personal web address, although for $4 dollars a month, I will likely build that into my school budget when I return to the classroom.  Weebly is intuitive to use, and its drag and drop features make it easy to build a beautiful, professional looking website. There are hundreds of templates to choose from, and the customization possibilities are endless.

For an iPad PD course, I started with the Google Sites option, because (up until this experience) I love most of what the GAFE system has to offer.  This website builder, is not as user friendly as Weebly, but I am not one to give up easily.  After all was said and done, I made the ugliest webpage ever! I am proud of the content the site contains, but aesthetically speaking, it leaves a lot to be desired.  You can see that website here. I was in too deep.....with the presentation too near by the time I decided I wanted to ditch Sites.  The old, perfectionist me would've stayed up way too late for way too many nights and re-built it.  But this is a new era, with a new, more realistic (or maybe slightly overworked) me, where I am letting it go, and moving on.

I do know where I'm headed next though....for my next website project, I will be trying out Wix.  It is very similar to Weebly with it's drag and drop features, and it's simple designs end up looking sleek and sophisticated rather than the archaic and blocky look of Sites.

Brain Breaks

I am having so much fun sharing "brain breaks" with my preservice teachers!  These intentional activity breaks spaced every 20-30 minutes do wonders for students young and old.  Brain-breaks can help students re-focus, re-energize, and incorporate much needed movement into their days.

This week I shared some of the research about childhood obesity from the CDC as well as information about the limited physical activity in the daily lives of Americans.   I also shared this eye-opening image from a study at the University of Illinois.

Current recommendations from the Institute of Medicine say that children under 6 need to be physically active for 15 minutes every hour, while older children need 60 minutes a day of moderate to vigorous physical activity. But those 60 minutes don’t have to occur at once.   This is where classroom brain breaks come in!  

Over the next four weeks, each of my preservice teachers  will research and teach a 5-minute brain-break to a small group.  The variety of activities already is astounding!  Some are energizing, others are relaxing.  Searching the web or Pinterest for brain breaks will produce a plethora of results. Some helpful classroom specific  tips can be found here.  Free, one-minute activities to get kids moving can also be found here.  

I will post pictures and videos of my students in the weeks to come.  In the meantime, try this quick trick called the Foot Circle: Circle one foot around clockwise.  With your finger make a 6 without changing the direction of your foot.   Can't you just feel your brain working??

Educational Technologies Concept Map

For my 'Teaching with Technology' course, I was asked to develop a concept map of educational technologies using a web-based tool.  There are many to choose from including:  SpicyNodes,  Inspiration/Kidspiration, Mindmeister, IHMC CMaps and Gliffy, to name just a few. 


I choose to explore Inspiration Maps because of its PC and iPad app capabilities.  This program has many simple features, and is very intuitive to use.  There are a variety of icon shapes and images to choose from, and you are able to customize the colors, fonts, and overall style with a simple menu of options.  Embedding web links was simple, but as far as I can tell, are only functional within the Inspiration app or PC program.  I used the free version, which allowed me to make the concept map using the full features.  However, in order to save it as a PDF, or email it as a PNG image file I will need to upgrade for $9.99.  With the free version I am able to send it as an 'Inspiration file' to someone else who has the program, and they would be able to open the links that are embedded in the map.  

This technology could be used prior teaching any new unit of study to serve as a pre-assessment, or at the conclusion of a unit to show the conceptual understandings and connects made by students.  Students could work individually or in pairs to visually conceptualize their funds of knowledge on any topic. This technology could also serve the purpose of the planning stage of any piece of writing that was taken through the full writing process, although it would be a time consuming and labor-intensive task.  At the second grade level, I'd most likely use this specific technology in a whole-class KWL model before and after my science or social studies units of study.  

Due to the time and labor demands of using electronic concept maps, I'm not sure that this is something I need in my second grade classroom at this time; and therefore won't be making the upgrade anytime soon.  I typically using concept maps as brainstorming/pre-writing activities rather than final projects, and would choose other technologies to spend my time on. 

Without the ability to use the links, this concept map would fall into the 'augmentation' level of the SAMR model because I was able to upload photos and icons digitally.  When using the full program, this would jump up to 'redefinition' on the SAMR model because of the ability to embed web links. I can see myself using Inspiration Maps, or something similar for a presentation to my students or colleagues, but this is not something that I'm going to ask a second grader to use anytime soon.  

Visualizing The Field of Teaching

I am two weeks in.  My role as a lecturer has settled into a sweet spot.  I wasn't sure just how the transition from teaching second graders to teaching college freshman would go, but I've been pleasantly surprised.  There really are more similarities between the seven-year-olds and college students than I ever would have imagined!  One thing that this experience has already done for me, is to highlight my love and passion for teaching.  I have learned that it really doesn't matter how old my students are.

Last week I asked my students to individually brainstorm the qualities of excellence in teaching.  Then, in small groups they needed to create a visual representation of their ideas and share out with the class.  Here are some of their ideas:

Can you guess what they are representing?  

Service Learning

As part of the 201 course that I am teaching, my students must complete 20 hours of service learning.     Our first effort was to help beautify the grounds of Lena Whitmore Elementary by pulling weeds, and trimming bushes and trees.  It was incredible to see how much was done in such a short amount of time!  

First Day Feelings

I asked my college freshman to write one word that described how they were feeling on the first day of class.  I then typed it into Wordle.net and came up with this:

They may need to work on getting some basic needs met....

Feeling Disturbed

Tomorrow is my first day of teaching all over again.  This time at the University.  My new outfit is ready and hanging up.  My lunchbox is packed in the fridge.  My syllabus is finalized and uploaded, although not copied off in paper form yet.  I have typed my 40 students names enough times to become familiar with them, and am excited to begin connecting faces with these names.  I have a pretty general idea about what is going to happen, but am a bit nervous about the limited technological capabilities of the classroom, and how I will work around that.

I'm sure the first day jitters will kick in soon.   But it's okay.  I am ready to be disturbed.   I was recently introduced to the works of Margaret J. Wheatley.  In her essay," Willing to be Disturbed she writes of  needing to have our thoughts and beliefs challenged.  She reminds us that we are not used to admitting that we don't know something, or don't know how to do something.   I am trying to get better at this. I am ready.  "....we can only find those answers by admitting that we don't know."

Juggling Act

Hold on tight......this is going to be a bumpy transition!  Today I took part in my first official training to become a TA as well as my first department meeting for Curriculum & Instruction.  While the learning curve is fairly steep (especially in designing the online course format), I am more concerned with my ability to juggle my various roles as instructor, graduate student, mother and wife.  There is such an intense demand for my time, that I'm feeling frazzled even before it's really begun at all. If only I could replicate myself....

I was also very disheartened to see my teaching space.  The tables were pushed against one wall and were buried under and piles of piles of miscellaneous math manipulatives, papers, and posters.  In the middle of the room were a stack of cardboard boxes waiting to be recycled. I'm not sure who it belongs to, but I'm sure hoping it will be gone in the next three days. This is definitely not the back-to-school routine that I'm used to!

NIWP Goes Digital

The NIWP 2014 Summer Institute was an incredible learning experience!  This year was a collaboration between the National Writing Project, Idaho Core Training and a big dose of technology through the Doceo Center at the University of Idaho.  The learning that was packed into these two weeks has been intense to say the least!  I was especially excited to be working in the Doceo Center at UI, where we were inundated with technology everyday.  

  The SAMR model was introduced to me as a framework for looking at how technology is used in the classroom. This quick video will give you the rundown in just 120 seconds.

 I find myself reflecting on previous lessons in a very different way now.  You could say that I have a new-found perspective.

Taking the Leap: Ready or Not

If I waited until I was "ready" to start writing this blog, it would never ever happen.  I could easily get caught up in all of my insecurities and self-doubt. I could let the fear of being judged or not living up to some perceived standard stop me from trying, but I am going to start anyway.

I'm going to leap into this new and scary place because I need to practice what I teach; because we all learn new things by trying new things. I need to struggle and stumble and persevere.  I need to feel safe taking risks, because I ask my students to take risks every single day.  

As a friend recently told me, "Sometimes all you need to do is take the first step....even if it's the wrong step."