eight

eight: grade level teams

In teaching, there is simply never enough time to accomplish everything.  This is the sad, unfortunate reality.  However, grade level teams can make things better and for them, I am thankful.

This year, my work wife Ms. H and I are planning reading for the grade level.  Not everyone uses our plans or copies, but that's okay.  Two other teachers plan/copy math while 2 more tackle writing.  It's nice to share the work load and bounce ideas off one another.

I'm also thankful that my work wife understands that unfortunately, sometimes this planning needs to happen outside of contract hours.  Tomorrow, on the day before Thanksgiving, we have a lunch date at Panera to crank out the next few weeks worth of reading plans. 

Beyond having other people to plan with and share the copying fun, it's nice to have a team where we can share ideas and strategies.  We are within a few days of each other in terms of plans, so it's nice to be able to give one another a heads up about what math lessons the kids struggle with or share strategies that really seemed to click for students.

As an added bonus, 4 of the 7 third grade teachers are in my pod, which means help is literally right next door.  I am thankful for grade level teams.

Try it Tuesday: Inviting in the experts

For this next edition of Try it Tuesday, we're going to zoom in on something that's a little scary...

Today's topic is inviting in the experts.

Since fifth grade is in the midst of our great map project to learn about the fifty states, I've been doing lots of research on interesting facts about the fifty states to embed into our social studies and science units.  I'm including land forms and trying to hit every possible learning standard, so it takes a bit of planning.  Lucky for you, they're available {here}.  

(As a side bar, one of the great things about TpT is that when I update a product, previous buyers get the latest addition for free.  After teaching the first unit on the Intermountain Region, my grade level and I discussed strengths and weaknesses, so there are some things I want to improve for when we teach this unit again next year.  I love that for the most part, I have a team that is honest enough to engage in the tricky conversations about resources that are being used and how to improve them without it becoming a personal attack.)

However, I am humble enough to know that I don't know everything and ask for help...in the form of guest speakers.

Since Las Vegas is such a diverse place, I have teachers at my school from all over the country.  I've been inviting in these teachers to talk about their home states and it's been a great success.  My students are loving getting to hear from experts (and in some cases, their former teachers!)

It started with our lovely school counselor, Mrs. G, coming in to discuss her home state of Wyoming.  She purposefully wore a Wyoming shirt and put together a slide show of pictures from her home town, because she's awesome like that.

Next, our assistant principal, Mrs. B, gave up part of her very busy schedule to share all about California.  They loved asking questions and hearing all about amusement parks.  I must say, I was quite jealous to hear that she was off to Disneyland with her family over this long Nevada day weekend!

Our most recent visitor was one of the great fourth grade teachers, Ms. H.  

She came in to talk about her beloved Hawaii and fill the students in on Hawaii's history. Several of my students had her last year, so it was great for them to see her again in a different role.

I also had her add some of the features to our map, which is an old FAO Schwarz design that was given to me by a previous teacher.  I've added velcro to the back of post cards to make the map interactive.

I'll admit, it's a little scary to hand over the reigns to another adult in the classroom.  I did choose speakers that I know personally because this education time is precious.  I'm not handing over the reigns to my classroom to some stranger off the street just because it's convenient.  I sought out fellow educators whom I trust and asked if they'd be willing to come in and talk to my students.  {Last year}, I had my friend Katie who is a local chemist come in and talk about making mixtures and solutions.  She took the whole day off of work and did a forty minute science lesson in each classroom. She sent me her power point before hand to make sure it matched our standards and went over her procedures with me.  After dealing with somewhat grumpy adults all day, I'm sure she loved coming to talk to very excited students who want to know absolutely everything about everything.  Sometimes having a guest speaker takes a little more work on the teacher's end in terms of planning and organizing the lesson.

 However, it's worth it.  My students love hearing from experts and I love that I get to learn something new.  It's a wonderful opportunity for them to see these adults in a new way and ask questions about the world.  To be fair, we have the ongoing conversation about thoughtful questions versus random questions, but they're ten year olds and they're still learning.  

The other teachers love talking about their homes and I always learn something new from their discussions.  It was a little strange asking other teachers at first to come into my classroom because I felt bad about asking my over-worked colleagues to give up their free time, but I'm fortunate enough to work with some amazing educators who will happily procrastinate paperwork to come talk with my students.

Having guest speakers in the classroom does take some prep work.  It takes some flexibility with the daily schedule because you most likely will have to accommodate  the other teacher's prep schedule.  I had to collaborate with the special ed teachers that I co-teach with to let them know our daily routine was shifting just a bit.

My students are really good about thanking the guest speakers at the end of the talk, which is about fifteen to twenty minutes.  I want to be respectful of other people's schedules and appreciative that they're giving up their free time to talk to my students.  I send a hand written thank you card a few days later and I've got other teachers volunteering to come talk about their home states.  Ms. M, who is one of my bridesmaids, will be coming in to talk about Pennsylvania.  Mrs. A, our speech pathologist, is ready to discuss Michigan and our spunky principal Mrs. W is ready when we get to the east coast.  I inform the guest speakers of what we've covered (state, capital, state symbols, major cities, major colleges, major land forms) and let them take it from there. 

For this week's try it Tuesday tip, think about what subjects you teach and if there is a local "expert" who can come in and share.  Is there another colleague in your building? A parent who has background in the subject?  You never know until you ask!

At a school site where no one will come talk to your class?  Try skype instead.

I know that when we get to Ohio, we'll be skyping one of my former colleagues who now works for OSU.  Surprise Ms. G, we're going to call you! Be ready! 


Still on the fence about it?  Here's some {background} on why guest speakers are great for students!

Take a deep breath, be brave, and invite in an expert to teach your students something new.  

Thankful?

I'm having a bit of a rough time finding positive things.  We are under a lot of pressure at work from a lot of different angles.  Granted, it's no where near the tear-inducing chaos of last year, but still.

We are under pressure to perform well on Reading Rangers.  My students are reading independently and quiz frequently.  However, there's a few boys that aren't following my expectations and do poorly.  They are lower readers and need to read books several times.  They need to conference with a peer about the book.  However, they'll sneak out to the pod or sneak an iPad to quiz and often score 60% or 80%, which brings down our class average.  I am then talked to about why I'm doing so poorly and it's really not fair.  I've had a few times I've been called out for the lowest scores and while some find it motivating, I'm mortified.

I don't like coming in last and I certainly don't like that publicly announced.

My students have between 45 and 60 minutes a day of silent independent reading time with our Reading Rangers program.  During that time I'm pulling small groups or individual conferences, they are writing about what they're reading, conferencing with a peer, taking an AR test, or silently reading.

Other teachers will sometimes skip other subject areas to allow for extra reading time to inflate their scores.  I'm not sorry that I refuse to skip math, writing, or whole group reading to give them silent reading time.  They need instruction in all subjects.

We've started some new positive reinforcements and it's helped.  We are in a race to 100 100%s with another class and it's quite motivating for them.  I also started using classroom dojo to reward them whenever they score 90%, 100%, or complete a badge.  They are quite excited about that.

We're all overwhelmed at work and it's showing.  The amount of effort and care I put into my portion of planning is not necessarily being matched by others and that's difficult.  Things aren't getting done in a timely manner.  There's been some miscommunication and that's difficult.

I think we're all just ready for a break and luckily, Thanksgiving is right around the corner.  I am thankful for that!

Thankful, Day 3

The thankfulness continues.

Day 3:

I am thankful to be in a profession where I have the opportunity to constantly learn new things and try new strategies.  I am thankful to be at a school where I can learn from others. I'm thankful for my grade level and for the support I receive from the other math chair.

Today I presented on math strategies for staff development.  It went fairly well and others were appreciative of new strategies and planning time.

Side note: I didn't teach math last year.  The two years prior to that? I taught stations in an inclusion classroom with the special ed kiddos.  Before that? A traditional classroom.

However, I've attended lots of math trainings over the past few years because I didn't want to fall out of practice.  I guess they've paid off!

As frustrating as these math trainings are, I do appreciate that I have the opportunity to attend them to learn more information (and be paid to learn).

Day 5

I made it to Friday!  

I did start my morning with duty...I'm not a fan of the gate.  I picked up my kiddos, took them off to Art, then planned math with another teacher in my grade level.  We had a grade level meeting yesterday and split up who is planning what subject.  This is an adjustment for me. Instead of planning everything, I'm planning one subject, writing up super explicit lesson plans, and making the copies for the grade level.  So far, I'm liking it!  I still read over their lesson plans and put my own flair on them, but it's nice that collaboration and team work is the norm for my grade level.

After I picked my kiddos up from specials, we jumped right into math.  For our number talk, it's "fact Fridays" where I gave them their first timed multiplication test.  

Last year my grade level split up multiplication and division facts into "easy", "medium", and "hard" facts.  We made 3 different versions of each test and would give them a chance every other week.  Today they had 3 minutes to do the easy multiplication ones.

Easy facts: 1, 2, 5, 10

Medium: 3, 4, 9, 11

Hard: 6, 7, 8, 12

Of those, about 6 of my students passed their easy facts on the first round.  I'll be making a tracker to glue in their notebooks and a brag wall similar to this:

For them to sign off when they pass each level.  Granted, this is a third grade standard, but many of my students don't have these facts mastered (yet!).  We'll alternate testing and practice weeks.

From there, I had them compare notes on what a good mathematician is before adding their thoughts (on post-its) to our chart:

 

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We also went over the first math practice (make sense of problems and persevere in solving them).  I had them record it in their math notebooks with sticky labels and added the chart to the wall.  I didn't want to put up all 8 without going over them because then students have no connection to what's on the wall.

I also raided another teacher's classroom and found the rods I was looking for!  I modeled that the rods and units represent tens and ones in this case, but made it clear this won't always be the situation.

I had the table teams model 43-29 for me using the manipulatives and they did a pretty good job.  I think most of our math this year will be hands-on because there are some major gaps to fill.  However, after talking with my grade level, I'm not the only one who feels this way so that's nice we're all wanting to give them meaningful practice to help make sense of numbers.

In science, they finished exploring the mystery bags and we had a conversation about all the skills they practiced.  They did a really good job with their team building task.

In writing, they finished their final drafts (which I accidentally left at school...Wednesday problem).  In reading, they took their STAR test to place them for AR and worked on building their stamina in silent reading until everyone was done with writing.

From there, I modeled the importance of previewing a text, again using The Lightning Thief as my mentor text.  I jumped right in and read, without modeling metacognition or stopping to think aloud parts.  A few pages in, they were confused (as they're supposed to be).

We talked about strategies that good readers use, one of them being to preview the text.  What this means is they need to look at the front and back covers, as well as the table of contents, to formulate an idea of what the text is about.  

I then had them practice with a book of their choosing, modeling on a post-it.

We reviewed phrasing and went over rate, adding to our charts in our notebooks.  We'll go over expression and accuracy next week.  We'll also go over buddy coaching and have some fluency practice before we take our beginning of the year Aimsweb benchmarks.

With the bell approaching, they did their classroom jobs and I sent them on their way with this:

They o-fish-ally survived their first week! It's Labor Day weekend and we have a staff development day Tuesday, so I won't see them again until Wednesday.  

One week down!

(On a side note, I did have to write my first citations and lock myself out of my room on Friday. I also forgot to send home last year's CRT scores, so I stapled apology notes to parents and those scores will go home Wednesday.  There were definitely moments of frustration on Friday, mainly due to me forgetting things...so a nice relaxing birthday dinner with B at Red Robin was so deserved!)

Thank Goodness

I got my official welcome back email today.  What a relief!  Now I know what day I go back to work :)

What I was more impressed with is my new administration's value for our summer breaks.  The earliest I could go back is Wednesday, but since I"m in training, that day is out.  They limited the hours we can work.  Yup, limited from 9-1.  They expect us to do other things then spend all day prepping our classrooms...and all I can say is thank goodness!

I won't get keys until next Friday and even then, I can work a max of four hours at school.  I can go in Saturday and Sunday (which I may, dragging B with me), but again I"m limited to four hours.  

I talked with the grade level chair and they long range plan during the first few weeks of school, so I'm not a slacker teacher.  More importantly, they plan as a team (hooray collaboration) and tweak the plans as the year progresses.  Yes, the mindset that the plans you make in August, before you've met your students, can be altered based on the students' needs.  Hallelujah this is a norm!

Besides my excitement about planning and not being allowed to work all day, there was one more piece of pertinent information regarding bulletin boards.

It's expected they'll be cute.  What a refreshing change.

See, last year the cuteness was severely frowned upon.  We did not have bulletin boards.  They were called academic wall displays.  They were graded, on a rubric, by ourselves and administration.  We had a stern talking to regarding ours...and we weren't the only grade level.  I remember being chewed out because some of the students' work wasn't perfect.  Um, correct.  I teach ten year-olds.  Learning is a process.  I hope they haven't mastered all of the fifth grade content in September.  So yes, in the interest of displaying all students' work, I included some work that wasn't 100% correct.  Again, I taught inclusion (with special education students), learning is a process...and the bulletin board was due in September.  Not the end of September, but by the end of day 8 of instruction.  Oddly enough, two weeks in, my fifth graders hadn't mastered that particular reading standard.  I got lectured for it.

I don't think that will be the case this year.  There was an email attachment about all sorts of ways to make your bulletin boards cute and recommended how to make lettering and borders.  I will keep the background sheet and burlap border up all year, but switch out the lettering and theme as I see fit.  Or every month, as is suggested.

Thank goodness for positive change.  I'm so excited to be headed somewhere where I'm encouraged to have a life outside the classroom and it's expected I have fun with my job.  

Hallelujah.  It's about damn time.

Days 3 and 4

Sigh...it's almost Friday.  That means I can wear jeans :)

Wednesday (yesterday) was my birthday and I got a new student.  (I got another new one as well today).

I was surprised by this lovely dessert and sign by my grade level:

One of my students brought me these beautiful flowers and Batman balloon :)

And most importantly, my kiddos were mostly on their best behavior so we got a lot of learning accomplished!

They worked on mystery bags in science and we talked about metacognition in reading:

I think they're starting to grasp the concept of thinking while reading :)

We've been doing a lot of read alouds to build class community, so we made this anchor chart together:

We've been adding to it as our discussions continue.  Today I added that another role for students was to listen for interesting vocabulary.

I'm exhausted and it's only week one!

At least I made my class poms to distinguish table teams:

For more on how to make these cute poms, see this post!

-Ms. Vice

Bring Yo' SWAG, part 2

I posted about our grade level's new management trick a few days ago.

Here's the poster I created to go along with it:

Bring yo' swag fifth graders.