Always Learning - Always Revising!

Fourteen years. That's how long I've been teaching fourth graders. No two years are ever the same. Of course, that means no two years' lesson plans look the same either! We're always evolving in order to meet the needs of our students. 

Yesterday, my team attended a training session titled, "Writing Strategies for Special Needs Writers."  After sitting through the training, I believe most of the strategies would be good for all writers - especially at this particular age. 

I was glad to walk away with a few new strategies in my toolbelt and immediately went to work making changes to our expository planning document. 

We added the box for drawing their thoughts/brainstorming. Why didn't we think of that before? I even used this page with my students today, and the KIDS LOVED IT! How great it was to spend 5 minutes or less drawing our thoughts on a prompt (today's prompt was about your favorite time of year) and then talking about how the pictures connect to the main ideas. Fantastic and SO EASY! 

Of course, my biggest take away might be this quote:

"I don't teach writing. I teach writers." 

Who knows? Next year, our planning document might look completely different. It'll all depend on what works for the kids. What works for your writers? I'd love to see some of your ideas!

What's your why?

As an educator, have you ever thought about WHY you do what you do? I'm willing to bet that you don't do it for the money or summers off. If you're like me, your WHY changes throughout the years.

Becoming a mother changed my 'why' in ways I could have never imagined. Not only that, but my relationship with my students began to change. I became more caring and nurturing toward kids that weren't even mine, yet they were mine. They'll always be "my kids." The amount of patience I had with my students grew infinitely! When I had my second child, I began to really see my students for the individuals they were rather than a classroom full of 20-something kiddos that were all ready to learn at the same pace and in the same ways.

When my personal children became school aged, my teaching changed once again. I have one child who just "gets" school. Things typically come easy to her. My other child has to work a little harder and longer to achieve mastery. We could blame it on age (being one of the youngest in the grade) or gender, but what good would that do?

On the way to school this morning, I was listening to comments like this:

I hate this!
I'm scared!
I'm not good at this!
Why do I have to go?
I don't want to make new friends!

...all because he was invited to attend a club in the early mornings for students who benefit from a little extra time working on their academic skills.

My immediate reaction was to talk about growth mindset and how we have to change our mindset when we're faced with things we don't want to do. That task may seem terrible at the time, but it's really set in place to HELP. Teaching a kid how to have a growth mindset is challenging, but I'm going to keep working at it!

Teaching students who are all ready for instruction at different levels is HARD, but my kids make me want to do better and BE better! My kids - the ones I birthed and the ones I teach on a daily basis - are my why. I want them to feel successful, but I also want them to realize that their versions of successful don't have to look like everyone else's.

Apps, Extensions, and Add-ons...Oh my!

Have you ever really taken the time to see what tools are available to you in the Google Web Store? I'm not even sure I'd know where to begin if it wasn't for an instructor or two sharing their expertise with me. Today, that very thing happened. I was able to sit in a class with many other educators from our district to learn from TCEA's very own Dr. Bruce Ellis (@drbruceellis).

I took PAGES and PAGES and PAGES of notes, but I'll spare you and only share a few of my favorite tools I learned about today.

Rewordify (rewordify.com)

Have you ever found an article that you wanted your students to read, but the reading level wasn't quite appropriate for all of your students? Rewordify is just the thing for you! It's so easy to use! Simply highlight, copy, and paste the section of the article that might need to be reworded. This tool will either re-word the hard words, or it will put synonyms in brackets next to those tougher vocabulary words. Settings can be changed by clicking on "Settings" in the top right-hand corner of the page.

For an example, I copied a recent blog post from my principal to see how it would change her words. Rewordify found 19 (NINETEEN!) hard words and gave me simpler synonyms. Sometimes, as adult readers, we forget which words are still hard for our kids, so I can definitely see this tool being useful this year with my fourth graders. I'm already picturing finding a passage/excerpt from a book that would be great for Guided Reading and using Rewordify to help support some of my lower level readers.

I also asked myself why I didn't know about this tool when I was going through grad school. It would have made all those journals so much easier to understand!

Timer Loop (app found in Google Web Store)

This app actually made me think of my Camp Gladiator trainer and how often she gets distracted by a camper who's asking questions while the rest of us are dripping in sweat waiting for her to change the exercise. She says one more minute, but what really happens is we're left hanging for three minutes which isn't really that long unless you're in the middle of doing bear crawls. Ha!

Timer Loop would be perfect for when your classes are going through stations/centers/guided reading groups. You can set up the timer for a specified work time and transition time, and it will continue looping until that station time is up.

I don't know about you, but I'm looking forward to not having to keep up with my timer during my rotation period. Timer Loop is going to be a time saver!

Google Tone (extension found in Google Web Store)

How much time do you spend creating QR codes or shortened URLs for your students? This tool is going to CHANGE YOUR LIFE! Google Tone allows you to broadcast any URL to other computers within earshot. This would be amazing for students working in small groups or at the teacher table. I could also see Google Tone being used during research units. When a student or teacher finds a good resource, all they have to do it click on the little blue megaphone extension in the toolbar to share it with everyone else's computer who might be sitting nearby. I will most definitely ensure Google Tone is added to all of my Chromebooks at the beginning of the 17-18 school year!

Appear.in (app, extension, and a website - https://appear.in/) 

Last, but certainly not least, I want to share Appear.in with you. I wasn't successful getting the app or extension to work, but the website worked fine. This is similar to Today's Meet, but with a video conferencing piece to it. My table group at today's class discussed a few different ways we could see this tool being useful:

* Students can meet with students in other classrooms (book studies!) or even at other campuses. Our GT teacher was especially excited about this possibility since it would give her GT students the opportunity to confer with like-minded students across the district.

* Teachers could plan with grade level teachers all over the district without having to leave school! We all know we already don't have enough time in the day, but how great would it be to quickly share an idea "face to face" from the comfort of your own classroom?

* Parent Conferences/Open House - As a teacher who is also a mom, I can appreciate how some parents simply can't get away or maybe don't want to drag little ones up to the school for a meeting. Appear.in is a perfect alternative! You can have a conference over the computer, and the parent can leave their napping toddlers in bed. It's a win for everyone! Also, we have an Open House scheduled for September. We invite parents up to hear more about academic expectations, homework requirements, and behavior policies. It's also a great time for parents to ask any questions they've had over the first few weeks of school if they haven't already been asked and answered. We could broadcast our presentation, and parents who can't leave the house can still participate!

I'll save some of my other favorite tools for another time. If you have suggestions about how you'd use any of these tools, I'd love to hear them!

I don't know about you, but I'm getting increasingly excited for the 2017-18 year!

A day in the life...

Today, I was given the opportunity to help complete some tasks that our campus principal has had on her "to do" list this summer. I went to school this morning to review the list with her. In my head, I was thinking, "I can totally finish this in a few hours! This should be a breeze."

Boy. Was. I. Ever. Wrong.

As a teacher, I'm sure you've asked yourself what your principal does all day not only during the school year but during all those summer weeks when we're not even in the building. Now that I've been given this little sneak peek, it's clear that she has no trouble keeping busy!

There were only eight (8!) things on the list. After about six(ish) hours of work, I was able to complete three things on the list. I plan to knock out at least one more of those jobs after dinner.

Please don't think I'm complaining. I'm actually grateful for the insight to an administrator's day. What I've accomplished today took a lot of work and time, but I'm proud of the products that came out of that effort. I can't wait to keep learning and growing in my role as a teacher and an aspiring administrator!

Make time for the things you love...

As a teacher, what's the one thing you look forward to doing with your students each day? Do you even have something like that? I sure hope so!

For me, it's our daily read aloud. From what I hear, a lot of teachers give up on the read aloud by the time students reach fourth grade. You know what? That just makes me sad. On days like today (state testing days) when we don't get to read together, I realize how important that time is with my students. We usually start each day by gathering in our meeting area "like a family" and devouring a chapter - or more if they're short. I intentionally choose a wide variety of books from different genres that most of my students probably wouldn't choose on their own. Together, we get to explore new places, travel through various periods of time, and meet all types of interesting characters.

Other teachers have asked how I find the time to be consistent with this practice. There are SO MANY skills we're responsible for teaching during the school year, but who says we can't teach some of those through the use of a read aloud? The best part about this type of authentic teaching is students often don't even realize they're being taught because they're so engrossed in the story. The learning happens naturally through discussions while reading.

Additionally, what better way is there to encourage a love for reading than for students to have a teacher who LOVES to read? I know that this works because there are numerous times when my students choose to checkout books to complete a series that we started as a read aloud, or maybe they look for books by particular authors they enjoyed. Possibly even better than that, is when they ask your opinion when looking for a new book to read because they trust you'll choose a good book that reflects their interests. We must make time for the things we love! 

What are some of you favorite read alouds? I'd love to add new books to our classroom library through your suggestions! 

Three Weeks

Tonight I cried in the car on the way to the mall. If you know me personally, you might think it was because of my hatred for clothes shopping. Nope. Not this time. For whatever reason, it hit me that there are only three weeks of school left. How did May arrive without me realizing it? In our community, I often run into parents and/or teachers, and nearly each one has asked me if I'm counting down the days until summer break. I can honestly say that I'm not. That hasn't always been the case, but I really do not have a countdown happening this year. This is my 13th year of teaching fourth graders. Every year, I feel that I'm a different teacher. I grow and change with each passing year as a result of my experiences. This year is no exception. In fact, I think I've done more growing and reflecting this year than any other year. I've tackled new challenges and have come to appreciate that I don't have all the answers and truly look forward to learning new practices. But let's get back to those tears shed earlier this evening. I'm not ready to let my students go yet. Some of them, I've just now (FINALLY!) been able to reach them and learn what makes them tick...and more importantly...what makes them smile! Three weeks isn't enough time to enjoy that! Teaching and all that it involves isn't always roses and butterflies, but getting pricked by a thorn on occasion is totally worth getting to see my kiddos bloom! I'm not ready to say goodbye yet, so I'm going to soak in these last few weeks and take every opportunity to make a few more memories with my kiddos. They deserve that!