Notes From McTeach

Text Poetry Image

2012-01-14T08:00:00.000-08:00

Once again, my seventh graders and I have enjoyed doing our text poetry activity. I'm currently looking for a new way to share their poems, something that will actually look like they texted me their assignment...without me having to give them my cellphone number. (This is always my students' first suggestion, by the way.)

I came across the website iFakeText via Tammy Worcester's Tech Tip of the Week and thought I'd give it a try:

The html code provided by the website didn't seem to work with my blog, so I took a screenshot to share with everyone. Unfortunately, it doesn't allow me to share the entire poem at one time. I'd have to create multiple entries along with several screenshots. It does look pretty cool, though!

Let's Jump Right In

2012-01-04T16:06:00.000-08:00

First day back after Christmas vacation for my students; how would I get us started? I stressed a little bit about this over the weekend.

Ok...actually, I stressed A LOT about this over the weekend! I wanted it to be something special, something poignant; something they would remember THE. REST. OF. THEIR. LIVES.

No pressure. And, clearly, no sense of reality either.

Finally, I decided to keep it simple...and fun. So we began our day today with a quick YouTube video. I prefaced this video with, "Now, I don't know what the person who posted this video wanted the title to be, but after you watch this I'll tell you what title I've given it. It has to do with starting back to school."

"And my title," I told the kids, "is....

Let's Jump Right In!"

Howls of laughter ensued. Well, it might have been more like very loud groans, but I choose to remember laughter.

Special thanks to Lee Kolbert for sharing this video on Facebook!

Happy New Year's Eve!

2011-12-31T08:17:00.000-08:00

May your New Year be filled with many blessings and plenty of warm memories!

Time For Change

2011-12-29T17:40:00.000-08:00

A couple of months ago I was walking along the beach at Bodega Head in Northern California, and I had something of a revelation. It was during the week that I had taken my seventh graders to camp and, while they spent the morning hiking around the cliffs with their teacher-naturalists, I had some quiet time to just be. It's not often that a teacher gets some time to herself; time that isn't filled with papers, emails, meetings, or lesson plans.

I'll admit that it was a bit disconcerting at first. I've become, sadly, unused to having time for myself. Even when I do take a break from the work that has taken over my life, my "free time" is spent reading blogs, books, and magazines that are all about education. Don't get me wrong. I'm not saying this is a bad thing. Education is something I am very passionate about, and I truly enjoy reading and learning all that I can. What I am saying, however, is that there can be more to my life.

There just doesn't seem to be.

What I realized at the beach that day was this has to change!

When I was growing up, I was incredibly passionate about three things: reading, writing, and photography. I could very easily lose myself for an entire day in any one of those three hobbies. Now, I can't seem to remember the last time I did that. Instead of losing myself in the pursuit of one of my passions, I feel as though I've just lost myself.

So, either I start wearing a t-shirt that says, "If found, please make me stop and breathe for a moment," or I start making some changes.

Well, I can't wear t-shirts to work, so...

I'm not going to sit here and write, "I vow to read for pleasure, write one poem or blog post, and take 50 pictures EVERY DAY!" That's far too much to commit to and I would last all of two days, I'm sure. What I will do is promise myself to at least remember that these are the things that make me happy, and I deserve some happiness. Right?

Right!

I know that in order to give of myself to my students, there must be something more inside me than just a feeling of emptiness. I need to fill the void with the activities I love the most. I must do the things that make me happy. And that means finding the time...no, not "finding" the time...making the time for happiness.

This is my goal for 2012: to get back to the person I always imagined I would become.

Much work lies ahead, but I'm up to the task. I'm ready to make time for change...how about you?

I love taking pictures of bees!

Everyone thinks of changing the world, but no one thinks of changing himself.
~Leo Tolstoy

If we don't change, we don't grow. If we don't grow, we aren't really living.
~Gail Sheehy

They must often change, who would be constant in happiness or wisdom.
~Confucius

Shared Passages

2011-11-06T07:01:00.000-08:00

Many thanks to those who have started sharing their favorite passages from literature. As they continue to come in I will add them to the following document so we can all enjoy them!

Favorite Lit Passages

If you have a favorite passage from literature that you would like to add to our document, please see the previous post Favorite Passages in Literature. My seventh graders and I greatly appreciate your help!

Favorite Passages in Literature

2011-11-04T10:53:00.000-07:00

I struggle each year with how to teach writing to middle schoolers. I know I write fairly well, but actually teaching writing is a totally different animal. Last night the thought occurred to me, "Do my students know what excellent writing looks like? Would it help them become better writers to look at some well-written sentences or paragraphs?"

When I was growing up, I used to write down favorite passages from my reading in a notebook that I carried with me everywhere. I've lost track of that notebook, sadly, so I want to re-create it...Google-style. And with the help of my amazing PLN!

Do you have a favorite passage from literature? Have you read something recently that made you stop and say, "Wow! I wish I could write like that!" If you do, I'm hoping you wouldn't mind sharing it with us. The link that follows is to a Google Doc I've created to gather all of our favorite passages. Please feel free to add your passages here:

Favorite Passages From Literature

If you've never used a Google Doc before, you might be more comfortable using this form to share your favorite passages:

&amp;amp;amp;lt;p&amp;amp;amp;gt;&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;lt;p&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;gt;Loading...&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;lt;/p&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;gt;&amp;amp;amp;lt;/p&amp;amp;amp;gt;

We truly appreciate any help you can offer us. I'll publish the document in a few days, after I start adding to it.

Photo Captions Contest Results

2011-10-15T09:07:00.000-07:00

For the second year in a row, I have asked my friends from around the world to vote in our seventh grade photo captions contest. This year we more than tripled the number of votes received! I can't thank everyone enough for taking the time to cast their votes. If you didn't know about the contest and would still like to have your say, please do. This contest was also an opportunity for me to demonstrate to my students just how amazing a PLN (Personal/Professional Learning Network) is. By collecting the locations of all respondents, I was able to create a Google Map with pins all over the world. My students loved it!

Before sharing the winners, let me explain the contest. A couple of weeks ago, I showed the pictures in this slideshow to my seventh graders:

As I showed each picture on the ActivBoard, they were to write down one or two captions they felt went with the photograph. After they'd written their captions for the first picture, I asked for a few volunteers to share theirs. I wanted to make sure that everyone was clear on the assignment; I know examples always help me understand a task much better.

Their homework that evening was to add all of their captions into a Google Form that I had created for them. I waited a few days, and then I chose what I felt were the top five responses for each photo. That's when my wonderful PLN joined in. I created this Google Form and sent it out to the world via Twitter, Facebook, and Plurk.

&amp;amp;amp;lt;p&amp;amp;amp;gt;&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;lt;p&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;gt;&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;lt;p&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;gt;Loading...&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;lt;/p&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;gt;&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;lt;/p&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;gt;&amp;amp;amp;lt;/p&amp;amp;amp;gt;

As the votes came in, I took the location of each respondent and placed it into this Google Map:

View Photo Captions Contest in a larger map

I loved adding the pins and seeing where people were voting from! I just hope my students enjoyed it half as much as I did.

I use Google Forms frequently throughout the school year, and one of the things I love the most is the option for a summary response. So rather than going through all of the data from the spreadsheet that looks like this:

Click on "Form" and then "Show summary of responses" and you'll have a much quicker way to discover the winner of our contest.

So, speaking of the winners, I've revised the first Google Presentation to show the winning captions. Thank you, again, to all who have voted!

International Dot Day 2011

2011-09-15T19:40:00.000-07:00

In celebrating International Dot Day today, I had the opportunity to read The Dot to three different classes: my seventh graders, the sixth graders and second graders. Before reading this wonderful book to my seventh graders this morning, I asked them to define "creativity". Some of their responses:

It lets you express your feelings through art or music.

The ability given to everyone to think outside the box and always have a unique idea.

With creativity, you can tell a story without talking.

Being your own person.

Imagining something new and original and putting it into the world.

Before reading the book to both the sixth and second graders, I asked the same question: "How many of you think of yourself as an artist?" I found it very interesting that only about half of the sixth graders raised their hands, while every one of our thirty-six second graders threw their hands up in the air. I wonder, if I were able to ask this same question at our diocesan staff day next week, how many teachers would answer "yes!"

At what point in our education did we go from artist to student?

The second graders had some amazing insight to share with me today. I asked them to tell me what they thought art was. They had so many wonderful answers that I wish I had thought to write them down. I remember one piece of wisdom:

It's when you use your imagination and put it on paper.

I asked the second graders if they thought books could be considered "art." The consensus seemed to be that books could only be considered art if they had pictures, lots of pictures. "Oh," I said, "you mean the big books we read in middle school wouldn't be art?" No, definitely not.

I tried a different question. "Do y'all know what poetry is?" They did. After a few more questions from me, they decided that poetry could be considered art because "it paints a picture in our imagination."

"Well," I said, "when I read a book that doesn't have any pictures, I always get a picture in my imagination. So, what do you think? Can books be art?"

That got them thinking!

Before leaving my classroom, the two girls who had been sitting right in front of me asked, "Will you still be here when we get to middle school?"

"I sure hope so."

They both responded with, "Yes!!"

Ok, that was cool!

Our Dots

We didn't finish all of our dots today, but I do want to share a couple with you. One student decided to combine our We All Matter project with his Dot Day artwork:

This same student also created a stop-motion video celebrating Dot Day which I hope he eventually shares with the world. It's amazing!

A couple of students asked if they could make their dots 3-D. Absolutely!

Students were even surprised to discover they were surrounded by dots in our own classroom:

We'll be finishing up our dot-work tomorrow; hopefully I'll have even more to share with everyone!

EdCampSFBay

2011-08-22T08:16:00.000-07:00

I'd never been to an EdCamp before, and I had no idea what to expect of the day. I was immensely curious, but I was also immensely stressed. The first day of school was days away and there was still so much work to be done. I really should go to school and work in my classroom...that was the thought that kept rattling around my brain.

I knew what I should do, but I also knew what I really, really wanted to do.

Now that the day has passed, I think we should have an EdCamp every year right before school starts. As I was driving home Saturday night, I felt inspired and re-charged. Exactly what a teacher needs at the end of her summer.

As always, the best part of any conference - or even an unconference - is the conversations in the sessions, at lunch, in the halls, and even at dinner after the conference. Imagine a room full of people all passionate about the same thing having a conversation about the thing that drives them the most. Then imagine the potential energy that could come from that room.

And now, multiply that by five rooms. Ten rooms. That, my friends, is EdCamp.

For those who have never been to an EdCamp before, let me explain a few things. When you arrive, one of the first things you will see is the sessions board:

The beauty of EdCamp is anyone can lead a session! You just need to fill out a card describing your session and post it to the board. Then, we vote with our feet. You go to the session that sounds interesting, and if, after listening for a few minutes you decide it's not for you then you get up and walk to the next session that appeals to you. No hard feelings. We're all there for the same reason: to learn, to connect, to collaborate.

And, by the way, if there isn't a session in any given time slot that appeals to you, guess what! You don't have to go! In fact, one of the best conversations I had at EdCamp was at a time when I "should have been" in a "regular" session. A group of us walked back to the cafeteria to check out the board and ended up standing in front of it having a wonderful conversation. A conversation that led Tina Schneider (one of the founders of LiveBinders) and I to add a new session to the board. "Where Are You?" wound up being a fabulous session where a group of us tried to figure out why there aren't more teachers in California coming to events like this or being involved in social media like Twitter. To be honest, I was surprised that anyone actually showed up to our session! But of all the conversations I had at EdCamp, that was the one that has me most fired up!

Special thanks to Alice Keeler for taking such awesome notes during the session! Here is her Google Doc.

Special thanks also to Catina Haugen for her lovely post about EdCampSFBay and our session! EdCampSFBay Got Me Fired Up!

And speaking of LiveBinders, I'm so glad Tina and Barbara decided to lead a session about their fabulous product!! I've been using LiveBinders for a while now, but I still managed to learn some cool stuff. They've made some awesome updates this summer; I'm especially excited about the new shelfs feature! Now I can "shelve" other contributors' binders for future reference, and whenever a binder is updated my "copy" of that binder will be automatically updated. Very, very cool!! Oh, and don't even get me started on the updated text editor!

Here's the binder the ladies created for their presentation: EdCampSFBay LiveBinder Presentation. The first tab in the binder has some great information on how to use their site. The binder also has some fabulous examples of binders that have been created by a number of different educators. I loved seeing my friend Jason Schrage's Cold War binder being showcased here. Such a wonderful way to assign a project to students!

The last session I attended was run by Dan Callahan, Mr. EdCamp himself. The session was a discussion on how we can use the EdCamp model at our own schools and districts. It really is a fantastic idea! Because it all comes down to choice. Teachers are allowed to choose their own learning for themselves. What an interesting concept!

What would happen if we held an EdCamp for Kids? What would that look like?

Barbara from LiveBinders, me, Lisa Dabbs

Of course, the most important part of EdCampSFBay for me was the people. Reconnecting with old friends and making new ones. Those are the connections that matter. And that is why I went.

Links of Interest:

Special Thanks to Our Sponsors:

Shark Week

2011-08-06T18:03:00.000-07:00

As much as I love watching Shark Week on the Discovery Channel each year, I don't quite celebrate it with as much style as the folks at Discovery do. This video shows how they manage to attach a shark, complete with a tail fin that is seven stories tall, onto One Discovery Place. Very cool!

Shark Week - Shark Building!
Get More: Shark Week - Shark Building!

How Do You Tie Your Shoes?

2011-08-01T11:35:00.000-07:00

I know...it's an odd question for a blog post. But, stay with me. I recently had the privilege of attending the Google Teacher Academy in Seattle, Washington. One of our presenters, Cory Pavicich, shared the following video with us:

While we had a great deal of fun both watching the video and then trying to tie our shoes like the young man does, it got me thinking. [Shocking, I know.] I think this could be a great video to use when working with teachers as a reminder that there are not only many ways to learn, but there are also many ways to teach. I thought I was pretty cool when I saw the second idea in the video and said, "That's how I tie my shoes!" And then the young man moved on to the "really, really fast" version. And it hit me: I may know one way to tie my shoes that has always worked for me, but that doesn't mean it's the best way. It certainly doesn't mean it's the only way.

It's never even occurred to me to look for other ways. I mean, why should I? The way I do it works just fine for me, after all. I've been doing it this way for years! I'm not about to change my thinking on something that works...for me.

Sound familiar? Ever heard another teacher say those words?

The next time I do a professional development session, I'm going to start out by asking the teachers in attendance: How many of you have been tying your shoes the same way for years?

Sidenote: If you haven't used Quietube for videos, I highly recommend it! It takes the link to any YouTube video and creates a clean presentation, with no other videos or ads. Check this link for the same video shown above: How to Tie A Shoelace Really, Really Fast.

Sometimes A Great Notion Comes Again

2011-07-20T18:17:00.000-07:00

In a post I wrote earlier today (Sometimes A Great Notion), I talked about the positive impact something as simple as a Twitter hashtag can have on our profession or, more to the point, on the perception that many seem to have about our profession. The question I asked in that post was "What would happen if we focused less on all of the negativity aimed at teaching and teachers, and, instead, started focusing on the positive aspects of our career?"

After I finished writing that post, I decided it was time to read for a bit. So I plopped myself down on the couch and grabbed my book, The Element by Sir Ken Robinson. After about five minutes, I came upon the following passages:

"What we think of ourselves and of the world makes us who we are and what we can be. This is what Hamlet means when he says, 'There is nothing good or bad, only thinking makes it so.' The good news is that we can always try to think differently. If we create our worldview, we can re-create it too by taking a different perspective and reframing our situation." p. 81

"In the nineteenth century, William James became one of the founding thinkers of modern psychology. By then, it was becoming more widely understood that our ideas and ways of thinking could imprison or liberate us. James put it this way: 'The greatest discovery of my generation is that human beings can alter their lives by altering their attitude of mind. ... If you change your mind, you can change your life.'" p. 82

Both of these passages describe how an individual can make positive changes in his life by simply changing his outlook. This may seem too simplistic to you, especially if you're thinking you have to be willing to work harder in order to make changes in your life. While that may be true, I would suggest that before you can make any kind of changes in your life, you have to first believe that change is possible. And that's where, for many of us, a new outlook would be most beneficial.

But what would happen if in changing our perspective we also managed to change the views of many others? What if thinking positively about teaching could change not only us as teachers, but all those who make decisions about us and our profession? I know you may be rolling your eyes at me right now, but, honestly, what have we got to lose? Nothing!

"What have we got to lose?" That's negative thinking. The question really should be: "What have we to gain?"

So, how can you add a more positive outlook to your career? Care to help me figure this out?

Sometimes A Great Notion

2011-07-20T10:23:00.000-07:00

I am constantly amazed at the level of awesomeness that comes out of my PLN on a daily basis. Occasionally, something that seems like a simple idea turns in to something awe-inspiring. At a time when so much negativity is aimed at our profession, Nick Provenzano decided to focus on the good that we as teachers do. His recent blog post, #SchoolDidAGoodThing, describes his idea of having people on Twitter talk about the positive aspects of their own education using the hashtag #SchoolDidAGoodThing.

I wonder if Nick had any idea what his idea would lead to. People talking positively about their education, and sharing some inspirational thoughts in 140 characters or less. Looking through the hashtag stream, not only can you get a sense of why so many of us became teachers, but you can also see quite clearly what an amazing impact we can have on the children in our lives. Even if we don't know it.

How many students have come into our classrooms just needing to be seen by someone? To be recognized as a person of value? A person who has great potential to do good in this world? But if there isn't anyone in their life to see that and point it out to them, what happens to that child?

I begin each school day by greeting my students at the door, looking into their eyes and saying "Good Morning!" What do I see when they look back at me? Do I see the student who aces every test because school is too easy for her? Do I see the student who rarely does his homework? Do I see the student who doesn't always have a lunch because mom and dad are so wrapped up in getting divorced that they've forgotten they still need to take care of their children?

Of course not. What I see when I greet my students each morning are young people who want to be treated as people with tremendous potential. They want to know they are cared for first and foremost. "And, hey, if we can learn some stuff too, that'd be cool."

I'm sorry if I've gotten a bit off track here. But reading through the #SchoolDidAGoodThing hashtag has me thinking about why I became a teacher in the first place. I've been struggling this summer with whether or not I should remain in the classroom. Teaching is an unbelievably hard job, but it is also the most important job I've ever had. I've faced a lot of negativity in the last year or so that has made my job even harder. I wonder what would happen if I focused only on the positive aspects of my job during the next year. How would that impact me as a teacher and as a person? And how will it impact my students?

And that is why Nick's idea is such a valuable one. It has people focused on the positive aspects of our profession.

A week or so before Thanksgiving each year, I have my students start keeping a gratitude journal. Each evening they have to write down three things that they were grateful for from that day. I explain to them that the theory is the more you focus on your gratitude, the more things will come into your life that you can be grateful for.

And so I ask you: What would happen if we focused less on all of the negativity aimed at teaching and teachers, and, instead, started focusing on the positive aspects of our career? Perhaps it seems too simplistic to you. But haven't you ever noticed that sometimes the greatest ideas are truly simple?

If you'd like to see the impact this idea is already having, be sure to read Nick's update, #SchoolDidAGoodThing - Follow Up. And then, if you are on Twitter, add your thoughts on how school was a positive thing for you and use the hashtag #SchoolDidAGoodThing.

Please join us!

Think Outside The Search

2011-07-06T19:41:00.000-07:00

I recently had the opportunity to attend a Google search class led by Dan Russell at the Googleplex in Mountain View, California. This was actually the second time I'd taken the class, and even though it was held the night before I was to get on a plane to head to the ISTE Conference in Philadelphia, I'm definitely glad I went. I got a lot more out of the class the second time around, perhaps because I was better able to keep up as I already had some background knowledge (hmmm...isn't that what every student needs?)

After an evening of learning, one thing was abundantly clear: we need to teach our students how to search! Do you have students who insist on typing their entire question into the Google search bar? Do they even include the question mark? Or do they just go straight to Wikipedia? [Not that there's anything wrong with that...as a starting point.]

So I'm adding to my summer to-do list creating a lesson or two for my seventh graders on how to search the web. Fortunately, Google already has some lessons created that we can all use as a jumping off point.

Google Web Search - Classroom Lessons and Resources

You can find more lessons and other goodies on the site that was shared with us during the search class:

Google Search Education Evangelism

And in case you haven't seen these, here are some handouts and posters for your classroom:

Google for Educators - Classroom Posters
Google Librarian Central - Tools (I like giving my students the bookmark to use as a reference tool throughout the year)

Have you seen A Google A Day yet? It might be a great way to encourage students to use better web search skills. Each day Google offers a question that can be researched by students. You could even make it a game where the first student to find the correct answer wins. The trick is to use the best search terms possible. Here are some tips to share with students that I picked up during the Google search class:

Before you type anything, think about what you would expect to find on the site you're looking for. Choose keywords that might appear on that site.
In choosing keywords to search with, start with the simplest terms. If that doesn't get you the results you were looking for, try using synonyms of your search terms.
Try using specific terms if you know them, but be sure you've got the words right or you could be sending yourself on a wild goose chase.

One of the best tips we can share with our students and with other teachers is how to find a specific term on a long webpage. The Find command will help you quickly find exactly what you need on a page. Try using it on a lengthy Wikipedia page and you'll quickly fall in love with Control-F (PC) or Command-F (Mac)!

As many cool tips as we learned that evening, I think the biggest reaction from the class came when we discovered this:

That's right! You can now search for recipes! Not only that, but you can narrow your search down based on ingredients, cooking time or calorie count.

Move over, Betty Crocker! Here comes Google!!

Graduation 2011

2011-07-04T15:47:00.000-07:00

As a middle school teacher who works with eighth graders, one of my responsibilities is to present the social studies awards to our graduating class. Rather than just dive right in to listing the names of those who excelled throughout the year, I take the opportunity to say my "official" goodbye to the students I've worked with for two years.

It's never an easy task to say "goodbye" to students you've grown quite fond of. But, this year was even harder. I knew as I spoke these words that I would not be addressing a graduating class again; I will no longer be teaching eighth graders. Perhaps I should be thankful that next year I won't have to stand up in front of hundreds of parents, grandparents, students, faculty and staff, and share my personal thoughts.

Perhaps.

After graduation, a number of parents and several of my co-workers asked if they could have a copy of what I said to my students. I was more than happy to oblige as it made me feel wonderful that I had managed to touch a few people. Of course, if I was willing to share my words with my school community, I knew I would also want to share them with the members of my PLN.

The following is from our eighth grade awards ceremony, June 3, 2011.

Good morning, Eighth Grade!

I would like to share a passage with you that I found recently. A little reminder for you as you leave us:

"It’s so important to surround yourself with the right kinds of people when you are striving to live a meaningful life. We cannot always choose whom we walk with on our paths in life, but whenever we can, it makes everything easier, more joyful, and so much more productive when we choose to spend our days with people who bring out the best in us, see the best in us, and believe the best about us. Seek people who make you want to become a better person, the kinds of people who are focusing on positive and good things in life. It will inevitably rub off on you and before you know it, YOU will be the one that others are seeking out because YOU are leaving everyone better, happier, and more hopeful than they were before you found them. You have SO MUCH more influence than you know."

[as quoted in Tales of the Revolution: True Stories of People who are Poking the Box and Making a Difference by Seth Godin]

I can honestly tell you today, that because of all of you, my world has been a better, happier, and more hopeful place. And, as hard as it is to say goodbye, as much as I will miss you, it is time for you to go. You see, there is much work to be done, and you’re ready to begin it.

Former football coach Lou Holtz once said, “I can't believe that God put us on this earth to be ordinary.” Today, we say goodbye to 36 extraordinary individuals. I am so proud of each and every one of you. I know that each of you will do great things. I expect nothing less.

Our theme this year was Imagination. I would ask you today to imagine the future you want for yourselves, and then go out and make it happen. And remember, who you are and who you will become are not defined by what others may say. You create that definition every day of your life with every choice you make. So, choose wisely, my friends.

Your ASCD 2011 Experience

2011-03-30T07:49:00.000-07:00

This afternoon at our faculty meeting I will have about five minutes to summarize all that I learned at ASCD's annual conference held this past weekend in San Francisco. I could really use your help with this! If you have a few minutes, could you answer a few questions for me? Or add some links to a Google Doc? Or add to a list of books? I truly appreciate it!!

&amp;amp;amp;lt;p&amp;amp;amp;gt;&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;lt;p&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;gt;&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;lt;p&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;gt;Loading...&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;lt;/p&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;gt;&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;lt;/p&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;gt;&amp;amp;amp;lt;/p&amp;amp;amp;gt;

Were any links shared during your sessions at ASCD? Your PLN, especially those who could not attend the conference, would love it if you could share those links here:

Links Shared at ASCD

I've also started a Google Doc for the books we heard mentioned at the conference. If you heard of any great books while you were at the conference, please feel free to add them here:

Our Reading List from ASCD 2011

Thank you for your help with this! I'll add your information to my reflection post when I get it written (hopefully by the weekend!)

My PLN Rocks!!

The Stamp Act - CTK Style

2011-01-19T16:14:00.000-08:00

The Stamp Act of 1765
AN ACT for granting and applying certain stamp duties, and other duties, in the British colonies and plantations in America, towards further defraying the expenses of defending, protecting, and securing the same; and for amending such parts of the several acts of parliament relating to the trade and revenues of the said colonies and plantations, as direct the manner of determining and recovering the penalties and forfeitures therein mentioned.

At the very last minute before social studies with the eighth graders today, I decided to change it up a bit and start out with a huge lie! I just hoped they would buy into it. So I began...

Good morning, ladies and gentlemen. Before we begin, I wanted to make sure you were aware of the new policy concerning student handouts. In order to help meet some of our expenses here at school, it has been decided that we will start charging students for each and every handout we distribute in class. Students will be charged one cent for every page they receive; so a handout that has five pages will cost you five cents. If a student loses a handout, it will cost five cents per page to replace it.

I'm sure you can imagine how high our paper costs are each month...teachers use a lot of paper! And we need to pass that cost along to the students. After all, these handouts are for your benefit anyway!

They totally bought it!

There followed the briefest moment of silence until..."WHAT!!!" And for the next thirty minutes we discussed, argued, and plotted. At one point Daniel offered up a huge hint:

This is sounding an awful lot like what happened between the colonists and the British.

I actually laughed after he said that, thinking that the jig was up and they would figure out that I'd made the whole thing up.

Nope!

Some of the comments from students included:

What if we refuse to pay?

Do our parents already know?

Are we supposed to bring pennies every day?

Another reason to go paperless! (my favorite!)

And, of course, the obligatory:

That's not fair!!

One argument that came up was that families pay tuition in order for their children to go to a Catholic school and items such as handouts should be covered by that tuition. I responded, truthfully, with "Tuition doesn't cover all of the costs to run a school. It doesn't even cover teachers' salaries. Remember, we didn't get a raise last year? And it's quite likely that we won't get a raise this year."

At one point, I stopped the discussion saying, "I can't believe I've spent almost an entire class period talking about paper!" I asked them to open their books and then asked Jack to read the paragraph about the Stamp Act of 1765. I assumed, incorrectly, that this would lead my students to understand the deception I had led them into.

Instead, it led them to start plotting. "Let's have our own tea party!" "We should tar and feather them!" Luke, a temporary voice of reason, offered up an idea for a boycott. "I say we 'borrow' the handouts, write everything down on a piece of binder paper, and then give them back their paper. Then they can't charge us."

Well, we'd still be making the copies, so we would still have to charge you for them.

"Ok," Luke decided, "if a boycott won't work, then I say we take their paper and stuff the sinks and toilets with it!"

This, of course, received a rousing cheer from his frustrated classmates.

I explained to the class that this would be considered vandalism to school property. At a time when they were applying to the local Catholic high schools, did they really want to risk being turned away from the future they had planned out for themselves?

It got very quiet for a moment.

And then the complaining started again. Questions came up about how the school was spending their money. Perhaps better financial decisions needed to be made, and they had a few suggestions (some of which I even agreed with). I stopped them and asked for a show of hands of those who could understand why the school would want to raise funds this way. Nearly every student had their hand in the air. "And how many are opposed to this idea?" All but two.

I asked them to explain why they would oppose something that they seemed to understand the reasoning behind. "It isn't fair!" reared its ugly head once again, and then someone offered the perfect question:

When was this discussed? Who was there?

"Beautiful!" I thought to myself. And then I responded, "I don't think it was really discussed. The decision was made by those over there" and I pointed toward the school office.

Oh come on!

That's not right!

"What do you mean, it's not right?" I asked. "Y'all said you understood the reasoning for needing to raise the money. Doesn't the school have the right to ask you to pay for expenses for your education? Why should WE have to pay for YOUR education?"

More complaining ensued and I heard Sam mention how the British had treated the colonists. We were getting close to the end of the class period, so I interrupted the conversation, stood in front of them and just smiled. It took a moment or two, but then...

NO WAY!!

Seriously...you made it all up?!

I reminded the class that, early in the discussion, Daniel had drawn the comparison between what I had told them and what had happened between the British and the colonists in the 18th century. I was rather surprised they didn't catch on at that point. A loud groan escaped my classroom! They couldn't believe it either. I went on to explain that I had put them in the position of the colonists who were frustrated with the British placing tax after tax on them without giving them a voice in Parliament.

And they got it! They really understood why the colonists could become angry at the way they were treated by the British and why they would eventually issue a Declaration. It was probably the best teaching moment of the year for me! The looks on their faces were absolutely priceless! I hope this gives them a totally different perspective on the American Revolution as we move forward in the unit.

Wait...do I have to bring pennies tomorrow or not?

Sigh.

Another Trip to the Library

2011-01-01T07:44:00.000-08:00

Take four seventh grade girls, plop them in the middle of the teen section at the local library, and just listen. You're in for, at the least, a very interesting morning. Of course, if you were sitting with my students, you might just laugh yourself silly and then be absolutely amazed...all in the space of about ten seconds.

Welcome to middle school. This is no place for wimps.

I met four of my students at the library again this week, hoping to sit and talk about books for a couple of hours. The girls who showed up on Wednesday are incredible readers, so I took advantage of our time together and asked them to help me create a list of recommended books. If you're looking for something to read from the young adult genre, this is a good place to start (along with the list I provided in my previous post).

These are in no particular order:

Fablehaven by Brandon Mull
The Host by Stephenie Meyer
Poison Apples by Lily Archer
Firestorm by David Klass
Harry Potter Series by J.K. Rowling
Eyes Like Stars by Lisa Mantchev
Fire by Kristin Cashore
Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen
The Chronicles of Narnia by C.S. Lewis
Paisley Hanover Acts Out by Cameron Tuttle
The Uglies (series) by Scott Westerfeld
Kiki Strike: Inside the Shadow City by Kirsten Miller
The Giver by Lois Lowry
Savvy by Ingrid Law
Somebody Everybody Listens To by Suzanne Supplee
Speak by Laurie Halse Anderson
The Last Song by Nicholas Sparks (I think every one of my girls has read this one)
Pretty Little Liars series by Sara Shepard
Gathering Blue by Lois Lowry
Kira-Kira by Cynthia Kadohata
The Mysterious Benedict Society by Trenton Lee Stewart
Beautiful Creatures by Kami Garcia and Margaret Stohl
Beautiful Darkness by Kami Garcia and Margaret Stohl
The Mortal Instruments series (City of Bones, City of Ashes, City of Glass) by Casandra Clare
Ender's Game by Orson Scott Card
The Looking Glass Wars by Frank Beddor
Skeleton Creek by Patrick Carman
The Extraordinary Secrets of April, May and June by Robin Benway
The Year of Secret Assignments by Jaclyn Moriarty
The Name of This Book is Secret (series) by Pseudonymous Bosch
Buffy the Vampire Slayer by Arthur Byron Cover, Alice Henderson, and John Vornholt
Mouse Tales: A Behind-the-Ears Look at Disneyland by David Koenig
Paper Towns by John Green

My students are always giving me the titles of book that I just have to read. So I created a Google Spreadsheet for them to add the titles to. Some of the books they've added, that I haven't mentioned here or in my previous post:

The Summer I Turned Pretty by Jenny Han (seriously, if Hannah tells me this is "the best book EVER!!!" one more time, I might just snap!)
It's Not Summer Without You by Jenny Han
Rush by Jonathan Friesen
Harmless by Dana Reinhardt
Just Listen by Sarah Dessen (Amanda recommends anything by her favorite author)
Along for the Ride by Sarah Dessen
Sunrise Over Fallujah by Walter Dean Myers (Joey's comment: "You should just read it.")
Under the Dome by Stephen King
The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie by Alan Bradley
Go Ask Alice by Anonymous (Dylan says: "It's a great teaching book.")
The Cupcake Queen by Heather Hepler
Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants by Ann Brashares
Revolution by Jennifer Donnelly (Taryn adds: "It was just so sad and beautiful at the same time.")

And if you're curious as to what books my students checked out from the library on Wednesday, here's a picture I took of our table (and these aren't even all the books that were checked out):

We also had three iPod Touches with us, so we discussed some of their favorite apps, including Livesketch which they were happy to demonstrate for me:

I have some amazingly talented artists in my class! That one was created by Lanvi; the following was done by Gaby:

Lanvi let me try it out on her iPod, but I didn't feel the need to take a picture of my, um, "creation".

Some of the other apps we talked about:

Doodle Jump (incredibly addictive game!)
Talking Tom Cat (he repeats whatever you say with a strange voice that makes middle school girls giggle...which makes their teacher giggle at them!)
Talking Gugl (a funny looking little creature who does the same thing as Talking Tom Cat)
Finger Balance (I think this one would drive me mad)
Fruit Ninja (I love this one!)
Veggie Samurai (I really shouldn't get this, but you know I will!)
Cut The Rope (yet another highly addictive game!)

If you need any other suggestions, I know my students will be more than happy to share their thoughts with us! Happy New Year!

Today's Book List

2010-12-22T21:52:00.000-08:00

As I lay in bed this morning wondering why I was awake at 5:00 a.m., I had to listen to this rather annoying battle. The battle was between my still-recovering body, wishing for a few more hours of sweet, non-cough-interrupting sleep, and my head that was looking forward to seeing my students at the most beautiful library in Northern California (one of them, anyway), anxious to get the day started!

Before you start making phone calls (“Hello, funny farm?”), keep in mind that I’ve been under the influence of cold medicine for several days. My thoughts are not always entirely my own.

No, seriously. Put the phone down.

Back to this morning…eventually my head won out and I got up and prepared for my day. Everything I needed was already in my backpack: laptop, iPod, notebook and pens, and, of course, my book. I was ready!

I just needed to wait for about four hours before I could leave. [sigh]

I share this description of my morning with you for one reason: So that you may better understand my dismay when I arrived at the library and, after paying my parking fee, discovered that the library was CLOSED! That’s right! CLOSED! “Due to budget cuts.” Budget cuts? Is that why they did NOT close the parking garage? Because they wanted some poor teacher to pay her $2 parking fee before discovering that the library was closed?! That was particularly irksome!

And then the disappointment set in. I was so looking forward to sitting on those lovely purple couches in the teen section with my kids, talking about our favorite books.

Alas, ’twas not to be.

Plan B was quickly put into action. And that’s “Plan B” for “Barnes and Noble.” My friend Karen and I walked with six seventh graders and one mom from the library into downtown Walnut Creek to take up residence in the cafe at Barnes and Noble.

As we walked into the store, Karen stopped us all and gave the kids their instructions. They were to go find a copy of their all-time favorite book and bring it to the cafe with them. “Just ONE, Taryn!”

“But…”

“One!”

She still showed up with two. Ok, I know how she felt. I was given the same instructions and didn’t know what to do! Just one? One in each genre? One for each decade of my life? I mean, seriously…one???

After we each picked our favorite book, we met in the cafe and sat there for almost two hours talking about nothing but books! What a wonderful way to spend a morning! Honestly, if you teach literature I highly recommend spending some time just listening to your students talk about what they’re reading; about what they love to read. Not only will you learn a lot about your students, you might also learn a good deal about what they need from you as their teacher. They don’t need someone to force-feed them the books that just happen to be in your classroom cupboard or that might be on somebody’s “Every Middle School Student Must Read These Books Before High School” list. That’s the quickest way to get them to stop reading! Or worse…hate reading!

Listen to them talk about the stories they love and then take a step back and let them share their books with each other. I watched in wonder one day as one student finished the book she was reading and then walked it over to another student who wanted to read the book. That student put down her own book, picked up the new book, and immediately started reading it. I watched as she carried the book with her around the classroom, reading as she went back and forth to her locker, packing her things at the end of the day. My students amaze me!

Back to today…

As we were talking about books, I started compiling a list of recommended books and thought I’d share them here. I know there may be a few that I missed, but this is definitely a good start to any reading list.

Student Recommendations

Dash and Lily’s Book of Dares by Rachel Cohn and David Levithan
Nevermore by Kelly Creagh
Thirteen Reasons Why by Jay Asher
The Maximum Ride series by James Patterson
Heaven Looks A Lot Like the Mall by Wendy Mass
Because I Am Furniture by Thalia Chaltas
Hush, Hush by Becca Fitzpatrick
Before I Fall by Lauren Oliver
When It Happens by Susane Colasanti
Paper Bullets by Kip Fulbeck
City of Glass by Cassandra Clare

Teacher Recommendations

The Boy Who Dared by Susan Campbell Bartoletti
The Book Thief by Markus Zusak
Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy
The Historian by Elizabeth Kostova
Angle of Repose by Wallace Stegner

[Cross-posted from Miss McMillan's Blog]

The 2010 Edublog Awards

2010-11-26T19:26:00.000-08:00

From the Edublog Awards website:

Welcome to the 2010 Edublog Awards.
Celebrating the achievements of edubloggers, twitterers, podcasters, video makers, online communities, wiki hosts and other web based users of educational technology.
Now into our 7th year!

When I first decided to write this post, I had absolutely no idea how hard it would be to choose just one person, blog or wiki for each category. After struggling to make my decisions, I came to the realization that the fact that this was so difficult is a good thing. A very good thing. The difficulty reminds me that our PLN is so rich with amazing people who do amazing things and share everything with all of us. How lucky we are!

Here are my nominations:

Best individual blog:
The Principal's Page Sometimes the best thing we can do for ourselves is to laugh at ourselves. I can always count on Michael Smith's blog to remind me that we should never take ourselves or our jobs so seriously that we lose sight of why we got into education in the first place.

Best individual tweeter:
Kelly Tenkely Whether on her blog or on Twitter, Kelly is someone I can always count on to share fabulous links, great information, and wonderful advice. How lucky we are to have her in our PLN!

Best resource sharing blog:
iLearnTechnology Without a doubt, Kelly Tenkely's blog has an amazing wealth of resources, including those of her own creation (check out the Bloomin' Peacock)

Most influential blog post:
"I'm Not Who You Think I Am," on A GeekyMomma's Blog
If we are defining "most influential blog post" by the amount of conversation it prompted, then this wonderful post by Lee Kolbert (@TeachaKidd on Twitter) should receive many, many votes!

Most influential tweet / series of tweets / tweet based discussion:
#speakloudly Think back a few years and ask yourself if you could have imagined protesting something as heinous as book banning with a simple hashtag (of course, you would also have to explain to your back-then-self what a hashtag is).

Best librarian / library blog:
The Daring Librarian I knew I was going to love Gwyneth Jones' blog when I saw the words "with sweet snarky freshness" in the blog header. That's my kind of librarian!

Best educational wiki:
New Tools Workshop Seriously, if you can't find it here on Joyce Valenza's wiki, it doesn't exist!

Best educational webinar series:
Classroom 2.0 Live If you are looking for me on Saturday mornings, this is the first place you should look. Every weekend I learn something that I can use in my classroom the following Monday; every weekend I am inspired to keep trying new ideas in my classroom.

Best educational use of a social network:
The Classroom 2.0 Ning. If you belong to only one ning, this should be the one! Educators from all over the world gather here to share knowledge, ask questions, and provide support. It exemplifies what a "social network" should be.

Best use of a PLN:
The ISTE Newbie Project A project developed by Beth Still, the ISTE Newbie Project puts our PLN to the task of raising enough funds to send one educator to ISTE each year.

Lifetime achievement:
Vicki Davis, the Cool Cat Teacher herself! How many of us have learned so much from Vicki! From her award-winning blog to projects like the Flat Classroom Project, she inspires educators around the world to bring 21st-Century learning into their classrooms and to find new and exciting ways to collaborate with other educators around the world.

A Little Low Tech

2010-11-10T22:20:00.000-08:00

One of the ways I have my students get ready for a spelling test is by creating what we call Spelling Art. Using their twenty spelling words, they create any piece of art that they'd like. The only rules:

Use all of the words.
Use color.
Have fun.

Most students will use a pencil to outline the picture and then add the words along those lines, adding color as they go. I always love seeing what my students come up with. Sometimes they are personal statements:

Sometimes they come with a punchline: "I like minions."

Occasionally a student turns in an incredible work of art:

And then there are those that are just so amazingly cool that you want to share them with everyone you see...like Taryn's spelling art...

of a spelling test!

Live From Pleasant Hill...It's McTeach

2010-10-17T17:00:00.000-07:00

The Classroom 2.0 Live Featured Teacher? Me??? Alright, who messed up? Was no one else available? Did somebody lose a bet?

Ok, in all honesty, I was tremendously honored to be last week's Featured Teacher on the Classroom 2.0 Live show! Honored and incredibly nervous! I know I've grown, however, because in the past my anxiety would have gotten the better of me and I would have found some excuse to not participate. That never even entered my mind last week! That is growth, my friends!

I definitely owe a great big

to Peggy George and Kim Caise for helping me prep for and then get through the session. You ladies made it so much easier than I was afraid it would be! I can't thank you enough for the honor and your patience.

If you are interested in listening to the show, click here for the full recording. You can find the links shared during the show here.

So, let me ask one question: If I can be found in iTunes, does that mean I'm eligible for the Grammy's next year?!

My Class Poll

2010-10-16T11:08:00.000-07:00

Fall Blogging Challenge #2

Sometimes writing a blog post can be as simple as asking a question and getting everyone to give a simple answer.

Today was a long day. Very. Long. Day. It started with a migraine and ended with...wait a minute...it hasn't ended yet. ~sigh~

After lunch it dawned on me that I hadn't yet polled my class for my second post in the Fall Blogging Challenge. Problem was I hadn't even come up with the question I was going to ask them. So, that's what I asked them.

What do y'all think I should ask you?

[FYI...if you are going to give a group of seventh graders free rein to come up with any kind of list, even a list of questions, you'd better brush up on your shorthand because they won't slow up until you cry "Uncle!"]

Here are their questions, in no particular order:

1. How are you a social butterfly?

Inside joke: Several weeks ago I was discussing the question "Why is it important to talk about books?" with my students. Patty's response: "To come out of your cocoon and become a social butterfly through books." Yes, it's become a "thing."

2. If you could live anywhere in the world, where would it be?

Inside joke: Audi is obsessed with the point where the equator and prime meridian meet. She has decided that she would like to live there and so she asks everyone this question so that she can share her answer when they're done.

2a. Other "If...?" questions:

If you could live in any time period, what would it be?
If you could invent anything, what would it be?
If you won a million dollars, what would you do first?
If you could get rid of anything, what would you get rid of?

3. What would you do for a Klondike bar?

No inside joke there. They love talking about food!

4. Ask us something food related.

See what I mean.

5. What would you do for a leaf hat?

Ok, this one could take some explaining. We read a story last week that involved a chariot race, so I showed them the chariot race scene from Ben Hur. After Judah wins the race, he is presented with a crown of leaves. This led Audi to say, "That's it?!?! He did all that...for a leaf hat??!!!"

6. There were some thought-provoking questions:

What is your definition of a hero?
What do you want to do before you die?
What do you want to be when you grow up? (I'm still working on the answer to that one!)
Would you rather be an elephant or a llama? (ok, not exactly thought-provoking except that it brings to mind another question: Where in the world do they come up with these things?!)

7. PC or Mac?

I love this kid!

8. The "like" questions:

Do you like to color?
Do you like to doodle?
Do you like stickers?
Do you think flying tigers are awesome? (Ok, not necessarily a "like" question, but where else would you put it???)

9. What's your favorite word?

We've had a discussion in seventh grade about words that we just love. Words that are fun to say, for the most part. "Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious" is always a favorite. (I love the fact that spellcheck is okay with that word!)

10. If the days of the week were people, what would they look like?

Two seconds after Claire asked this question, Anthony responded:

Monday would be ugly.

So, what do I do with all of these questions? Well, I ask my PLN, of course! I've created a Google Form with some of the questions that my students came up with. Would you please answer some or all of our questions? I'll have my students fill out the same form and then we'll compare their answers with all of yours.

We can't wait to hear your ideas!

Loading...

My Life As A Reader

2010-10-06T21:09:00.000-07:00

Because I don't seem to have enough to do these days, I decided to participate in the Fall Blogging Challenge started by Melanie Holtsman. Those who are participating in the challenge must write one post a week based on the writing prompts Melanie has provided us. I liked the idea so much that I'm also having my students participate in a Blogging Challenge of our own. You can follow us here:

Seventh Grade Randomness

This week we are tasked with answering the question "What is your life as a reader like?"

Do you read for work, pleasure, instructions or emails? What is your favorite author and/or genre? What is your favorite reading spot? What did you like to read when you were the age of your students?

I love to read. Always have. But it is not something that is easy for me. I have learning issues that cause me to be a very slow reader. Painfully slow at times. And my reading comprehension has never been what I would like it to be. I can't always remember key parts in a novel, so please don't ask me. However, I don't let that keep me from something I so enjoy doing.

I read constantly: for work, for learning, for personal enjoyment. I read blogs, I read magazines (yes, the kind that are printed on paper), I read books. I'll even read the cereal box in the morning while I'm standing in the kitchen. I don't even think about it, really. If there are words in front of me, I'm reading them! Several years ago I had to have surgery to repair a detached retina. The doctor explained that after the procedure I would need to keep my head in an awkward position for five days. Ok, not fun, but I'll do it because I don't want to go blind. "Oh, and you can't read anything for the next two weeks." I'm sorry...what?!

Yes, those were the longest two weeks of my life!

Since I became a teacher I find that I do very little reading during the school year. I just don't have enough time in my days to get my job done, much less lay around and get lost in a great book. Over the summer I read The Book Whisperer by Donalyn Miller and decided to incorporate her ideas into my literature curriculum with my seventh graders. Can I be honest with you? I think a large part of the reason I did this was because I'm supposed to read at the same time as my students. Their silent reading time is my silent reading time! How awesome is that! So I will at least have fifteen minutes per day of time for me. Thank you, Donalyn!!

There have been times in my life as a reader when it was very easy to answer the question "Who is your favorite author?" Favorite authors have included Dean Koontz, Stephen King, Jodi Picoult, Anita Shreve, and, of course, J.K. Rowling. But lately, I've read a wider variety of authors, most likely because I'm trying to read a lot of the books that my students like. I'm currently reading The Wednesday Wars by Gary D. Schmidt, and I'm loving it. The main character is a seventh grade boy trying to figure out his seventh grade teacher...I think I can relate to that.

My favorite time of year for reading is almost here! On a cold, rainy day I love nothing better than lying on the couch covered with a blanket and with a fire going in the fireplace. And if the cat is feeling snuggly...even better!

Flip Cameras in the Classroom

2010-09-26T00:22:00.000-07:00

In a few days, I will be giving a Flip Video presentation to our teachers along with our tech coordinator. We will only have an hour to show them how to work with the cameras and the videos the create as well as discuss all the different ideas for how to use the cameras with students. What I would like to share with them is a resource that will have many different types of ideas. And I'm hoping my PLN will help me create that resource.

If you use Flip cameras with students or if you have ideas of how you would like to use Flip cameras with students, could you take a few moments and answer the following questions for me? We would all greatly appreciate it! And, of course, I'll make the spreadsheet available to everyone.

&amp;amp;amp;lt;p&amp;amp;amp;gt;&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;lt;p&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;gt;&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;lt;p&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;gt;Loading...&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;lt;/p&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;gt;&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;lt;/p&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;gt;&amp;amp;amp;lt;/p&amp;amp;amp;gt;

Learning to Blog Using Paper

2010-09-05T18:26:00.000-07:00

That's right...you heard me! And it's one of my favorite activities all year long. Paper Blogs. I use them to introduce my seventh graders to the idea of blogging and, more importantly, commenting.

Let me just be clear right from the beginning. This was not my original idea! I first heard about it at a session on blogging at our East Bay CUE Cool Tools mini-conference a couple of years ago. The presenter, Matt Callison, had each participant create their own "blog" on a piece of paper (cardstock, I believe). If I recall correctly, I believe our topic was food...or something food-related. I definitely remember writing about food. Perhaps I was just hungry at the time.

We also had to decorate our new blogs so they might reflect our own personality. I shudder to think what my "decorations" said about me that day. So instead of showing you the one I created that day (you don't think I actually kept it, do you?), here's an example that Cassidy created last year:

I didn't require that their paper blogs actually look like blogs (we use Google Sites, in case you were wondering), but several of my students chose to be tech-creative. Jack had a similar idea, even going so far as to make up a URL for his blog!

Of course, I'm getting ahead of myself a bit. Back to me.

After we were done writing and decorating our blogs in our blogging workshop, it was time to read some blogs. We exchanged blogs with other participants and practiced the art of commenting. First, of course, we had to read the blog post thoroughly...you can't write a proper comment unless you totally understand the message. Then we wrote our comments on 3 x 3 Post-It notes and attached them to the blogs. Naturally, if you wrote a comment to a commenter, then you would attach your Post-It to that comment.

As you probably know, teachers are just great big kids at heart. At least the ones I was with that day were. We could not wait to get our blogs back and see what others had written in their comments! It was a fun way to introduce the idea of blogging to a room full of teachers. I knew middle schoolers would love it as well.

Before I continue with my take on the lesson, let me share with you the original lesson developed by Leonard Low and shared with us at our workshop:

Mobile Learning Blog - Workshop Activity: Paper Blogs

In the comments on that post, you'll also want to take note of Sue Rockwood's reference to her lesson plan based on Leonard Low's activity:

No Matter, There Blog - Paper Blog LP

The McTeach Version

As I mentioned at the beginning of this post, I use this activity to introduce the idea of blogging to my seventh graders as we start our year together. Not only does it help my students understand blogging and, more importantly, the art of commenting, it also helps me to learn a lot about my students.

Step One

Before I give them the writing assignment portion of the activity, we have a class discussion about blogging in general. I ask them what they know about blogging and whether or not they've read any blogs. There were only a couple of students in this year's class that have read any blogs.

We discuss why someone might want to blog and the kids come up with a lot of different ideas: sports, news, favorite activities, personal journaling, one student even said, "for school." Bonus points for that one! I explain that we'll be using our blogs throughout the year for educational purposes and I want all of my students to feel comfortable posting their work to their blog. And that means they need to feel safe. "Why might a student not feel safe blogging?" Not a tough question to answer in a class with only eight boys and twenty-six girls! "Somebody might be mean."

Thank you. I was hoping you would say that.

And that's when I pass out the 7th Grade Blogging Rules handout that we read through together. They then must take the form home and read it again with their parents. Both the student and the parent sign this form which is based on the Academy of Discovery - Discovery Blogging Rules.

2010 7th Grade Blogging Rules

Step Two

I explain to my students that we will be practicing several aspects of blogging on paper before we hit the computer lab. To begin, they need to create their Paper Blogs. The assignment:

Write one to two paragraphs about something you are passionate about; something that you could do all day, every day and not even realize time had passed. It could be your favorite sport or hobby, or a topic that is of particular importance to you, like the environment or ending poverty or increasing teacher salaries. (Hey, it could happen.)

I have my students write out a rough draft first which they bring with them the next day. I want them to have every opportunity to create a product they can be proud of; a Paper Blog without a thousand eraser smears is a good place to start.

Step Three

The next day we start creating! I provide each student with a heavy piece of cardstock, about 9" by 12", which they will use to write their "final" draft of their blog post. After they finish with their post, they need to decorate their blog, adding color and artwork that speaks to their own personality. Of course, the decorations also have to go with the topic of the blog, and I preface this portion of the activity with a discussion about what types of photos or artwork you might see on different types of blogs. "Do you think a blog about soccer would be decorated with pretty flowers?"

"Yes! It's the field before you trample everything in site."

"Yes! I like to wear a flower in my hair when I play soccer."

Note to self: Ask better questions.

I give the class plenty of time for this part of the activity. It's the beginning of the year, they have a lot to talk to each other about, and it gives me a lot of time to wander around and chat with my new students.

Step Four

Ahhhh...my favorite part. Commenting! Before beginning this portion of our Paper Blogs activity, the students and I go over in great detail "The Art and Aspirations of a Commenter." While looking for lesson ideas to help me teach commenting, I was fortunate enough to happen upon A Pirouette: Commenting blog post where I found exactly what I needed! On the reverse of the handout, I added a list of possible comment starters for those who needed a little kick-start to get going.

The Art and Aspirations of a Commenter

When I'm fairly certain that they understand how seriously I take this portion of the activity, I point to the baskets I have placed around the classroom. Each one contains 3x3 Post-It notes for them to use for their comments. Before they start wandering around the room, I give them four more pieces of instruction:

One person at a blog at a time. I don't want them to start talking about the blogs and finding out what someone else thinks about them. I want them to think about what they think about the blogs.
Read the blog thoroughly. In order to write a proper comment, you must first give the blog post full consideration. No skimming!
Quiet please! Let's provide everyone with the reading environment they might need. [This works quite nicely for the teacher too!]
Enjoy! This is their first real blogging experience and I want them to see that they can have fun and be considerate of others at the same time.

And they were awesome! I didn't hear one peep out of these seventh graders for about 30 minutes. That's right...half an hour of peace and quiet for the teacher, but more importantly, my students spent thirty solid minutes reading and writing. And they didn't even realize it! Love that part!!

Afterwards, we spent some time reflecting on the activity. I asked them their initial thoughts as they got started, how they felt about writing comments - was it easy, challenging, fun? [Their responses were overwhelmingly positive!] We talked about the blogging process itself and whether or not they felt this activity would be similar to what they might experience with their "real" blogs (they didn't at first, but changed their mind afterwards). What did they learn in doing this activity?

I teach at a Catholic school. Most of these kids have been together since kindergarten; they think they know everything there is to know about each other. They're always so surprised after this activity that there is still something they can learn about their classmates. I love that! It's my cue to remind them that people can change and we need to allow them the space to change and not hold them in our own definition of who they might be. It's also a great lead-in to a conversation about being open to everyone they meet; if they pre-judge someone before they get to know that person, they may miss an amazing opportunity to make an important friend.

After the activity is over, I am left with a bright and colorful stack of Paper Blogs, and a room full of seventh graders ready to become full-fledged bloggers!

Can You Help Me Get Organized?

2010-08-02T17:31:00.001-07:00

As a teacher with learning issues, I struggle constantly with keeping on top of all of the tasks and paperwork that comes with my job. I'm approaching my fifth year as a teacher and I still haven't figured out a system that will work for me. So I thought I should ask my PLN - the wonderful educators from around the world who make me feel smarter.

Can you help me? Do you have any favorite tools (Web 2.0 or otherwise) that you just can't imagine getting through your day without? More importantly, how exactly do you use that tool? What is the feature that you just can't live without?

If you have any suggestions, would you be willing to fill out this Google Form:

Are You Organized?

All of the responses will appear here:

Are You Organized Spreadsheet

I greatly appreciate any help you can offer. I am determined to find some ways to make my job easier this year!

Thank you!!

My Reading List

2010-07-30T16:23:00.000-07:00

As I shared in my previous post, I have decided to join in on the 48-Hour Read-A-Thon in order to get myself back into reading. I wanted to share with you the books I will be reading this weekend. I've already started the first two, The Book Whisperer and The Magician, both of which I highly recommend. When I finish with those two, I'll move on to The Book Thief and Jeremy Fink and the Meaning of Life.

In case you're wondering about my fancy bookends, those are the "just in case" books for this weekend (as in, "just in case I finish all four books I'll have more reasons to continue lounging around enjoying my read-a-thon!") Those books are:

The Warrior Heir by Cinda Williams Chima
The Time Travelers by Linda Buckley-Archer
The Wednesday Wars by Gary D. Schmidt
The Mysterious Benedict Society by Trenton Lee Stewart

Time to get back to the couch. That's where my books are!

Happy Reading!

48-Hour Read-A-Thon

2010-07-29T22:08:00.000-07:00

I am a teacher. I pride myself on getting middle school students to love reading. The best compliment a parent ever paid me was almost a complaint: "We could never get him to read before; now, we can't get him to put down the books!" I love reading! There's nothing better than curling up with a good book and staying there until I've finished it.

And yet, I have not done nearly enough reading in the last year or so. I let school get in the way of my biggest joy in life. How can I expect to remain happy in my career if it keeps me, or if I let it keep me, from something that gives me joy?

Time to make some changes...starting this weekend! Enter the 48-Hour Read-A-Thon. It's quite simple. Just take time away from other activities like television-watching or internet-surfing and devote that time to reading. I can do this! Will you join me?

Here are the guidelines from the Unputdownables blog:

If You’re In:
Choose a few books that you will attempt to finish this weekend (Friday evening through Sunday night).
Post your TBR Read-a-Thon books on your blog so your readers can see what you are attempting for the weekend.
Challenge your readers to read along with you! (It’s OK if they don’t, but might be fun if they want to choose at least one book to participate with).
Join the discussion all weekend long at #bookblogchat on Twitter.
Post updates on your blog about what you are reading and what you have finished (full reviews can come later, but this will let your readers know what you are reading so they can either read along or look forward to your reviews!)
Visit other blogs that are doing the read-a-long. Post comments and follow your fellow bloggers.
Make sure you sign up here with Mr. Linky with a link to your first post so we can follow your progress!
*If you don’t have a blog but want to participate: Sign up with Mr. Linky, just don’t add a website (or you can link to your Twitter or GoodReads page).*

If You’re Not In, but Want to Support:
Check out the blogs that are participating below in the Mr. Linky list.
Visit those blogs and leave comments and encouragement
Add to your own TBRs as you see what others are reading!

And here is my reading challenge for this weekend:

The Book Whisperer by Donalyn Miller (I've started it, but plan to finish it)
The Magician by Michael Scott (I'm surprised I put it down to write this post!)
Jeremy Fink and the Meaning of Life by Wendy Mass
The Book Thief by Markus Zusak

It's tempting to add another twenty books to this list, but I need to keep the list manageable for this slow reader! Now, I wonder what would make the best snacks...

My Thoughts on ISTE

2010-07-09T10:22:00.000-07:00

It's an interesting experience meeting for the first time people you have considered friends for several years. And it's an experience that can be hard to explain if you haven't been through it yourself. Let me put it to you this way: You know that feeling when you're meeting someone for the first time, when you feel like you've known them forever, and you know instantly that you'll be friends for a very long time? Multiply that feeling by about one hundred and you'll understand what it was like for me in Denver last month.

I wasn't exactly sure what to expect when meeting the members of my PLN (personal learning network) for the first time. I definitely did not expect to feel like I was amongst family from the moment I stepped off the plane in Denver. But, I guess when you think about it, it makes perfect sense. These are people from all over the world, from all walks of life, that share something very important: a passion for education and the use of technology in education. In other words, if you ignore the differences in height or weight, hair color, eye color, or skin color, rock star status or starry-eyed groupie, those of us gathered at ISTE for a few short days were really all the same. Educators dedicated to our students.

There is a phrase that keeps bouncing around in my brain ever since ISTE, and it's something that Vicki Davis said in one of her sessions. We always talk about our "three takeaways" when it comes to conferences or professional development of any kind, the three new ideas or tools you take with you back to your classroom. But Vicki put it in a way I had never heard before:

If you don't do something with the information you get from a conference right after you get home, you won't be changed.

I won't be changed. When I really started to think about it, I think that was the reason I went to ISTE. I wanted to be changed. I wanted to be different afterward. I wanted for something deep down inside me to wake up and say, "This is it! This is what you are meant to do! Now, go do it!!"

I probably should have asked for specifics.

Three Takeaways

Let's start here. Just what were my three takeaways from ISTE? They can be summed up thus: Connections. Creativity. Collaboration.

Connections.

By far, the best part of ISTE for me was being able to connect to the amazing people who make up my PLN. Being around people who think like I do when it comes to student learning was invigorating, but it was also incredibly validating...I wasn't the only one in the room who knew what was going on with technology! What a novel concept!

My Connections Takeaway. During the school year, I get so involved in all the things that make up my job that I always seem to be working. All day. Every day. I can't keep that up. I need to make sure to include time in my year to connect with my friends. There are so many different ways to connect with people in the 21st century; I know that. Any type of connection, virtual or otherwise, will be so much better than none. I made so many amazing connections while I was in Denver, and I'm bound to make even more connections at Google next week. These are connections that don't end when the school year begins, at least not if I nurture those connections instead of ignore them. Or myself.

Creativity.

Most of what I learned in sessions at ISTE, at the Denver Zoo with all those amazing Discovery Educators, and in plenty of moments in the Bloggers' Cafe, could fall under the category "creativity." If you want to engage your students, bring creativity back into the classroom. We know we have standards to worry about and tests to work toward, but what about the learning? Shouldn't learning be fun? I love learning something new; I find learning to be incredibly exciting and full of hope and promise. Do you? Do your students?

My Creativity Takeaway. There are so many ways to allow our students to be creative in showing what they know. We just need to be open to letting them. Let the students decide how they will be assessed. Not only will they have a more vested interest in the process, but they will go above and beyond what you think they are capable of. I saw that very clearly last year. One of my goals for the last school year was to take a step or two outside of my comfort zone and let my students have more control over their learning. It led to some pretty amazing experiences for all of us. As it turns out, part of the reason the kids loved it so much was that they felt like someone was finally listening to them and honoring their ideas and opinions.

In case you're wondering about the picture above, I took it during one of Rushton Hurley's sessions. He is an incredibly dynamic speaker, not to mention truly inspiring. It's hard to capture the essence of a presentation in a photograph, but I think the energy with which Rushton shares his passion came through fairly well in this picture.

Collaboration.

Before leaving for Denver, I asked myself what my goals were for ISTE. One of my main goals was to learn more about collaboration, but I especially wanted to know more specifics about how I can get my students working with students from other schools, other states, even other countries.

My Collaboration Takeaway. My biggest concern about collaborating with other schools has always been that I wouldn't be able to manage the project and that I might let someone down. My learning issues make doing my job challenging enough. Would I be able to handle what I imagine would be a fairly large undertaking?

For all those who know me, I'm sure this will be a tremendous shock: I believe I may have been overthinking things a bit. I'll give you a moment to recover from that incredible insight.

Anyway...at ISTE I was able to attend Vicki Davis and Julie Lindsay's session 7 Steps to Flatten Your Classroom. It was probably the best thing I could have done while at ISTE in terms of my own growth as a teacher. Vicki and Julie make it sound easy enough that even I could handle it. I know that I'll have many moments of doubt in any project of this nature, but being at ISTE reminded me that I have people all over the world that I can lean on for support. That alone gives me the confidence to step a little further outside of my comfort zone.

And Finally...

To be honest, I think my biggest takeaways from ISTE had nothing whatsoever to do with technology or even education. I learned a lot about myself while I was in Denver, and I was able to see the changes that I've made as a teacher and as a person in the last five years or so. I'm not the person I once was, and that's a good thing. Talking with teachers from all over the globe made me realize that maybe I don't need to be in a classroom to make changes in education, but I'm there now and it seems like I may just have some pretty good ideas. Stay tuned...

Miscellaneous Takeaways.

True "Rock Stars" are those who don't believe they are.

Learning happens anywhere...

...and is more fun with a few thousand of your closest friends.

Life comes with musical accompaniment, and you get to choose the soundtrack.

There are so many ways to communicate; never miss an opportunity to reach out.

And, most importantly...

Great friends...

...are great friends...

...no matter where...

...or how...

...you find each other.

My deepest gratitude to all of those who have helped me along on my journey. The journey is never smooth...but that's what makes it interesting!

Photos: Most are mine and can be found here: Flickr

Photo from EduBloggercon is from Peggy George

Photo of Lee Kolbert and Me is from Lee Kolbert, taken by Teryl Magee

Photo of Teryl Magee and Me in Bloggers' Cafe is from Melanie Holtsman

Notes From McTeach...And YOU!

2010-07-01T19:34:00.000-07:00

I'm sure everyone is breathless with anticipation for my first blog post about ISTE 2010. Unfortunately, I was left rather breathless from the entire ISTE experience. I have several blog posts rolling around my brain (or one really, really LONG post), but for the moment I just need to rest and let my brain recuperate from such an amazing experience.

In the meantime, I'd like to ask for your help. I attended two of Vicki Davis's sessions yesterday at ISTE, and would love to have some help with my notes. If you took notes at either of these sessions, would you be willing to add them to these Google Docs? I really appreciate the help with my own learning, but I also want to show my students and other teachers how powerful a PLN can be in helping me learn and grow.

I truly appreciate any help I can get with my notes! My PLN has been an amazing source of knowledge and, more importantly, support. I just hope I can return the favor sometime.

Get Your Edubloggers Here!

2010-06-19T12:55:00.000-07:00

It goes without saying (for me, anyway) that I have learned so much from the amazing educators that I follow on social networking sites like Twitter, Facebook, and Plurk. Of course, it wasn't easy to learn everything I wanted or needed to know via 140 characters or less. So I started reading blogs. Lots of blogs. Perhaps too many blogs. (My Google Reader can attest to that fact.) It can definitely be a bit overwhelming considering the number of educators who are now blogging.

Eventually I was able to get down to less than ten favorites that I read regularly, and check in with the rest as they posted updates on Twitter. It took me some time to figure out which blogs I wanted to follow and recommend to others, but it was definitely worth the effort. I have learned more from these ten bloggers in the last couple of years than I ever could have in a teaching credential program!

If you are currently looking for blogs to follow, you're in luck! There are several great lists of edubloggers out there, but the one that just came out yesterday is by far the best one I've found yet. The Top 100 Technology Blogs for Teachers has some incredible blogs written by incredible educators, including seven of my top ten:

A few blogs that I thought should have been included in such an awesome list:

Well, I had to force myself to stop adding blogs to my list; there are just so many brilliant edubloggers out there! The key, if you're new to reading educator blogs, is to find a blog that you feel a connection with. Perhaps the author teaches the same grade level you do, or works in the same district as you. You might find a blogger whose writing style your particularly enjoy or who happens to be writing about a topic of special interest to you.

Once you find a couple of blogs that you enjoy, check out the blogs that those bloggers read (most bloggers list their favorite blogs in the sidebar or somewhere else on their blog). And don't be afraid to leave a comment. We LOVE comments! I tell my students that the comments tend to be the most important part of any blog because that is where the conversation happens. And it is in having that conversation that insight can happen, that changes can begin, that we can learn from one another. How very powerful! So if you have something to say...say it!

Join the conversation!

Our Next Field Trip

2010-05-08T12:55:00.000-07:00

My seventh graders and I went to "The Big City" yesterday on a field trip to the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art (SFMOMA). A side note: have you ever tried explaining modern art to a group of middle schoolers? Not an easy task, let me tell you! Of course, it doesn't help that I often have trouble understanding modern art myself. Ah well. We couldn't have asked for a more beautiful day in the city for any kind of field trip!

San Francisco Museum of Modern Art

So, it's time to start planning our next field trip. Since my credential is for social studies, I think our next trip should be to someplace historical. Somewhere that my students can hopefully gain an appreciation for the difficulties faced by their ancestors. I was thinking about this while out running errands this afternoon when I had what can only be described as a lightning bolt to my brain! Of course! The perfect place for my students to experience history is right in our own backyard:

But seriously...how many of our students have actually used one of these?!

How Will You Save the Earth This Week?

2010-04-19T06:45:00.000-07:00

Tonight (Monday, April 19th), the PBS series American Experience will premiere the Robert Stone film Earth Days: The Seeds of a Revolution. This Thursday, April 22nd, marks the 40th anniversary of Earth Day, and this film provides an excellent starting point for a discussion about Earth Day and the history of the environmental movement around the world. The following is a brief trailer for tonight's film:

Teachers may find the Earth Days Teacher's Guides particularly useful, along with:

Introduction: Earth Days
A Timeline of the Modern Environmental Movement
Twitter Discussion with Robert Stone - information about how to follow the Twitter conversation during the Earth Days premiere.
PBS Webinar Archive - information about the recent webinar with Robert Stone

Earthcast 2010

Earthcast is a 24-hour global webcast held on Earth Day that hopes to foster a global conversation on the issues that face all of us. To find out more about the webcast and how you can get involved, visit the Earthbridges wiki. Other information and ways to get involved can be found here:

Earth Day Resources

Here are some other Earth Day resources I've been collecting:

The Green Guide for Everyday Living - some great eco-tips from National Geographic
Think Green - Discovery Education and Waste Management - includes lesson plans and activities
From Jen Dorman - A sharetabs collection of carbon footprint calculators (very cool!)
Classroom Earth - from the National Environmental Education Foundation (geared toward high schools)
Cool School Challenge - what a difference we could make if all of our schools went Green!
Earth Day 2010 EnviroLink Resource Guide - can help you find an Earth Day event or organize one of your own
Earth Day 2010 wiki - pledge to do something different to help the environment
Earth Savers Club for Kids
Eco-Schools USA - National Wildlife Federation Learn how to green your school, inside and out!
EPA Environmental Kids Club - Be sure to also check out the EPA Teaching Center
Green Activities & Classroom Resources: Environmentally Friendly Lessons - TeacherVision
Green My Parents - kids grade their parents on saving energy, water, and gas (site goes live on Earth Day)
Good Guide - find safe, healthy, and green products
Green Living 101 - includes articles like "25 Easy Ways to Help Save the Planet," "9 Things You Can Do to Save Water," and "How Green Are You?"
How to Recycle or Reuse Anything from Real Simple - "An A to Z guide of what can be tossed into which bin", it includes links to other websites where you can find more information about how to recycle particular products.
Meet the Greens - a site for kids about sustainability and green living.
Nationmaster - Environment Statistics
Planetpals Earthday Educational Ideas Activities Fun Facts, etc.
PBS Kids - Earth Day
PBS Teachers Activity Packs - Earth Day - a cool widget for your blog!
Reach Every Child - Develop students' environmental awareness
TeachersFirst: Earth Day - Editors' Choices - great list of Earth Day resources for the classroom!
The Guardian - Environment news, comment and analysis Be sure to check out the Green Living section!
Top 1000 Environmental Websites - World Environmental Organization
Worldmapper: The world as you've never seen it before - Carbon emissions map from 2000

[I'll be adding more links to this list, so check back! If you have any suggestions, feel free to leave a comment. Thanks!]

What A Lovely Shade of Red

2010-04-15T18:42:00.000-07:00

[cross-posted from Just A Thought blog]

I'm just sitting here in my nice quiet classroom trying to do a little reflecting on my day, and I'm really not sure what to make of it. Today had moments that made me want to pull my hair out (which I'm really trying to avoid as I'm letting my hair grow out right now), moments of joy and laughter, and moments of total embarrassment for the teacher. Well, just one embarrassing moment, really, but it was a good one!

Where to begin...

I began my day by introducing the seventh graders to a new website that I think is pretty slick for research, and showing them a quick video that explains some of the new changes in Google Docs. I'm not sure which one we were more excited about! Google has finally added a chat feature for Docs, so now my students can chat while working on a document. You know middle schoolers will love anything that includes the word "chat"!

We're also very excited about now having real-time collaboration abilities in Docs. My students will be able to see the changes their group-mates are making on a document as they're making them. We've had too many issues with students writing over one another in Docs because they can't tell where another person is writing at any given time. That has been changed! This is the video I showed my seventh graders this morning that explains these changes as well as the addition of Google Drawings:

I'm not sure what it says about me, but the fact that Google is adding rulers and tab stops to its documents made me happier than the new chat feature made my students. [It is NOT necessary for any students of mine who may happen upon this blog to offer their opinions of what this says about their teacher! Thank you.]

What I showed the kids next is a website I can't wait to start using with them! I'd heard about this new search engine when it came out, but the best I could do at the time was to bookmark it for checking into later. Late last night I watched one of the videos posted on the WolframAlpha site that explains how teachers can use this new tool. I found my way there after clicking on the link that Shannon Smith shared on Plurk. Turns out, Shannon and her mom, Nancy Brachbill, are two of the teachers in the video which I just thought was too cool for words! You can find the videos at WolframAlpha for Educators.

After watching one of the videos last night, I decided to play with the site a little bit [it was almost midnight...I really should have been asleep by then, but you know what they say about us edtech geeks and our new "toys"!] One of the first things I searched for was my date of birth. I know, I know...it's all about me, isn't it! So, I typed in this:

And the first thing I saw:

Oh, come on...you know it's the first thing you're going to do when you check out the site, aren't you!

Well, one of the first things that Shannon mentioned in her video was using WolframAlpha to search for vocabulary words. What a great idea! So, this morning when I was demonstrating the site for my seventh graders, I asked one of them to give me one of their words; you can see the results here:

As someone who enjoys writing poetry, I was especially excited to see, and show my students, that the search results include a list of words that rhyme with the search term. [Stick with me...this will come back to bite me later in the morning.] Of course, mentioning to my seventh graders that it provided rhyming words led at least one boy to call out, "Type in 'orange'!!"

Oh brother.

My seventh graders are currently finishing up giving their presentations about Africa. Each student researched a different African country and created a powerpoint to share what they'd learned in their research. I'm so proud of my students; they have done an amazing job with their presentations! But it took me all of about 30 seconds using WolframAlpha to realize that their research time probably could have been cut in half if we would have been using this wonderful tool. Here, try this and see what information just one search can provide you:

I'm sure you'll have roughly the same reaction that my seventh graders and I had this morning. Whoa! "Dude, that's totally awesome!!" Yeah, thanks Devin.

I tried to avoid the gazes of those students who were shooting me death glares. "You couldn't have found out about this before we spent 50 gazillion hours on this project???"

Sorry.

Fast forward about two hours...time for eighth graders. They are currently working on a research project about the Civil War, so I wanted to share with them this same website. I shared with them the birth date search...middle schoolers just love hearing how old and decrepit their teacher is. Then I asked for someone to give me a name to search for. "Bob."

Sigh.

I think I need a little more than that.

"Robert."

No, seriously. I swear I live in a cartoon. I'm just waiting for that darn anvil to drop. [It's coming, by the way.]

I decided to show them how to search for their vocabulary words. I asked an eighth grader to give me one of their words, and the first one that came to mind was "vex." [Don't get ahead of me, here.]

Now, picture me standing there in front of my ActivBoard, sharing this wonderful new website, thinking it's just the coolest thing since the invention of the modem; I haven't a clue. No, it doesn't even enter my mind that I am about to show a list of words that rhyme with "vex" to 34 soon-to-be giggling eighth graders. No, no...I proceed with "so if you're writing some fabulous poetry and you need to find a word that rhymes with 'vex'..."

That's when I saw it. The word that shall not be named. At least not in my blog that would eventually be spammed by who-knows-how-many who-knows-what-kinds of websites. I kept my face turned toward the board for a moment or two, but I'm sure the bright red glow from my face bounced right off that board toward all of my now-giggling students.

I tried to make like I had planned that all along by quickly adding, "Of course, I'm not really sure any of us wants to see what kinds of poems you can create with these words." But my brain was already composing a limerick or two while they continued to giggle.

Ok, one last search...somebody give me the name of a battle. [Quick!!]

"Wilderness!"

God love ya, George and Zane!

Joy and Laughter

There were at least a few moments of joy and laughter today. One of my favorites occurred during lunch recess. No, I wasn't shooting hoops, although I really wanted to. I had my camera in hand, and didn't feel like risking dropping it. I was taking some pictures when Kate ran by me, chasing after another student and yelling in a "we're just regular kids having some good old-fashioned 'tag you're it' kind of fun." Well, she nearly took out the teacher as she ran by, so I yelled out "Kate!!" That's when this quietest of quiet, reserved to the point of being almost hidden, students stopped, turned, ran back to me, threw her arms around me, and yelled "I love you, McTeach!!"

Oh, geez. "I love you, too. Now, get off!"

Laughter ensued.

"Oh, McTeachy!!"

Sigh.

Just another typical day in middle school.

Teachers Can Have Fun Too!

2010-04-11T18:39:00.000-07:00

Students aren't the only ones who like to pull April Fool's Day pranks, you know:

Is It Just Me?

2010-04-02T06:35:00.000-07:00

Or do any other middle school teachers find themselves faced with correcting the spelling of "supercalifragilisticexpialidocious"? Why is it that seventh grade boys, especially, are obsessed with being able to use this word in their writing? Is it just because they can?

Well, I've come up with a plan. It may be considered student abuse, but I'll do anything to make my students BETTER writers! So, here's the plan...I'm going to play this video over and over and over until they cry Uncle!! Bwa-ha-ha!!!!

More Txt Ptry

2010-03-13T08:25:00.000-08:00

I thought I would share a few more text poems that were written by my seventh graders. Some of the poems I’ve read were surprisingly beautiful! Is texting a valid form of expression? After reading these, I dare you to say “no”!

Luv

Thy look at echoter

Trn awy.

Look agin,

Turn awy.

Thy act lyk thy don’t lyk echoter,

But u can c it in their i’s.

She :)’s

He :)’s.

Ths is their rutine.

It hppns evryday/

Thy act lyk thy don’t ntice echoter,

But thy rlly luv echoter.

it’s tru n u c it evryday.

by Adriana

Sounds like the perfect description of a middle school crush, doesn’t it? Please excuse the all-caps of this next poem, but it was just too amazing to not share.

TXT POEM

LITNIN STRIKS FROM THE BLANKET OF DRKNESS

BRINGIN A FLASH OF LITE

A REDWUD TREE IS ITS NXT VICTM

SPLTIN IT INTO 2

THE 2 SPLT SIDES REACH 4 THE SKY OPENIN IT’S ARMS 2 HEVIN

ANTHER LITNIN BOLT FALLS FROM THE SKY

HITTIN A GRASY FIELD

A FIRE SPROUTS FROM THE LONG YLLOW GRAS

SENDIN UP SMOKE AND ASH

THE FIRE TWIST N TURNS IN THE NITE

IN A REDISH ORNGE LITE

THE FLMES LIC THE EDGS OF THE DRKNESS

WHILE THE FIRE QUICKLY SPREADS

THE FIRE REMAINS TO BURN

WHILE THE STORMS SEEMS 2 NVR END

CHAOS STRTS TO SPRED THRO THE FOREST

WHILE THE ANMALS RUN N HIDE

CUZ NO ONE WNTS 2 B IN THE WAY WEN A FIRE COMS OUT 2 PLAY

by Megan

I have some deep thinkers in this class…many deep thinkers, actually. It’s exhausting. My brain often hurts.

Wat Wud i SA

Evry1 wants da chnce 2 b herd,

4 ppl 2 lisen, when dey speek deir wurds.

i’ve said it mslf, mny tyms b4,

Bt now i think, wat wud i speek 4?

i have so mch 2 get out, if i ever come 2 da day.

Bt if i do get da chnce, i wunder, wat wud i sA

Wud i speek of my God, and his all healing pwr.

How he wants us 2 trust him, nt cwer.

Or wud i speek of understanding

Da pwr of listening 2 my surroundings.

Or mayb of love and hope and faith.

Or how i have ben changed by da goodness of da human race.

Evry1 wants da chnce 2 be herd,

4 ppl 2 lisen, when they speek deir wrds.

i’ve said it mslf, mny tyms b4,

Bt now i think, wat wud i speek 4.

i have so mch 2 get out, if i ever come 2 da day.

Bt if i do get da chnce, i wunder, wat wud i sA?

by Colleen

Feel

I wlk alng the old nd rsty railrd trcks,

Kckng stns whle wlkng silntly witout a thght in my hd.

I c the lke 2 my lft glimr in the snlite,

Bt I do nt stp to behld its beuty, 4 I hve a mtting.

Instd I kp on wlkng,

yt no thght in my hd.

Nd as I grw closr 2 the forst,

Drknss sprds ovr the lnd as if a blnkt.

Bt yt no thght in my head,

Jst a…. Feelng.

1 tht no scientst cud xplane,

Bt I knw tht ths feelng ws ldng me somwhr.

A plc of whch I do not knw.

Bt I do knw tht ths gut feelng tht I hve is no ordnry feelng,

Bt yt it is.

The strng thng is, is tht I knew wht it ws,

Nd as I grw clser 2 tht drk forst, with no nd to its drknss,

Ths feelng bilds 2 the pnt of no nd.

Bt as I look bck I reliz tht I hav trvled no whr.

So now I wait 4 the drknss to grb hld of me,

Because ths feelng hs no mrcy.

The feelng tht 1 mst lt go of,

1 I can’t ovrcom

….Fear

by Nick M.

Of course, not everyone is skilled at texting. Jack can explain why:

Jus a fone

Evry1z got a fone

Itz as smpl as that

No mattr where I look

Im da only1 w/out

Common mom n dad

Plz I beg u

Just 60 buks a munth wont kill u

it’s a teenage necessity

I shuldnt need 2 giv any mor xplanation than that

Wen u pay urself day say

But by the time I reach in my own wllt

It just mite b my 30^th bday!

by Jack M.

One more before I go…and this one is just plain fun! Thanks Dominic!

A txtn poem

dis is new

wht a srpris

i hve nvr seen dis b4

who rites thse poems

well i do

nd so do my clasmats

they r fun 2 rite

u can misspll wrds all da time

no markn down dis time

well dis waz fun

now it's done

my txtn poem 4 u!

by Dominic D.

Txt Ptry

2010-03-07T16:29:00.000-08:00

My students and I have been having some fun with poetry lately. I provided them with five of my all-time favorite poems and then proceeded to discuss with them what we look for in poems, how to interpret poems, how to read poems out loud. I waited for their eyes to start glazing over and then I sprang the assignment on them!

"You need to re-write one of these poems using text lingo!"

There was a "wait...is she serious?!" pause, and then they erupted! "NO WAY!!" "OH COOL!!"

I paired them up and set them to work. It got a bit loud in my classroom that morning, but it was a fun kind of loud! And, as I wandered around the room, it was all pretty much on topic. They really needed to understand the poem and what the poet was saying before they could re-write the piece. I was stopped a number of times by students who said, "But no one will be able to understand what these say!"

"That's okay. The point is you REALLY know what the poet was saying!"

If you stop by my classroom anytime soon, you can see all of their text poetry hanging in my classroom window. It's gotten a lot of attention! But...on to phase two of this assignment!

After working with a partner, it was time to write a poem on their own. And, yes, they were using text lingo for this poem as well. An original piece of their own creation...all in txt. The first question I got was, "Can we text it to you?!!" That one was met with a rousing chorus of "Oh yeahs!" and "great idea!" My response:

"I am NOT giving my cell phone number out to 36 seventh grade goofballs!!"

"Oh, come on, McTeachy, you know you love us!"

Bah!

Anyway...they're supposed to be adding their text poems to their blogs this weekend. I think it's going to be tough to compete with the very first poem I read this morning by Annalee:

Wings

i run az fast az i can.
tryin 2 get away frm tha crazines.
i hear thm bhnd me
hu u ask
erasers
tha demns on erth
i stp at tha end uf tha clif n jmp
tha erasers hv cot up 2 me n r clawin at mi ft 2 pul me bak down 2 hell
i unflded my wngs,
feelin tha cool breeze go thru my fethers
i fly
i am a mutnt
bt i am myslf

anale

Oh, how I do love this assignment! Fun with poetry...and it's not even April yet!!

The Twitter Diet?

2010-02-21T20:05:00.000-08:00

First I saw this...

And then I saw this...

Now I've lost my appetite...for who knows how long!

Valentine's Day

2010-02-14T15:55:00.000-08:00

Your planet has a special Valentine's Day message for you...

Special thanks to @jackiegerstein for sharing this on Twitter this morning.

Teaching 2.0

2010-02-09T19:13:00.000-08:00

Of all the tools I have at my disposal that help me to do my job better, nothing is as invaluable as my PLN! I cannot imagine not having thousands of educators around the world to connect and collaborate with...every day. On Saturday, I gave a presentation at our local CUE affiliate on the importance of having a Personal Learning Network (PLN) and how I found mine. In the weeks leading up to my presentation, the question became "How do I explain the benefits of having a PLN? And how do I convince other educators that in the 21st Century one can no longer teach effectively without having connections all over the world?"

A daunting task, wouldn't you agree?

As I began my presentation on Saturday, I broke one of the cardinal rules of public speaking: I confessed that I was nervous. Really nervous. I explained that the reason I felt so nervous was that this is a topic that I feel very passionate about, and I wanted to be sure to do it justice.

I had created a powerpoint to get us started, even though powerpoint is definitely not one of my strengths. I was hoping that it would help keep me on track of what I had planned to talk about, and maybe keep some of the nervous tension at bay. I think it helped, especially since I was able to incorporate some of my humor into the presentation. At least it helped me remember a couple of the jokes I had planned to say!

I had also created a wiki for our morning together. We were going to have 2 1/2 hours together, so I planned on plenty of time to play! I thought having the wiki would make playing much easier. It definitely was a great idea, but I think next time I should organize the wiki a little better and keep in mind that not everyone who attends an educational technology conference is completely comfortable with technology.

One of the benefits of having the wiki created ahead of time is that I was able to have links prepared for us to use together. One of the goals for my presentation was to demonstrate at least a few ways that teachers and/or students could collaborate on projects. So I created an Etherpad for us to play with, along with a Dabbleboard, which was just plain fun.

But we started off with Twitter. In my presentation, I spoke about the power of the PLN using my seventh grade National Geography Week project as an example. Back in November, my seventh graders created a list of questions that they would ask someone from another region to gather information about geography. We then created a Google Form and then sent it out on Twitter, Plurk, and Facebook. By the end of one week, we had heard from almost 250 people from all over the world. Every continent was represented...including Antarctica! (the form is still live if you and/or your students would like to fill it out.)

The point I was trying to make is none of that would have happened were it not for my PLN! It continually amazes me how willing other educators are to help out a teacher and her students.

So when another teacher asks me "Why do you spend so much time on twitter?" my response is, "Why don't you?!" If teaching is supposed to be about providing our students with the tools they need to be successful in life, then why on earth are we, their teachers, not using the tools we need to be successful in our career?

By the end of our morning together, everyone who didn't already have a Twitter account had signed up for one. They also joined the Ning I created for Saturday, Connecting Teachers. There are so many different ways to connect to our PLN, but I sure hope I didn't overwhelm them.

Overall, I felt really good about my presentation. It was a lot of work getting prepared for it, but being able to spend a day with people who feel the same way I do about technology in education went a long way to restoring my spirit which has been wilting of late. Amazing what spending some time with like-minded individuals can do for a person.

Perhaps it's even more amazing that there aren't more of us!

Teaching20

McTeach Is Moving!

2010-01-24T09:44:00.000-08:00

After having my first blog on Blogger for almost two years, I have decided to move it over to Edublogs. One of the main reasons for this switch is I wanted my “professional” blog to look just that…professional. It’s really a personal preference on my part, but I feel like Edublogs has a more professional look and feel to it. Plus, you just can’t go wrong with Sue Waters on your side!

A feature that I felt was missing from Blogger is the ability to add pages to a blog. I would like to have additional pages on my blog so that I’ll be able to share with everyone in my Personal Learning Network (PLN) all the wonderful resources I find while I travel the world of web 2.0. I’ll be adding pages in the weeks ahead as I can squeeze in time to play…I mean “work”…on my blog.

If you’ve been a loyal follower of Notes From McTeach on Blogger, I hope you’ll follow me over to Edublogs. To make the transition easier for you, here is the RSS feed for the new site:

Notes From McTeach on Edublogs

Change is good, my friends! Join me!

Where Are You, My Wonderful PLN?

2009-12-30T23:01:00.000-08:00

Ah, my PLN...what would I do without you? Where would I be without you? Where are YOU??? That last question is really the one I'm looking for help with right now. In February, I will be giving a presentation on Personal Learning Networks and sharing with the teachers in attendance how to develop their own PLNs and why I think it's an invaluable resource to have.

My presentation is called Teaching 2.0: Connect, Communicate, Collaborate. In order to show the "Connect" portion of my presentation, I'm creating a Google map to show just how far-reaching my PLN really is. And I'm hoping to get all of you to "Collaborate" with me on this to truly show the power of the network! So, if you wouldn't mind helping a McTeach out, could you add your placemark on the map below? If you're on Twitter or Plurk, please feel free to add your username as well. I truly appreciate your help...with this and with so much else!

Please note that I will be adding this map, once completed, to the wiki I'm creating for this presentation. If you have any questions or comments, please let me know.

View My PLN in a larger map

St. Boniface Day

2009-12-17T19:19:00.000-08:00

Each year at this time, something very special happens at my school. The San Francisco Police Department arrives, sirens blaring. We prepare for their arrival by encouraging our students to buy lots and lots of gifts! But the gifts aren't for the police officers who drive out to our school from the city. These gifts are destined for the people of St. Boniface parish in the Tenderloin, a district with significant poverty, homelessness, and crime.

The "Giving Tree" Project for St. Boniface Parish

For the past twenty years, our school community has participated in the "Giving Tree" Project. From the flyer that goes home to parents:

Each year St. Boniface Parish (near St. Anthony's Soup Kitchen) in San Francisco enlists our help to share our gifts with the many less fortunate and/or homeless children and adults in the parish and beyond. This is the third year that the San Francisco Police Department has been able to pick up and deliver all the gifts to St. Boniface Parish.

I'm not sure who gets more excited to see the SFPD arrive with lights flashing...the students or the grown-ups. And this year the caravan included the Bomb Squad! This definitely got everyone's attention today:

It garnered almost as much attention as the police dog and this:

The officer who talked about the Bomb Squad's robot, affectionately called Wall-E by many people this morning (all of them grown-ups), informed us that it cost about as much as a Ferrari. I wonder if it's as much fun to drive.

It's an amazing experience from start to finish. The officers leave as they arrived, lights flashing and sirens calling out to the entire neighborhood. I do have to say more than a few of us wondered what the neighbors might have thought seeing several police cars and vans as well as the Bomb Squad drive onto our campus. Perhaps they would have understood if they happened to see the cars leaving stuffed full of beautiful packages that we hope will make someone's Christmas a little merrier.

Wherever you are, whatever you celebrate, I hope you and yours have a wonderful holiday season.

To The Polls!

2009-11-16T15:46:00.000-08:00

It feels like forever since I've posted anything here. I blog almost every day, but it's all over on my teacher blog. I really need to write more on this one, however. It's a good place for me to process what I'm doing in my job and share ideas with my wonderful PLN.

Today, however, I'm going to ask for help from my PLN. In the last 24 hours, I have created two very different polls. If you're reading this, my seventh graders and I would love your help in gathering some information.

My seventh graders and I recently returned from a week-long trip to Camp Caritas in Northern California. I asked them to create Google Doodles based on their camp experience and what they turned in to me was amazing! I knew right away that we needed to do something more with these pictures. So, I've created a poll and am asking you, gentle reader, to choose your two favorite Doodles. I warn you...it is most definitely NOT easy! Here's the link: Great Google-y Moogly.

Our second project that we could use your help with involves National Geography Week. If you wouldn't mind answering a few questions, could you please take our survey about where you live? We'll be taking the information we gather and plotting it in a Google Map (the kids don't know that yet). National Geography Week Survey.

I'll be sure and share the results with everyone when we complete our projects. Thank you so much for your help. I don't know what I would do without my PLN!!

A Week to Simplify My Life

2009-08-01T14:09:00.000-07:00

According to the folks at OnlineOrganizing, today is the first day of Simplify Your Life Week. I need this. I really need this! So I've set myself this challenge: find one thing each of the next seven days that will help me become better organized or, at the very least, make things simpler for me.

Today I am working on email. I don't know about you, but my email is out of control. Actually, I think I aspire to have just "out of control" email. I'm not sure there's an expression that properly describes the state of my email inboxes (yes...plural! "inboxES")

I've read a few articles about dealing with email:

And now I think I'm ready to get to work.

Where Did These Come From?

I don't even remember signing up for all these e-newsletters. I find it fascinating that teachers receive so many different emails from vendors trying to get us to buy their product. Um, hello?! I'm a teacher. My money is spent on exciting things like food, rent, and books. So, bye-bye vendor emails! My first chore is to unsubscribe from any and all e-newsletters. This may take some time...but it will definitely be worth it, especially once the school year begins.

Now, I should say that it's not that I don't like these vendors or any of the newsletters I receive in my emailbox. I actually enjoy several of them. However, this is information I can go get from their websites, most of which I have bookmarked.

Where Did I Put That?

The next step is to create folders for my incoming emails. I haven't actually decided how I'm going to set this up, but I have the rest of today to figure it out (remember, one organizational tool per day...that's my goal). I would love to hear what others have done in regards to email folders or, even better, see some examples. Anyone care to share?

Timing Is Everything!

The first thing I did in regards to my email was to change the retrieval setting. Do I really need to know every five minutes if someone has sent me something I probably don't have time to read anyway? No..I don't. Right now it's set for 30 minutes, but I'm working up to not even having my email open at all. I need to set a time each day which I can devote just to dealing with email; then and only then will I open up my email account.

I may have to work up to that.

Those are my goals for today. How about you? Care to join me in simplifying our lives? You don't have to start with email, I'm sure you are much more efficient when it comes to email than I am. So, check out the ideas on the Simplify Your Life Week page, or go to Organizer's Toolbox for a list of tips to help you be more productive and live and breathe easier.

Flickr image: ROYGBIV

Happy Birthday, Dad!

2009-07-19T15:56:00.000-07:00

I was only five years old that day, and I really don't remember the event first-hand. But I still think about it every year on the 20th of July. Our entire family does, actually. You see, the lunar landing will forever be connected for us with my father. Today is not only the 40th anniversary of man's arrival on the moon, it's also my dad's birthday!

Happy Birthday, Dad!

While I don't remember July 20, 1969 as well as I would like, I am able to relive it today in the 21st century as if I were there. And it still gives me chills!

Right now, as I'm writing this post, I am listening to the conversation between Mission Control in Houston and The Eagle in real time via the website We Choose The Moon. This past Thursday, July 16th, 2009, Apollo 11 "launched" via this website and has allowed us to follow the first trip to the moon by listening to the communication between Mission Control and the Apollo 11 crew as if it were happening today. Currently, I'm listening to the conversation as the lunar module begins its preparations for the landing. I am amazed!

Of course, what would a 21st experience be without Twitter!? I am seeing the most amazing tweets come through my Twitter stream right now. Here is just a sampling:

Before McBro calls me a "dork" (something I actually love to hear from him), I know I'm a geek and I am very much reveling in my geekness today! I mean, seriously...what an amazing time to be living on this planet! Or out in space. Because while I am watching these Apollo 11 tweets come through the stream, there are also REAL real-time tweets coming from space via space shuttle astronaut Mark Polansky, known to us on Twitter as @Astro_127.

I do think Commander Polansky needs to update his profile, however. His current location is most definitely NOT Houston.

If you'd like another way to celebrate the 40th anniversary today, head on over to YouTube. Actually, you'll want to start with this post from the kind folks at Mashable: "Apollo 11 Moon Landing: A YouTube Timeline." In this one post, author Ben Parr has managed to capture the race for the moon in a total of twelve videos, including one with those famous words:

As a history teacher, I feel I should also point out that 1969 can be remembered as a year that saw a number of amazing stories. Remember these:

Super Bowl III - The New York Jets and their quarterback Joe Namath beat the heavily favored Baltimore Colts
The Beatles give their final live performance
Richard Milhous Nixon was inaugurated as the 37th President of the United States
Woodstock
The Saturday Evening Post published its final issue
Ted Kennedy had a bit of an accident at Chappaquiddick Island
Dave Thomas opened a small restaurant and named it after his daughter, Wendy
And, of course, how can anyone forget The Miracle Mets!

If you'd like to see a wonderful visual representation of the year that was 1969, check out this photographic presentation from the New York Times: 1969. If you'd like to learn more about the Apollo 11 mission, you should head on over to the blog I discovered just this morning: A Year of Reading. Today's post has several good books to recommend about the mission.

Not to be left out of the loop, Google is announcing today the release of the Moon in Google Earth. Now we will all be able to travel to the moon (and elsewhere in space) and investigate the lunar surface. Of course, today just wouldn't be complete without this:

As I've been working on this post, a few more important tweets have come through the Twitter stream:

It may seem strange, but as I sit here listening to the "live" broadcasts from the Apollo 11 mission, I feel like I'm experiencing the same - or similar - emotions to what my parents must have felt that day forty years ago. It's been exciting and even a bit nerve-wracking. And I can still feel that sense of history in the making. I'll say it again...what an amazing time to be alive!

Last week, the Boston Globe celebrated the anniversary in pictures. The Big Picture includes a number of remarkable images, many of which are now iconic, a few of which I'd never seen. I sent this link to my dad when I saw it because I knew he would enjoy seeing the pictures also. He sent the following email back to me:

Karen

So do you remember exactly where you were when Armstrong stepped on the Moon on July 20, 1969?

Dad

I couldn't help myself. I responded:

Dude! I was five! I'll have to ask mom and get back to you.

So, Dad, what do you think? Pretty cool for everyone to celebrate your birthday like this today!

Happy Birthday!
Love,
Karen (I'm the one on the right):

Leadership Day 2009

2009-07-12T15:25:00.000-07:00

Scott McLeod has challenged bloggers again this year to participate in Leadership Day 09. While I didn't get my own post written, I did very much enjoy reading the thoughtful - and thought-provoking - posts of others today. I started to think it might be useful to save these wonderful posts in one central location, if for no one other than myself.

But, that's not how things work in this EdTech web 2.0 world. We create things knowing that we will, at least at some point, share them. Perhaps that is the one thing I would want our educational leaders to remember: today's world, educational and otherwise, can be amazingly collaborative. We have all seen the wonderful work of teachers and students collaborating with their peers all over the globe. We've heard them talk about the amazing things they've learned, and it's not just about the technology. They learn from one another. They learn that a twelve-year-old in the United States can have the same joys and sorrows as a twelve-year-old living in a far different country. They learn what it means to be human in another spot on this earth.

I would invite any administrator to sit and learn from our students. They'll tell you who they are and who they want to be. How could anyone sit and listen to them and not want to give them the tools they need to get where they're going? That includes encouraging all teachers to catch up to their tech-savvy students. You can't teach them if you can't reach them.

As I said, I spent most of the day reading and compiling these wonderful posts. I've collected them in two places, a Google spreadsheet and a list in Diigo. Enjoy!

Leadership Day 2009 Blog Posts

My Leadership Day 2009 Diigo List

World Population Day 2009

2009-07-11T11:07:00.000-07:00

Today, July 11th, 2009, marks the 20th celebration of World Population Day, an event designed to raise awareness about the impact our increasing global population has on us and our world. The United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) believes the world's population will reach 9.1 billion people in the next forty years. That's an increase of nearly 36%. It makes one wonder what the impact might be on poverty rates, world health, and our climate. [It is my understanding that this estimate of 9.1 billion is based on a decrease in the current birth rate in developing countries from 4 children per mother to 2. If that decrease does not happen, the population will be even greater.]

This year's theme focuses on an idea to help prevent such a tremendous population increase in our world: educating girls. If you watched the video above, you probably noted the staggering statistic:

Of 900 million illiterate adults in the world, 2/3rds are women

Investing now in the health and education of women around the world leads to a ripple effect that starts with a girl's family leading eventually to their community, their country, and our world. I love this quote from Ms. Thoraya Obaid, Executive Director of UNFPA and Under-Secretary General of the United Nations:

"The world is paying a high price for not allowing women to live up to their full potential."

My question is what can we do about it, other than donate money to this, that, or the other fundraising organization? I would love to do something with my seventh graders this year to promote the education of girls around the world. But what? I'm thinking this would work well as a service learning project, but that is as far as I've gotten. Have you any ideas or suggestions?

We Hold These Truths...

2009-07-04T12:12:00.000-07:00

Happy Fourth of July! Like many people in our country today, I am spending time with my family. We'll be partaking of the obligatory Fourth of July BBQ later today...hamburgers, hot dogs, potato salad, and plenty of watermelon. [Quick side note: I asked my five-year-old nephew this morning how many hot dogs he could eat in one minute. Ten? Twenty? Fifty? His response: "One. Nobody should eat fast." Wise words from one so young.]

As a history teacher I feel it necessary to reflect today on the very beginnings of our country. What a remarkable thing our Founding Fathers did, creating a new country in a new fashion. They were willing to risk everything for freedom. Everything! Today I ask myself: "What would I be willing to risk for freedom? What would I give to live free?"

The Fourth of July is more than just a reason to get together with friends and family, eat, watch fireworks, and wave a flag about. It is a celebration of all that is unique about country. It is a means of reminding ourselves that we enjoy, and should be quite grateful for, freedoms that many others in this world do not have. Today I also ask myself: "What of them? What is my responsibility as one who enjoys such freedoms to those who cannot?" Surely the Founding Fathers would have wanted us to share the ideas they crafted into our Independence.

Let me be clear. I am not saying we should send our military out into the world to force independence upon every nation that does not have it. Our nation's Independence began with an idea that no one man (or woman) should hold control over a country without care or concern for the people who lived there. That idea spread by word of mouth and by the written word. It was a slower process back then. Thomas Jefferson did not have a Twitter ID (I wonder what he would have chosen for his screenname. @TJefferson? Too easy. How about @DecOfIndieWriter? Or just @DecWriter?) Thomas Paine was unable to use an iPhone to send Common Sense to the press.

But look for a moment at this amazing thing they created! And it all started with an idea. "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness."

All men. All people. Everywhere on this beautiful planet, all people are "created equal" and are entitled to "Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness." Why is it some in our world think they are entitled to more? That they can possess that which belongs to another by birthright? And what are our responsibilities as Americans to those in our world who do not have the freedoms we sometimes take for granted? Do we have any responsibilities to them?

I have no answers for you today. I have only questions. It's often how I teach my students...I ask more questions than I answer. I'm curious by nature; I hope to pass that along to my students.

One more question: What do you know about the holiday, Independence Day? How did it come about? I highly recommend reading this article, "The Invention of the Fourth of July" by David Waldstreicher. The first paragraph sums it up quite nicely:

The Fourth of July, or Independence Day, as it has come to be known, is perhaps the most and the least American of holidays. It is the most American because it marks the beginning of the nation, because it rapidly became an occasion for expressing what America is all about, and because it is locally and voluntarily observed. It is the least American because it was created mostly out of English material.

"Mostly out of English material" but now uniquely American. So, wherever you are today, or this weekend, stop for a moment and ask yourself: What is freedom worth to me?

One more note. If King George III had had a Twitter account back in the day, this is what his tweet for today might have looked like (courtesy of one of my favorite websites, Historical Tweets):

Bald eagle and flag image from: Wikimedia Commons

NECC 2009 From Where I Sit - Part 2

2009-06-29T23:15:00.000-07:00

As I've done each summer, I plan to do a lot of learning this summer. NECC always presents a great opportunity for learning, even if it's done from a distance. To harness that learning, I thought I'd experiment with something else I'm learning this summer: PBWorks.

I've enrolled in the PBWorks Summer Camp; we're just starting the second week. The main reason I signed up for the camp is that PBWorks (formerly PBWiki) has always been a bit confusing for me. I think it's just the way it's laid out; that sidebar is quite different from the Wikispaces sidebar that I've grown accustomed to. But I'm adjusting! I'm actually feeling a lot more comfortable with PBWorks now that I'm through the first week of camp. Actually, I'm thinking it may be an even better solution for me with my organizational challenges. The use of folders to hold your pages is tremendously helpful!

So, how am I combining PBWorks and NECC? I've started a wiki to collect all the information that all of my friends are sharing from the conference in Washington, DC. I add to it throughout the day, so be sure to check back and see what other wonderful things we're learning.

McTeach.pbworks.com

You'll notice the wiki has other folders that don't have much information in them...yet. I plan on using this wiki to help me process all of my learning goals for the summer. Up next: Understanding By Design.

One other way I'm keeping track of all the information coming out of NECC is through my Diigo account. I've created a list called "NECC 2009" and use that to save links to as I get them. Feel free to check it out:

NECC 2009 List

NECC 2009 From Where I Sit

2009-06-27T22:14:00.000-07:00

It's been quite awhile since I've posted anything here, and what better time to write something than the start of NECC 2009! Unfortunately, I wasn't able to find the funds to go myself this year, but I know I'll be learning plenty in the next few days as I read, listen, watch, twitter, and plurk from the comforts of my own home.

With all of the information that will be coming out of Washington, D.C. during the conference, I decided to try my hand at creating a Netvibes page with feeds coming in from several websites (Delicious, Diigo, Flickr) as well as a number of blogs from the folks I follow on Twitter and Plurk.

It is definitely not easy to keep up with all of the information that comes out of NECC, so I've got a couple of other ideas I'm working on. One idea is a wiki to use as a collecting spot for all the links that will be coming out fast and furious starting tomorrow. I don't know if that will be the best way to stay on top of things, but it might be at least a bit better than the mess from last year. (Don't ask!)

I'll be sure to share as I go, and if you have any other suggestions, please let me know.

For now, if you have a Twitter and/or Plurk account, be sure to follow the hashtag #necc09. Or, if you're like myself, you can also choose to follow #notatnecc09, a hashtag that @marierush came up with this morning for those of us who were unable to make it to NECC (in case you couldn't figure that one out on your own). To search for hashtags, go here:

Twitter Search
FriendFeed Search

For a Twitter search that updates in real time, you have to try TweetGrid! I'm sure it will be moving fast and furious tomorrow!

The Votes Are In!

2009-05-13T08:38:00.000-07:00

The votes....or more accurately....the vote...is in! In case you've been waiting with bated breath (might I suggest a mint), the winner of our middle school Earth Day Google Doodle contest can be found on the McTeach wiki:

The Winner Is...

For more inspiration...or voting practice...be sure to stop by the original Google Doodle contest and vote for your favorites.

Vote For Your Favorite

You have until May 18th to vote for your favorite Doodle in each of the grade categories. The winner will have their doodle on the Google page on May 21st. How exciting that will be for the winner!

What keeps me going as a teacher? The fact that my students continue to amaze me!

Earth Day Google Doodles

2009-04-26T22:10:00.000-07:00

For Earth Day this year, I had my seventh graders create their own Earth Day Google Doodles. They decided we should have a contest as to who could create the best Doodle. Why they thought I would ever be able to choose just one "best" out of this incredibly talented class, I have no idea. But I agreed. Silly teacher.

Later that day...the eighth graders had a lengthy social studies test and I didn't feel like making them start anything new afterwards, so I invited them to also create their own Doodles. Before I knew what had happened, the eighth graders had challenged my seventh graders to a contest to see who could do the best Doodle out of both classes. They decided I should choose one from each class and then ask our Principal to choose the overall winner. Once again, I agreed. Crazy teacher.

Well, I have been unable to choose even a top five from each class. The best I could do was a top ten (David Letterman would be so proud). And now it's your turn! Please help me by voting for your favorite doodles, one from each class. (Right now I'm crossing my fingers that this will work, as I've never created a poll before. Crossed fingers makes it more difficult to type!)

Please visit the McTeach wiki to vote. Thank you!

Earth Day Animation

2009-04-25T16:29:00.000-07:00

On Earth Day my seventh graders created their own Earth Day Googles and were quickly challenged by my eighth graders to a contest to determine the best Google Doodler in middle school. I have no idea how I am going to choose one Doodle from each class...there is just far too much talent in both of these classes! Wait...I know...I'll make my PLN do it! Phew...what a relief.

I'm working on a poll for everyone to take to help me determine a winner, and once it's finished I'll post it here (and on Twitter and Plurk and my teacher blog and my new Wordpress blog...and anywhere else I can think of).

Until then, here's a cute cartoon with an environmental theme. I actually chuckled!

If you'd like to check out more educational videos from notebook babies, be sure and visit Tony Dusko's website, Notebook Babies. Just scrolling over the little creatures on the home page had me chuckling again (if you don't have your sound turned on, you might think I'm a bit off).

Fast Food Humor

2009-04-10T13:45:00.000-07:00

Ah, spring break! I know I will spend most of my break creating new and fabulous lesson plans and attempting to conquer Mount Grade Me Now. But first...a little humor. My thanks to Alec Couros (@courosa on Twitter) for this video. I watched it shortly after waking up this morning (to discover it was almost 9:00 AM...Yikes!), and quickly found myself laughing with ease.

Be sure to watch the video all the way to the end. Big time kudos to the Taco Bell dude!

Daylight Savings...Really?

2009-03-08T10:49:00.001-07:00

Do you know why we "spring forward" and "fall back"? Have you ever wondered if it is still a practical measure in today's world? Well, sit back and watch this video from the Fast Draw Team on CBSNews. Then ask yourself those questions one more time.

Now, let me see...is it lunchtime? dinner? Wait...did I have breakfast? Oh, heck, just bring on the caffeine!

Just for Fun

2009-02-15T12:16:00.000-08:00

One of my seventh grade boys keeps trying to call me "Miss McTeach." And while I find that fairly amusing, I still need to command at least a modicum of respect from my students. "Let's stick with my real name, okay?"

That being said...how cool is this!! My nickname created with images from Flickr courtesy of a website that is being shared on Twitter this morning (I'd like to give credit where credit is due, but I've seen the link so many times today that I just can't remember where I saw it first). Spell With Flickr is the creation of Erik Kastner. You just type in the word or words you'd like to spell using images from Flickr and Spell With Flickr does the rest. It's just too much...

Fear Not!

2009-02-11T21:59:00.000-08:00

This video of a four-year-old girl named Kylie working on her laptop is absolutely priceless! While the video is part of Microsoft's "I'm a PC" ad campaign, it's also a perfect video to show those teachers who are reluctant to integrate technology into their curriculum (and into their lives).

Shall we start a new ad campaign? "If Kylie can do it, so can I!"

Kylie uses Windows Live Photo Gallery

Catholic Schools Week

2009-01-25T15:02:00.000-08:00

Catholic Schools Week began today with a lovely mass (our new choir sounded beautiful, Mrs. Alonso!) and then Open House right after. I take a great deal of pride in the set up of my classroom, and I must say that it looked outstanding today!

Our CSW theme this year is Catholic Schools Celebrate Service. One of the ideas that we Catholics celebrate as part of our faith is the need to serve, not only our church, but the community and our country also. Last week I asked my students to write a few paragraphs about what serving others means to them. Here are a few highlights:

"Serving others is just one of the many things that we can do to live the way that God wants us to."

"Remember that we are servants of the Lord, and our charge is to be stewards and stewardesses of His creation, including our fellow humans."

"Serving others is important to me because it shows respect."

"Every time you serve someone not only do you benefit from the experience, it makes your community a better place."

"Albert Einstein once said, 'Only a life lived for others is a life worthwhile.' That's what service is: putting others before yourself, thinking before you act, and executing random acts of kindness whenever you can."

I think Katie's quote comes closest to my feelings:

The world may be a big place, but really there aren't that many of us who really dedicate themselves to serving others. Isn't that why we are all here? To help a neighbor when he is in need. Or to lend a helping hand to someone who has nothing. Again I ask, isn't that why God sent us to Earth? To help each other be the 'best possible versions of ourselves'?

We will be talking a lot about service this week in my classroom and as a school community. So I would like to ask my incredibly wise PLN the following question: What does 'service' mean to you? Feel free to add your comments here, and I will share them with my students as we move through our week.

One last thing...my favorite picture from this weekend is the seventh grade's answer to the question "Can we change the world?":

It's a Sad Story

2009-01-04T09:24:00.000-08:00

As embarrassing as this may be to admit, especially for a technology addict like myself, I feel I should come clean in the hopes that it might save someone else from the painful reality I am now faced with. [Yes, this grammar teacher ended that last sentence with a preposition...moving on.] It is a sad story I will call "From Memory to Senility."

You see, my home computer, a PC, once had a lovely memory. It held onto everything for me: photos of family, friends, students, and pets; household documents like tax information and addresses, both email and home, of friends, family, and clients (I am also a massage therapist); and, of course, school documents: lesson plans, unit plans, handouts, research, flipcharts for my Promethean activboard. You name it (because I can't remember everything), it was on there.

Did you notice the use of the word "was" in that last sentence?

Wait. Let me back up a bit (because I can't seem to remember to do that when I should).

I spent a lovely few days over Christmas at my mom and dad's house in the California foothills. We even had a white Christmas! My first in many years. I took my laptop with me because I wanted to do some organizing of files, and my dad is the King of Organization when it comes to All Things Mac! (he's a really cool guy, that dad of mine! Something I don't think I've ever told him.)

Dad and I spent some quality time in front of my MacBook, and he gave me lots of wonderful ideas on how to organize my files and photos. He also reminded me about the need for regularly backing up EVERYTHING! I've always been really good about backing up my laptop; well, at least since it crashed last year and the hard drive had to be replaced. Lucky for me, that our school computers are regularly backed up to the school server. But, after that experience, I went out and purchased an external hard drive which I use with my MacBook on a weekly basis.

The same could not be said for my PC. While talking to dad, I made a mental note to purchase a second external hard drive to use with the PC. The Sunday after Christmas I went down to Fry's Electronics (I love that place!) and purchased a 500-gig external hard drive. When I got home and started looking at my severely cluttered desktop, I thought it would be best to unclutter the desktop and do some organizing of files, photos, and various other documents.

I spent a good deal of Sunday afternoon doing just that, and was actually feeling pretty proud of my work. But it wasn't quite finished, so I shut down for the night and planned on finishing the clean-up Monday morning, after which I would hook up that lovely new hard drive.

Any guesses what happened next? I woke up Monday morning, turned on the computer, and stared at the large Windows icon on the screen, the one that's supposed to stay there for about two seconds while Windows is starting up. "Hmm," I thought to myself. "Why is it not moving past this screen?" Now, I wasn't quite awake yet, and I was in desperate need of caffeine, so I didn't quite process in my own internal hard drive what was happening. "Must just be slow today."

Unfortunately, it wasn't the computer that was slow...it was me. Slow on the uptake, slow on the back-up. My computer is currently back at Fry's, where I purchased it, waiting its turn in line to be serviced. I'm fearing the worst: loss of everything not backed up recently (I would define "recently" for you, but I'm already depressed). My brother suggests looking at this as an opportunity to start anew with a clean, fresh hard drive. I could do that.

OR...

[Yes, that's me...back in the day.]

I guess for now I'll just share my sad story with you and leave you with one question:

Have you backed up lately?

P.S. As Alice mentions in one of the comments below, Cheryl Oakes has a wonderful post on the techLearning blog called It Is Not a Matter of If...

Happy New Year!

2009-01-01T11:40:00.000-08:00

2009 is here and with it new opportunities for growth, both for our students and for ourselves. I'm not usually one to do resolutions; the word has become synonymous with "failure" for me. Instead, I'll set a few goals for myself and my students for the remainder of the school year.

Let's start with adding even more technology to our curriculum! We've just started blogging and I've set up a class account on Diigo so I can teach my students how to bookmark online. I am currently making plans for working with wikis, but I also want to incorporate a little bit of techy fun for my seventh graders.

This morning, one of my Plurk buddies sent out a cartoon from a website called FunnyTimes. I decided to check out the site and discovered you can also create your own comic strips there using their playground. I'm thinking this could be a really fun way to have my students use their vocabulary words! Check out what I created this morning for the word "apathy":

There is also another website called ToonDoo that is much more elaborate that I would love to explore. It has a few characters available to choose that aren't quite appropriate at my Catholic school, but I could definitely see using ToonDoo to create stories or summaries of, for instance, a current social studies chapter. I know most of my students would love it!

Not My Usual Subject

2008-12-19T21:06:00.000-08:00

I asked my students a couple of weeks ago if any of them had used chapter maps in their other classes and, if they had, would they be willing to share them with me so I could share them with others. Before I knew it, I had a large stack of papers sitting on my desk! Fortunately for me, these were papers I wasn't going to have to grade.

One thing I love about my seventh graders is that they are very generous young people. I'm sure they love the fact that I'm adding these to my blog so that other teachers will be able to see them! Of course, keep in mind that I don't teach science when you read these...

And when it comes from one of my special needs students, I have to say this is the most beautiful thing I've ever seen:

A few more for you:

I love when they add a key!!

Mapping Our Chapter

2008-12-07T11:00:00.000-08:00

It has been far too long since I've posted to my blog. For the most part, I've just been extremely busy with school. But I also haven't really had a topic that I felt I absolutely had to blog about. Until now.

I'm trying to really emphasize study skills this year with my seventh and eighth graders, starting with the different ways to take notes while reading a textbook. We've done two-column notes (similar to Cornell notes), and we've done the standard outline (surprising how many of my students did not know how to do that!) But, by far, our favorite note-taking activity has been chapter maps.

Last year, our principal sent all of the teachers to a workshop on a writing program called Step Up to Writing. It's a wonderful program for teaching our students how to construct a coherent sentence, paragraph, and, eventually, essay. But it also includes many other helpful lessons, such as note-taking.

Chapter maps have proven to be a wonderful tool for my students because they can actually have fun while doing something they usually consider a painful chore: taking notes. These chapter maps seem to have something for everyone. For my artistic students, they can be as creative as they want, including in their notes illustrations and lots of color. For my future engineers and architects, they can still be very linear thinkers if that's what they want. I have one student, whose map is included here, who was very reluctant to do something "artsy" with his notes. He's a by-the-book, everything-in-its-place, kind of guy.

And then came chapter maps...

When I first told the class that we would be doing something other than two-column notes, I actually heard him let out a groan. Change? Do something different? It can be intimidating if not downright frightening for some. The next time I asked them to do a chapter map, however, I actually heard him say "Yay!" Now that's cool!

Some of my favorite maps came from my special needs students. Normally, note-taking can be a fairly painful experience for them (and me, as the one who has to read the notes). But they really got into these chapter maps and created notes that nearly brought me to tears!

Here are two examples:

Aren't they gorgeous!?!

The best story came a few days after we first tried chapter maps...and it wasn't even for one of the subjects that I teach! One of my seventh grade girls came up to me and told me she'd made a chapter map for something they were studying in science. She explained that she'd read the material in the book several times, but she just couldn't "get it." Then she decided to try creating a chapter map on the section they were studying. As she said to me, "It all made sense after I was done!" I almost cried! You mean I've actually taught my students something that works? Something they can use in other classes as well as into the future?! That, my friends, was an amazing teacher's moment! In case you're curious, here's her science chapter map (sorry, it's not in color):

If you'd like to teach your students how to create a chapter map, here are the four steps from the Step Up to Writing handbook:

Find the chapter title. Write the topic anywhere on the page as long as additional information can be built around it. Put this topic in all caps, put a circle around it, or box it in. Illustrate the topic. Novelty and pictures help learning and memory, so be creative.
Determine what subtopics you will need. The chapter subheadings may help. You should have several subtopics. Print these subheadings in large letters and connect them to the main topic. Again, it will help if you add illustrations.
Look for supporting details by doing a careful reading of the chapter. Check your entries to make sure that what you write down is accurate. Connect the details to the heading. Don't forget to use color, symbols, or pictures.
Go over your map. Be creative but remember that you want your map to be a collection of facts. When you are finished, you should be able to explain all of your drawings and markings to your classmates.

© 2008 Sopris West Educational Services

We took some liberties with the instructions, of course. First of all, we didn't map an entire chapter, just one section of it. Secondly, I wanted my students to feel free to be as creative as they wanted with these maps. To me that meant letting them make some decisions about their maps on their own. If they had not been given this freedom, I don't think I would have gotten a set of notes with a Key like you would find on a regular map!

I try to remind myself that I just need to give them the information they need and then get out of their way. This is a wonderful example, for me, of how getting out of the way of our students can allow them to find their own wings so they might soar!

Ok, before I go...one more chapter map. I think you'll agree that this one is suitable for framing!

Some Step Up to Writing links:

Website of Step Up to Writing author Maureen Auman
A teacher's site with an excellent explanation of the program.
Anchorage School District language arts site

First Days of School

2008-08-06T11:54:00.000-07:00

Summer is quickly winding down for me, and like many teachers I am working on my lesson plans for the first days of our new school year. Several teachers that I follow in Twitter and Plurk have been sharing ideas lately and I thought it might be a good idea to put them all in one place. At the very least it will be a quick and easy reference for me!

Here are some blog posts I've found with first day ideas:

Here are some links to websites with first day ideas:

Both of these lists are far from complete, I'm sure. If you have some to share, please do and I'll add them here. I've also created a Diigo list for the First Days of School. I'll be adding to it as I find new resources.

I'd also like to share the two things I make sure to do on the first day of school. First, I take a picture of each student individually and quite a few of them in groups, at work, and at play. The individual photos are taken in a certain spot in my classroom. During the last week of school, I take individual photos of them in that same spot and add it to my end of school year slideshow so they can see how much they've grown (or not, in some cases).

The second thing I do is give each student a small wooden heart (which I purchased this morning from Michael's). I give them fifteen minutes to decorate their hearts however they would like, but one side must have their name and the other has one quality that they like the most about themselves. When they are finished, they put their hearts in a basket which I take around the classroom allowing each student to draw one heart. The name they draw is the classmate who will be their prayer partner for the year (remember, I teach at a Catholic school). Whenever we say prayer in class or in church, they are to keep that person in their heart (hence the wooden hearts). I preface the drawing by saying, "The classmate whose name you draw now is the person that God is asking you to pray for this year." This tends to prevent the loud "I can't believe I got stuck with him/her" groans.

Do you have a favorite First Day of School activity? Please feel free to share it in a comment.

Now, one final question before you get started preparing for your first day of school: What do you keep in your teacher survival kit? Do you have any of the following? Is there anything I should add?

chocolate (it always comes first!)
a small sewing kit
safety pins
bandages
suntan lotion
change
snacks
tea bags or coffee singles
bottled water
breath mints
tissues
hand sanitizer
aspirin!

Electing a President

2008-07-30T11:44:00.000-07:00

I'm very excited to finally be able to teach social studies this year. My dream job, yay! To celebrate the realization of a life-long dream, the country has been kind enough to hold a presidential election that should prove to be quite interesting, to say the least. I've spent the past couple of days looking for resources to use with my students this fall, and just this morning found this fabulous video posted on Twitter.

Our friends at The Common Craft Show have taken a break from all things Web 2.0 to create Electing a U.S. President in Plain English. It's perfect!

After you watch the video, if you have a Digg account I know the folks at The Common Craft Show would appreciate a quick Digg here.

No More Time to Waste

2008-07-28T19:12:00.000-07:00

Professor Randy Pausch passed away last Friday (July 25th), losing the battle with cancer that led to his Last Lecture video and book. [You can see that video on my blog here] It has always amazed me how people come and go in our lives, some close by and some at a distance. Some stay for a lengthy period of time, others flit in and out of our lives rather quickly. All have something to teach us if we're willing to stop and learn.

Professor Pausch was given an amazing gift to be able to reach so many people with his story. And yes, I did mean to say that he was the one given the gift. And I'm willing to bet he might agree with me. As a teacher I can tell you that teaching is a gift that you share with your students, but you keep a big chunk of that gift for yourself. It's a wonderful thing to be able to go home at the end of a day and say, "Wow! I reached at least one person today!" How it must have felt to reach millions, I can't even imagine.

My sympathies, my prayers, and my thanks go to his family at this time. Especially my thanks for sharing Randy with all of us, even if only for a short time.

But there's one more lesson to be learned. This one is all about time management. And it comes from the man who had so little to waste.

How to Break In Your New Laptop

2008-07-12T19:59:00.000-07:00

If you're wondering what the best way to break in that new laptop might be, this is NOT it!

Spam I Am

2008-07-10T20:02:00.000-07:00

If you hate spam but love Dr. Seuss, this is the slideshow for you!

Enjoy!

| View | Upload your own

THE Web 2.0 Directory

2008-07-09T10:14:00.000-07:00

I was sent a link this morning (thanks @kolson29) to the Web 2.0 Directory that you see below. It is a comprehensive list of Web 2.0 sites, everything from abazab to Zypsy. If there's something you'd like to accomplish on the internet, chances are you'll find a solution here.

Seeing this directory also led me to check out the website it came from, Scribd. Scribd is a website that allows you to "Publish Yourself Online." You can upload your own documents if you'd like to have a worldwide audience and possibly get feedback from the community. You can also explore their library of "over 12 billion words" to find documents that might be of interest to you. Once you join the website you can save any documents you like by marking them a "fave", or even download the document to your computer. If you'd like to share the document on your blog, you can easily get the embed code right above the document (that's how I managed to include the Web 2.0 Directory here).

Once you join, add me as a friend. I'm McTeach there also.

Web2-Directory - Upload a Document to Scribd

Another Grammar Post?

2008-07-01T16:04:00.000-07:00

Yes, I know, two grammar posts in a row. While you might not think of this as entirely a grammar issue, I just had to share it somehow. Nothing irks me more than finding grammar or spelling errors in publications or advertisements like the one I saw at the gas station today. Picture this mild-mannered grammar teacher standing there, pumping my gasoline (I'm still trying not to think about how much that cost me), when my eye is caught by the sign above the pumps. I read it and reread it a few times before my mind actually acknowledged, "Holy cow! There's a big glaring typo on this sign!" And it wasn't on just that one pump. No, it was on each of the six pumps, one sign on each side, twelve signs in all.

At first I was shocked, then amused, and then teacher mode kicked in. Frantically I searched the gas station for someone with a cellphone who could take a picture for me. No such luck. I even waited for a few minutes to see if someone would pull up who could help me with my future grammar lesson. The only people who pulled up were the landscaping crew from up the street. No cellphones.

What's a grammar teacher to do? Well, drive home, get her camera, and drive back to take the picture, of course! At this point you're either shaking your head or, like my mother, just outright laughing at me. That's fine. I can take it. I've got big shoulders. And somehow I will work this photo into my curriculum next year. In fact, I'd like to ask for your help. If you find an advertisement or billboard or street sign with an error, please take a picture of it for me. You can either email it to me at ctkmcmillan@gmail.com or add it to the group I've created on Flickr. Follow this link to the group's page, Stop the Grammar Madness. How's that for a catchy title?

But on to this morning's find.

I'm hoping that any one of my seventh graders could tell you what's wrong with sentence number one. That's right, even a seventh grader can tell you how to spell "available." Perhaps I should suggest to Chevron that they hire a few of my students as proofreaders. Just a thought.

On to error number 2. Now, unless they are actually planning on adding armor to your tires, I would suggest that they make "ArmorAll" one word and, to be completely accurate, they should also add the "registered trademark" after ArmorAll (you know, the little circle with the "R" in it). I'm sure the ArmorAll folks would appreciate it.

So, in your travels this summer, if you happen to spot an errant apostrophe, a glaring misspelling, or, heaven forbid, poor grammar, please take a picture of it and send it to me. Let us band together and say "Stop the Grammar Madness!"

Grammar Rules!

2008-06-28T21:28:00.000-07:00

Now, that title could be taken one of two ways. Either you're reading it to mean the rules of grammar. Or, if you're a stickler like myself, you could be reading it like this: Grammar RULES!!! Woo-hoo! [I can almost see my brother rolling his eyes at me.]

Since discovering podcasts at a technology conference last year, I've been a regular listener of Grammar Girl, aka Mignon Fogarty. Her "Quick and Dirty Tips for Better Writing" are quick snippets of grammar rules done in such a way that makes the rules easy to remember. No, really! You can find her podcasts, which I highly recommend, at her website or through the iTunes store.

Of course, if you're more of a visual learner do I have exciting news for you! Grammar Girl has written a book!! (I hope she doesn't get upset with me for using two exclamation points there, but I'm excited!) If you'd like to preview the first chapter, you can click on the book to the left. I'm sure after a few pages you'll be ready to preorder your copy which is due out July 8th. Just follow me over to Amazon.com to preorder.

I can't wait to hear the comments McBro will be making about this post!

Dance Globally

2008-06-28T10:33:00.000-07:00

With tremendous thanks to Lisa Parisi, I have found how I will start my year off with my new seventh graders in August. Lisa shared this video with us on Twitter this morning, and I can't stop thinking about it. I've decided to show my students this video and ask them one question: "How will we connect with the world this year?" I don't expect them to go out and dance their way across the planet, but I do want connections made.

In this video you will see an American man named Matt Harding doing one simple thing: dancing. But what you will also see are real human connections being made in a universal language: dancing. You can watch the video here, but I recommend you go to YouTube and, before the video starts, click on "watch in high quality" right underneath the video (you can also choose to watch it full screen). It really makes a difference!

My favorite parts are the ones with kids (in Fiji and the Solomon Islands), the tribesmen in Papua New Guinea, and the dancers in India. That one is priceless!

Thinking About Thinkfinity

2008-06-22T09:15:00.000-07:00

I spent two days last week in a seminar learning all about the website Thinkfinity. Once I left the seminar all I could think was "I can't wait to share this!" With three new preps starting in the fall, I know I'll be spending a lot of time this summer exploring the website and all the lesson plans it has to offer. If you're in a similar situation, or if you're just looking to find some new lessons to add to your repertoire, please start here!

According to the website, Thinkfinity:

makes it easy for educators to enhance their classroom instruction with lesson plans, interactive activities and other online resources. Thinkfinity.org also provides a wealth of educational and literacy resources for students, parents and after-school programs.

All of Thinkfinity.org's 55,000 standards-based K-12 lesson plans, student materials, interactive tools and reference materials are reviewed by the nation's leading education organizations to ensure that content is accurate, up-to-date, unbiased and appropriate for students.

Before you read any further, I should also warn you that I've been playing with screencasts using Jing. That's been a lot of fun! So let me show you how to get started with Thinkfinity.

Once you're at the website, click on the link for "educator." This will take you to the "educator resources" page where you can choose to either do a search for what you're looking for (on the right side of the page), or check out the "content partners" (on the top left of the page). These are the organizations who have created and contributed the thousands of lesson plans that you'll find here.

Contributors include National Geographic, the Smithsonian, National Council of Teachers of English (NCTE), the International Reading Association, and the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts.

Aside from the fact that you will find wonderful lessons and activities here, what I love most is that each lesson comes with links to everything you need to conduct the lesson in your classroom: handouts, worksheets, website links where you can get more information or your students can do their research. No more spending hours upon hours looking for just the right resource to share with your students.

If you can't already tell, I'm very excited about using Thinkfinity and sharing it with my friends and coworkers. If you have any questions about this wonderful resource, please don't hesitate to leave me a comment or send me an email. Feel free to visit the list I've created on Diigo where I'll be saving all the lessons I'm finding on Thinkfinity that I'm anxious to try next year. You can find that list here: http://www.diigo.com/list/mcteach/thinkfinity-lessons

My Delicious Tag Cloud

2008-06-16T10:03:00.000-07:00

Following others in my Twitter network, I used Wordle to make a word cloud of my del.icio.us tags. It definitely shows me what topics I've been spending the most time researching. For those who've never seen a tag cloud, the largest words are the tags that you use the most, for instance "internet safety" for me.

Today's Eco-Tips

2008-06-14T15:11:00.000-07:00

Did you know that if one million people turned off their office computers at night, we could eliminate up to 45,000 tons of carbon dioxide per year? That's like taking almost 8,000 SUVs off the road!

Here's one that drives me crazy...literally. Many people seem to think that they need to let their car engine warm up by letting it idle (I have a neighbor who will let his car idle for up to ten minutes!) Today's fuel-injected engines don't need that warm-up period. In fact, it can actually lead to excessive engine wear. According to Climate 411, following the 10-second rule (don't let your car idle for more than ten seconds) could save you gas and decrease the amount of pollution you put into our air.

For more eco-friendly tips, visit the Environmental Defense Fund website or one of my new favorites, We Can Solve It.

All About Reading

2008-06-08T16:14:00.000-07:00

My second year of teaching has come and gone, and I've just noticed that I've been a bit lax in keeping up with my blog. Report cards are done, my students have left, I have no excuses now.

Before my future seventh graders left for their summer vacation, I gave them their summer reading assignment. It is very similar to the one I gave them last summer, but this year I decided to create a wiki with the assignment and reading list on it, and email the link to their parents. No excuses of "I lost the handout" this year!

I had never created a wiki before, but I'm feeling pretty proud of my creation. Not only does it have the summer reading assignment and the reading list, but it also has a page called Challenge the Teacher. The student who manages to read more than I do this summer will receive a gift card to Borders (conveniently located up the street from our school).

While explaining the wiki to my current sixth graders/future seventh graders, they asked if they could also challenge next year's sixth graders to a Read Off. I ran it by my boss and our fifth grade teacher and, well, Challenge On! The class that reads more (as a class) over the summer will receive Skittles from yours truly.

I'll do anything to get my students to read more!

Feel free to stop by my Notes From McTeach wiki and let me know what you think.

Happy Mother's Day!

2008-05-11T13:23:00.000-07:00

A little entertainment for all you moms out there! Happy Mother's Day!

"The Mom" song, sung to the William Tell Overture, by Anita Renfroe.

What a mom says in 24 hours, condensed into 2 minutes and 55 seconds.

"The Mom Song"
Get up now
Get up now
Get up out of bed
Wash your face
Brush your teeth
Comb your sleepyhead
Here's your clothes and your shoes
Hear the words I said
Get up now!
Get up and make your bed
Are you hot?
Are you cold?
Are you wearing that?
Where's your books and your lunch and your homework at?
Grab your coat and gloves and your scarf and hat
Don't forget! You gotta feed the cat
Eat your breakfast, the experts tell us it's the most important meal of all
Take your vitamins so you will grow up one day to be big and tall
Please remember the orthodontist will be seeing you at 3 today
Don't forget your piano lesson is this afternoon so you must play
Don't shovel
Chew slowly
But hurry
The bus is here
Be careful
Come back here
Did you wash behind your ears?
Play outside, don't play rough, will you just play fair?
Be polite, make a friend, don't forget to share
Work it out, wait your turn, never take a dare
Get along!
Don't make me come down there
Clean your room, fold your clothes, put your stuff away
Make your bed, do it now, do we have all day?
Were you born in a barn?
Would you like some hay?
Can you even hear a word I say?
Answer the phone!
Get off the phone!
Don't sit so close, turn it down, no texting at the table
No more computer time tonight!
Your iPod's my iPod if you don't listen up
Where are you going and with whom and what time do you think you're coming home?
Saying thank you, please, excuse me makes you welcome everywhere you roam
You'll appreciate my wisdom someday when you're older and you're grown
Can't wait till you have a couple little children of your own
You'll thank me for the counsel I gave you so willingly
But right now I thank you not to roll your eyes at me
Close your mouth when you chew, would appreciate
Take a bite maybe two of the stuff you hate
Use your fork, do not burp or I'll set you straight
Eat the food I put upon your plate
Get an A, get the door, don't get smart with me
Get a grip, get in here, I'll count to three
Get a job, get a life, get a PHD
Get a dose of,"I don't care who started it!You're grounded until you're 36"
Get your story straight and tell the truth for once, for heaven's sake
And if all your friends jumped off a cliff would you jump, too?
If I've said it once, I've said at least a thousand times before
That you're too old to act this way
It must be your father's DNA
Look at me when I am talking
Stand up straighter when you walk
A place for everything and everything must be in place
Stop crying or I'll give you something real to cry about
Oh! Brush your teeth, wash your face, put your PJs on
Get in bed, get a hug, say a prayer with mom
Don't forget, I love you
And tomorrow we will do this all again because a mom's work never ends
You don't need the reason why
Because, because, because, because
I said so, I said so, I said so, I said so
I'm the mom, the mom, the mom, the mom, the mom!!Ta da!!!

RSS Awareness Day

2008-05-01T06:30:00.001-07:00

Where would I be without my Twitter network?! Last night I was in a panic because I could not for the life of me find my teaching materials for the book Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry, which I'm just starting with my sixth graders. So I sent out an S.O.S. to my Twitter friends and within minutes had two fantastic websites sent to me by Diane and Pat. My Twitter network continues to amaze me with their continued generosity and kindness! Thank you one and all!

Fast forward to this morning...without a tweet from Will Richardson I never would have known that today, May 1st, is RSS Awareness Day. I'm willing to bet that very few of us knew that! In case you're scratching your head and trying to come up with what "RSS" might stand for, let me just stop you right there before you come up with something really off-the-wall. RSS stands for Really Simple Syndication which is the format we use every day to get our blog feeds sent to us. Care to know more about RSS or RSS Awareness Day, then please visit the RSSDay.org website. Thanks again to Mr. Richardson for this one!

Blogged with the Flock Browser

One Last Lecture

2008-04-27T15:29:00.000-07:00

Would it surprise you to know that one of the most popular videos on YouTube has nothing to do with strange people doing stupid stuff? In fact it is a video of a college professor giving his Last Lecture. This video has probably already made its way into your emailbox, or you've heard friends or colleagues talking about it, or you might have seen Randy Pausch himself being interviewed on ABC recently.

Randy Pausch is a professor at Carnegie Mellon University who was diagnosed with terminal pancreatic cancer last year. The video is based on a lecture series that asks the hypothetical question, "If you could give one final lecture, what words of wisdom would you leave behind?" In this video Professor Pausch discusses his childhood dreams and how he realized them.

It truly is inspirational.

"We cannot change the cards we are dealt, just how we play the hand."

Now That's Creative!

2008-04-23T07:48:00.001-07:00

Paper Art

From: jovirakel, 1 year ago

| View | Upload your own

It's not my artwork, just something I got on my e-mail box and thought I'd share here. the artist: www.petercallesen.com

SlideShare Link

Do You Flock?

2008-04-20T16:58:00.001-07:00

Image from Flickr user Capitrueno

I've spent some time today trying to figure out Flock. It wasn't in my original plans for today, but problems with Internet Explorer and Twitter started me thinking, "Wait a minute, I remember downloading Flock...why aren't I using it?" A very good question! Flock calls itself the Social Web Browser because you can do so many different things with it: check email, Twitter, Facebook, Flickr, even YouTube. I can even blog directly from Flock, which I'm doing right now for the first time. They make it incredibly easy to share everything you find on the web with your network!

I'm still trying to figure it all out and would love to hear from those who are experts at it. Speaking of experts, be sure and check out the following screencast from Liz Davis, the Queen of All Things Screencasted.

Or for a longer demonstration, check out the following video from last year's TechCrunch Conference.

And for the record, it was very tempting to title this post "What the Flock?" but I didn't know how mom would react to that!

Blogged with the Flock Browser

Field Trip!

2008-04-03T19:38:00.000-07:00

Field trips are a lot of work. First there's the paperwork, then there's prepping the kids for the trip, and, of course, finding drivers, and then more paperwork. And when a driver cancels at the last minute, you check your blood pressure, say a few Hail Marys, and start making phone calls.

And when you're planning a field trip to San Francisco you never know what kind of weather to expect. We were unbelievably fortunate today, as you can see from the photo I took of the Golden Gate Bridge. Beautiful, beautiful day!

Our trip today was to the Legion of Honor, where we were to see the Annie Leibovitz exhibit. I have been an admirer of her work for many years, so to get to see this exhibit was truly a privilege. Her work, mostly done in black and white, somehow manages to capture more of a person's inner beauty than can be discovered on the outer shell. I loved every minute and every photograph, even the ones that made me gasp. Especially the ones that made me gasp.

I found out just before we left school this morning that the Legion of Honor was also holding an exhibit of the Dead Sea Scrolls, along with a number of other antiquities from Israel. They only had one small portion of the Scrolls, Psalm 119 to be exact, but to be that near a religious document that was written over 5,000 years ago was truly awe-inspiring. Flash forward two minutes to find me asking one of my seventh graders, "Did you see the Dead Sea Scrolls?" After receiving the response, "Yup. Cool," I was quickly brought back to reality.

While I loved being able to see both of these exhibits on such a beautiful day in San Francisco, I have to admit that the best part of our trip was getting to spend some free-spirited time with my students. I brought my camera with me and once I started snapping pictures of the kids, the goofiness took over. "Miss McMillan, take a picture of this!" Pose. "No, Miss McMillan, come over here and get this!" Pose. I took seventy pictures in all, and can't wait to share them with my students. Goofballs, each and every one!

As we were leaving the city, I snapped one final picture. The saying around these parts used to be, "Welcome to California. Now go home!" The sign today said, "Dear Yuppies, Make sure you have more to offer San Francisco when you move here than just your Money!" Things have changed...but not by much!

Happy April Fool's Day!

2008-04-01T06:33:00.001-07:00

If you're looking for a high-tech prank to pull on someone today, look no further!