Cycle of Failure

I have a note sitting in the reminders app on my phone that has been there for quite some time.

Fail, fail, fail, success!

When I see it, it reminds me of two mindsets I have while working on the art and science of teaching. I either feel supremely confident that what I’m doing/teaching/learning/leading at the time is going really well, and I have a great grasp of it… OR, I realize how much more there is to learn, and I feel vastly incompetent, or at least, unqualified to have such great responsibility for young minds.

Isn’t this true of all teachers (and learners)? We go through a cycle of failure while learning new things. Shouldn’t we embrace failure as a step in the process of life? Surely if you’re a teacher browsing online for classroom decorations you’ve seen the poster idea for “FAIL = First Attempt In Learning.”  True, the word “fail” has an extremely negative connotation: missing out on a goal, not meeting a standard, getting a bad grade. How can we change our mindset to think of failure as just another step in the process of being successful? It’s not going to happen with just a poster on the wall.

It’s not just the mindset of the teacher or the students that needs to change; teachers must encourage this mindset in parents, too. Open communication and showcasing students’ work is essential to show that yes, there is learning going on, and we are all striving to get better and learn more.

As I find myself daydreaming of what my new classroom will look like, it will (by far) not be a perfect place. I may even make a poster for my wall that redefines failure as a step in the learning process. I want to get across to my learners, that I too, have lots of times where a plan may not work the way I want, or there is some kind of failure. I want them to learn (and for me to remember) that if something doesn’t work, or we don’t understand, we’ll find a different avenue to accomplish our goal. I want them to know that not being very good at something is just the first step to being good at something. Teachers, know that what we do matters, and it matters in all the right ways–getting our students to love learning and to be unafraid of trying new things.

In the words of one of my favorite TV teachers, we’ll “Take chances! Make mistakes! Get messy!”

Keep a song in your heart, and have fun getting ready for the new school year!

Teach Like a PIRATE Book Whisperer

Yadda yadda, haven’t posted in a long time. Course load increased, prep time decreased, musical production, mentoring a first year teacher, supervising a pre-service teacher, etc. etc. etc.

Image from Denise Caparula via Amazon.com

BUT I just finished reading Teach Like A Pirate by Dave Burgess. Oh. My. Goodness. It’s our book for our WELS Book Club this summer. We’re discussing Part 1 of the book on Twitter – July 15th at 8pm CST using the hashtag #WELSbkclub.

My brain is now swirling with ideas. Hopefully I don’t get sucked down into the infinite vortex!!

So. Next year I’m teaching (subject/grade level):

Homeroom 6; Reading 6; English 6; Music 6, 7, 8; Technology 5, 6, 7, 8; Geometry 8

That seems like a lot looking at it, but I also am thankful because it’s less than I had last year (when I almost died).

Aaaanyhow, last summer, I read/listened to The Book Whisperer by Donalyn Miller. Unfortunately for me, my school also dropped a bunch of money on a new Reading textbook (Journeys from Houghton Mifflin) so I needed to use the text as much as possible. I still supplemented with a couple novels and Scholastic’s SCOPE magazine, but the joy just wasn’t there.

In the light of Teach Like a Pirate and The Book Whisperer, I’m thinking of an idea kind of like the Challenges Dave Burgess uses in TLAP wrapped around the idea of independent choice and reading like The Book Whisperer. Students can choose to read whatever book they want, and if they provide some kind of review or summary (who knows what that will look like — I’m sure I’ll allow many different forms from the traditional report to a YouTube video and everywhere in between) they get some sort of credit in the gradebook (because I still have to take grades, and if they’re going to put in the work, I want their grade to reflect it), and some kind of public acknowledgement.  I’m considering some kind of competition around it as well, but I’m not certain how that would go over with the kids. Maybe I’ll leave that up to them! I’m still coming up with how I want to design my instruction during our time together, but letting the kids have time to read is going to be a big part of it.

Let me know what you think of this idea! I’m planning on creating a rubric and guidelines of what is and is not appropriate, and I’ll update this post with links to that when I’m finished.

Thank you, Teach Like A Pirate, for putting some zip back into my step and getting me excited about teaching again.

Update 1: Wowza! Thanks Dave for your kind comments. Donalyn, also for your feedback on Twitter. As I said on Twitter, when I mentioned competition above, I was thinking of a recognition wall where we could either track how many books were read, or to show off some excellent product. I don’t like pitting students against each other, but I’d rather we work together to a common goal, such as 200 books read or something. Finally, just as a side note, I only have 12 students in my 6th grade next year. Think of how well we’ll be able to build our relationships!! 🙂

April, Already?

Waste less EARTH do less homework[Day270]* by Chapendra, on Flickr

The teachers and I here are just coming off our first “real” break since Christmas. It was a delightful time for me, a whole week off (almost…still had grad school work to do), and time to visit parents, brothers, sisters, and my nephew. I missed meeting my new nephew by only a couple days! My husband and I look forward to going back to South Dakota to meet him in a few weeks for his Baptism.

And yet, here we are, in the home stretch of the school year. I am so thankful that we do our standardized testing in the fall, because many of the educators I see out there in the universe are all pressed for time because of test preparations. I’m pressed for time because I want to get my poetry unit and another novel finished before the end of school. I want to get through all the human body systems before the end of the year, and we’ve only done skeletal, muscular, and digestive. I want to actually reach the last section of my 6th grade science book, and have the kids make the e-book guide to space and technology that they’re so excited about. (Look for a longer post about how we went about the process of making our ebook in May or June.)

The K-6 reading teachers are meeting tomorrow morning to decide on a new textbook series that will fit our Reading curriculum. I’m glad for this, because coming into my new grade level this year and discovering that there was no textbook was a challenge. I’ve filled our time with visual literacy with CNN Student News, non-fiction texts through Scholastic Scope Magazine, and then a series of four novels, one per quarter. (Freak the Mighty, Hatchet, The Westing Game, and Bridge to Terabithia) I am fairly sure that I met all the curricular goals that we had outlined in our previous curriculum. Now that it’s revised and more CCSS-based, I’m hoping that whatever textbook series we go with will help me plan a little better. I really think I want to lobby for the digital edition for my classroom, since they will have Chromebooks next year, too. We’ll see what ends up happening.

Whatever happens here or in your neck of the woods, know that you, teacher, have a noble calling. We are preparing kids for the world of tomorrow! Do your best, finish strong, and keep His song in your heart!

Google Wrap Up

Hi friends!

It’s been a few weeks since I blogged about the Google Education Summit at Wisconsin Lutheran College. The week went well, and my brain is still reeling from all the information we stuffed in during that week.

My biggest takeaway will be using the suite of Google tools in my classroom.  Right now, I’m planning to have my students do much of their work with Google Drive. We will use the Docs tool to journal and do most of our writing assignments. (I will never suggest completely giving up writing with a pencil!) We will use Presentation/Spreadsheet/Forms to do learning together. I will be searching the Chrome Web Store for different apps/weblinks for us to use in our learning. Speaking of apps and links, I’m going to dump a bunch below so you can see some of the fun things that we did while at the Summit:

• Edmodo – a Facebook-esque site for teachers and students
• Aviary – online sound/voice/photo editing (The advanced tools are going away on September 15. They will be concentrating on photo editing)
• PicMonkey – image editing (similar to the former site Picnik)
• Picasa Web Albums – Google’s photo storage site
• WebcamToy – fun Photobooth style pictures)
• ColourLovers – where I can find fun palettes and designs to use in image editing
• Quizlet – for create-you-own flashcards, or find ones shared by other people
• Prezi – for zooming, flying presentations
• Desmos Graphing Calculator
• Screenr – screencapture with voiceover ability
• VoiceThread – upload pictures and record voiceovers to share presentations
• QR Codes – create your own codes with any information you desire for smartphones to scan

As you can see, there are many things that we learned about.  I can’t wait to get the kids’ hands on some of these tools and see what awesomeness they can cook up in our classroom next year.

Speaking of that… there are only 34 days left until school begins! Will I be ready? I hope so! 🙂

Until next time, keep a song in your heart!

Sock Monsters

Mrs. P's Example Sock Monster

Our art project before Christmas time was one of the most non-traditional art projects I’ve done in my teaching career. (Definitely not a bad thing!)

We learned a skill that has, in my opinion, declined quite rapidly in today’s society.

We were sewing!

First, we practiced on some scrap pieces of fabric. We threaded our needles, tied the thread, and began to do simple stitching. Next, we learned how to sew on a shank button. Some of us also decided to practice on more traditional buttons with two or four holes.

Once we got the basics down, we got on with our actual project: a sock monster!

Out of one sock, we cut arms, legs, and a mouth. The other sock became the torso of our monster.

After a couple weeks of sewing, our finished products emerged. The neat thing about this unit was that it was done using Skype with a guest teacher: my friend Rini, who is the manager of Project: Give! where she makes many sock monsters and donates them to children in hospitals and to anyone who may need a smile on their face.

Take a look at our finished products at Picasa (click)!

Screen Sharing with Screenr

Have you ever wondered how people take videos of their computer screen and add a voice over? I’ve written before about Jing, which is a program you install to your computer.  For those of you who don’t like taking up precious space on your hard drive, Screenr is a web app that will have you screencasting in no time! All you need is an internet connection, the Java plugin and an external microphone. You will also need to sign up for a free Screenr account, which can be based of a number of different social media sign-ins. (I used Google.)

Here’s my first attempt at using Screenr:
http://www.screenr.com/embed/9ERs

Another attempt where I talk about uploading art to Artsonia:
http://www.screenr.com/embed/DQRs

There are so many educational uses for a web app like this! Here are the ones my partner and I decided to put in our course wiki:

• Students may search the public gallery for information on items they are studying.
• Students may easily produce screencasts themselves as part of a presentation or to teach concepts to others.
• Teachers may quickly produce a screencast to review the day’s assignments for absent students.
• Teachers may teach and post lessons using a desktop computer and screencasting to supplement concepts covered in class.
• Teachers may create screencasts to demonstrate and teach technology usage to other teachers.

Happy screencasting! (Again, if you need any help, let me know!)

Keep a song in your heart!

Start Simple

Right now I’m in a course called “Building Online Learning Communities.” (For those of you just popping in to the blog, I’m working on my Masters in Educational Design and Technology through Concordia University – Wisconsin.)

Overhead Projectors at US Grant High School in Oklahoma City by Wesley Fryer

We’re learning about using blogs, wikis, podcasts, and other Web 2.0 learning tools in education.  Our course has a wiki that we’re building as we’re going through our assignments. We are working on weekly technology reviews, and we also have a section on student safety and ethical considerations as students are working online. The students in the class are also a part of a Diigo social bookmarking group where we have a bunch of links that we have shared of things that interest us. For someone who hasn’t used a lot of technology before, that probably seems really overwhelming!

One of my goals through the Masters program and a personal goal of mine is to increase the use of technology and collaborative work in education. It seems to me a huge challenge. I asked the teachers at my school what kind of technological things they would like to learn. The majority of them asked me to teach them how to use PowerPoint. That hit me like a ton of bricks. It seems outrageous to me that PowerPoint…even the basics of making slides is an unknown.  But…that’s me. I’m not saying that the teachers here are completely ignorant when it comes to technology. I’m on the cusp of being a digital native.  Things were just exploding with the world of the internet as I was growing up. People who were already out in the teaching field before this technology came out may not have had a chance to learn how to use it. (I think, just to be crafty, I’m going to show them Google Docs Presentation. That way, they will have learned a great Web 2.0 tool.)

What I’m attempting to say: When you are working with technology, it’s best to start simple. If a slide presentation is what the teachers at my school want to start with, I’m more than willing to take that first step. It will be the first step to more technology engagement!

If you have a great idea, but are wondering how to do it, just ask! I’m more than willing to help.

Find me on Twitter. Send me a message on Facebook. Email Me. I want to help you!

Mr. Miagi’s Rules for Students

My family and I were in Cincinnati this weekend for my younger sister’s graduation. (Congratulations on your Masters in Genetic Counseling, Heidi!! We’re proud of you!)

When you’re staying in a hotel, it’s inevitable (at least for our family, it seems) to channel-surf. As my brother and I were hanging out this evening, we stumbled upon The Karate Kid. (The original.) In the movie, Daniel-san makes a deal with Mr. Miagi. Daniel will be taught karate if he follows exactly what his teacher tells him without question. First, Daniel is told to wash and wax cars. Then, to sand a deck, paint a fence, and paint a house. Each task had to be accomplished in specific ways. Finally, Daniel gets so frustrated with these tasks, he threatens to leave. All along, Mr. Miagi was teaching the basics of karate and Daniel learned without even realizing it.

What revolt would we get in our classrooms if we assigned tasks with no apparent goals in mind? Could it possibly be okay for students to learn the process of a task before they know the outcome? In what situation could we ask student to implicitly trust us, their teachers? In today’s climate of “teacher at fault, student always right,” in what way could we implement these ideas? I realize I am asking many questions without posing answers, but maybe this will get us to think.

I believe that innovation lies with those who are willing to take risks. Teachers who constantly find new ways to present materials. Students who are willing to follow a teacher’s directions, even though they might not know where they will end up at the end of the lesson. Teachers who see the process of learning as one of discovery and enrichment.

I pray that all teachers can find this spirit and have students who are thrilled to share in the process of learning because of it.

iPads in Middle School

EEEE! An iPad! For me!? Really!?

I can’t wait! My principal is super-awesome and has allocated some tech funds in order for us to get two iPad 2s. They should be arriving sometime next week. As much as I’d like to take this sweet new piece of technology and make it mine and love it forever, I have to figure out some way to let my students use it as a tool for learning. (Shame on you, Selfish Rachel!)

I’ve done some Twitter-searching, Google-ing, and digging into the App Store and have found a few apps that I think I’ll like. In our tech meetings, I was directed to http://sites.google.com/site/wlcipad/apps which has a list of the best apps for education.
I’m definitely going to grab iBooks, Dropbox and Evernote. I’ve heard great things about Flipboard, and I’ll definitely need to get Twitter. Our school adopted the Everyday Math series this year, so I’ll probably pick up some of their apps. Some of the others I’ve been recommended are Adobe Ideas, Flashcards deluxe and Storykit.

I know this ends up to be a pretty short post, but if you are using an iPad for anything in education, what are some of your favorite apps to use? What could be best for grade levels 5-8? Comments are appreciated!

Metro-Milwaukee Teachers’ Conference

Today I had the privilege of presenting a sectional at the Metro Milwaukee Teachers’ Conference (MMTC).  My principal and I presented on the use of Technology as a means of Alternative Assessment.

We started out with a Poll Everywhere question: “What skill is the most important to develop in our students?” We received lots of good responses! I’m thinking about using this tool in my classroom while the kids are coming into the class before school starts.

The outline for our presentation is at Google Docs: http://tinyurl.com/metropresent All the links that we covered in the presentation are in that document.

Please feel free to comment on this post or get in touch with me if you’d like more help on implementing technology in your classrooms!