Wordless Wednesday

Collage Collaboration on Measurement

Online Safety

I've read many posts on internet safety in the year I've really been engaged in the blogosphere. But I haven't really been invested in what I was reading. I think I figured it wasn't a big issue for my students - fifth graders who aren't upper middle class. They don't have computers in their bedrooms, many of them don't have internet access at home.

So, an incident last week took me completely by surprise. One girl in my class went to the counselor with a concern. The counselor kept returning to my room throughout the morning and borrowing or returning students. I didn't really think too much about it, assuming it was a friendship issue (a common problem). At lunch I walked past my principal's office and noticed the counselor and four of my students in there. I got them to lunch and went back to figure out what on earth was going on.

It turns out that quite a few of my students have been using a social networking site. I had never heard of it. It seems to have a focus on anime and manga. One student began receiving threatening emails two days before this. When she didn't respond the bully began emailing her friends to get to her. They were all quite scared.

As a school, we contacted parents, reassured students, and turned this over to the proper authorities. I'm keeping an eye on these students to see if they seem to be upset or distracted or if they show any other signs of distress. Hopefully they will all stop using this site and not be bothered by this bully anymore.

It was eye opening to me and I think I need to do more on internet safety with my students. I thought they were too young, but I was wrong. Only one of them had anything very personal on this site, fortunately, but it's clearly a lesson we need to discuss.

The positive side to all of this was a reaffirmation of the wonders of my school. I spent part of my lunch getting the scoop on the issue from the principal and counselor, but that was all that was required of me. The administration took care of everything. My job was to teach my class and they made sure I could do that. I'm not sure that level of support is a common thing.

(I have to admit that I wasn't willing to be that uninvolved. I'm lucky to have an intern/student teacher working in my room right now so I was able to be out of the classroom to help call parents and talk with the authorities. But, it was nice to have options.)

Wordless Wednesday

With our buddies (head start three and four year olds):










































(Many bloggers, mostly outside of the edublogosphere, do Wordless Wednesday posts every week. I've greatly enjoyed them and decided to give it a try.)

Me as a Model

Not a fashion model, obviously, but a role model for my students. I've been thinking about this since Dan posted about keeping students' attention. It's a great post and my musings are way off topic, but it got me thinking. He has a short video in this post in which he calls his class "boys and girls." It struck me because I typically call my students "ladies and gentlemen" and they are a few years younger than Dan's students. I wasn't the only one intrigued by this. Dina posted a poll asking what others call their students. The responses are interesting.

Since reading all of this I've been more aware of how I address my students. I'm exceptionally polite with them (thank you, please, etc.), more so than I am in the rest of my life. I've also realized that I write thank you notes for anything my students give me, no matter how small. I am not that good about thank you notes to others who give me gifts.

I've realized that, consciously or unconsciously, I try to model the behavior I would like to see in my students. As a result, I am a better person as a teacher than I am in general. I'm not sure if I'm proud of that or not.

This also made me realize how much I'm teaching my students that has nothing to do with the SOLs or our county curriculum.

Mary Lee, at A Year of Reading, was inspired by this year's Newbery Award Winner. Laura Amy Schlitz wrote Good Masters! Sweet Ladies! Voices from a Medieval Village. She is a librarian at a school in Baltimore and wrote the book originally as monologues for her students to perform. Mary Lee believes that Schlitz went to the ends of the Earth for her students and decided to award some To the Ends of the Earth awards to people at her school.

I think the idea is a fantastic one and I'd like to add a few awards. First, the parent liaison at our school who knows everything about our Spanish speaking students and their families. She arranges transportation to school for some, finds clothing and furniture when needed, and works tirelessly to find medical care and other services.

Second, the secretaries in our office who go way above and beyond for the teachers, students, and families at our school. They are the first ones in each morning and the last to leave. They track down maintenance help, find substitutes, help students celebrate birthdays, and are always cheerful.

The third grade teacher who in addition to raising three girls of her own, manages to be a model teacher, complete her National Boards, advocate for her students, innovate in her classroom, and recognize everyone else's achievements and contributions to our school. We are a better school thanks to her presence.

Our reading teacher who thinks everything through. Nothing happens in our school related to literacy that she isn't considering how it impacts our students. Her model has made all of us more thoughtful about our instruction and has made our school a model in our district.

And, our administrators. It is the atmosphere that they create that allows the rest of us to teach students as well as we can. They treat us as professionals and work hard to find the support for anything we request. They meet with families frequently and are at all evening events. It is thanks to them that we have so many others who go to the ends of the Earth for our students.

(I'm sure that once I post this I will think of six more worthy awardees!)

2008 Education Blogosphere Survey

Scott McLeod, over at Dangerously Irrelevant, has opened up his second annual survey. It's 25 questions, some of them quite thought provoking for me. If you can find 10-15 minutes, go fill it out. The more people who respond, the more fascinating the results will be. I'm looking forward to reading others' thoughts on blogs they enjoy, tech tools they use, and reasons they blog.

Annual Report

dy/dan has put up a design challenge to create your own annual report. He did a previous contest, the Four Slides Sales Pitch, which fascinated me. I lacked the time and confidence to enter that contest. I refused to let that stop me this time.

I'm not happy with this as a final annual report, but time constraints require that I stop. I'm actually glad of those time constraints because I think I could spend a ridiculous amount of time on this. I will say that the more I do, the better I start to see ways to improve presenting what I want to say. I still have a ton to learn, but this has pushed me in a good way and I've really enjoyed it.



2007 was the year I really started blogging. I was on maternity leave from January on into April and took that time to get serious about reading and writing blogs. It was interesting to look back at what I've written and reflect on what I've learned through it.








With two children I've done a lot of reading of children's books this year.












Looking at this year through statistics got me thinking about the physical side of teaching elementary school.










Finally, after the birth of my second daughter I felt a need to get back in shape and lose weight. It felt good to look at the year this way.

Personal Learning Environments

The tech guru at our school has been thinking hard about how best to work with students and technology. He's pushing us to push the boundaries and meet students' needs in the best ways possible. This morning he shared an epiphany with me. He's been mulling over the idea of 'personal learning environments' and has created a working definition for himself. (I'm sure he'll correct my explanation if I'm missing something, at least I hope so.)

Here's an example: students are working on a study of oceans. In a group they could have a specific focus, say ocean currents. Their group would create a wiki as a base for all their research. They would create a group delicious site full of relevant links, a bloglines collection of feeds, and a blog that they write to share their thinking and their synthesis of their learning through the research. All of these sites would be linked in their wiki.

My question is, what else is a possibility? My feeling is that no piece will make sense for every group and for every project, but these seem like a good starting point. What other tools could help students research and/or pull their thinking together?

XO Laptop

I've been meaning to write about this since Christmas because my four-year-old daughter received an XO laptop from her grandparents. She has been loving it and goes to it each day. She now has an email account and has been feverishly sending emails to family and friends. So far folks have been quite kind and quick to respond. We'll see how long that lasts. My husband has done a lot to make the computer work for her and has been adding activities to it regularly.

She dropped it off the kitchen table yesterday as she was trying to pick it up and it survived without problem. The keyboard is tough for me to use, but works well for her little fingers.

I was finally moved to write because I just read an article from BBC news. It seems that Intel has pulled out of the OLPC project rather than stop backing Classmate, a rival low-cost laptop. I'd love to think that competition will push all of this forward, but I have reservations. I know the XO is far from perfect, but I am very impressed with the entire project. I hope that the loss of Intel does not hinder the good work happening here.

More Grading Thoughts

(I wrote this post last night and it apparently disappeared. If it shows up multiple times in your reader, I apologize.)

The Washington Post had an article recently on grading scales and weighted grades in various honors classes in different school districts in our area. This is frustrating to parents (and I assume to students, although that is not a focus of the article). This was a front page article in the Post which suggests a significant level of importance. I read the article with growing frustration. These parents are up in arms over this issue which has absolutely nothing to do with what their children are learning. The only thing that matters, apparently, is the grade on the transcript.

I found this to be a sad commentary on the state of education today. Our students are working to earn grades rather than to learn and their parents are encouraging this. Many teachers will say that one of their main goals is to encourage life-long learning. Grades are in direction opposition to this aim.

Brilliant Man (and small world)

My sister works with Gever Tully at his Tinkering School each summer. He is absolutely amazing in what he plans for those students and what they all do together. I'm looking forward to the point when my daughters are old enough to go. He recently presented a TED talk about dangerous things you should let your children do that is well worth the 10 minutes it takes to watch it. (Plus, there's a picture of my sister in the midst of his slideshow.)

The other piece of this that has fascinated me is how it is an example of the interconnectedness of our world. Doug Noon, blogging at Borderland, shared a blog post from Stephen's Web that linked to the TED talk. To recap, a blogger in Alaska shared a blog post from Canada with me in Virginia about a talk in California. I love it. I should also mention that Tim, in my own school district, also blogged about the TED talk. I'm thrilled to see Gever creating this sort of buzz.

Math Literacy

An article in the Washington Post this morning got me thinking about how we teach reading and how we teach math. It seems to me that we've made gigantic strides in our teaching of language arts (reading, writing, word study) in recent years. There are phenomenal professional books out there, many of them written by classroom teachers, or individuals who only recently left the classroom. There are some good professional books about math, but they are fewer and often written by large groups of professors or others removed from elementary classrooms.

We've got a lot to learn about teaching math.

Virginia Commonwealth University math professor William E. Haver, who is involved in the partnership, said elementary teachers need to know far more than the standard curriculum. With a depth of knowledge, teachers can help children understand relationships between numbers and solve problems in different ways. Without it, teachers often rely on memorization and aren't well-equipped to help struggling students.

"Elementary math isn't elementary," Haver said. "There are a lot of deep ideas there. Usually, if a child doesn't get the right answer, there's a fair amount of good thinking along the way, but it got astray at some point. If you can pinpoint that problem, you're better off."

I think this is a bigger problem than just our schools. Our society has math phobia issues. It's acceptable to be bad at math and to hate math. Saying the same thing about reading is taboo. It seems unlikely that we'll manage major change in education without similar change in society.

To Grade or Not To Grade

It's the end of the second quarter for us. That makes it my least favorite time each quarter. Most elementary school teachers in my district will tell you that report card time stinks because it requires bubbling grades in eight content areas (an academic grade and an effort grade) and ten word study areas. Then comments also have to be bubbled in. It is very time consuming and mind numbing.

I, however, hate it with an even greater passion. I can't figure out why I'm doing it (aside from the fact that I'm required to as a part of my job). What is the purpose of these grades? My husband, a college professor, firmly believes that grades are what motivates his students to do the work. He's probably right. But, I think it's true because we've trained kids with that motivation. I want my fifth graders to work because they want to learn, not because I'm going to judge them.

Another argument is that we use report cards to communicate with parents. Again, probably true. But, does a report card really communicate effectively? Telling a parent that their child earned a B in math with a G (good) for effort doesn't really say much. It doesn't let them know that the student excelled in geometry that quarter, but is still struggling to understand how to multiply and divide with decimals. It does a much better job of ranking students and making it easy to compare them to one another.

I would much rather spend two or three times as long on a more effective mode of communication for parents than to use a report card. I'd rather have to work even harder to make my lessons engaging and relevant to my students than to expect them to do the work in the hope of earning an A. One of my goals as a teacher is that my students love to learn. I think grades are in conflict with that goal.

(I think I'm in the minority in this area and I'd love to hear others' thoughts.)

Do as We Say and as We Do

I've been thinking a lot lately about one of the main reasons I love my school: the collaboration. Teachers here are always talking to one another and working together to improve their teaching practices and find new ways to help students. It occurs to me that we are modeling what we expect from our students. We often have our students work together to solve problems and to deepen their understanding and we work with them to make those collaborations effective. It's wonderful to be able to do the same.

My reflections on this are more elaborate at my most recent post on In Practice.

During a meeting yesterday I warned a friend of mine that blogging about a meeting during it is like calling someone when you're drunk. I'm no longer in the meeting I feel a need to blog about, but it may still be too soon. However, blogging is cathartic for me so I'm moving forward with this even if I may say things I'll regret later.

I spent two hours today in a local screening meeting. We were discussing a student who has been at our school since head start. He's been on our radar as a student we are concerned about since at least first grade. He's very, very bright. I think that is actually part of the problem. Academically he is fine, as a result we feel like we're doing our job as a school. However, he has significant issues with social interactions. He frequently says things that are offensive, hurtful, even cruel. He does not understand that people are hurt by him. Many of us have been concerned that if he does not get help he will have serious problems in the future. We've been trying to get his mom to get counseling for him and/or the family. I firmly believe that he needs counseling and we will keep doing all we can to push for this.

This child is not easy to label. If he were we'd have dealt with this years ago. We discussed a wide range of possible ways to serve this child with an appropriate label: autism, emotional disabilities, or other health impairment. None seemed to fit. I'm fine with that. I don't feel a need to slap labels on students all willy-nilly. What matters the most to me is that we help students. I don't feel that I can give this child all he needs on my own. We kept returning to the idea of counseling. Again, I think that is critically important for this student.

But...I finally got so frustrated with the whole situation (he's in 5th grade, we can't keep waffling!), I gave a little speech.

In the past, when I've come to local screening, my goal has been to get a label for a child. This has nothing to do with our school. We will get kids what they need no matter what label they have, it's what we do. When I want a label for a child it's because I want to know that if they move or when they head off to middle school they will still get the services and accommodations they need in order to learn. I feel just the opposite with this kid. I don't care what label he does or doesn't have, I care that we figure out how to help him. I'm afraid that what we'll do is say that he doesn't fit any category, he needs counseling which his family needs to deal with, and therefore we wash our hands of this.

I don't normally do this sort of thing. In ten years I've been through a lot of local screening meetings. I've never felt a need to preach to the committee. I was close to tears today. In the end, I think we're going to create a 504 plan for this child (similar to an Individualized Education Plan but probably more appropriate for him). That's fine. But I'm still unclear on how we're going to help him. Maybe next week's meeting will answer that question for me.

By the way, it probably goes without saying, but this is a great kid. For all of the difficulties and challenges we face (he and his teachers) he has many wonderful qualities.

Technology

My four-year-old has just figured out how to truly use a computer independently. She uses the trackpad on my laptop fairly well. She can now choose videos to watch and play games on the preschool websites we open for her.

Neither my husband nor I did any direct instruction on using a computer. A while back her grandparents had a child-sized mouse and keyboard for her and probably taught her some things. But it's been a while since she was using them. However, she's sees us on the computer frequently (most likely too frequently) and has played games with us controlling things for a while now.

She's not even four and a half and I'm wondering when she'll get her first email address. How long before she joins social networking sites? When will we she begin shopping online? Will she have a blog soon? I'm excited and terrified by the possibilities.

Her grandparents are getting her an XO laptop for Christmas. I can't wait to see what she figures out how to do on it. Learning new technology is a challenge for me, just as learning a new language would be. However, at four it comes easily.

This has re-energized me about using technology with my students. Her ability to pick it up so quickly has reminded me that my students are capable of learning and utilizing technology as well. We'll be in the lap next week.

Famous Folks

We just completed a biography unit in writing. I was astounded by some of the subjects my students choose. Some wrote about typical subjects for 5th graders: Shakira, JK Rowling, Emma Watson, and such. But others were much more creative. They wrote about William Shakespeare, Pythagoras, Martha Graham, Emily Dickinson, Edward Lear, Pocahontas, Al Capone, and Edgar Allen Poe.

I gave them no guidelines on who to choose. It was completely up to them. I am fascinated by their choices. As an added bonus, I'm enjoying reading these much more than I would if they had all chosen pop culture icons. Possibly I should thank them.

My big question now is how much influence I (or the student teacher or their previous teachers) had on these subjects. Were their choices influenced by us, in which case I'd like to know how so that I can replicate it, or would they have made these choices regardless of outside influences?

Buddies

My 5th graders met for the first time with their head start (3 & 4 year old) buddies this morning. Some of the little ones were shy and uncomfortable and some of the older kids didn't really know how to interact with their buddies. However, on the whole, it was quite a success. I feel compelled to write about it because of what I noticed with one student.

One girl in my class, very bright, friendly, and well-adjusted, never seems to be enjoying anything we do. She's happy with her friends and jokes and plays around, but during lessons she has a flat affect and is very serious. Serious doesn't really explain it though; she seems almost unhappy, but not quite. I'm not really worried about her, but I'd like to see her smiling more.

As soon as she sat down with the little girl in head start, she softened. It was a visible thing. I felt as though I could see hard corners and stiff lines melt away. She leaned in to her buddy to read and talk about the book. She smiled at her, made eye contact, and encouraged her. Her body language was completely different from what I am accustomed to seeing. She seemed maternal almost.

I could have sat and watched the two of them the entire time we were there. Other partnerships went well. I saw other fifth graders being strong mentors; asking questions of their buddy, getting their buddy to talk about his/her thinking about the book, etc. But nothing compared to watching this girl.

We will meet with our buddies every week now. I haven't done this for a few years because I haven't been able to find the time. Today's experience left me kicking myself about that. This may not help my students earn better grades or score higher on tests, but they are learning and giving something so much more important. For at least one student this half hour may be the most important thing we do all week.

And I haven't even started truly reflecting on how this benefits the little ones!

Edublog Awards

The Edublog Awards' finalists have been announced. (I have to admit that I'm still new enough to the whole blogging thing that this wasn't on my radar. I'm still learning.) In Practice is one of the finalists in the Best Group Edublog category. It's been such a pleasure to write for and read this blog. These educators are dedicated professionals who give their all for their students and, in addition, share their thinking and expertise in the blogosphere.

Check out the various finalists in the different categories. There are so many fantastic blogs out there.

Reflections on Blogging

Doug, at Borderland, has written a post about educational blogging. It came at a time when I was already doing some serious reflecting on why I blog. I began blogging solely to force me to reflect because I don't do so as naturally as I would like. It has worked quite well for me. Blog posts float around in my brain constantly. The jury is still out on whether or not this makes me a better teacher. On the positive side, I do reflect more which I firmly believe improves my teaching. On the negative side, sometimes I have to stop in the middle of the day and have my students read silently so that I can write or I feel as though I'll burst.

My big thought from all this, and I promise there is one, is that this is why I've had my students start blogging. (There's nothing like the zeal of the converted.) I know what blogging has done for me as a writer and a teacher and I want that for my students. For me, blogging has been transformative.

I don’t see “transformation” as a particularly strong selling point for the blogging practice since transformative experiences are generally unsettling to people.

Doug makes a really good point here. Expecting this result for my students is ambitious and probably just a bit unrealistic. Knowing this won't stop me for having them blog, but hopefully it will mean that I'm not crushed when blogging doesn't change their lives as learners.

And, if by chance, one of them really latches onto this, it will have been worth it. And if not, it certainly gives me more to reflect on.