Experimenting with Technology: My Real-Life Oregon Trail

Check out my post for the Indiana Department of Education's Digital Learning Month Blog!  I am so excited to get to be a part of this and their webinar on Tuesday, February 16th.

I remember 5th grade like it was yesterday. My family and I were in our cart. We had very little food. My sister had died of a broken arm. My brother had a snake bite and I had dysentery, yet my family persevered on to Williamette Valley. When we reached it, I felt like I had won.

Even back in 1995 in a rural community, my teachers recognized how the right technology can aide, engage, and inspire student learning. I was raised on the Oregon Trail. Well, not literally. I actually grew up in Small Town, Indiana, but my 5th grade world revolved around escaping to the high-ability room and knowing that if I had to die on the Oregon Trail, I needed to at least die by dysentery rather than a fever, because, let’s face it, dysentery was way cooler than an ordinary fever. As a 6th grader, I got to show 5th grade students which key was the spacebar so they could continue their journey on the Oregon Trail, and how to save medicine for a snake bite. I was allowed to teach them the things that I had learned while playing the game.

I live this same philosophy now with my 7th graders. We try new technology to aide in our learning of extremely challenging standards. As a teacher, I am trying to engage my students with technology in the same way that Oregon Trail engaged me, just with more relevant technology. Because I use technology with every student, every day, lots can go wrong.

Yes, lessons always turn out differently than planned, but when you add more moving parts to a lesson, there are more things that can go wrong. Wi-fi is down, the battery on a device won’t stay charged, kids show up without their device. The best thing we can do as teachers, though, is probably the most uncomfortable for us - do not solve the problems for them.

One of the classes I teach is our school newspaper. We recently added a poll to our paper to feature more students each week. We wanted to make this section visually appealing, so we searched and found piktochart.com, a website specializing in infographics. The two students working on this new feature were struggling with how to add pictures from their phones to the infographic on their Chromebook. Almost immediately, my instinct was to save them, to take the Chromebook and the phone from their hands and email the pictures to myself to open and save to the computer, and then import the images to their design. It would have taken a matter of minutes for me to finish the infographic. I knew exactly what steps needed to be completed, so it would have been easy for me to do it for them.

But, I didn’t. I didn’t learn how to survive the Oregon Trail because someone did it for. In fact, I learned because my teacher walked away, making me ask myself some important questions, so that’s what I did for my students. “Okay, so we have some issues. What should we do now?” By asking that simple question, I became the sounding-board for their discussion, not the leader of it. I put the learning, experimenting - and maybe even failing - experience back on them. After 5 minutes or so, they had a plan. I asked them, “Why do you think that’s the best way to do it?” Asking them to think about their thinking showed me how they eliminated other options. I know they were processing through information. Once they completed their assignment, I asked them to show the rest of the staff how to use this website for future issues. This assignment took much longer than needed to complete, but I know they learned not only how to use the website, but they also learned how to be persistent and problem-solve.

Technology is changing. A teacher’s desire for her students to be creative, analytical thinkers does not. Think about technology in the classroom as the Oregon Trail - lots of things will go wrong in the beginning, but don’t get discouraged. By asking the right questions, teachers will see how technology revolutionizes the type of thinking students will do and that will be like the teacher-version of making it to Willamette Valley.

Love and Sparkle,

Are you a Ms. Hill?

Steve Jobs quote courtesy of awaken.com
I'm very blessed to be able to answer yes to this every day.

     One of my favorite units I use with my seventh graders is an informational reading and writing unit "What makes someone successful?"  In this unit, we look at the definition of success, read the biography Steve Jobs: The Man Who Thought Different, and research an inventor (my pre-AP kiddos will make a simple machine and present it in a how-to format to the class).  I love this unit - I cannot say it enough.  The kids are engaged, excited because it is someone who is relevant to them, and of course, they have a lot to say about success.  My favorite reason, though, for this unit happens in Chapter 1 of the biography.
     Chapter 1 discusses Jobs's childhood, and specifically what school was like for him.  Jobs hated school because it simply wasn't interesting to him.  So, to make school interesting, he often caused trouble, like letting a snake loose in a classro
om and making an explosion under a teacher's chair.  His father defended him, often saying, "If you can't keep him interested, its your own fault."
     That all changed for Jobs in fourth grade when he met Imogene "Teddy" Hill, his teacher.  Ms. Hill started off the year by bribing, er, I mean, motivating Jobs to complete work ("Complete the math workbook and get at least 80 percent right, and I'll give you $5 and a giant lollipop.")  But before long, he just respected and admired her enough to complete his work.  Jobs credited Ms. Hill for the beginning of his success, stating, "I'm one hundred percent sure that if it hadn't been for Ms. Hill in fourth grade and a few others, I would have absolutely ended up in jail."
     Ms. Hill showered Jobs with much needed attention, and did not see him as a troublemaker, but has a gifted kid who needed more.

     Are you a Ms. Hill?

     By this, I mean, we each have that student sitting in class that no one seems to understand - the one that puts his head down constantly, or the girl that seems to not be listening to a word you say, or the group of kiddos that seem more interested in the computer game trend of the week than anything you are teaching?  Are you trying?  Are you trying to understand that student's behaviors?  Are you trying to figure out what motivates him?  Are you trying to build a relationship?  Yes, it will be difficult.  And yes, it will be challenging, but isn't that student worth it?  A student will never learn from a teacher they don't respect.  No, a student doesn't have to like you, but they do have to respect you enough to listen to you.
     Ms. Hill thought so.  She had no idea that Jobs would go on and be a creator of so many things we use today, but she did see something special in a kid that others only identified as "trouble."  Find that student in your class, and make an effort in the following weeks to figure out how you can make this student interested - do it a day at a time, or an assignment at a time.
     Build a relationship.  Be a Ms. Hill.

Love and Sparkle,

Writer's Notebook Part 3: My Fav 3 Assignments

            It has been a month since my last post.  Well, over a month.  That’s what happens at the end of the semester if you’re an ELA teacher – you lose yourself to final exams, retakes of final exams, and enough data to make you wonder if you teach Language Arts or Math.

            My previous posts have been about the Writer's Notebook in my classroom, and this post will wrap up that series.  The timing of this post is kind of on point – as I reflect on this past year to make new goals for myself, I get to think about which writing assignments worked well and which ones….ugh, which ones were lessons learned.

            I started the notebook in my classes last year, but have fully implemented it this year.  We start with 10-15 minutes of writing in our notebooks each class period.  Some days a topic might just be for the day.  Some topics might last 3 or 4 days.  Some assignments we work only at the beginning of class.  Others might last the whole class period.  It depends on the assignment, but more importantly, how it engages my students.  If it is something the kids really get into, I might let it go on for another day if they are working hard. 

            Besides getting to talk to kids while they are writing, my favorite part of the writing process is Author’s Chair, when the students get the opportunity to share what they have completed.  Sometimes this is meant to showcase their work; sometimes it is meant as an opportunity to present challenges or questions to the class so the author gets feedback.

            Here are my Favorite 3 Writer’s Notebook Activities from this semester:

Memorial Design

            This makes me feel old just thinking about it, but I teach kids who weren’t alive when the events of September 11^th, 2001 took place.  (I think I just felt a hair turn gray thinking about it!)  My kids don’t remember where they were when it happened (in utero is something we don’t like to imagine…or talk about in school), or comprehend just how much the world has changed since then (in utero vs. out of utero), but they have experienced the memorials.  So, on September 11^th, we talk about how we honor those who lost their lives – on this day or any day.  We talk about moments of silence, statues, scholarships, naming public places after people, etc.  Then, we read Billy Collin’s poem, The Names.  After reading it, table groups discuss if a poem or other literary work can be a memorial, and why.   Finally, students are given the opportunity to create a memorial for someone special to them in their Writer’s Notebook.  It can be a poem, drawing, song, etc.  I’ve had kids design parks for grandparents who loved going to the park.  I’ve had kids create football stadiums for parents.  One of my personal favorites is a ginormous Diet Coke statue that dispenses Diet Coke for a grandmother that always had a can of Diet Coke in her hand (I can relate).

            In the design, I ask kids to think about color choices (what do colors symbolize and how can they contribute to honoring someone), and what is the best way to honor that person (what was important to them and what legacy would they want to carry on).  This assignment usually lasts a few days and kids get the opportunity to share their work on the document camera.

            Middle school kids can be very self-centered.  This assignment is one of my favorites because it makes them really think about someone beside himself or herself.  I enjoy listening to the rationale behind their choices.   It also lets me hear about special people for my kiddos, which allows me the opportunity to know more about them before we start more formal writing pieces and they need help brainstorming topics.  With this assignment, I can start to tell what is important to them already.

A House of My Own Vignette

PQP Notes for a rough draft

            Everyone tends to use the “My Name” vignette from The House on Mango Street, and believe me, I did, too.  However, the “The House on Mango Street” vignette digs a little deeper.  We did the whole “My Name” thing and the first drafts were…well, not what I expected.  I started to panic.  I realized that my kids were being very, very literal.  So I told them we would come back to that piece, but we were going to read another piece.  The first drafts of “The House on Mango Street” were nothing short of amazing.  With that piece, students started to see the more creative, reflective type of writing we would be doing, compared to the more technical and formulaic writing they had previously done.  (I’m not trying to knock that type of writing – at all.  In fact, when I have kids who haven’t had to do a lot of writing before, I often start with “formulas” to help them.)  After that first round, we did PQP editing (Praise – Question – Polish), which is now a go-to process for a class in particular.  If you have extremely social kids, this works well.  Kids work in pairs or triads to share writing drafts.  The group then shares praises they have for the piece, question things that don’t make sense, and then give the author a couple of ideas for things that might need to be polished for the next draft.  Because this involves a lot of discussion and movement, the students love it.  Because the discussion is very specific, I love it.  It is really a win-win situation. 

            With my Pre-Advanced Placement class, several students had done this type of writing, while it was completely new to others.  For my kiddos that needed to be challenged, I gave them the challenge to emulate an author they really liked.  I had a student that took this to a whole new level and “shaped” her poem like that of her favorite author’s works, Ellen Hopkins.  Click here to see it.

            If your kids really get into this activity, they can create their own version of The House on Mango Street.  My students created The School on Veterans Parkway, full of their own stories.  It is being self-published in Spring 2016 (in other words, I finished editing it during break earlier this week and am sending it to an online printer to be published).  In the meantime, here is a student's work on his "My House" vignette published on his dad's site.

            When building relationships with my kids, I often wonder how they became the person they are now.  The “My House” dives into this a bit.  Kids have talked about renting apartments with the dream to one day own a home so they get to paint their walls, to the crazy neighbors their family likes to prank, or the loss of a home due to poor choices and how that impacts them.  This particular assignment had me laughing and crying while reading.

The Desk

Desk Writing Collaborative Piece

            We had a day at the end of Quarter 1 that we literally didn’t have anything that had to be done.  We had completed our end of the quarter exam and had made corrections.  We had organized our binders.  Our Writer’s Notebooks were in order.  So, we did a writing assignment that I will now be the first writing assignment I do every year.  My high school English teacher did this with my class back in the day, but I put my own spin on it.

Desk Writing Assignment with "Favorite Line"

            I put a student desk in the middle of the room.  I then told students they had to write about the desk for 15 minutes (pencils couldn’t leave the page).  Also, no talking (which is a big deal – we do a lot of talking while we write).  I bet 10 hands went into the air.  I told them I wasn’t answering questions at that time – write for 15 minutes about the desk and no talking were the rules.  Students walked around the desk; one student even sat at the desk while writing.  After the 15 minutes, we did an author’s chair and students shared their work.  We had pieces that ranged from describing the graffiti on the desk to accusing the chair of being part of the Illuminati to a story set in a nightclub where the desk was a transgender transformer that had been accused of murder.  (Have I mentioned how much I love my students?!?!)  Students that had written more descriptive pieces wanted to redo the assignment to write more creative pieces.  So, we did, but in a different way.  I asked each student to choose one sentence or line from their piece that they really liked.  As each student shared, I wrote their line on the board.  When we finished, we had 25 really good lines, but no real piece.  Students were then asked to take those lines- all 25 of them – and create a new piece.  It could be a poem or a story.  The end result was AMAZING!  I know they are really good kids, but their work on this shocked even me!  As an exit ticket, I asked kids to send me an email about the activity.  Every kid wrote that it was their favorite assignment of the year.  Every. Single. Kid.  It was great!

            This assignment without a doubt is my favorite because we work on the final product together.  I try to instill a sense of community in my classroom.  With this assignment, I finally saw that “spark” in students where I knew our classroom community had come together.

I love getting new ideas - what are some of your favorite notebooking activities?

Love and Sparkle,

Writer's Notebook: Part 2 - Organization, Grading, and other Teacher-ish Questions

Cover of a student's notebook - it captures her personality.

     When writing is mentioned to any Language Arts teacher (well, and other content teachers, for that matter), one of the first things that come to mind is "Writing means soooooooooooo much grading!"  My first few years of teaching, I associated writing with Peppermint Patties because for every 5 essays I got through, I rewarded myself with a Peppermint Patty.  It was kind of like my own school economy.
     Anyway, during Writing Project, I'm pretty sure I loved the thought of a Writer's Notebook, but the thought of grading it made me want to curl into a ball and cry.  Then, what would happen when inevitably kids wouldn't set it up to my specifications?  What would happen when I couldn't find a single assignment in there because they didn't label it, or put it on the right page, or one of the other 583 ways that this could go wrong?
     I'm only in my second year of a Writer's Notebook, but here are some of the things I've learned:
Organization
     So, if you've ever met me, in about 10 seconds you can tell I'm a Type A personality.  I have a weekly to-do list paperclipped into my planner that has both a weekly and monthly calendars, long-term project pages, and note pages.  This is carried in conjunction with with clipboard that has a ridiculous amount of note pages so that I can reference anything at any time.  My first year of my Writer's Notebooks, I asked kids to set up their notebooks with tabs - Title Page, Dedication Page, Table of Contents, Writing Lesson, Writing Notes, and Writing Goals.  Then, I did the unthinkable - I asked middle school students to keep up with that.  Because they didn't, I gave up on the notebooks about halfway through the year.
   

Table of Contents in a student's Writer's Notebook

 At the end of the year, I thought about what I liked and didn't like about the notebooks and why I gave up on them.  I realized I made it INSANELY too difficult.  My kiddos are a very transient popular, like I've had 8 new kiddos in 6 weeks and that's not anything new.  I need something that can be explained to new kiddos quickly, and a routine that can be picked up on after just a few days.
    So here's what I did this school year and I already really like it:  Every student had to have a composition notebook by day 3.  On day 3, we spent about 20 minutes numbering every page, front and back in the notebook.  Kids grumbled, but it has saved some headaches, for sure.  Page 1 is a Title Page, that includes first and last names, and a picture.  Pages 2 and 3 are a Table of Contents.  That's it.  No tabs.  No ten different sections.  Plain and simple.  Kids know we add the title of the assignment to the Table of Contents, flip to the next blank page, and that's where we start the assignment.

Grading

Mailing label grading - Ah-maz-ing!

    Remember when I said that the thought of grading writing makes me cringe.  Well...it still does.  I wish I had the ultimate solution to that, but I don't.  I have found a couple of ways to make it easier, though.
     First, I never collect all 75 Writer's Notebooks at one time.  I will do it by class period, or by tables.  Once I get those finished (2-3 days), I move on to the next group.  It usually takes me a little over a week to every notebook graded, and I don't feel so overwhelmed looking at the mountain of notebooks!
     Second,  I started following Sarah Koves at Kovescence of the Mind after participating in a Twitter chat with her.  She had this amazing tip for grading and it truly is a timesaver.  She grades using...wait for it...mailing labels (See her full blog here).  It is great.  You type whatever you want on the label (which can be a rubric you use on formal writing pieces or prompts even), and then stick it in the notebook.  It cut my grading time down by half.  I simply put whatever items should be in their notebooks and then grade it out of 4.
     Third, the most important part of grading is conferencing.  When I distribute graded notebooks, I do it through conferencing.  We conference quite a bit during the actual writing, and grading shouldn't be any different.  I pull students up and ask them which piece was their favorite and which piece was difficult to start.  Then, from there I may ask more questions, or ask them to elaborate more on something they said.  This gives me so much insight to how a student attacks a writing task and I can provide feedback for more challenging assignments.  Conferencing with my students about writing is the absolute best part of my job.  Any day with conferencing involved will always be listed as one of my favorite days (and Fro-yo Fridays.  Fro-yo Fridays are pretty amazing, too!).

I hope this gives you enough inspiration and answers enough basic questions about Writer's Notebooks.  Check back soon for my third and final installment, Writer's Notebook: Part 3 - Ideas, Student Examples, and What I Would Do Differently.

Love and Sparkle,