All Good Things Must Come to an End

     Saturday was an amazing way to see the fruits of our labor this year. I loved watching my colleagues and cohort members soar during their presentations. The best though was sharing our successes at lunch. I was reminded yet again how lucky I am to work in Littleton with such dedicated, hard working people. I am also excited that I have all these new connections, ideas, and inspirations to use to better myself and my teaching. I feel like I need to say thank you to Kristi, Wendy, and Melissa for all of the positive feedback and ideas this year. These women are inspiring on many levels and I can't wait to collaborate with them more moving forward (even though we are all at different levels). I am truly a lucky girl.
     I also have to say thank you to Dana and Randy for the opportunity to do this work with so much support and guidance. A huge piece to my success was knowing that I could falter or fail and have people there to catch me and hoist me back up. What an incredible resource we have access to!
     I cannot wait to move forward with all the knowledge I gained this year, I am the better for it. I now have a network that has expanded ten fold. I can't wait to find new projects to dip into without fear. What a truly incredible year!!!

Getting Ready to Inspire Some Learning :)

     This Saturday marks the final piece of our cohort journey, the Inspired Learning Conference. I cannot even believe that our year is almost finished. My teammate Erin and I are presenting "Parent Communication Tools" via Google Sites, Sign-Up Genius, and other varied resources. We felt lucky to have a Teacher Work Day today so we could brainstorm our agenda and what we want to post on our resources page for the Conference site. I actually got pretty excited when putting together various bits and pieces today.
   
     I spent over two hours putting together a directions sheet today for creating a Parent Volunteer Sign-Up Genius. I tried to include as many screen shots as possible so people could have the written and visual components to put their own together. It turned out well I think and I am excited for people to use it (I hope it is actually helpful). This has been an invaluable resource in my classroom this year and I hope it can benefit others as well.
Sign-Up Genius Instructions

     I also got the idea to reach out to my current parents and ask them about their experience with the website this year. I have had two parents respond so far and their feedback has been extremely helpful. I have even included some of their quotes on our resource page so that teachers can see how important these tools are when communicating with their parent community. Who better to advocate for this type of communication then the parents themselves. The website can be a lot of additional work at times, but the response I got today reminded me that the time and effort is worth it.

"As a former teacher, a parent and grandparent, I cannot emphasize enough how important communication with parents is – for the teacher, the parent and, most importantly, the child. Miss Wyman’s website is full of information and helpful hints. Classroom websites are a great way to consistently update what occurs each day/week, and allow parents a revealing look as the year progresses. I particularly appreciate the way Miss Wyman ‘tells it like it is’ – both the positive and the negative. Honesty allows the parents a heads up so that they can work on problems the class might be having at home. Most importantly, it’s significant that kids know that you know all that goes on."

That feedback keeps me going and I am excited to translate that enthusiasm to others on Saturday. Here is to hoping that we make a good impression on our peers (as they can be the most nerve-wracking crowd to present in front of).

Good luck to all my fellow presenters, we have come a long way in a year and I am excited to celebrate that with everyone on Saturday!

Inviting Parents Into Our Book Clubs Via Blogging

     Well so begins another adventure into the world of technology. This time though I am not just taking myself and my students but their parents as well. YIKES! We are doing Historical Fiction Book Clubs to end our year of reading. The students have been divided into 5 groups: The Watson's Go to Birmingham, Number the Stars, My Friend the Enemy, The Midwife's Apprentice, and The Mostly True Adventures of Homer P. Figg. To add to our discussion this year I have invited parents to join us. They will read the book along with their students, discuss it at home, and blog with the group.
    Not only am I using Blogger for the first time as a teacher in this kind of way, but now I am trying to explain to parents how to use it as well. Thanks to Dana I gave them some videos she created, but then I also crafted a letter of instructions as well. I am excited and nervous all at the same time. This could go incredibly well or it could crash and burn. I sent out these instructions this morning, which means I could also be fielding a ton of email questions this weekend. No rest for the wicked I guess.
    Like anything else I am excited to see what works and what doesn't so that I can make improvements for next year. I did give parents a choice whether to participate with us or not so that means at the very least I have willing guinea pigs, I mean participants. I am going to attach some of my creation here as well as links to our Book Club blogs. I would love any and all feedback :)

Number the Stars Blog

Homer P. Figg Blog

The Watson's Go to Birmingham Blog

The Midwife's Apprentice Blog

My Friend the Enemy Blog

Parent Instructions Google Doc

Innovation Avenue - What a GREAT Event!

     Well to say we had a great time at Innovation Avenue last night would be an understatement. It was a long 5 hours, but well worth every minute.
     We prepared for the event this past week during lunch. I had a total of 14 students who came in twice to help us. They worked in small groups to pick projects that should be displayed and created write-ups on what Sam and Julia should say. The collaboration was fantastic and impressive. It was fun to hear their take on all the projects they completed this year. It was also incredible that they were willing to give up their time to help us. It gave all of them the chance to be a part of our success at the event.
     The event itself was great. It was nice to spend some quality time with my two students who both needed and benefitted from the chance to shine bright. They were both a little nervous, but by their second round of "talks" they settled in just fine. They each discussed two different projects we worked on this year with technology. They were engaging, clear, and to the point. We had a lot of positive feedback from those who stopped by our table. It was fun to see them get more comfortable and in the groove as the event continued. I was proud of them, proud of our class, proud of my school, and proud to be a part of such an incredible district.
    Because they did most of the talking, I was able to gaze around at some of the other amazing displays. Our schools really do shine and I  got to see what an amazing community of educators I am surrounded by. They are innovative, passionate, inspired, and courageous. They are pushing the boundaries and that is truly inspiring. I was also pleased to see some of my Franklin colleagues there presenting as well.
     I am excited for Sam and Julia to share their experience with the class on Monday. I am printing out some homemade award certificates for them, as well as some for their classmates who helped as well. It was a proud evening for me on many levels, and made me remember why we spend the time and energy doing what we do :). Thanks so much Dana and Randy for this opportunity!

Innovation Avenue

     I am so excited about my class' acceptance into Innovation Avenue this year. We have been doing some amazing projects (especially during Social Studies) and I cannot wait for them to share that. What has surprised me most though, is their desire to present and share. Before I applied I told them about it to get a sense of who would want to go. Because we needed to take two students with us, I figured I should have the student interest first. I was blown away, I had 16 of my 26 students raise their hands to participate. When I sent home a parent permission form all 16 families wrote back to say that they would support their student. I expected a handful, but instead got over half of my class. As a teacher this was a proud moment because the students who signed up ranged in ability and interest level overall in class. I had some shy students volunteer in an effort to push themselves socially, I had some students who applied in order to boost their own self-esteem, I even had some of my struggling students volunteer because they were excited to show off our class. The most crushing part of this process was narrowing it down to two students. I was worried that if they weren't chosen to go they would lose interest with the project.
    Today I announced our representatives and alternates. Those 4 students could not be more thrilled. But what surprised me again was the fact that the other 12 students still wanted to help them prepare and pick projects to share. My class has struggled collaboratively this year in many ways and it was amazing to see this opportunity really bring them together. We will start working this week on what projects and ideas we are going to share. I cannot wait to see what they gravitate towards and how they will work together to come up with a solid presentation. I am excited to facilitate and really put this into their more than capable hands. Technology has really enhanced our learning this year, and what a great chance we have to share that with the district. April 6, 2013 here we come :)

Google Maps!!!

     Now begins my last big project (that I have planned at least) for Social Studies. Google Maps here we come. The students have each chosen a famous Colorado landmark that they are going to research. They will then take their research and synthesize it into a paragraph. They will then be asked to copy this paragraph onto their pin along with an image.

     The best new feature I have found is that you can invite people to collaborate on the map. I sent out the invites and then walked them through how to access the map. The only struggle I found after doing this was that they started pinning too close to Google's pins and then had a hard time re-clicking on their pin. It was very cool to see them find their landmark and their excitement at watching the map zoom in. We also made sure to discuss the importance of including their sources at the bottom of their paragraphs so they could give credit where credit is due. They still aren't citing them correctly, but that is not my focus at this point. The focus is just that they do it. I have included the map on this post, but keep in mind it is still a work in progress. It is a great way for them to learn about amazing things in our state and have a visual link to the geography as well. It really does bring the project to life.



View Famous Colorado Landmarks in a larger map

Blown Away with Technology!

     Last week brought me two amazing experiences in regards to my classroom and technology. Currently in Social Studies, we are learning about Colorado Settler Groups. My class has been researching for sometime in order to become 'experts' on one of the settler groups. The research road was a bumpy one (as expected with 9 and 10 year olds). Some students nailed it, others missed the boat. The positive though was at the end of the 3 weeks they all did learn something about their group that they were able to communicate that knowledge in one of two ways. The first project I had them complete was very open ended. The only directions I gave were "it has to be on your settler group" and "it must involve technology." The project had to be done on their EEE in whatever medium they chose. Part of me was scared to give them this much freedom. I knew they would either rock it or ask a million questions and be terrified. To my pleasant surprise, they took the challenge and exceeded any and all expectations I had. Some students put together Powerpoint presentations (with images) on their settler group experimenting with backgrounds and creating their own outline of what the slides should include and in what format. Other students went a more daring route and used Lucid Chart to create timelines on their group. They even went so far as to include images, change the backgrounds, and even turned their points into little gold pieces for Miners. Some of my students are very artistic and wanted to create comics. I was supportive of this idea but wondered how they could do it with technology. One student suggested drawing the comic panels by hand, taking images of each panel with our Vado HD Camera, uploading them each onto the background of a slide in Powerpoint, and then including text box talk bubbles on top of the image for the words so it could be read more clearly. WOW! They ended up turning out great! I even had one student who typed a full made-up interview with a Colorado settler in Google Docs. This project proved how tech savvy they are, but more importantly it showed me how much choice can engage students in the right situation. It was that moment as a teacher where the "You Do" part of teaching goes well beyond what I could have taught them. There was so much personality in each project as well that it was fun to see each student in their work.
     Our second project was a Cover-It Live debate on Colorado Settlers on Friday. They had to take all the information they researched and put it together into a discussion. We had modeled Cover It Live the week before with an unrelated topic to get them used to the format. I think Dana and I can safely say it was a discussion for the ages. The students discussed buying brand names vs. buying generic. Dana even had to add her own questions into the discussion because they were headed in such an interesting, puzzling direction. Our Colorado Settler debate was wonderful. Each students really got into the discussion and had something important to say about their group. They made strong arguments and really realized that Colorado wouldn't be the same place if each and every group didn't exist together. I even video recorded some of the Fishbowl discussion so I could reflect on their work (since it wasn't documented in the Cover It Live discussion). It really pushed them to dig deep and look at each group in a different light. They are now requesting that we have more discussions on Cover It Live because they feel like everyone has a chance to shine and be heard (I agree).
     I had such a blast going through this with them. Technology can be a pain and challenge sometimes, but at this point in the year it really does show you that laying the right groundwork can produce amazing results in the end.

Research, Research, Research

     Well my large undertaking of teaching research has jumped into full swing this week. I did this project last year but was not very satisfied with its outcome. The benefit of "failure" though, is that we learn from it. My big "ah ha" you could say is that I needed to be more explicit and break it down. I had already introduced what research is in previous lessons, so I spent more time this week on how to do it properly and accurately. I love having online tools to support this undertaking with my students. I showed some wonderful BrainPop videos to re-introduce research and how to do it. I then used/taught about the Research tool in Docs that allows students to research right alongside their document/notes.
     This week we spent time talking about how to narrow our searches to find information we actually need. By narrowing our searches and being specific we would have less to sort through. We then discussed how to scan sources to see if they were quality and if they had information that would help us. So many of my students were writing down everything under the sun, I needed to help them save time (and save my sanity). We discussed to only write down the important things, and to help them with this we developed five essential questions together. I told them that if the information doesn't answer one of these essential questions, they shouldn't spend time writing it down. This helped immensely. Being a history major I am a whiz at research, so I needed to be reminded that I too had to learn how to do it.
     I think the best conversation we had though because of this topic was a topic a discussion about primary and secondary sources. We defined what they were, discussed their importance, and then discussed why it is important to have a combination of both in our research. I love having these kind of conversations with my students due to the new standards. I am excited to see how this turns out and I know there will still be things to learn this time around, but I feel like they are less overwhelmed because of the new things I have put in place this year.