Technology Reflections

Ok this has nothing to do with teaching, but I am an avid, some might say obsessed, Red Sox fan. Last night they clinched the American League East Division Championship for the first time since 1995, thanks to the Baltimore Orioles’ win over the Yankees!

Post Season here we come!!!

An interval of time between one event, process, or period and another.

Interims went home yesterday. That means we’re halfway through 1st quarter – an eighth of the year. Most of my students have earned respectable grades. 1st quarter grades are usually the highest grades. Of course some maintain those grades throughout the year, but of the kids who are going to slip, this is usually the best quarter, though many put on better effort for 4th quarter. 2nd quarter is typically the worst quarter for grades. The kids are comfy and they let things slip. But this is only Interims, not final 1st quarter grades. The purpose is to give the kids and parents a look at what is happening so that they can make corrections – or keep up the good work! I have one student with a failing grade. He failed one test and got a 60 on the second. He didn’t do one homework assignment at all and I excused him on the other one. Yes – only 2 graded homework assignments in 5 weeks. We’re reading a novel and most of the homework is to read in the novel. I know I could give a few questions to check that they read, but I don’t it will even out by the end of the quarter, though.

I need to post on a great lesson that I did on Friday. I got the lesson from The Reflective Teacher. He has some great ideas that I have stolen….er….borrowed in the past.This lesson was to write a Haiku about what the kids are reading. I changed it up a bit to have the kids describe a character in our novel because our Instructional Focus for the week was Characterization. As a description of how it went, I’m going to post my comment back to The Reflective teacher here:

I did this lesson with my 7th grade reading classes today and it was AWESOME! Every child was engaged and creative and even when I asked them to revise something (not on topic, etc) they didn’t give up and everyone produced amazingly insightful stuff!

It was funny and inspiring to see fingers counting and blank stares into space where you could just see the gears turning in their heads!

They completed the poems so quickly that I let them get on the computers and type them up and illustrate them with clip art.

Thanks again for another great lesson!

We are almost done with the first four weeks of school. Summer vacation seems so far in the past now. We’re past the excitement of the start of school and the “I don’t want to get up the morning” blues have hit. It’s amazing how many times I hit the snooze now – sometimes without even realizing it! Today is a day off for the Jewish holiday and it’s a welcome day of rest. I’m actually feeling refreshed today. I fear that tomorrow will be tough – coming back to school for one day at the end of the week! Ick!

I sent home grade sheets with the kids last week. Overall, grades are good, but that’s typical for the beginning of the year. Also, there were only about 5 grades listed, and not in every category. There were 3 WarmUp grades (10%) and one each of Classwork and Tests (30% each). Other categories that I have are Homework (20%) and Projects(10%). Projects are usually only one per quarter – sometimes I’ll break it up into more than one grade, but at 10% it’s not a grade buster if they don’t do well. When reading a novel, homework is mostly reading for the next day. Can’t really grade that. Sure, I could give them a few questions to answer at the start of class, but I have my warmups all set and that really IMO just takes away from teaching time. I have what I call an Active Reading Chart (ARC), which is an organizer for the kids to jot down important details while reading since they can’t write in the novels. I do an ARC check for a homework grade every now and then. I did one this week – they KNEW I was going to do it – and I still had some that were not done. That one zero killed a lot of grades – but that’s because that was the only homework grade. Interims are next week and I’ll have at least 2 more homework grades by then.

I had one student who scored a 59 (F) on the one test that we’ve had so far. Her overall grade was a 69 (D). She had one assignment that was listed as missing, but not a 0. Turns out I had that assignment, but the student did not put her name on it. We determined that it was hers and I said I’d grade it and add it to the gradebook. I proceeded to teach the class for that day. At the end of class the student asked if I had added that grade – did she not see me teaching? LOL Obviously, I told her not yet and she proceeded to complain that it was affecting her grade (she also had to take the grade sheet home to get signed!). I told her not to blame ME for her low grade and I pointed to the test grade and said this is why you have a D! This is a student who thinks she is ‘all that and more’. She is one of the few who I mentioned previously about not understanding that it’s rude to talk while I’m teaching. She’s also one of those who need to comment on everything I say – usually to try to butter me up, but in reality it pisses me off LOL She is also, however, a very intelligent student. I just wish she’d use her intelligence more positively! While I do try my best to encourage her and give her credit for good answers, she always will be one of those kids that I just never warm up to.

To end on a more positive note, I have a bunch of students who were pains last year who are so much better this year! Maybe it’s just the change in maturity between 6th and 7th graders, maybe it’s difference between having them in a computer class (6th grade) compared to Reading (7th grade), but these kids who names I cringed at when I first saw them on my class lists, are proving to be different kids this year – yay!

This time it’s two weeks with students. So far, so good! Most of my students and classes are really good. A few random kids who still do not understand that it’s rude to talk when someone else is talking, a few who will take negative attention over no attention and I always forget how young and needy the 6th graders are at the beginning of the year.

In Reading class we are reading Tangerine by Edward Bloor. This is probably the 4th year that I’ve taught this book and every year I learn more about it and like it even more! It’s always a slow start, but we’re getting through it. I’m supposed to do a book in about 4 weeks and then the LA teachers do a book in their class for the second half of the quarter. Luckily I only have one LA teacher to coordinate with and we are really flexible with each other. Also, she tends to read the book more in class and I tend to have the kids read more at home so that we can discuss in class. The idea is to not have the kids have to read too many books for homework. In addition to the books we read in class, they all have to be reading an independent book for our Reading Counts program.

The computer classes are going well. We’ve finished the Online Safety unit in all computer classes. 6th graders are making Wanted Posters for the WizzyWigs, characters from the Netsmartz curriculum that I use. I’ve moved onto teaching the 7th graders how to use Word more effectively and 8th graders are about to begin a Unit on Digital Photography.

I have decided NOT to use blogs in my classes this year. One overriding reason is the time and effort it takes me to set up all the accounts. In order to ensure safety, I created gmail emails for each of my students in 8th grade computers and reading classes – thats about 100 kids. Then I had to go create each of the blog accounts for them, because I had to keep the gmail email passwords private (I did the gmail+name trick so that all passwords and emails came to one gmail account that I had control over). This week I found a new tool that I am going to use – www.myhaikuclass.com While it does not have blog features, it does have a discussion area where the kids and I can have message board type discussions. It also allows students to upload assignments to me, which I think is cool! There is an email feature, but the teacher has to ENABLE the feature for students to email each other – I won’t be doing that for liability reasons, but I will be able to email the kids and they can respond to me. One other great feature is that the kids do not need to have an email address to sign up and I can have each kid sign up on their own through a special link. That will save me hours of time. I plan to use this program with 8th Grade Computers and Reading classes.