The First Two Weeks of School

The first two weeks of school are so important. During this time students have to learn about their new classmates, new teachers, new routines and expectations. Teachers have to learn about their new students, new parents, new colleagues, new technologies and new curriculum initiatives. A new community has to be built, team spirit established and a sense of excitement and anticipation for the year of learning ahead. If not carefully managed and orchestrated it can be a stressful and overwhelming time for all involved. I find myself today, at the end of my first two weeks of school, happy, hoarse, exhausted and enthused about the year ahead.

My teaching partner, Rick Joseph, and I share 54 kids and together we make the “Joberts56”. Having both 5^th and 6^th graders, each year we lose half of our class as they move up a grade and gain 27 new students. A priority for us at the start of each year is to help the class bond and form their own unique identity. We launched this process by showing the students Blindsight. This is a documentary detailing the journey of six blind Tibetan students as they climb a mountain in the shadow of Everest. We encouraged the kids to write down their thoughts as they watched the movie and during a follow up debrief the Joberts56 of 2012-2013 was born! Our students were able to clearly articulate what was important to them as a group and the mindset that will guide them throughout the year. It didn’t take them long to graphically represent those notions and by day 2 we had a class T-shirt design.

 

The big eye on the front of the shirt signifies my students’ determination to not just be observers in life but to really see the world around them, think about what it means and wonder how they can make a positive and significant impact on it. The logo “Climb Your Own Everest” on the back reminds them that they need to take risks, overcome their fears and face challenges head on in order to achieve their true potential. Pretty cool, huh?

On day 3 Rick and I shared our progress with parents during Welcome Back Night and attempted to express our individual philosophies and aspirations for the year. It was an opportunity for parents to put names to faces and be assured that we will love and nurture their children as well as guide them academically. A parent volunteered to get the class T-shirt organized and printed and by some wonderful miracle she had all 56 shirts ready for our three day camp during week 2 of school. Getting 216 students, sixty some volunteers and eight teachers to camp on the seventh day of school has been a labor of love for several months. Nancy B, school secretary, and Cindy B, Community Service Officer, did a tremendous job of preparing this trip, getting all the necessary transportation, medication and documentation together. They organized parent volunteers, accommodation, travel groups and without their dedication it simply could not have happened.

So on the seventh day of school I found myself 125 miles away from home at Camp Michindoh, watching a group of my students try their hands at archery. I wasn’t participating because I’d never done it before and didn’t want to look incompetent in front of both new parents and students. One of my sixth graders invited me to join in and when I declined she said, “We are the Joberts56 Mrs R, we don’t just observe, we go beyond our comfort zone and get involved. Climb your own Everest.” Astounded and inspired how could I not get my Catniss on and step up? The next few days were spent canoeing, building shelters, making fires, climbing rock walls and handling a variety of snakes, frogs , spiders and cockroaches. The mantra “Climb Your Own Everest” was used repeatedly to encourage and challenge all of us, students and teachers  alike to achieve what we never thought possible. It even began to impact our fabulous parent volunteers as they too stretched themselves and found themselves beyond their comfort zones during their three day marathon event as chaperones. Their commitment, leaving behind work and families, was another major factor in making camp happen. It also provided us with the opportunity to begin to get to know each other and form relationships that will be crucial to the success of this school year.  By day 10 of school, the Joberts56 community was born!

Did the first two weeks go off without a hitch? No. The schedule changed after distribution of over two hundred paper copies, our T-shirts were not  quite what we originally designed and a student spent three days at camp with only the clothes he was standing up in because his bag was left on the bus. Instead of whining and complaining everybody demonstrated solidarity, flexibility and understanding which enabled us to sail over these small bumps in the road. I’m secure in the knowledge that we will overcome future obstacles on our journey together because of the people I travel with: amazing students, supportive parents, dedicated office staff and passionate educators.

During the next two weeks of school my students will face a battery of district mandated assessments. I know these will provide me with a snapshot of their academic abilities but the knowledge gleaned from these tests cannot possibly compare to what we have learned about ourselves and each other during the first two weeks of school.

 

 

 

Character Education

I was invited to speak to the newly hired teachers in my district on the subject of Character Education yesterday. I know those of you who know me well must be wondering if I was asked to present on how to be a character but my role was to demonstrate how character education can be incorporated into the curriculum.

I have served on my school’s character committee for the last six years. At the time of joining the committee the different grade level teams at my school participated in several community service projects such as Gleaners Community Food Bank, Care Packaging for the Troops, and Forgotten Harvest. We would come together as a whole school community to respond to natural disasters both nationally and globally and while these projects were successful, there was a certain level of frustration amongst both staff and parents that they were scattered, overlapping and lacking in long term significance. We decided to make a concerted effort to integrate service learning into the curriculum.

Service learning is an experiential teaching strategy that intentionally combines academic learning and relevant community service. Key components of service learning include:

-          Research/Investigation

-          Project has purpose or meaning

-          Reflection

-          Sharing or demonstration of knowledge gained

There are similarities between service learning and community service. They both foster civic responsibility and an individual’s growth personally and ethically. Both create strong community connections and meet real needs, but there are some significant differences.

 I shared with my new colleagues a service learning project that my teaching partner and I collaborated on. We share 54 students, I teach math and science, while he teaches Language Arts and Social Studies and the result was our River Rouge Watershed wiki. Yesterday I asked the teachers to peruse the wiki and try to identify possible learning objectives and character traits that students may have learned about during the course of its creation. I was thrilled with their responses and how much they saw in it but I was also struck by how much unintentional learning took place. It became crystal clear to me that when it comes to the education of a child we cannot separate heart and mind.

At risk of giving away my age, when I was at school students were empty pails waiting to be filled with information, facts and knowledge. I am so fortunate to work in an environment where the teaching of core subjects is seamlessly interwoven with character education and key 21^st Century skills. The result of that is that I get to work every day with highly engaged, passionate kids who are teachers and learners and influential global citizens.

Recovering

It’s been a week since I returned from the Microsoft Partners in Learning Forum in Redmond and I’m still recovering from a PiLUS hangover: Recovering from the jetlag, from the time difference, from the shock of winning, from over indulgence in innovation, camaraderie, and inspiration!

My teaching partner and I were fortunate to gain first place in the Extended Learning Beyond the Classroom category with our project Doing Businessin Birmingham. I say fortunate because the caliber of the projects presented was astounding. The judges, including winners from the 2011 Global Forum Lou Zulli and Doug Bergman, must have spent hours wrestling over their decisions. Rick and I are truly humbled by the honor and look forward to participating in this year’s global forum in Prague, along with the other US winners.

It’s difficult to explain the impact this experience has on teachers and convey how truly uplifting it is. To be surrounded by teachers who are taking risks and pushing the boundaries in their classrooms every day is like being plugged into the ultimate energy source. While the forum is technically a competition it is so much more than that. It’s an opportunity to connect with other educators, share ideas and build relationships that last well beyond the forum itself. It’s a place where teachers get to meet and learn from educational leaders like Alan November, Vicki Davis and Kari Stubbs. It’s a showcase for new technology tools and a cradle of creative thinking. For the most part it is a celebration and appreciation of pioneering teaching and learning practices.

Lou Zulli asked us all to “pay it forward” and I know won’t be alone in sharing my learning with my peers, encouraging them to take risks and to get more connected with other innovative educators .My first advice will be to have them join the Partners in Learning Network , where they can become involved in  a global community of educators, driven by passion and committed to providing a quality education for all students.

I met many amazing teachers in Redmond who were recovering themselves: Recovering bankers, recovering lawyers, and recovering fashion designers who have chosen to enter the world of education to recapture a sense of significance and to make a positive difference in the world. That they certainly do! I am thankful for my PiLUS hangover. Because of it, I am more acutely aware of my responsibilities, I am inspired to do better and I am reminded that teaching is indeed a noble profession.Thank you Microsoft!

Revving Up For Redmond!

The first month of summer has been heavenly. We had family visit from England, we’ve been to the beach, hung out at the pool, even managed a trip to Disney! Now, however, it’s time to swap flip flops for heels, shorts for skirts and get my game face on. I’m heading out to Redmond, Seattle on Monday to attend Microsoft’s Partners in Learning 2012 US Forum.

For those of you who have not heard about the forum, Microsoft has invited 102 educators to Redmond from 25 states to showcase the innovative ways they are using technology in and beyond the classroom. The Partners in Learning US Forum is an annual event that connects and celebrates educators for the outstanding and innovative work they are doing with technology to creatively engage students. Educators compete for a chance to go on to represent the United States at Microsoft’s global forum this fall in Athens, Greece.

I am so fortunate to be attending for the second time with my teaching partner Rick Joseph to present “Doing Business in Birmingham”, a sustainability project imagined and created by our 54 students. Curiosity about sustainability in business led our students to organize their own research field trips to various businesses in Detroit. Travelling in small groups and driven by parent volunteers our students visited places such as Ford Field, the Fox theater, the Ford Sustainability lab, the Renaissance Center, and Detroit Mercy Hospital , eager to learn what they were doing to be sustainable. They compiled their collective knowledge to create Downtown Detroit, but learning about sustainability wasn’t enough. They wanted to do something with their knowledge, and turned their attention to the local downtown area. Armed with informational flyers and brochures they had created themselves they took to the streets of Birmingham and visited over 100 businesses to educate and inform the owners about sustainability. They recorded the trip with Photosynths and Cliplets and created an Honor Roll for businesses that provided evidence of sustainable practices through follow up calls and emails.

I’m revving up for the forum not so much to compete but to make sure that I effectively represent my students and the wonderful work that they do. Their insatiable curiosity led them to wonder how sustainable other business communities are and the final page of their wiki includes all of their resources and an invitation to other students and teachers to replicate their project. I’m psyched to attend the forum to share their invitation and if I can get at least one other educator to give it a try I will have done them justice. I’m also eager to learn about the other amazing learning opportunities taking place around the country and the possibility of making connections with other classrooms for my students to collaborate with in the future.

I wish you could all kick off your flip flops and join me for this incredible celebration, for a celebration is what it truly is: A celebration of teachers and students working and learning together. Fortunately you can still get involved by following the event on Twitter #PiLUS, or the Partners in Learning Facebook page, by reading about the projects on TeachTec Blog , or better still, by joining the conversation and sharing your own innovative practices on the Partners in Learning Network, one of the world’s largest global professional networks for educators. I know its still summer but get revved up, get ready to learn, get involved!

Take Time To Connect

After teaching for twenty some years I feel confident walking into most classrooms. No matter how many times I do it however, presenting to adults makes me a nervous wreck! The only thing reassuring me about my presentation at the BPS Learning Conference 2012 yesterday was the quality of the material, most of which was generously supplied by Phil Macoun. I helped to facilitate a MoodleMeet with Phil in January, and when asked to present on global collaborative projects by my boss, it seemed natural to revisit the wonderful course Phil had put together.

One of the many resources was a video by Vicki Davis, describing seven principles that can take your classroom global and the current challenges and misconceptions surrounding what it means to globalize your classroom. I’ve watched this video many times and every time I take away a new nugget.

Presenting to strangers yesterday the principle that resonated most with me was the need to take time to connect with others. In fact, the whole reason I was there in the first place was through connections I had made over the course of the last year. Again I owe much thanks to Phil Macoun, who, after a brief meeting at a conference in Vancouver last summer, became my Twitter tutor. Phil responded to every one of my emails about how to find people to follow, hashtags, and chats and in doing so, opened up a whole new world for me. I’m amazed by how much I have learned and how much my teaching has been positively affected by the generous sharing of educators from all around the world. Teachers I can only dream of meeting like Michael Graffin, Miss Noor, Paul Bogush and Vicki Davis herself, by taking the time to answer my questions, by supporting and encouraging and by sharing their wisdom have impacted me and my students in ways they will never know.

Several months ago, Monica Noakes, a teacher from Vancouver contacted me through Twitter and we have since forged a friendship that will I hope, last a long time. Monica was looking to collaborate on a global project and together with our students we created Ingreenious Inventions, a wiki that documents our students growing understanding of the invention process. Working with Monica was an absolute joy. She embodies the qualities that we were trying teach our students in order to be successful: perseverance, flexibility, adaptability, understanding, active listening, respect and trust. She has enriched my personal and professional life immensely and while I will miss our weekly Skype sessions throughout the summer, I am determined to reconnect and continue working with her and her colleague, Natalia Russo, in the fall.

Microsoft’s Partners in Learning Network has been another wonderful way for me to gain a deeper global perspective and next month I am excited to attend the U.S. Forum in Redmond. Being my second time attending I know I can look forward  to learning from my peers from around the country about the wonderful ways that they are integrating technology into the classroom and being provided with the opportunity to make new connections. I am also thrilled to be able to meet up with some of the wonderful people I met last year including Kelli Etheredge who gave me the courage I needed to start this Blog and Lou Zulli who inspires me every day with his wit, wisdom and wealth of experience.

I could go on ad infinitum mentioning the people who have impacted me this year. I consider myself extremely fortunate to have found my new friends. One of my favorite lines from Vicki’s video is, “When you are ripe you rot!” Twenty years of teaching definitely makes me ripe, but by growing my personal learning network and by learning with and from others I’m finding it difficult to find the time to rot. I urge every educator-take time to connect.

We Were Created For Significance

The title of this post is a quote from Angela Maiers in a TEDx presentation I watched last year. It really resonated with me because as a teacher I try to impress upon my students that they are significant, that they positively impact not only me and each other but that they can also have a significant impact on their local community. Over the years my students have designed, developed and implemented several projects that highlight their ability to be agents of change within the community and they have been validated and felt like they matter not only by collecting and analyzing data, but also because of recognition they receive from others though projects like the Siemens We Can Change the World Challenge and the GlobalSchoolNet.org Cyberfair program.

I was prompted to watch the presentation again because of two important events that have happened to me over the last few days that have made me feel significant. The first was receiving notification of a successful submission to the Microsoft Partners in Learning U.S. Forum .This will be my second year attending the event and I am absolutely thrilled at the prospect of visiting the Redmond campus once more to spend two days learning with and from innovative educators from all over the country. Attending last year had a huge impact on my life as an educator. I was inspired and reenergized and my teaching throughout the year has been positively impacted because Microsoft sent the message loud and clear that as an educator, I matter.

The second event was receiving an email from a local senator congratulating me on the work that my students have been doing to raise awareness of sustainability in our local community. I have no idea how he heard about it and I was just so excited to tell my students that other people are recognizing their significance too. I also realized how much these events affected me personally. This school year has been challenging and rewarding, hectic and exhausting and as we draw closer to summer vacation it has been just that little bit harder to get out of bed in the morning, I’ve struggled to find the motivation to keep up with my Blog and I’ve been feeling slightly overwhelmed with necessary end of year school business. Being told by both Microsoft and a local senator that the work I do is significant and meaningful has totally changed my outlook in the last few days. I’m ready and able to finish the year strong with as much enthusiasm and passion as I started the year with.

The purpose in writing this post has not been to be boastful, but to confirm the message that Angela is conveying in the TEDx talk. Using the two simple words “You Matter” can have a tremendously positive impact on the people around us. All over the country, as the school year comes to a close, educators are participating in their own version of Survivor. As Angela states, big people need to know they matter too. In the last few remaining weeks of school I am determined to remind not only my students that they matter but also my colleagues. I want to let them know that I see them, that I value and appreciate them and that they are significant. I cannot think of a more powerful and simple way to thank my colleagues for another great year of learning.

So What Do Kids Want To Learn?

As a math and science teacher I often feel like I only get to know half a child. With a background in elementary education I miss reading kids’ stories and reflections and sharing their ideas about what they are reading. I got some small insight into what my students are thinking with this tweet from a student last week:

Social studies ? Those people are all dead. L.A? I speak English don’t I? Math? Calculators! BOOM!

It may have been tongue in cheek but still, it made me stop and think. If these things seem irrelevant to our kids how do we make them relevant? Secondly, what exactly do they want to learn about?

This year my teaching partner and I have been piloting a new class dubbed Sciracy-a blend of science and literacy. We have embarked on several projects with the aim of finding authentic and natural connections between the two subjects .We decided for the last few weeks of school we would open up this time for the kids to follow their curiosity .What topics are you interested in? What do you want to learn about? What questions do you have? Where do you want to travel on your personal learning journey?

We didn’t really have much more vision than that; we just threw it open to the kids to see what would happen. The direction was that they had to generate a “non-Googleable” question and answer it.  I suspected that some kids would dive right in while others would have no clue where to begin but I was wrong. They all had at least three topics they wanted to pursue and they set about initial research quite hungrily. After digging around for a while the kids naturally started to refine their thinking , honing their searches and discovering the areas that really motivated them to delve deeper.

Across the fifty four students the breadth of fascination is staggering. Some questions that have been developed so far include:

Can we launch our Golden Gnome (class mascot) into space?

Would a Tyrannosaurus Rex survive in the 21st Century?

Can we add composting to our recycling efforts in the school cafeteria?

What would it take to start a successful Football team at BCS?

How can we start a school radio station?

Was Merlin a scientist or a magician?

What will be the most sustainable materials to make clothes with in the next five years?

For fifth and sixth graders I find these questions impressive, but as their teacher I also feel overwhelmed about how to manage the diversity of inquiry and learning.George Mixon, a colleague, suggested I try the GROW model. GROW is an acronym for Goal-Current Reality-Options-Wrap-Up and provides a framework for me to play a coaching role to help my students learn new skills, solve problems and make informed decisions about their progress. The goal is to for my students to develop the skills and strategies that will enable them to drive their own learning journey.

I’m excited to see where this takes us all and I’m now ready to respond to my student's tweet.

Goals? Tell me where you want to go. Current Reality? Tell me where you’re at.  Options? Tell me what you can achieve. Wrap-up? Show me how you’re going to do it. BOOM!