Posts Tagged ‘Reflections on Teaching’
I’m taking part in the weekly Slice of Life Challenge sponsored by Two Writing Teachers, where teachers write and share each Tuesday. Join in yourself or head over to check out what’s happening with other slicers. If you’re taking part in the SOL, leave a link to your post. I’d love to read it.
What is the best way to come back to school after spring break? Why by taking my classes to the book fair all day!
If you could see the piles and boxes of books I have stacked around my house and classroom, you would know that the book fair is the last place I need to to spend my day. But what could be better than spending time every period browsing the new books, pointing out favorites to my students, and discovering new titles that look intriguing. To make it even better, this is the BOGO book fair. How can I turn down a deal that lets me get a free book for each one I buy?
I also had chance to look at next year’s Young Hoosier Book list and buy some of the titles for my classroom. I can tell I am much more aware and current with my reading. When I first started promoting the Young Hoosier books through our book club at school, most of the books and authors were new to me. When I looked at this year’s list, I realized I already owned eight of the titles in my classroom library already, and several of the other titles have been on my wish list. I am looking forward to discovering a few new books and authors as well.
The more books and authors I know, the better I am able to recommend the right book to my students. And my students have been reading up a storm this year. I currently teach 113 students. Those 113 students have read a grand total of 2,121 books so far this year. I think that rocks!
I’m taking part in the weekly Slice of Life Challenge sponsored by Two Writing Teachers, where teachers write and share each Tuesday. Join in yourself or head over to check out what’s happening with other slicers. If you’re taking part in the SOL, leave a link to your post. I’d love to read it.
For the second year in a row, I have joined Two Writing Teachers in the month long Slice of Life blogging challenge. For the second year in a row, I wasn’t sure I could actually pull it off–write and share every day for the month of March. For the second year in a row, I did it. I wrote, posted, shared, and commented every day. For the second year in a row, I have learned more than I could have imagined before I started. What have I learned?
- Writing is sometimes hard, but I can still do it. There were quite a few days when I had no ideas, no words. Those were the days I dug through notebooks or read posts (especially the inspiration posts–Thanks, Stacey) from other writers to find ideas when my brain was empty. One day I even wrote about having nothing to write about.
- Somedays I wrote better than other days. I cringed as I published some of my posts, but I am grateful for the kind words of people who encouraged me to try again the next day.
- I can find time to write every day. Usually how long it takes me to write a post depends on the amount of time I had available. On busy days, I could crank out a post in less than 30 minutes. During spring break and weekends when the entire day stretched before me, it would take me an hour or two to write a post. The posts on those leisurely days weren’t necessarily better than the others. They just took longer.
- I have readers I didn’t know about. Throughout the month, I would run into people at school and church who would comment on my posts or ask me a question about something I wrote about. I usually share my posts on Facebook and Twitter, and sometimes responses would come there as well.
- I love comments! I still get excited when someone takes the time to write a comment about my posts. I also love reading and leaving comments for others. I could spend hours reading and commenting if I had the hours to give each day. Sometimes, though, it is hard to know what to say. Sometimes I wish I could be there face to face instead.
- I am glad to have found and become a part of this community. The slicing community is filled with some of the most dynamic and passionate teachers, literacy coaches, administrators, and parents that I’ve ever met. I have learned so much from what you have shared from your classrooms and homes. I am inspired to become an even better teacher and mother.
I stand in awe of those of you who have classrooms of students slicing with you. By next year I am going to figure out how to organize and keep up with 120 language arts students so I can share the excitement with them as well.
I will be back tomorrow for the weekly round up of slices each Tuesday! I hope to see you there, too.
I’m taking part in the weekly Slice of Life Challenge sponsored by Two Writing Teachers, where teachers write and share each Tuesday. Join in yourself or head over to check out what’s happening with other slicers. If you’re taking part in the SOL, leave a link to your post. I’d love to read it.
My second period students poured into the classroom. Some sat down quietly in their seats. Others bounced like pinballs between the desks before they found their places. As everyone got settled, I started passing out supplies.
First, I hand out the wintergreen mints. No, you don’t have to take one if you don’t want one. No you can’t have all the extras. Next I hand out pencils sans erasers. It seems that if you erase anything on the test, it creates an unreadable dark blur when scanned for the scorers to read. If they scorer can’t read what you write, you can’t pass. Finally I pass out the test booklets. No, don’t open them yet.
I glance at the clock and take a deep breath and start reading the instructions. After three days, we all have the instructions memorized. I try to put in as much enthusiasm as I can. Yes! You get to write today, but they aren’t buying it. Then the first hand goes up.
“Why do you have to read these directions again? We all know them.”
“Why can’t we use erasers?”
“Who scores these tests? Do you have to be smart to score them? How much money do they make?”
After three days, I recognize these questions. They are delaying tactics. The more questions they ask, the longer it will be before they have to face this session of the test. I glance at the clock, knowing that we have scheduled just enough time to get through the directions and leave enough time for the test. I cut the questions short. (I promise my students we can talk about them after the test if they wish. For some reason, no one has any interest in these questions then.)
I instruct my students to open their test booklets. It’s time to begin. They clench pencils in their hands and begin reading. I prowl up and down the rows of desks, smiling encouragement at anyone who lifts their head to look my way. Occasionally, a hand goes up. “Can you tell me what this word means?” I shake my head and reply, “I can’t tell you that. Read it again. You can figure this out.”
As time clicks by, I mark the remaining minutes on the board: 30 minutes remaining, 15 minutes remaining, 10, 5. The hands go up more frequently now. This time pencils have worn down and become dull. I wander up and down the rows with a handful of freshly sharpened pencils, trading them for worn out lead. At last every student closes their test book.
Now we wait to see what strangers think of our work this week.
I’m taking part in the weekly Slice of Life Challenge sponsored by Two Writing Teachers, where teachers write and share each Tuesday. Join in yourself or head over to check out what’s happening with other slicers. If you’re taking part in the SOL, leave a link to your post. I’d love to read it.
I have enjoyed reading a variety of posts with different variations of “10 Things Right Now.” Since today has been one of those days where good things kept bubbling up and are still fluttering around my brain, I wanted to try to capture ten of those moments in a list of my own.
- My very energetic, very excited students in my homeroom/1st period class helped me to rearrange the desks in a large circle this morning. It is such a relief to have something different than the rows required for standardized testing. In fact, they did such a good job, I’m going to ask them to help me move the desks back in rows tomorrow morning before our testing begins. Just two more days and we can get back to our regularly scheduled classroom fun.
- Since we are in the middle of state testing this week, my first two classes could not go to the library today because other classes were testing there during those periods (and our regular library day got snowed out last Monday). Instead, I brought the library to them with the help of our awesome librarian/media specialist. I couldn’t bring all the thousands of books to my classroom, but I did have a well-stocked cart of high interest, popular titles.
- Our awesome librarian even gave me the super secret password (Okay, it may not be super secret since the 8th grade library monitors get it, too.) to the card catalog so I could check out library books to my students right from my classrooom. Oops! I forgot to put due date cards in the books for one entire class. I hope she won’t fire me because I am way too excited about this.
- My secret evil plan (to match students with books they are dying to read) worked. Before my homeroom left, I spread books around the desks for a game of musical chairs–library style. I have strict instructions that they could not look at the books. Of course, they did, and before homeroom was over I was checking out books to students who couldn’t wait to start reading.
- Musical chairs–library style. Don’t worry, it is not a contact sport, and the only thing eliminated are books that aren’t for you. While the music plays, students walk around the desks. When it stops, everyone sits down and grabs a book from underneath. After spending two minutes getting to know the book, students rate it as “Love it!” “Maybe,” or “Not for me.” Then the music begins again.
- My most musical class got into dancing while they walked around the chairs. They even broke out in song during our read aloud today from Gary Paulsen’s Notes from the Dog. When I read the line, “Grandpa says we are a family of men,” I heard “Men, men, men” in perfect harmony. Wait a minute. Surely 7th graders aren’t old enough to watch that show.
- Both classes listening to Notes from the Dog laughed at all the right places. Thank you, Gary Paulsen.
- The class listening to Endangered by Eliot Shrefer hung on every word. I savored that as most of the time no one wants to sit still for anything during the last class of the day.
- While my students were getting to know books through musical chairs, I discovered a new book by Margaret Peterson Haddix that I haven’t read–Full Ride. It looks exciting. I’ve already peeked, but I’m trying not to read it until Saturday when I have volunteered to sit in a bookstore window to read for their Read Across America celebration this month.
- Yesterday, I shared the awesome doodling that my students have been doing while listening to Moonbird by Phillip Hoose. Today during lunch, I received an email that Phillip Hoose had left a comment on that blog post. OMG – You should have heard the students’ excitement when I shared it with them. (And you should see the stack of doodles I have after today’s reading.) Here’s the comment. B95 is still flying!
I’m taking part in the weekly Slice of Life Challenge sponsored by Two Writing Teachers, where teachers write and share each Tuesday. Join in yourself or head over to check out what’s happening with other slicers. If you’re taking part in the SOL, leave a link to your post. I’d love to read it.
I struggle to find time to read aloud to my seventh grade students. I value its importance, but there is only so much I can squeeze into 46 minutes. Now that we have extended our day by 45 minutes to help make up the fourteen snow days we’ve missed, I have an additional ten minutes for each class period. During this week of standardized testing, I started reading aloud a book to each class. Each class got to vote on the read aloud selection from my choice of books.
Much to my delight, three of my classes chose Moonbird by Phillip Hoose. (It was a close second in several other classes, too.) I introduced the book by telling students that I didn’t want to read it at first. What could be interesting about a bird? But once I started reading it, I couldn’t stop. I also became quite obnoxious, sharing everything I learned as I read. I don’t know how many conversations that week began with “Did you know….?”
This is the first nonfiction text that I’ve read aloud, and I’m learning again along with my students. Where is the best spot to stop reading the main text and share the information in the sidebars and photo captions? I wish I had a document projector so I could more easily share the illustrations and maps on the big screen, rather than walking up and down the rows. (At least when this week is over, I can rearrange the furniture to make sharing the pages easier.)
I allow students to doodle while I read. (But not play games or pass notes–and yes, writing a letter is the same as writing notes.) Yesterday, one of my students asked if they could share their doodles afterwards. Since I’ve been playing around with doodling as a form of note-taking, I offhandedly mentioned that some people doodled to remember what they read or hear. I suggested that if they wanted to share doodles, it would be about the book. I mentioned it to each of the classes that listened to Moondbird yesterday, and I was blown away by what my students came up with.
Here is another doodle that didn’t fit into the Tapestry story very well, but wowed me with all the information capturesd:
Now I’m even more convinced that doodling can be a powerful tool to help my students learn. I’m ready to learn more and share with my students.
PS – I used the Tapestry app to showcase my students’ doodles. It’s my first time using the app. (I learned about it from fellow slicers during the past year.) I’m not sure how it will play on all devices, but there is a website, too.
I’m taking part in the weekly Slice of Life Challenge sponsored by Two Writing Teachers, where teachers write and share each Tuesday. Join in yourself or head over to check out what’s happening with other slicers. If you’re taking part in the SOL, leave a link to your post. I’d love to read it.
I look forward to Friday’s in my classroom, and not for the reason you might think. Friday’s are the day we set our reading goals for the week. For 10 minutes we all read together. Since students need to read for the entire 10 minutes to set their reading goal, I don’t feel guilty for not conferencing with as many students as I can during this time. Instead I get to read along with my students and share with them from the books I am currently reading.
I also take time to watch my students while they read. While each class is different, there is nothing I love more than to watch my students read, each lost in their own world within the pages. Some students on some days still look for distractions, but most of them eagerly look forward to the time of uninterrupted reading. Here are some of the scenes from yesterday:
- A boy who finds it difficult to sit still in a desk perches across the top of two desks pushed against the back wall, reading Gary Paulsen’s Flat Broke.
- A girl who had not read much this week finally got her hands on John Green’s The Fault in Our Stars Thursday. When she came in Friday, she had read 170 pages and couldn’t wait to dive back into the story.
- A girl in a different class is also reading TFiOS. She came in and told me, “I’m in love.” I asked, “With Augustus Waters?” She nodded and I answered, “Me, too.”
- A boy in one of my morning classes groans when the timer goes off at the end of the 10 minutes. “We can’t stop now. I’m at a good part.”
- After I shared the book I was starting this week–Hollow City by Ransom Riggs–one student shared the first volume he started yesterday. Another student quickly snapped up a second copy of Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children that another student had just donated to our library.
- While students share a summary of what they’ve read, I hear students claiming dibs on classmate’s books as soon as they’ve finished. As students enter class, I hear a common refrain, “Have you finished ____ yet?”
Now I’m off to finish Hollow City this weekend so I can give it to the students who are waiting to read it next. I hope your weekend is filled with good reading and writing.
I’m taking part in the weekly Slice of Life Challenge sponsored by Two Writing Teachers, where teachers write and share each Tuesday. Join in yourself or head over to check out what’s happening with other slicers. If you’re taking part in the SOL, leave a link to your post. I’d love to read it.
As I slog through the cold, dark days of February every year, I always wonder if I make any difference at all with my students. With the weather disrupting our schedule more than usual this winter (last week was our first week of school with no snow days, two-hour delays, or early dismissals), I’ve found it even harder. But if I look carefully, I can see signs of new growth among my readers, just like I will see new green shoots poking up from the ground soon–even if we do have more snow on the way!
Many of these signs of reading taking root came after discussions about abandoning books. Maybe some pruning is needed for new growth to take root.
- One of my boys was reading a book of poetry (I ask students to read at least two poetry books) that he hated. When I asked why, he replied that he didn’t like any poetry except for limericks. I offered him John Grandit’s Technically, It’s Not My Fault, and he devoured it in less than a day. Now other students are lined up to read it, too.
- Two girls in another class are swapping books back and forth between them. Now every day I hear, “Have you finished The Fault in Our Stars yet?” Before that it was “What page are you on in Michael Vey? I’ve finished the first one and am waiting for the second.”
- Speaking of the Michel Vey books, they may not escape my fourth period. As soon as one student finishes one, someone else grabs it before it makes its way back to the shelf.
- One of my boys who would much rather be doing anything outside than reading, discovered the Amulet series. After hunting down copies of all the books in the series for him, I had to ask him to stop reading to do our other work–writing. He even wrote about how much he loved the Amulet books (quickly, so he could go back to reading).
There are more signs of reading sprouting among my students if I look for them. I will keep looking and nourishing.
I’m taking part in the weekly Slice of Life Challenge sponsored by Two Writing Teachers, where teachers write and share each Tuesday. Join in yourself or head over to check out what’s happening with other slicers. If you’re taking part in the SOL, leave a link to your post. I’d love to read it.
I have been wanting to read Donalyn Miller’s Reading in the Wild ever since I heard she was writing it. Reading her earlier book The Book Whisperer impacted my teaching in ways I am still counting, and I suspected that this new book would do so as well. I was right. My brain is spinning with ideas that I can take to make my teaching–and my students’ learning–richer and deeper.
I also did something different while reading this book. Friends on Facebook and Twitter had been sharing about a different way of note-taking through doodling. Even though I am not an artist, I wanted to try doodling my way to a deeper understanding. I normally think in words and dialogue, so capturing ideas through images was quite a stretch for me.
I learned things about myself by reading and doodling this way. It took me much longer to read this way–almost two months. One reason for the slow trek was that I wanted long chunks of uninterrupted reading time so I could get through an entire chapter in one sitting. Thank goodness for several snow days that gave me time to do so. I also found that I wanted more time at the end of each chapter to process what I had read. Looking back over my doodled notes, I am excited to see that they still make sense to me!
Here are my notes for each chapter and the ideas I am mulling over from each one.
Chapter 1: Time is the central issue. My students complain they don’t have enough time to read (I can’t wait to discuss edge times with them), and I complain I don’t have enough time to teach. We do find time for what we value. I can’t change the length of my class periods, but I can make choices on how to fill them with reading and writing lessons that I value.
Chapter 2: I do many of the things in this chapter to promote books to my students, but too many of them are still too dependent on me to help them find books. Here are ways I can encourage their independence and teach them the skills to take with them so they don’t experience that lost feeling I felt when I moved from the children’s room of my public library to the young adult and adult collections upstairs.
Chapter 3: I share the books I love with other readers, especially my students, but how often do I give them the opportunity to share the books they love? There are so many ways to share–face to face, online, displays, graffiti, and more.
Chapter 4: I often say that I have so many books I want to read that I can never die, but many of my students don’t see past the last page of the book they are currently reading. Summer will be here before we know it (in spite of the forecast for cold and even more snow). Will my students be confident that they will find and have access to books over break? How can I incorporate the cycle of planning and reflecting on reading throughout the year?
Chapter 5: I know what my preferences are for reading. How can I help my students discover their preferences?
These are the Woodson books I got Thursday night! They’re all good.
It wasn’t quite over the river (though I did drive over a few bridges) and through the woods (more like empty fields), and it wasn’t to go to grandmother’s house, but last Thursday I braved the cold and snow roads to drive down to IUSWP’s “Authors as Artists” series. Learning from Jacqueline Woodson was a bright flame in a week filled with cold and snow.
In addition to sharing from her books, (I’ve got to find a copy of Show Way because she stopped before we got to the end), she shared her perspective on writing and life and even got us writing. This is a woman who does not believe in writer’s block even though she may be my equal in procrastinating. She says writer’s block is just fear getting in the way. Her advice for overcoming the fear for us and our students? Just tell yourself that no one has to read your first draft.
The we got to write (and no one has to read it). We picked an age from childhood to write about. I chose age 10 and started making a list of everything I could remember about being 10. Before I knew it, that list turned into the beginning of a story about a sick little girl who wanted nothing more than to play in the biggest snow she’d ever seen. No, you can’t read it yet, but I want to finish that story today.
Someone asked how many unfinished books she had lying around. I was surprised at the answer–just the current story she was working on. Then she shared her thinking: Every story has a point where it falls apart and nothing works. That is when the writer has to make a decision to work through the hard part or abandon it. Her advice is to work through it. The story may turn into something else entirely, but if you start abandon one story, it will be too easy to abaondon all the rest because they all fall apart at some point. Hmmm…I think that means I need to dig out that retelling of Little Red Riding Hood that fell apart because I have no idea where to go next.
I jotted down a few words of wisdom that I want to take back to my students (if we ever get back into the school routine again). There were many, many more, but these three struck me:
- “Writing is so much about listening.”
- “Writing is powerful and empowering even when it’s hard.”
- “Everyone has a story.”
If I can share these truths with my students and give them the tools and voice to tell their own stories, I will have accomplished something good.
P.S. It is the season for nominations for the Summer Institutes for the National Writing Project. If you have never taken part in this incredible professional development opportunity, find the closest site to you and apply. It will change your life.
Today in class I asked my students the unthinkable: as they got ready to write their blog posts, I told them they had to write at least 150 words. (I don’t like assigning a word or page length to writing. My usual answer to “How long does it have to be?” is long enough to do the job).
Some students were listening to lessons on developing or elaborating on ideas and were starting to write better blog posts, but too many were writing status updates of just a sentence or two and were content to write no more no matter how many questions I asked or how hard I pleaded with them to “tell me more.”
Today I had students start to get the concept of elaborating on an idea. Once they wrote their first thoughts down, we looked at the writing together. Where can you add an example? Where can you explain what you were thinking? Is there a place to add sensory detail? No, adding ten “verys” to each sentence does NOT count.
Other students, though, were ready to give up before they started. “I can’t write 150 words,” one said.
“Can you start by answering the questions in the prompt?” I replied. That worked for some, but others were still overwhelmed.
Underneath these conversations, I kept thinking about two articles I read about failure and success over the weekend. Katherine Sokolowski challenged herself (and me) to try to bring in the attitude gamers have toward failure into the classroom. When a gamer dies in a game, he or she doesn’t give up, but goes right back to the game to try again and again. Each failure is an opportunity to learn for the next level. A columnist in our local paper reviewed David and Goliath by Malcolm Gladwell. He shared an anecdote from the book which illustrated the point was that hard work rather than inborn talent is the key to success, and that hard work is the rarer quality.
So many of the students I teach think that you have to be born with the ability to read and write well (as well as many other things like athletics and music). How can I convince them that hard work makes the difference, not natural ability? I know they can and do work hard. Just this morning, a students shared with me what he did over break. I didn’t understand all of it, but it involved dropping an engine out of truck, making repairs and putting it all back together. He saved birthday and Christmas money for years to buy the equipment he needed. He assured me it was easy.
Those students who couldn’t even think about writing 150 words? After class they became involved in an animated conversation about the latest video games they got for Christmas. You got it–they talked about they ways they died and how to overcome each obstacle they encountered.
How can I get students to connect their passions and the things they are good at with their reading and writing? I invite students to choose books that connect with their interests and to write about what they know and love. How can I assure them that “failure” in school is not the end of the game but an opportunity to learn?
I’m taking part in the weekly Slice of Life Challenge sponsored by Two Writing Teachers, where teachers write and share each Tuesday. Join in yourself or head over to check out what’s happening with other slicers. If you’re taking part in the SOL, leave a link to your post. I’d love to read it.