In my Edutopia post, I challenge teachers to do the same and even list 5 new habits I’m thinking of adopting as well.

So think about it: what new instructional habit could you try on, if only for 30 days?

© heather for tweenteacher.com, 2011. | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: edutopia, k12, middle school, TED

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Tony has been at my school for a while and no matter the cohort of students under his guidance, he serves them with the same support, kindness, tough-love, and wisdom year after year.

He meets the most challenging students with a smile before making them push themselves beyond what they thought possible.

He works with us all, pushing us all, asking for the moon and settling for a star. He asks the students to reach as high as the sky and then celebrates them for just reaching as high as they can. He asks the teachers to look at things from a different point of view, to see things through the student’s eyes, to try different tools, and to rededicate our hearts despite our daily frustrations. For it takes a village to educate our students. No teacher can do it alone, and Tony packs the punch of so many caring teachers combined.

He meets with a cadre of students in the morning, checking their backpacks for assignments due, keeping them accountable the minute they walk into school’s door. He meets with a different gaggle during their lunch, keeping them on track throughout the day. He runs our after school homework club, sitting one-on-one with students, giving them a safe place to work, to ask questions, and to succeed.

He knows every teacher’s expectations and assignments. He knows every student’s tendencies and saga.

In parent meetings, he supports all the stakeholders; he is straightforward with the parents, he is relentless with the students, and he is collaborative with the teachers.

Recently, I was in our front office, meeting with Tony about a student that was in my first period and that was a part of his caseload. A phone call came in as we were talking. It was from a parent whose student wouldn’t get out of bed and refused to go to school. To whom did the mother turn? Tony.

Apparently, there are students who have been awoken by Tony in their very bedrooms. He goes to their homes in the early hours of the morning, and convinces them to come to school. That’s right. He parents.

Yet, as special as our Tony is, I would bet that on every staff there are other Tonys out there: be they teachers, administrators, or counselors. Maybe they are recognized, maybe not, but they are there. The media doesn’t speak about The Tonys of our schools. The Tonys of our schools aren’t highlighted by our politicians. But they are there. These self-sacrificing, generous people can be found in every school and daily walk down every hall.

I don’t mean to diminish what our particular Tony does for our students by saying that his kind abounds in our educational system, but I do question why our media and policy makers hone in on this mythical 10% of “bad” educators and don’t acknowledge the literally millions of educators out there who have the angelic qualities of our Tony.

These Tonys are trying to desperately fill in the gaps created by well-intentioned families and misguided students who struggle to know what to do or how to do it. These Tonys work tirelessly to help students find a voice, find their motivation, find their meaning, and find their future.

So, who is your school’s diamond? Who is your school’s Tony?

© heather for tweenteacher.com, 2011. | Permalink | One comment | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: achievement gap, education, k12, middle school, school counselors

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It is a community defined by our schools, our parks, our weekend activities spent watching AYSO and Little League. Every newsletter is highlighted by the activities available for families and for students. Every day, my kindergartner is sent home with information from the cottage industry of after school tutoring, Lego clubs, sports leagues, and more. The school choir sings at the local tree lighting. The high school band has marched in the Rose Parade more often than any other band in the country. It’s Norman Rockwell in a 21st Century world. In others words, our community, as with many communities in this country, is tied to our schools.

But this post isn’t about what I love about our area. It is, in fact, about a disappointment.

I recently received an informational brochure through the mail slot that gave an overview of an initiative that the school board is trying to pass as a funding measure to get on our local ballot. Fine by me. The goal is to educate people about Sacramento’s funding cuts and how they are chipping away at our schools. No problem there. They are seeking to “create a stable funding source that cannot be taken away” by the ebb and flow of cuts. Got it. I’m with them so far.

Here’s where they lose me:

“Senior citizen homeowners, aged 65 or older, can receive an exemption.”

Look, I’ve heard this before. The older generations in this country have raised their kids, and they no longer have a stake in our schools, so why should they continue to help pay for them?  This possibility of exemption is seen as a selling point for this measure, but I see it as a sadness in an increasing trend.

It’s simple. As the superintendent says, “we all benefit from living in a community with great schools….quality schools make [our district] a desirable place to live and creates demands for our homes. This keeps our property values strong, which is more important than ever.”

We are entering a very interesting time in this country as our citizens age and the next generation statistically will not be as well off as the one that preceded it. Since we all benefit from our schools, can we afford to exempt a growing population in this country from being held responsible for helping to support the students of this country?

Even printing the possibility of exemption sends a message that if it doesn’t apply to you, it is something you can overlook. Yet our schools do apply to us all. We can’t just hold the young parents of our students accountable for funding our school system. It is a responsibility of us all. Our public schools help neighborhoods to flourish. They help us all retain our sense of community, a sense that we all want as adults and one that begins at childhood with the sense of security, community, and neighborliness that is found in places like church, temple, and school.

How can we fund our educational system with only the aid of the generation that is currently using its classrooms? What message does that send to our students?

It sends the message that once a student leaves school that person can walk away from schooling and societal responsibility. It send a message that you can allow the current generation to fend for itself, but still expect that the community in which you live will be maintained without your aid.

If people live in a community, enjoy the benefits of that community, go to restaurants, events, break bread in that community, can they ignore the responsibility for helping to maintain that community? What will allowing an entire generation of citizens to opt out of educational funding do to our schools? That Norman Rockwell image would be a mere echo in this community were it not for our schools.

Does responsibility end at a certain age?

© heather for tweenteacher.com, 2011. | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: educational funding, Educational Policy, k12, middle school, public schools

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Life is persuasive. A lawyer persuades a jury. A job applicant pitches oneself as a potential employee. A scientist competes for a grant. A writer sells her idea in her query letter. Persuasive writing is a key that unlocks a world of possibilities. It is a skill that we see at every stage of life from writing the inevitable cover letter to one day hopefully writing a letter of recommendation.

School must reflect the world around it, and writing persuasively is a key skill for college and career readiness regardless of the path a student takes.

My question to all my readers is Should all teachers be held accountable for the quality of a student’s writing?  Is it the burden of ELA teachers alone or do other content area teachers have a role to play in this new CCS world of Persuasive writing?

© heather for tweenteacher.com, 2011. | Permalink | 2 comments | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: Argumentation, Common Core Assessments, common core standards, education, edutopia, k12, middle school, Persuasive Writing

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A couple of weeks ago, my school told the staff that they were going to roll-out the ability for parents to have access to our grade books online. Needless to say, many teachers grumbled and rumbled. As for me, it gave me pause, but I knew that the high school was already doing it, and it was merely a matter of time for the middle school. Besides, two of my four ELA classes this year are the 8th grade honors classes, and many times those parents have the expectation of access that goes hand in hand with being an active academic participant in their students’ lives. Keeping up on their student’s progress plays a part in that student’s success. Perhaps the thought is that if the grades are accessible enough, more parents of the mainstream and at-risk students will begin to play a greater role in their children’s learning too. I frankly deeply believe the writing is on the wall about such levels of access. It’s where we’re heading (and many schools already have), so it’s not a battle I’m interested in waging.

Besides, there are some pluses to this new transparency:

1. There is no longer such a thing as, “I had no idea how Little Johnny was doing. Nobody told me.” Wow. That’s really powerful stuff to be able to take Lack of Communication off the list of excuses as to why a parent has been inaccessible or not present for a student’s struggles.

2. It will light a fire under my tush to grade at a quicker pace. I’m not very sluggish at chipping away at that mountainous stack of essays, but I definitely appreciate the incentive to get things posted quicker. Sometimes those piles can really be overwhelming, and knowing that folks might be routinely checking for updates will aid in my own motivation to routinely get feedback to my students perhaps quicker than I do now.

3. No more progress reports. As of now, every Thursday, I get a stack of progress reports from my students at the start of each class. They come from the various AVID teachers or counselors. They’ve been set up for one reason or another, and I find the weekly communication very helpful to those kids. But it can be a dip in classroom energy to fill them out and get them back before the end of the period. Now, as my colleague Darlene has realized, rather than the student handing these grade sheets to each teacher, turning them in to the counselor, then to the parent to be signed, then back to school to their AVID teacher, a student need only be at home to compile their own grades, print it out, have it signed, and bring it to school. The missing of instructional time is henceforth cut out of the weekly process.

4. It reflects the time we live in. I can check my bank account balance 24/7. I can check my emails 24/7. I can watch the news 24/7. This is an extension of the reality of our world, and school must keep pace with the world around it.

But there are some concerns I have with this transparency too:

1. It leaves little room for a student to slip and solve their own problem before Mom knows about it. That is, you always get some kids per assignment who don’t turn it in or, of course, the many who turn it in at a lower level than you would like to see. Those kids, especially those in middle school, need to be able to approach the teacher and solve the problem. And many times they do. OK, so they get an extension or they turn their work in a day or so later. My final grade book reflects the kid they became. It doesn’t ding them for the process it took to get there. This portal gives parents a snapshot of the components of learning in a way that might take ownership away from the student.

2. It will light a fire under my tush to grade at a quicker pace. Oh, I already said that as a plus. Well, it’s a minus too. I think I keep up a pretty good pace with my scoring and feedback, but I fear it’s never going to be enough for some parents and students.

3. It will require all teachers to be on the same grade book program. I don’t necessarily think this is a big deal, but I have a modicum of fluency with technology that some teachers don’t have. Every so often, a district adopts a new grade book program and teachers learn the new fad. Eventually, a teacher tends to settle on one that appeals to him or her. Many teachers have learned the many grade books over the years, and stuck to those they felt best served their needs. They will have an even bigger switch to make, not only philosophically but also technically.

4. It will require educating parents in how to read the program itself. Teachers don’t have the time to answer all the technical questions about how to read the online grade book. Why isn’t this filled in? Because it’s a staggered due date for students. Why does the “completed date” say such-and-such? Because that’s the date the last student submitted their work. Why does the program call Quarter 1 “Y”? I have no idea. It confuses me too.

These concerns, however, are not grand enough to get in the way of progress, and I believe that this is progress. It puts more on the parents, more on the students, and fills a need every family has had since that little pioneer schoolhouse on the prairie. Hey, I watched Little House every week. Don’t you think if given the chance, Mr. Ingalls would want to know every time Laura ditched to go fishing? He’d use the portal as a way to make sure Laura and Albert were doing their jobs as students (he never needed to worry about Mary, after all). But I think the fear many teachers have is that the ones who are really monitoring these online grade books are the Mrs. Oleson’s of the world who are really there to check on the teachers.

Nevertheless, the fact is that this accessibility, whether we as educators believe in it or not, is the present and the future. As a parent, seeing my student reach for that TV remote instead of his homework, one day I’m sure I will also want to see how my kid is doing when he’s claims he’s doing fine in Math. Then again, we have a no-TV-during-the-school-week rule in my house.

Our job as educators is to prepare our students for their future. Communication plays a large role in that job.

© heather for tweenteacher.com, 2011. | Permalink | 10 comments | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: education, grading, k12, middle school, transparency in teaching

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Instead, we need to embrace more fully mobile technology. The big clunky forward facing, whole class method of lesson delivery via Interactive Whiteboard, I believe, is the Laserdisc of educational technology. The overpriced fad of Interactive Whiteboards (whether Smart or Promethean) is imperfect in their current incarnation. Sure, we all imagine classrooms with “Iron Man2”:-esque 3-D touch sensitive lessons, but inherently these pieces of equipment do not illustrate the spirit of technology in information delivery: all-access, collaborative, open, interactive, etc…

Currently, they are only as engaging as the lessons created, and those lessons are tedious to create and time-suckers in their efficiency. The prep time to create charts that utilize any effects over-and-above what you would already do with a laptop and LCD projector feels clearly developed by those with a disconnect to the precious time we have in education and the many hats we already wear. Additionally, while these boards were initially meant to help less-tech savvy teachers to embrace technology use, their hefty training time and prep time serves as its own gatekeeper for more than just tech tentative teachers.

I believe an online colleague of mine, Bill Ferriter, said it best when he wrote,

“I’m willing to argue that even with time and training, interactive whiteboards are an under-informed and irresponsible purchase. They do little more than reinforce a teacher-centric model of learning…make presentations, give notes, deliver lectures…I ask you: Do we really want to spend thousands of dollars on a tool that makes stand-and-deliver instruction easier?”

Instead, I believe mobile technology, that truly frightening technology the schools would rather spend money on avoiding than really examining, is really the silver bullet (if there is such a thing.) Smartphones, for instance, have the potential to be the great equalizer.

Mobile technology caters to individualization and differentiation, which is the present and future of student-centered learning. Mobile technology is cheaper and also represents the concept of “democratization of information,” the openness of high levels of information to the masses. The Interactive Whiteboard is still locked and loaded into the antiquated philosophy of “sage on the stage” rather than “guide on the side.”

Yes, the remote clicker technology gives the very important immediate feedback, but gaining access to remotes is not dependent on the purchase of the boards themselves. The fact is that 99% of all students carry their own remotes right there in their backpacks.

In fact, my students interviewed a young scientist from JPL earlier this year. She had just returned from rural Africa where she helped establish Internet access to remote areas throughout the continent. When asked by one of my students what the future of Internet Access was, she said that it, frankly, didn’t include computers. After all, many people in these remote areas don’t have Macs or PCs, but they do have iPhones right there in their pockets. In other words, the future of Web 2.0 tools is already being defined by global availability.

As for the future of educational technology, we must guide our purchases to reflect the world around us. We must support the learner on the go. We must support individual use, not teacher-only use. We must support inexpensive options that give us access to the most information, easily accessed and easily presented. Smartphones, (and, I believe, eventually iPads or other tablet options) permit us to assume more and more that learners have access to the same information and opportunities.

The real question is How can we spend the money saved on Interactive Whiteboard purchases in ways that really propel education into the 21st Century?  What tools or training do you think are more to the point of education’s future?

© heather for tweenteacher.com, 2011. | Permalink | 39 comments | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: educational technology, interactive whiteboards, iPads in education, k12, middle school, smartboards, smartphones

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In it, I’ll be sharing what I have learned about the upcoming Common Core standards and how they will be assessed. It’s pretty interesting stuff and, in theory, far more aligned with authenticity than the bubble tests of yore. Nevertheless, there are challenges in making the transition to these tests that districts need to be prepared for. Despite these hurdles, however, teachers and districts can begin making the transition by identifying the skills students will need and by using more authentic methods of assessment in their own classrooms.

I’ll share some of what I’m doing in my classroom and some of the writing that’s on the wall with the tests to come.

Come join me! Like a birthday party, you’ll leave with goodies: a couple of download-ables and a slew of resources to help you in your practice.

Hope to see you Monday.

-Heather

© heather for tweenteacher.com, 2011. | Permalink | One comment | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: 21st Century assessments, common core standards, education, k12, middle school, professional development, standardized tests

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Wonka has left us with questions about his miraculous factory and the wonders he has taken with him.

© heather for tweenteacher.com, 2011. | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: apple, education, huffington post, k12, middle school, steve jobs

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So began my schpeel on writing an Executive Summary for this DARPA/NASA Project I’m doing with my students (see earlier posts, “The Power of Teaching Something you Know Nothing About” and “DARPA project con’t: Research and Questioning.”)

I have decided that even though the NASA/DARPA video conferencing event is on Friday, Sept 30, there should be one last period at the end of this sentence for all students involved, not just those who were selected as panelists to speak on camera. So the following week, each of the small groups will be presenting in their own panels to their classmates. The classmates will be given mock checks in the amount of 1 million dollars, and at the end of the week, the students need to give their check to the group that they feel most deserved their funding.

It’s incorporating business with education, the reality of funding with Project-Based Learning. After all, while we may not run education lock step like a business, there is no reason not to be teaching some elements of business as we prepare our students for their future.

The most substantial part of my students’ writing contribution for their overall project is the Executive Summary. Yes, they also incorporated the science they learned into a science-fiction narrative. Yes, they have been doing research and taking Cornell Notes. But their end result must be presented in the form of an Executive Summary.

The Executive Summary is an interesting writing genre in that it hits many marks that make it applicable to life outside of school, which is why I’m choosing to teach it this year. For one thing, students can find examples of Executive Summary that exist in many industries. Can you say the same thing about the 5-paragraph essay?

Also, to prepare for it, I still teach the standards that are necessary for test scores. The genre, however, applies to both masters: meaningfulness and standardized performance. It uses Summarizing, Persuasive Writing, Research Skills, and Computer Literacy.

It also demands rigor in the form of simplicity, which can be uber-challenging, because it insists on concise writing and the role-play it connects to a real life scenario. In our case: our real-life scenario is speaking to a ballroom of scientists to convince them of our findings (Friday) and presenting in panels in front of our philanthropic peers (the following week.)

Yet the true rigor of this unit is the fact that it mashes so many genres of writing together. After all, life is not categorized. Scientists applying for a grant must summarize their findings and recommendations and still Persuade in order to receive it. Small business owners looking to present at a conference must Summarize their session, create a bio, and Persuade a committee to select their topic. A graduate student ready to venture out into the world must create both a Cover Letter and a Resume: both of which are versions of summaries using different methods of summarization (prose, bullets, numbers, headings, subheadings, paragraphs, bolded text, etc…) in order to Persuade potential employers to hire him or her.

So it is not surprising that presenting this writing unit is more rigorous than a more traditional unit. It is, in fact, more real. Which brings to light a question about our tendencies in education: if categorization of topics is easier to understand, but isn’t as true to life outside of education, are we really preparing our students for the expectations of real life by breaking our writings down into simple blocks of learning?

Look, the fact is that categorized, linear teaching is easier to comprehend. I get it. But it’s not life. So the best we can do to help each other is perhaps break down the components of the complexity of the job that we do as teachers every day. For it is complex.

To help break down a little about this particular writing genre, I thought I’d provide a brief outline that might help simplify what is far from simple. If you are interested in teaching Executive Summary, a simple order of the writing might be:

I. Why is this issue important?
II. Give a little background of the issue
III. Present some evidence of past/current methods
IV. State your own recommendations.

Remember with Executive Summary that the goal is short and sweet, max 3 pages. A person who knows nothing about the topic shouldn’t be slammed by a wall of dense text. The student needs to break up the information using Headings, Sub-headings, bold text, bullets, etc…The student can insert graphs, charts, and other simple visuals as well. It is a combination of fact-based, irrefutable evidence presented with no voice. Let the facts do the talking. Then, in the recommendations section, that’s where students can throw in more persuasive language and opinion. Of course, the whole piece takes a clear stance, which is opinion in itself. But it uses the strength of fact and summary to do the heavy lifting.

Overall, an Executive Summary should be positive, persuasive, and punctuated by simple and visual text design elements.

So here’s a snapshot of where we are in the whole project: I collect their Executive Summaries this Monday. Their multi-media presentations are also due on that date. The websites or PowerPoints are a collaborative, visual-based version of their Executive Summaries combined into one presentation where each panelist provided 2 slides to represent the main ideas of their research. The students will begin practicing this week for next week’s panels in order to earn the blank checks. In the meantime, the students will also be developing high-level questions using Costas and Blooms in order to grill their peers who were chosen this week to speak on the Sept. 30 panel to Florida. This way, the selected students can practice recalling their research and citing evidence on the fly when the time comes for the Q & A portion of our session.

Oh, yeah, and somewhere in all of that, we have to read the assigned short story in the textbook for a reading assessment bubble test the following week.

How’s the old Sesame Street song go? “One of these things is not like the other. One of these things just doesn’t belong…”

© heather for tweenteacher.com, 2011. | Permalink | 4 comments | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: authentic assessments, darpa, education, k12, middle school, NASA, project based learning

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In this case, my students have applied to sit on a panel in an upcoming DARPA and NASA conference in Florida. It was a mythical session at the time I designed the unit, but the amazing thing, as many of you may know, is that we were actually contacted by NASA in order for my students to Skype in as a session to the actual conference.

In preparation of this event, we are doing a lot of research. To frontload for this, we talked a lot about Internet Literacy. Some of the topics we have discussed are:

1. Google Advanced Searches
2. Recognizing biased Websites
3. Citation of various online sources
4. Norms of blogging and video conferencing
5. Tracking down more resources using the bibliographies of current resources

We’ve also begun a classroom resource library broken down by the strands of research each student is conducting. The students bring in their bibliographies and selected articles copied or printed out, and put them in their corresponding files. This library then becomes possible resources for other students assigned to that strand.

So the bulk of this past week or so has been research, and as a component of that, my students had the opportunity to interview some professionals in the field. JPL (Jet Propulsions Laboratory) found some very kind and willing volunteers who offered to be interviewed by email. This then blossomed into a full-on Skype session last Friday where my students could interview, face-to-face, scientists who are actually involved in the development of interstellar space missions.

My students, clipboards in hand, took Cornell notes as the scientists listened, answered, and even asked their own questions. Needless to say, it was cool.

I was particularly proud of the questions that the students developed to take advantage of these scientists who were willing to donate their time to share their expertise. We’ve talked a bit about the Levels of Inquiry and developing high-level questions. We’ve talked a bit about asking questions in an interview that are not easily answered with Google. We’ve talked about how asking great questions is an indicator to great comprehension. The result was great, and the time spent with the professionals gave us some richly researched, primary resources for our DARPA arguments that are due on Sept 26 as final drafts.

Here is the list of questions my students developed and agreed upon to send:

1. Do we currently have the technology to create an atmosphere?
2. What would be the most efficient way to generate electricity?
3. Where would we store waste?
4. How can you prevent contracting diseases from other planets?
5. What importance is there to human life suspension?
6. What ready and reliable fuel sources already exist that can be used to get off the surface?
7. What speeds, with today’s technologies, are we able to accelerate up to? And how will we maintain that speed?
8. If possible, are we going to use the properties of black holes/wormholes to our advantage? (sling shot-ing, portal traveling, etc.?)
9. In your opinion, would it be better to first send probes to new destination options, or take journeys of faith with real people?
10. How do you think we could fit all the materials (food, water, etc.) in the star ship?
11. How can we keep the public interested in the project throughout the course of time?
12. What use of media/ technology is best to project the endeavor throughout the US and the entire world?
13. In terms of selecting a planet, what would you look for as required qualities of a habitable planet?
14. What type of people should first try to colonize on the planet? EX: researchers, scientists, athletes, or regular humans/civilians?
15. What are the mental ramifications of being at/in one place (i.e. planets) for too long?
16. Would it be more economical to change the environment of the planet that we may find habitable or create an artificial area to inhabit?
17. How do you get knowledge of the new scientific discoveries out to countries that don’t have the technology we have?
18. What kind of environmental toxins are in outer space that we already know we need to plan for/avoid/utilize?
19. Is there another source of energy besides solar power that can be used on a planetary colony?
20. What are the most important qualities that a colony needs to be self-sustainable?
21. Do we currently have any technology that makes it possible to prevent bone loss?
22. Which medicines (from over-the-counter to powerful anesthetics) will be needed to carry on board to the starship?
23. Please describe a sleeping chamber on a starship and the process of waking up and going back to sleep with daily check-ups in between.

One can clearly see that while they are asking questions, they needed to have a level of research conducted and a level of understanding before asking these levels of questions. Wouldn’t you want to know the answer to some of these? Well, I tell you the responses that came back were as detailed as the questions asked and fascinating. As you may know from my last post, I am learning along with my students.

I’ve given them the scaffold of writing necessary to mimic those found outside of school. From there, the universe is theirs to discover.

I’ll keep you all in the loop as it happens!

© heather for tweenteacher.com, 2011. | Permalink | 3 comments | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: curriculum integration, darpa, education, k12, middle school, NASA, PBL, project based learning

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As a result of this shift, and mind you, it’s only been a couple of weeks since school began, I’ve found that not only do my students enjoy learning more, but I enjoy teaching more. The strange thing is, however, that it is mostly due to the fact that with PBW, I’m not limiting myself to only teaching what I know. I’m learning with them, and in so doing, am modeling how to learn. In other words, I am the writing authority, but not the content authority.

Let me give you the best example I can. Right now, as we speak, I am in the midst of a fantastic unit called The Darpa Project. It all began this summer when my husband told me of a cool symposium going on in late September in Florida for which DARPA (the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency) was seeking presenters. They were asking scientists, futurists, ethicists, and science-fiction writers to apply to be a part of a forum to brainstorm ways to colonize a planet within 100 years. The project itself is called the 100 Years Starship Study. Incidentally, I can hear Star Trek music in my brain scoring that title every time I write or type it.

The conference would be segregated into 7 tracks, all focused on different aspects of what it would take to colonize: the time-distance issues, economic challenges, medical considerations, communicating and publicizing the rationale, etc…

As I read over the website, it occurred to me that applying to speak at a conference was a sort of a persuasive writing exercise. It also occurred to me that studying these different “tracks” and synthesizing one’s research into a proposal was a sort of an executive summary. And lo, a Project Based Writing Unit was born.

So I whipped together an iMovie introducing the concept with some dramatic suspense music thrown in. I threw together a pacing guide for myself and a packet with checklist for them. The packet gave details of how each small “professional community” of experts would be broken down into groups of 7 students. Each student would be responsible for becoming an authority on one of the “tracks.” The packet also contained various assignments and due dates leading up to a mock panel that would take place during lunch, where students from all over the school could come to our symposium to learn about colonizing the stars. And then I had a thought: hey, what if I called my friend in the CalTech patent office and asked if she knew of anyone who could come over during these lunchtimes to be an authentic audience for my students? Perhaps that person(s) could ask questions like a Q & A, or evaluate the presentations in some way? Wow, wouldn’t my students be excited, I thought.

So I sent out the email to my buddy, who responded and said she’d ask around and get back to me, and two weeks later I got a call…from NASA.

It seems that there is now an additional group added to the agenda for the DARPA 100 Years Starship Study: my students. It’s true. A small panel of my students will be presenting via Skype (or WebX, TBD) to an audience of those very same scientists, futurists, ethicists, and science-fiction writers my students will be researching. My students will be presenting not as scientists, but as experts with a unique invested interest in this project. After all, the adults in the room are planning for the generations that will come after the generation after us. My students, on the other hand, will have a hand in building the future for their own children. They will be leaving a legacy behind when they leave 8th grade.

But the import of what this unit has become is not what makes it so fun to teach. What makes it so fun to teach is how little I know about the content I’m asking my students to learn.

Sure I know a lot about writing and reading comprehension and research skills and internet literacy; and that’s ultimately what I’m responsible to teach. However, that’s not what the content of this unit is focused on. What that means is that we get to learn together. This is different than reciprocal learning, which is when I learn from them and they learn from me. This is going on a journey with my students, emailing and exploring and discovering and having head scratching moments and eureka moments along with them. We enter the classroom with ideas together, we sit and brainstorm together, and ultimately we will come away from this experience richer and more knowledgeable together.

I’ve got a few units already in the works for other genres later this year: Literary Analysis and Narrative to name two. But my goal now for this year is not to teach what I know, but to fold in what I know with what I don’t so that modeling learning becomes part of my job.

© heather for tweenteacher.com, 2011. | Permalink | 6 comments | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: authentic assessments, darpa, education, k12, project based learning, test prep

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I know nothing about the woman; all we have is a name. But we love her already. It’s amazing how so many hopes and dreams become immediately attached to a name. This year, I will remember what this feels like in my own teaching more than ever because of what I’m going through as a parent.

It’s as if all questions of educational policy and policy reform go out the window when you are staring down your own kid’s first day of school. Sure I know that the system is cracked and broken. Sure I know that the teachers face challenges and funding issues and problems beyond their control. But for one child and his mom, anyway, it’s all about this woman, her name, and my prayer:

May you see him for whom he is. He is a kid who makes an adult think, but that comes at a price. He can have that conversation full of deep thoughts and questions; unfortunately he can’t seem to stop himself from having that conversation with you, even when you are busy talking to others.

May you forgive him his trespasses. Sure, he can go over to the Dark Side sometimes, but sometimes his audience likes those who are willing to go there, and I hope that you can help make the Side of the Force just as attractive.

May you find ways to allow us to help you. A real terror for a parent is that with the onset of school, all knowledge of your kid’s day stops. I wish I could be a fly on the wall witnessing all of his successes. I also wish to know about his key failures so that we can follow through with consequences at home. We’ve got your back.

May you give him opportunities to test out his leadership and his ability to follow.

May you let him name a chicken and clean out the coop.

May you let him be line leader and bring up the rear.
May he not totally strip down when using the john, and if he does, please know that we’re working on that at home too.

May you realize that while he talks a lot about TV, he doesn’t watch it nearly as much as he talks about it.

May you not let him play before he finishes his lunch. He’s a really slight dude and could use the nutrition. He just finds talking more interesting than eating, and then it’s too late, and the world is moving on around him.

May you enjoy his laughter, questions, thinking, dreams, expressions, gestures, monologues, un-rhythmic dancing (I point a finger at my husband for that one), impersonations, connections, and curiosity as much as we do.

May he not get lost amongst the carpet squares of large-class sizes.

May your smile light up his morning, as I hope his does yours.

May each time his hand goes up, you know it will be a contribution that will help propel the conversation. I make no promises, but I pray that will be the case.

May you catch when someone does something unkind to him, and praise him for handling it well.

May you catch if he does something unkind to someone, for he is a child who feels regret, and he doesn’t like the feeling in his heart when he’s hurt someone.

May you praise his uniqueness, for that will one day be his superpower, even if his penmanship may not be.

May you be the first of a long line of teachers that he loves and remembers for years to come. May you give him the start of a beautiful relationship with school and with education, one that sees him through frustrations with authority figures that one day he will just have to deal with. For now, however, he’s building up the memories of those who love him and care for him, and you are the first in that foundation.

May we be able to work together to help this young man in his relationships with people, with learning, and with himself.

May you have a wonderful year with our son. He is our joy and we trust you with him.

© heather for tweenteacher.com, 2011. | Permalink | 7 comments | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: education, first day of school, k12, middle school, parent's prayer, teacher's prayer

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Open Letter to a New Principal

© heather for tweenteacher.com, 2011. | Permalink | 4 comments | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: administrations, education, edutopia, k12, middle school

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“Ohhhhh, teeeeeching,” he said knowingly. “Must be nice to have so much time off. Out at 3:00, and only what, 180 days of work? Nice gig.” He laughed in a smarmy manner and returned to his cocktail. I decided for the sake of the newlyweds that his drink must have dictated his manners.

I was getting my eyebrows waxed a few days later, and this clinician whom I have never met before asked what I did. “I’m a teacher,” I replied, wincing as she yanked off the strip of torture. “Ohhhhh, how relaxing that must be,” she said, smiling down at me in a dreamy way. “You know, to just, ahhhhh all day and not have any worries, no stress!” I winced again but opted not to say anything as she spread hot wax along my other brow.

There’s something I find confusing about the phrase “I’m a teacher.” Is it a secret password for “Release the verbal Kraken?” Is it some kind of code that means that not only can you judge my job, but you can also assume that I will find some modicum of humor in your massive misunderstanding of what it takes to do it? Does it give someone immediate allowance to be rude and degrading, losing all sense of etiquette?

After all, if someone had said, “I’m in construction,” I would never assume I knew how hard they worked, how they did their job, or what challenges they faced. If someone had said, “I’m a grip on a TV show,” I would never assume I knew how long they worked vs. how long they were seasonally on hiatus or how they spent their break. If someone had said, “I’m a lawyer, doctor, pharmacist, computer programmer, teller at a bank, waiter, day worker, chef, or even dish washer for said chef,” I would never utter the immediate judgment that may come to mind with each of those jobs. It’s just plain rude.

So what is it about admitting that one teaches that removes all filter of conversational decency from others?

Why is it that talking about teaching opens the door for not only poor judgment of what I do but poor judgment in one’s social manners?

Are teachers so downgraded in people’s minds that we don’t even qualify for polite conversation?

Perhaps in the future, I will keep little folded copies of Taylor Mali’s poem, “What Teachers Make,” in my wallet to pass out silently as people laugh at my expense. Or perhaps I will just harden up, smile, and do the job that people think they know how to do. I’ve written before that people’s assumption that they know about teaching because they’ve been through school is much like saying they must know childbirth because they’ve each been born.

I sigh, because as much I want to rip into those folks who straddle between the realms of good-intentioned-but-stupid and downright passive-aggressive-in-their-contempt, the fact is that truly educating people about teaching will never be about shaking one’s finger at those individuals who don’t get it. It will be about improving practice and promoting that quality. It will be about upping my pedagogy and being unabashed in announcing the hard work I do and the achievements of my students. As I’ve written about before, we must be both teachers and publicists.

And I use “announce” with everything I’ve got. We must stop being modest and quiet with our accomplishments. We must own our abilities, have pride in them, and yodel our victories like the Ricola guy on the mountaintop.

It starts with something small, like adopting a bulletin board on your site. Maybe it’s about tweeting a victory, writing a brief entry into the school newsletter, a submitting a success to the local newspaper.

I challenge you this year to start small in your bragging, not for yourself but for our profession. With enough teachers promoting what we do, with any luck, those who are rude in their anti-teacher sentiment will find no audience for their ignorance.

© heather for tweenteacher.com, 2011. | Permalink | 7 comments | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: education, k12, middle school, publicity, taylor mali

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Publishing Release Form. Check.

PG-13 Video/Clip Release Form to cover me for the whole school year. Check.

Set up YouTube Channel even though I have no idea how to use it yet. Check.

Purchased a Blackboard Collaborate account for a 100-person room. Check.

Tried out said room and can’t seem to figure out how to load a darn PowerPoint, but figured out how to remove a student from the room if he or she chats inappropriately. Check.

Sent off Book Spines templates to get copied for kids to use to show how much they are reading. Check.

Set up Weebly website. Check.

Designed first three weeks of lessons for all three different classes. Check.

Began email discussion with ELA department about digital portfolios. Check.

Set up bulletin board for opening days’ activity of agreeing on a classroom constitution and norms for online and offline behavior. Check.

Purchased 150 feathers to make quills and ink to sign said classroom constitution. Check.

Dusted off classroom library and set up realia props to lure kids in. Check.

Shoved around desks and chairs into position. Check.

Labeled chair names at each table group: Skulduggery, Prince Hal, Katniss, Mr. Darcy. Check.

Labeled table groups by colleges and universities: Harvard, USC, UCLA, Yale, Stanford, Berkeley, Connecticut College (mine), Lewis & Clark, Vassar. (Note to self: Allow students to do research and choose their own group’s college name during persuasive writing in second quarter). Check.

Broke into file cabinet that somehow got locked over the summer. Check.

Rigged a bookshelf that collapsed while being moved for carpet cleaning last month. Check.

Found all wires to set up Internet, LCD, and laptop at the front of the room and began yearly search for the rubber strip that allows me to walk over said cordage without breaking my neck. Check.

Air-blasted all tech equipment and set up the three classroom computers (rescued from being eRecycled a few years back). Check.

Made a list of supplies I need to purchase from Office Max, Staples, Office Depot, or whomever has the best deal this weekend: pencils, pens, post-its, highlighters, etc… Check.

Cleaned out cubbies to receive textbooks when they get delivered from the library on the first day. Check.

Killed 3 black widows. Check.

Sprayed for ants. Check.

Put up posters. Check.

Decided I’d rather have the students design the room as we go so I took down posters. Check.

Washed down the tops of cabinets and shelves that hadn’t gotten cleaned this summer. Check.

Designed opening day PowerPoint of results from my 8th grade surveymonkey activity at the end of last year. Check.

Spoke to NASA and JPL representatives to solidify their involvement in the culminating activity of a project-based learning unit that begins the third day of school. Check.

Set up phone. Check.

Cleaned out fridge. Check.

Looked inside my own desk, saw it was still a disaster, decided to just keep the drawers closed for another full year. Check.

There’s a lot that happens at the beginning of a school year before school even begins. Things are constantly happening behind the scenes, off camera, and, incidentally, out of contract. But it’s all necessary to do the job and start the year off right.

We’ve got PD days and department meetings scheduled for Monday and Tuesday. During this time, we also meet our new principal for our first faculty meeting of the school year as well. We’ll get our final class assignments, schedule, and class lists to learn for sure what we’re teaching and to whom. Despite the official returns to work date, many of us have actually been working for a while, setting up our learning environment and setting up for the arrival of our clientele.

Good luck to everyone this year. May your own checklist help the start of the year begin smoothly, and may the rest of your year follow suit.

© heather for tweenteacher.com, 2011. | Permalink | 12 comments | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: digital portfolios, education, first days of school, k12, middle school, virtual classroom, weebly

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It all started with a survey I conducted of my readers and those who follow me in my various social networks. I asked folks which were the Top 5 Skills (based on a list of 13 from the book) they felt students most need to know in order to be prepared for college or career.

Based on the results of that survey, I presented a number of strategies and lessons that could be used Monday and Someday in the participants’ classrooms. We also sent participants home with a shwag bag of handouts that they could use with their students and as future resources.

If you want to check out the archived webinar, you can find it here.

http://bit.ly/lkn7v5

Enjoy!

-Heather

© heather for tweenteacher.com, 2011. | Permalink | One comment | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: building community in the classroom, colllaboration, education webinar, eye on education, independent learning, k12, questioning

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So here I sit, in bed rest, waiting for the birth of son #2 (I can’t tell you the name yet or my husband will freak out that I let the cat out of the bag before telling his own folks.) It hasn’t been the smoothest of pregnancies, and I can’t wait to meet the little guy, which will be tomorrow because we’ll be inducing at that time.

In addition, I’m awaiting the metaphorical birth of my first book. It’s title is, drumroll please, ‘Tween Crayons and Curfews: Tips for Middle School Teachers, and it’s due out March 1 courtesy of Eye On Education Publishing. It has been a very interesting process from beginning to end, and they’ve proven to be a great publishing house, very nurturing of a new author, permitting me input every step of the way.

I’ll be publishing some excerpts from the book over the course of the next few weeks over here at Tweenteacher, on my Edutopia blog, and my column at The Huffington Post- nothing too weighty, but just enough to give my readers a taste of the book and truncated advice from some of its different chapters.

Meanwhile, back at my school site, it seems that they are gearing up for more possible lay-offs. I received a scary letter in the mail earlier this week with a checklist of criteria to break ties in the event of seniority list conflicts. The checklist itself is missing so many pieces, I can’t help but wonder who had a hand in its creation. Were there teachers involved, just admin, or is it perhaps from a state template of some kind? Anyway, I dutifully checked, documented, sent it off, and will now focus on the more pressing matters at hand until there’s a more concrete bridge to cross later this semester. Besides, I spent time examining tenure and the seniority list in my 2010 Teacher Magazine article, “Does Last Hired, First Fired Really Make Sense,” so I’m not looking to spend more time and energy on it now.

Nevertheless, the issue of my number on the seniority list won’t be far from my thoughts. Last year, after lay-offs, I was left at only 3 from the bottom, so we’ll see where this all shakes down in the end. Hopefully, due to my years as a teacher and in my current district, I will have a position to return to in the fall after my maternity leave of absence.

In the meantime, I’m off to the hospital to begin a new chapter as a mom of two sons, and I’m off on a journey as a first time author. I’ll be back on the blogging horse in no time, as well, with new news, new perspectives, and new information about the educational world at large.

I’ll be in touch soon, everyone, and update you as things progress on all fronts!

Sincerely,

Heather

© heather for tweenteacher.com, 2011. | Permalink | 2 comments | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: author, blogging, edutopia, eye on education publishing, huffington post, k12, middle school, public school, seniority list, tenure

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OK, so I’m only teaching first semester this year, my testing period during the spring is in the hands of a sub that I have no control over in choosing, and I care deeply about my students’ achievement.

What do I give up and what is lost in the answer?

I’m going on maternity leave this year, leaving the students I am slowly growing to love to the random lottery that is the subfinder system. There’s a lot to be concerned about, not the least of which centers on my own child.

I believe that there is a gradual build up that should happen over the course of a school year. After all, a first semester 7th grader vastly differs from that same kid 10 months in their future, and there’s groundwork to be laid for that to happen. Not so this year.

I’ve started making a list of my beloved go-to lessons and units, the ones I have never lived without since learning or developing them, the ones that seem to catch more of them in the nets of learning. And I’ve started looking at this list critically and sadly.

* I teach them how to develop high level questions in order to create their own quizzes that, if done properly, are 10x more rigorous than a standardized test.

* I teach young authors how to think critically online, evaluating the validity of websites, linking their essays to richer resources so that their readers can dive deeper into the research it took to construct their reasoning. Despite my dedication to teaching this future skill, Internet Literacy isn’t tested. Is this the unit that goes?

* We work on community building so that the students are comfortable with each other, so that each student can feel pride in something they are academically good at and no shame in that which they still need to learn. This allows for deeper differentiation because giving students choice and students advising students (two very powerful tools of differentiation) can’t happen without building community.

Are these the lessons that I need to chuck out the window this year due to my own time constraints?

And what of my own district assessments? As it is, we give a fall benchmark writing test and a spring benchmark-writing test. We give a standardized reading test that mimics our state tests once a quarter. Do I want them to show growth or do well when I’m there? And what if they don’t show growth under the sub’s tutelage? As value-added assessments grow in popularity, will I be defending the scores of this year for years to come? Will I be accountable for a year of learning with only 5 months influence on these students’ progress?

I also started thinking about the duration of a teacher’s career in this Brave New World that so many are wishing our schools reflected. The world I mean is the one seen before, where the teacher’s sole priority was to her students, where on each paycheck, the stub read, “must be unmarried.” For despite my own dedication to the profession and to my students, I can’t deny that I committed far more time to other people’s children before having my own. Frankly, I think being able to see both sides of the teacher’s desk makes me a better teacher, but to many, they wonder why I can’t give more. My job has become to balance what once I never had to.

So that got me thinking about the issue of charter schools. Many clearly are getting a lot of press these days as being staffed with dedicated teachers willing to stay late, come early, work 6 days a week, etc..Despite the fact that many charters can’t boast any more success than a regular public school can, I wondered what that level of dedication meant in regards to a teacher’s shelf life. Recently, I spoke to a doctorate student about her study of 4 charter schools. Two were remarkable, she said. One was “fine,” and the other “not so good.” She shared some details of her research, but said that even the two best charters she studied, the ones with the teachers who spent the most time committed to working with the students, suffered when the teachers begin to reprioritize their lives.

So according to the charter system, to the media, and to those wanting this Brave New World of education, do they believe teachers are “over the hill” when work can’t be their primary focus? In their ideal world, save for a few veterans kept around to help the youngins’, should teachers’ careers be shorter than that of a professional athlete?

I mean, athletes can have a family and still play until their bodies play out, but in society’s ideal educational world are teachers done when their priorities shift? Can we be permitted lives and still retain the title of Superman? Or is Superman less super if he moves in with Lois and has a kid?

That being said, I am trying, as many in my case do, to make it all work. My first priority is my growing family, but I have a responsibility to setup this school year the best I can.

So what do I cross off? Do I go deeply hitting fewer standards? Or, do I cover as much as possible in a more shallow way? Do I pick the best of my lessons from each unit? Or do I progress as I do, trusting the system and hoping that my unknown counterpart for second semester will fill in the gaps that time would not allow me to fill?

My doctor enters, smiling, and I put down my lesson plans for now…

© heather for tweenteacher.com, 2010. | Permalink | 11 comments | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: education, k12, maternity leave school, middle school, teacher career, value-added assessments

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The tragedy is that we’re only going to get one shot at such a powerful cooperative wave towards systemic educational change, and when this current wave fails, I fear the public will finally throw up their hands in exasperation and cut-and-run in their interest and support. Some would even say the charter movement is the beginning of such an exodus of effort.

However, never before, that I can recall, have the mainstream and media rallied in such forces to try to help education. This should be a time of hope. Yet whom do they listen to? What standard does the public rally behind? They look for answers from those farthest from our schools, the politicians and philanthropists looking for an easy solution and an easy target.

And teachers have become that target.

Even though we were the ones who first began calling out for help and attention to our schools, even though we are the ones who have been yelling into the darkness for support and reform and changes in the system, even though we are the ones who recognized the failures of this system first, we never received a call back.

Teachers have been the ones keeping education’s head above water while politicians from both sides of the fence slashed and cut our needs to ribbons. And now we are to blame?

How do you blame a boxer for coming out of the ring bruised? How do you blame the doctor on the airplane, the hero who uses a pen to save a suffocating man, for not using the resources given the doctor at Cedars-Sinai?

So to solve the problem of education, celebrities, entrepreneurs, and politicians have banded together to discuss education’s woes and salvation. But where are the true stakeholders in the discussion: the parents, the teachers and even the students? The invites to be a part of a national discussion on education have been sent out, yet all of our mailboxes remain empty.

Now, I will say this: despite the sneers of some in education, I don’t blame philanthropists for their involvement or passion for our schools. And I actually want the input of those who have the ability to fund some of the necessary changes. But money does not an educational expert make. In addition, teachers also have some ownership in this recent development. I’ve spoken before that I believe the minority of teachers who give this profession a bad name have long controlled the reputation of our profession, and that teachers and unions have not moved fast enough to help clean their own house. Unfortunately, I believe that that this wave of anti-teacher sentiment, this “teacher-ism” is, in part, due to the result of that inertia.

However, just as it remains unfathomable to me to have major discussions about law and not invite lawyers to the table, or to have a meeting about medicine and not invite doctors, so does it remain unacceptable to block teachers out of the discussions about our schools.

Why does everyone think they are an expert in education? Is it because everyone went through school and so they believe that they are experts in schooling? Isn’t that like saying that since everyone’s been born, that must make them experts in being an OBGYN?

Finally the media and the public have woken up to the needs of our schools. However, rather than look to the lists of reforms teachers have long been researching and suggesting, they have instead rushed by our corner booth, racing to buzz in and offer the silver bullet answer themselves.

For we all live in a game show society where we want to be the ones to get the Daily Double, to give the answers, and we want them now, no excuses. After all, as the Nike ad said, “Just do it.”

And this ad drives our politics and decision-making even today. For this MTV generation of reformists wants things done yesterday, and as they discover the complexity of the problem that we teachers have always lived in, they use the strategy of Blame in order to deflect the delay in getting the hungry public the solutions they promised would come so quickly. In so doing, they have created a lynch mob out to rob teachers of their voice and their professionalism.

Those who are new to the conversation don’t want to think that the answers have been here all along, having been thought of long ago and ignored. They don’t want to think that there is this indigenous tribe here on the planet surface that already has the knowledge of what plants to eat and what not to eat and of what traps and sandy pits exist beyond the falls. Instead the tribe has been quarantined. And in so doing, our survival as an educational planet is in serious jeopardy.

Interested in reading more about our current Teacher Quarantine from the educational debate? Check out these recent blogs:

http://learningismessy.com/blog/?p=929

http://teacherleaders.typepad.com/teachmoore/2010/09/teachers_on_sidelines.html

http://walkingtoschool.blogspot.com/

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/alfie-kohn/what-passes-for-school-re_b_710696.html

http://accomplishedcaliforniateachers.wordpress.com/2010/09/16/the-danger-of-a-single-story-part-one/#comment-533David

© heather for tweenteacher.com, 2010. | Permalink | 4 comments | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: education, k12, NBC Education Nation Summit, Teacher Townhall

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The discussions are rich, organic, and run themselves. All I needed to do was have the patience to set it up right. So I’ve pulled together some steps that I’ve been working on for the past couple of years that help introduce students to the art of blogging without neglecting the science of building community and collaboration.

1. First give them a technology survey. After all, you need to know who has access and who does not. That way, you can strategize options for students who are not online at home. I do not believe that we can hold classes or schools back, creating an ever-widening gap, by holding out for students who do not yet have access. It is our responsibility, however, to provide options. I offer lunchtime or after school computer use in my classroom. The local library is willing to reserve computers at certain times. And our school media center has a couple that are available as well.

2. Show them what a blog is. I first show them the little video by Commoncraft.com, “Blogging in Plain English.
Then I show them examples of other blogs. I might show them one of my own book reviews or an author’s blog or even look at the give and take in some Amazon book discussions. (I, of course, scout ahead for appropriateness. I never assume the link or the content from one year is able to be used again the next year without previewing it first.)

3. Hand out a simple list of the basic rules of Netiquette for How to Comment on a Blog. I use the ones for a middle school workbook I wrote for Teacher Created Resources. I have them here with their permission. Even just going over rules helps to set a tone of expectations.

4. We do offline blogging first. I think offline blogging is an important step because it demystifies the process and breaks it down into a more tactile activity. Basically, I print out 4 different online book reviews (one for each kid at a table group to read.) I attach a template that includes user name, subject line, and comment field to the end of the review. It’s just three boxes of differing sizes to mimic what they will see online. (I actually attach multiple templates so that multiple students can comment.) The students read the review, then fill in their user name (their first name + last initial), the subject line (which is the main idea of their upcoming comment), and their comment. Then they rotate their review to the next person in their group for that person to comment on. After the first student, the kids have the option to comment on the initial review or comment on another student’s comment. By the time a few students have rotated their reviews around, the list of comments has noticeably grown, and the students get the idea of blogging by creating the visual themselves. Here’s also a hint: use books from your own classroom library and they’ll be checked out by the middle of first period. This year I used Uglies, Shiver, The Hunger Games, and Everlost.

5. Have the students choose their own book club groups. I say no more than 5 kids in a group, and I believe that student choice, whenever possible, is key to middle school buy-in. These students won’t be working together face to face, only online, so it won’t be a classroom management issue to allow them this treat.

6. Hand out Guidelines on How to Write a Discussion Post. You can get a copy of mine here that is based on a version first designed by my awesome colleague and fellow Writing Project mentor, Liz Harrington. This gives students a sense of your expectations regardless of the book they are currently reading or where they are in their book. Incidentally, if you teach a subject other than Language Arts, it’s a good idea to hand out guidelines about what you want them to be posting about: what to base their topics on, where to find concepts, etc…just to get them started. They can blog about how they discovered the solution to an equation or predict the outcome of an upcoming experiment. Anything with guidelines can be used to begin an online conversation.

7. Still working offline, I have them turn in a final draft of their first discussion post on paper before we go to the computer lab. This will be the only time they turn this in to me other than as an online post. It’s just a format they are used to and it allows me an easy way to make sure everyone’s prepared before going up to the lab for the first time. Everyone needs to be on the same page to learn the skill.

8. Once in the lab, introduce them to your blogging program. I use www.kidblog.org. It can be a little buggy, but it’s safe, fantastically user friendly, and forgiving. It takes 5 minutes to learn, and 5 minutes to set up. Show them a post that you’ve created already on the same subject that follows their same guidelines. Model, model, model. Have the students log on and comment on your post. This way, you can give quick feedback on their commenting quality before they comment on each others’ posts.

9. Have them type their discussion post into a new post entry and teach them to link a piece of their text to a website or image as a further resource for their readers. I think linking is a vital skill that students in this digital age should learn. It’s an added layer of comprehension that the author shares with you and an added dimension of information to which a reader has access. Once their post is typed and a piece of text is linked to an online resource, the students can click to publish (which actually goes to you for approval first on many programs.)

10. Skim for appropriateness and publish their first discussion post. Then spend some time privately commenting on each of their posts, give them a score, whatever, while the kids begin publicly commenting on the published posts from the members of their book club group. Eventually, however, you’ll notice that students will start commenting on everyone’s posts. They can’t help it. Blogging’s addictive.

I have no doubt that there is a more efficient way to frontload blogging in your classroom. But this is what’s worked for me, especially with kids who have no freaking clue what I’m talking about when I first approach them the the “b” word.

Middle schoolers love to talk, so give middle schoolers the opportunity to talk using technology. Blogging gives them the chance to exchange ideas and discuss, but with eloquence, guidance, and the rules of netiquette. It taps into their chatty tendencies, creating greater buy-in, and it gives them a 21st Century skill that will move with them beyond their year with you.

© heather for tweenteacher.com, 2010. | Permalink | 31 comments | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: 21st Century skill, blogging, education, k12, middle school, Netiquette

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