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Middle School Nuts and Bolts: Intro to Time Management

heather — Sat, 28 Aug 2010 17:56:38 +0000

A tween is all about distraction. Their brain is just going through so many changes that focus can be an issue under the best of circumstances. They are trying to settle on an identity, their cast of friends changes from act to act, and for many, this is the first couple of years changing teachers throughout the day. But responsibilities are static, and despite our understanding what a tween is going through, we still need to teach deadlines and responsibility. So when teaching about time management to a tween, it can be all about providing enough options that they have no choice but to look their deadlines in the face.

When it comes to time management, we have to specifically teach tweens, and that means introducing them to different ways to look at time in the hopes that one method might ring with one student or another. Think about adults: some like wearing a watch. Some still like to write all their events in the little Filofax in their bag, crossing out what’s accomplished or dog-earing a completed page. Others like using something like Google docs or some other online program. Still others like their iPhone to ring them when something’s coming up. As adults, we differentiate how we manage our time.

Students, however, are sometimes at the whim of the method that works for that particular teacher for that particular year or the one designated by the school site. Yet middle school is a vital time for tweens to learn multiple strategies. In elementary school, much was given to them explicitly, and once they enter high school, there’s this expectation that they can manage their time already independently. So when else are they going to learn these skills but in middle school?

It’s constantly a work in progress, but I have a few methods that I use with students to help them manage their time so that they can take responsibility for their own deadlines:

I have multiple ways in my ELA classroom that students can look at their workload and time management. I also post our agenda online (web.me.com/bulldogradio) so that they kids have access to the weekly information from home. After all, school should mimic real life, and folks outside of education have access to information 24/7, why shouldn’t we grant it to our students as well?

Here are some strategies I provide for my students, from micro to macro:

1. Weekly agenda - This reflects the online agenda, changing from week to week. The students come in to a board with a brief summary of what’s being planned for the week. Each day has the gist listed in blue, and if there’s something in red, that means it’s due that day. The students copy all information into their school agenda that they keep in their backpacks. So this incorporates color-coding as well, another great tool for time management. This actually also helps me as a brief outline of what I need to accomplish that is posted in the room, like my own personal checklist. In addition, this method forces me to weekly lesson plan. I make sure the upcoming week has this brief outline worked out by the time I leave on Friday afternoon so that my weekend is less stressed and more devoted to my own personal life.

2. Monthly Calendar - This is just your run-of-the-mill calendar I purchased at Office Max that hangs in my classroom with bright color coded indications of when tests, days off, and events are occurring. It gives a slightly broader view of upcoming responsibilities and deadlines.

3. Quarter Timeline – This is a taped timeline that stretches over the back of my room, divided by lines that represent the weeks of the quarter. It gives an indicator using symbols which days are off, which are testing days, holidays, minimum days, etc…I use a post-it in the shape of an arrow to indicate where we are in the timeline. A student moves the arrow during my first period class each day. Again, it widens out their perspective of time and what’s coming up.

4. Yearly Agenda Sit-Down – At the start of each year, I spend about 15 minutes with each period going through the yearly agenda. So I ask them to take out their agenda and I sit down with my own calendars for the district, site, and department. We go through EVERYTHING: fundraisers, testing days for the state and the department, holidays, major informational meetings, dances, etc…They are really focused on what I’m saying. After all, tweens like to be in the know. And it always pulls out discussions that are really valuable. For instance, this year as I told them the date for the meeting to get information for our 8th grade DC trip, I told them about the financial aid available and how the teachers chip in to help students go who can’t afford it. However, the trade off is that students have to keep up their grades, stay out of trouble, and go the meetings to show their interest. Perhaps this might help with my own classroom management by sharing this carrot with them now. In addition, we all crossed off our student-free days in our agendas including our furlough days this year, which began a talk about how much more focused we have to be because we all have the same job to do in less time. Perhaps this also might end of helping them keep their eye on the ball when we’re in a crunch.

Introduce tweens to multiple strategies of time management. Let tweens into knowledge of the master calendar, and give them the tools to manage their own responsibility. In the end, you’re giving them the ability to make your own middle school classroom run smoother and, more importantly, you’re giving them the skills that they will take into their lives beyond school.

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Post tags: agenda, education, middle school, time management, tween

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Peter Walsh, OfficeMax, and me, Oh My!

heather — Sat, 08 Aug 2009 20:44:14 +0000

So earlier this week, I was flown to Chicago to participate in a Webcast helping parents to organize their students for back to school. Sponsored by OfficeMax and hosted by Peter Walsh (of TLC’s Clean Sweep and Oprah fame), the half-hour show invited over 200 mom-bloggers to tune into the live online broadcast, followed by a Q & A with us for 20 minutes over Twitter.

Showing parents how to color code

Working with Walsh was a pleasure in the way that it’s a pleasure to work with an administrator that you know is the best at what they do. In fact, I found myself likening Peter to a fairy tale principal, albeit one that has been given the time and authority to participate in and improve on every element of their school, and who has knowledge of how each element plays its part in that school’s success. I know, a mythical educational world at best.

(...)
Read the rest of Peter Walsh, OfficeMax, and me, Oh My! (971 words)

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Post tags: administrators, middle school, officemax, peter walsh, principals, tween, twitter, webcast, webinar

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Book Review: Pride and Prejudice and Zombies

heather — Mon, 29 Jun 2009 23:25:30 +0000

You know the old commercial: “You got your chocolate in my peanut butter! Well, you got your peanut butter in my chocolate!” And just like a Peanut Butter cup, it seems that Jane Austin and Zombies go great together.

Pride and Prejudice and Zombies combines two very different genres from the farthest poles of the bookshelf. It smooshes together Empire waists with half-eaten brains. And, gosh darn it. It works.(...)
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Post tags: book review, Curriculum, ELA, genre, k12, middle school, teaching, tween, Writers Project, writing project

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Student-Designed Schools

heather — Fri, 26 Jun 2009 16:47:19 +0000

This year, my 8th graders all produced a multi-genre project during 4th Quarter that focused on possible careers of their choice. But I went a step further with my 8th grade Honors class. They not only had to research a possible career, but they then had to each relate it to educational reform and school design.(...)
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Post tags: collaboration, curriculum design, curriculum development, differentiation, ELA, k12, Language Arts, middle school, tween

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5 Things Teachers can do to Improve Teaching

heather — Wed, 22 Apr 2009 04:36:43 +0000

We all know there are many problems in education and not one bullet to solve any one of them. We as teachers can’t do a lot about many of the factors that have huge influence on student success: parental involvement, health care, funding. But there are a few steps we as educators can make in protecting our professional reputation, advancing student achievement, and making our day-to-day lives a little less challenging.(...)
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Post tags: collaborate, Curriculum, Ed Tech, merit pay, middle school, performance pay, Title I, TLN, tween, writing project

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Twitter as Think Aloud

heather — Mon, 13 Apr 2009 13:46:58 +0000

I was reading through my Digg headlines this weekend, and I happened on this article of the top 10 most extraordinary Twitter updates. I also did some digging (no pun intended) and found articles that range in claiming that there are anywhere from 4 million to over 14 million current Twitter users. If true, then Twitter has a greater population that Greece. Or, if you would rather think in cities, twice as large as London.

So today, my class is going to start Twittering. I’ve been thinking about using Twitter as a tool for Thinking Aloud for some time now. I always pictured it on the LCD projector as I taught, entering thoughts as I simultaneously taught, so as to model my own reasoning and processes for my classes.

I also think it will be a powerful 21st Century (hate that term) tool for them to use to give me a snapshot of what they are thinking. So I’ve been tackling the issue of how to Twitter online and offline with students.

Here’s what I’m just now deciding on. You know how you sometimes get your best ideas in the shower or in the rear-view mirror? Well, I got mine brushing my teeth. Just a little share for all you readers out there.

Here’s how I’m setting up the unit and how I’m helping to control their safety while creating a transparent and open-door environment in my classroom.(...)
Read the rest of Twitter as Think Aloud (368 words)

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Post tags: Curriculum, curriculum design, Ed Tech, education, ELA, Think Aloud, tween, twitter, UCI, Writers Project, writing

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Fictional Crushes

heather — Sat, 11 Apr 2009 22:37:23 +0000

OK, don’t tell my husband, but I have a fictional crush. That is, I have a crush based on a fictitious character. I think I’ve always had one, but the object of my literary love has always changed with my own chapter in life. (...)
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Post tags: achievement gap, blog, book review, classroom library, ELA, k-12, k12, middle school, TLN, tween, UCI, Writers Project

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Obama’s “Race to the Top”

heather — Sat, 11 Apr 2009 03:38:39 +0000

So US News is reporting that President Obama and the educator leaning out of the sidecar, Arne Duncan, have created ”a $5 billion ‘Race to the Top’ fund for states that have made progress on the following fronts: 1) improving teacher effectiveness, 2) creating better assessments aligned to rigorous standards, 3) fixing failing schools, and 4) using data systems to track student achievement. The details of how states can qualify for this money will be released later this year.”(...)
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Post tags: Title I, TLN, tween, UCI, Writers Project

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Where the Wild Things Are: Part II

heather — Tue, 31 Mar 2009 00:20:24 +0000

So I recited the book and showed the movie trailer to the students on my Interactive Whiteboard, just as I mused about in my last post. From there, I read an old version of the “Three Little Pigs” and asked my students to formulate questions or plot points to fill in the gaps in character development, narrative, background, etc, muck like what Spike Jonze seems to have done in his adaptation.

So I want to share some of the awesome questions my 7th graders developed to help them fill in the story gaps:

1. If the mother pig didn’t have the “means” to have so many kids, why did she have three?

2. Why did the three pigs go their separate ways? How was their relationship if they wouldn’t stay together?

(...)
Read the rest of Where the Wild Things Are: Part II (154 words)

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Post tags: Curriculum, curriculum design, Ed Tech, education, interactive whiteboards, k-12, k12, middle school, tween, UCI, Writers Project

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Teaching Secrets: Finding a Job That You Love

heather — Thu, 26 Mar 2009 01:33:00 +0000

Know a teacher who got a pink slip? Maybe my newest post at Teacher Magazine can help. Click here for the article.

It’s Step 1 of my Top Secret New Teacher Handbook. Hope it creates some shortcuts, a machete even, through the education jungle.

-Tweenteacher

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Post tags: achievement gap, blog, classroom library, classroom management, collaboration, common language, critical thinking, Curriculum, curriculum design, curriculum development, differentiation, Ed Tech, education, ELA, employment, free, fundraising, internet literacy, jobs, k-12, k12, Language Arts, learning, life long learners, merit pay, metacognition, middle school, NCLB, new teachers, peer teaching, performance pay, professional development, technology, test prep, Think Aloud, Title I, TLN, top 10, tween, UCI, Writers Project

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A teacher’s duty?

heather — Sat, 21 Mar 2009 00:05:18 +0000

So by now I assume we’ve all heard of the sanctioned “cage fighting” in a Dallas, TX school. As AP reports, school officials apparently condoned the use of a steel cage in which students could bare-knuckle fight their way towards agreement. Great peer mediation program, right?

But why is it that only the worst of the worst appears in the news, as if this level of inappropriateness was a common disease facing education today?

I was corresponding with Teacher Leader Network all-around-awesome-guy John Norton, and we stumbled on an interesting point which relates to this issue of highly publicized educational indecency. And it kinda got me thinking.

Sure, I’m frustrated by the ease in which the news reports the horrible, inbred cousins of education. Sure I tire of the publicity behind those YouTube worthy rants, those rare abuses in schools made seemingly frequent, as if they were a chronic problem along with the achievement gap and childhood obesity.

But I feel that we as teachers in the trenches have a duty to battle this poor publicity.

Teachers of yore were quite isolated, closing their door and teaching in their solitary rooms. Some still do, but the job has changed. Collaboration has become a key to our survival. Teaching with transparency and an open-door policy has become necessity, evidence of our ability. Some of why this is necessary is because test scores and observations have become the go-to way to evaluate a teacher (but that’s for another post). Another reason is that our challenges and our horrors have become far more public than our glories.

Whose fault is that? I blame us.(...)
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Post tags: collaboration, Ed Tech, education, education policy, publicity, technology, Title I, TLN, tween, UCI, Writers Project, writing

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Extreme Makeover: Classroom Edition

heather — Thu, 12 Mar 2009 05:45:58 +0000

There’s been so much talk lately of deep-needed reforms for education, but we neglect just how powerful a simple makeover can be. I’m lucky to currently work at a school that has a patch of green, which fixes the broken windows and washes off the graffiti when it happens. But I’ve worked at the schools that smell of urine, at the sites that lay forgotten by funding, yet are still expected to succeed.

According to What Not to Wear, a makeover does wonders for your confidence, your pride. According to Extreme Makeover, it can renew your hope in life.(...)
Read the rest of Extreme Makeover: Classroom Edition (248 words)

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Post tags: Ed Tech, ELA, ELD, extreme makeover, fundraising, k-12, k12, middle school, TLN, tween, UCI, Writers Project, writing

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How to be an Ed Tech Advocate

heather — Sun, 08 Mar 2009 01:26:24 +0000

OK, guys. So I got it from the horse’s mouth at CUE. According to the ISTE Director of Governmental Affairs, No Child Left Behind is not going away.

In the weeks leading up to the election, the Obama administration talked the talk, proving that Educational Technology was on their radar, but if you’ve been listening, the silence on Ed Tech has since become deafening. (...)
Read the rest of How to be an Ed Tech Advocate (515 words)

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Post tags: achievement gap, blog, budget, CUE, Ed Tech, education policy, EETT, equity, ETAN, fundraising, internet literacy, k-12, k12, learning, lobbyist, middle school, NCLB, obama, online, school accountability, school funding, technology, Title I, tween, UCI, writing

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The Importance of The Classroom Library

heather — Sun, 01 Mar 2009 18:00:25 +0000

I believe a classroom library is the heartbeat of a teacher’s environment. It is the window into their own personality, and it reflects the importance of literacy in the classroom. I believe every teacher, no matter the subject taught, should have one.

Access to books should be thought about with the same differentiated approach as any other lesson, assessment, or activity. It seems to me that there are four kinds of library-learners:

1. THE BRASH BIBLIOPHILE: These are students who are well versed in the language of book choice and seek out what they want, avidly asking questions or using learned or inherent strategies to find the book that will make them sigh into their bed with a flashlight in hand. They will find their way to their local bookstore by any means necessary, and look through the stacks until their parents pull them away.

(...)
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Post tags: assessments, blog, book review, classroom library, classroom management, education, ELA, Golden Lines, How To, k-12, k12, Language Arts, learning, middle school, new teachers, school funding, teaching, textbooks, Title I, TLN, tween, UCI, Writers Project, writing

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Teacher Magazine: Test Prep Magic

heather — Fri, 27 Feb 2009 14:32:33 +0000

Check out my article in yesterday’s Teacher Magazine outlining 5 little-thought-about strategies in teaching test prep. Hope it helps you during your own Test Prep season.

-Tweenteacher

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Post tags: assessments, data, education policy, ELA, test prep, Title I, tween, UCI, Writers Project

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DARPA to create metacognitively aware robots

heather — Wed, 25 Feb 2009 05:03:05 +0000

The Register reports that DARPA (Defense Advance Research Projects Agency) is currently researching how to create robots that are “like some self-aware computer systems capable of “meta-reasoning” and “introspection…” Their goal is to “Provide machines with an ability to reason about their own reasoning.”

Um, is anybody else seeing the irony of these objectives? We are funding the creation of synthetic brains that are able to reflect and have insight, yet we are still unwilling as an educational system to support, teach, or assess our children towards these same goals.

Our current student assessment system doesn’t even acknowledge the importance of thinking, but bubbling, on the other hand, ranks really high up there in the skills that students desperately need to know.

The students of today will, theoretically, be the scientists of our future generations; yet they will not have had the cranium training that their garbage disposals will be privy to.

Perhaps we should just start training our Tech-Com human resistance now.

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Post tags: curriculum design, curriculum development, ELA, Language Arts, metacognition, Title I, TLN, tween, UCI, Writers Project, writing

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Starting from scratch in teacher training

heather — Wed, 18 Feb 2009 22:49:36 +0000

I recently heard Judy Willis (of “syn-naps” fame) speak at a conference. In her pre-teaching life, she was a neurologist and she brings her knowledge to the classroom and to her lectures. (See my recently published article in Teacher Magazine, “My Brilliant Second-Career”). Willis mentioned that she had just gotten back from Dubai where her charge was to teach new teaching program students about brain development and how it relates to education.

Questions she tackled with these candidates were:

How do children and adolescents learn?

What actually happens in the brain in order to hear and retain information?

What are proven strategies that help information to become embedded into long-term memory?

(...)
Read the rest of Starting from scratch in teacher training (169 words)

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Post tags: 2008, achievement gap, ascd community, blog, collaboration, credential, critical thinking, Curriculum, curriculum design, curriculum development, integration, metacognition, Title I, TLN, tween, UCI, Writers Project, writing

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Test Prep-Bubbling Power

heather — Tue, 03 Feb 2009 03:23:06 +0000

So I looked at my 8th grade students’ scores after they took the MMA and sighed. Their scores sucked. (...)
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Post tags: 100% accountability, 2008, achievement gap, assessments, education, k-12, k12, middle school, teaching, test prep, Think Aloud, Title I, TLN, tween, UCI, Writers Project, writing

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Is EdTech changing how students think or is it addressing the changes in student thinking?

heather — Fri, 30 Jan 2009 04:13:02 +0000

Science Daily is reporting that there has been a shift in how students are thinking as a result of their use of technology. They believe it possibly lowers critical thinking skills and analysis. Additionally, they wonder just how much schools should be catering to this change.

The important thing to remember is that when we talk about differentiation, we have to include all forms of teaching, from traditional pencil and paper to the use of technology. But if we were to ignore the evolution that is occurring, that of the transition our brains our making as a result of society’s onslaught of daily technology, we would not be doing our job.

(...)
Read the rest of Is EdTech changing how students think or is it addressing the changes in student thinking? (437 words)

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Post tags: achievement gap, ASCD Brief, assessments, blog, collaboration, critical thinking, Curriculum, curriculum design, curriculum development, Ed Tech, education, education policy, internet literacy, k-12, k12, Language Arts, life long learners, metacognition, sesame street, teaching, technology, Title I, TLN, tween, UCI, Writers Project, writing

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Marketing Metacognition

heather — Sun, 25 Jan 2009 22:42:02 +0000

So I just got the January MindWare catalogue and I realize that here we have a toy catalogue that is solely for metacognitive purchases. So this got me thinking: how can schools market metacognition? I realized, of course, that until our standardized tests become a more critical-thinking assessment, however, is there a point in doing so?(...)
Read the rest of Marketing Metacognition (309 words)

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