Jobs

This is my first year teaching 2nd grade. In the beginning of the school year, I asked myself jobs or no jobs? I decided that I would have classroom jobs. Next year, no jobs. The reason being, that this summer I am going to research and prepare for a student led classroom. Instead of assigning jobs, my goal will be to teach students to think and act independently and responsibly. Depending on what grade I am teaching, this may be reconsidered...

Back to this year... I tried to come up with tasks that were important and that students could complete entirely independently. For example, "Tech Director". The tech director is responsible for all things tech - i.e. charging iPads and assisting with the Smartboard. I began with reading the title and description of each job to the class. The kids were pumped! Some jobs were much more alluring than others. Everyone gasped when the coveted line leader position was announced. 

Instead of randomly assigning jobs, I decided to create a job application. Students would need to complete the job application and apply for their job. Upon reflecting, I wish that I would have taken the time to have the kids "interview" with me. Too excited and too nervous to jump right in to the school year. 

The original application required students to record their personal information: name, address, phone number, and birth date. Students also had to write which job they were applying for. Most importantly, they had to note why they would be good for this job. Why should I hire them? 

This was way too much work for the kids, initially. Many did not know their personal information and struggled greatly to complete the application. I tossed the application and had students record the following information on a blank piece of paper: name, date, positions applying for, and why they would be good at the desired position. This was much more reasonable and realistic. However, I, again, wish that I would have taken the time to practice the information until they knew it all and kept practicing on each application. Note - students applied for jobs at the 1st of each month. They held their position for the month, unless they were fired. Students could be fired if they were not doing their jobs or were inappropriate. For example, if the line leader was running down the hall. 

Here are some of the applications that I received:

"I want to be paper monitor. I will be quick and not disturbing."

 "I will be a good messenger because I won't talk in the hallway." 

In the future, if I were to have classroom jobs, I would definitely have student complete a job application and interview process.

Mystery Skype

This week, we participated in our first "Mystery Skype". It was amazing! I wanted to reflect on this experience, because I would LOVE to do it again in the future.  Some notes...

What worked:

• We practiced questions beforehand and the kids did a great job. Possible questions:
• Do you border an ocean?
• Are you east/west of the Mississippi River?
• Do you border another country?
• Do you border a great lake?
• Vis-a-vie markers worked great on the laminated maps. 
• We discussed the objective: practicing map skills. However, we need to focus more on the social skills aspect.

What didn't work:

• Having an assigned speaker. We had one assigned speaker. Next time, have a rotation, give all of the children an opportunity to speak to the mystery class.
• Kids were sitting at desks. This was great to control movement, but could not see all of them on the computer screen.
• Someone asked the kids what the name of their school was...only one student answered and they answered incorrectly! They kept saying, "Northland Pines School." Not totally incorrect, but they did not include Eagle River Elementary School. Go over geographical information with students more regularly. We did this in the beginning of the year, but need to revisit it more. Our school is... Our city is... Our county is... etc.

To do in the future:

• Beforehand, make sure to go over the objectives with students. Why are we doing this? 
• To practice map skills.
• More importantly, to practice social skills.
• Practice marking on a map, show students what a small dash/mark looks like. More modeling of this. Also, show students how to circle a region to eliminate the rest of the states. For example, if their state borders a great lake, then circle the possibilities. This eliminates all of the other states without having to dash/mark them out.
• Students practice speaking. Look into the computer, do not start talking until you are completely seated, introduce yourself, and speak in complete sentences.
• Have the kids sit in front of the smartboard, have the other class crowd around their camera and take a "group picture"! Other class did this, great idea!
• Create a list of questions for the other class to ask about their city/region/state and come up with some fun facts to share about Eagle River and Wisconsin.
• Research Skype for Education website and see if there are more detailed lesson plans or formats to follow.
• Start IMMEDIATELY at the beginning of the school year. Ask students' families if they have family members with school aged children in other states that they would like to share our contact information with. Set a goal to Mystery Skpye with all 50 states!

I am very excited to do this next year, no matter what grade I teach! This activity lends itself nicely to differentiation; for example, more extensive questions, more detailed information about each state, etc.

P is for Pirate

I just got and read P is for Pirate: Inspirational ABC's for Educators by Dave Burgess and Shelley Burgess. Great, short, easy read. One "letter" and idea really stuck.

I was intrigued by this...what five words would I want? I decided that I would give my 2nd graders a little "pre-test". I asked them to write 5 words describing what they thought or felt about our classroom. I really didn't give them any other guidance. The responses were interesting and pleasing. The most used word...

Not only was it the most used word, it was the word that is most important to me. My first and foremost concern is my students happiness, their emotional well being. I want them to feel safe, secure and to know that I care about them. I have been thinking a lot about what I want my five words to be. I have run many words through my mind, and go back and forth. I will begin my list here! (Notice the exclamation point? I am trying to be confident...)

1. Happy 

I want every person in my classroom to feel that our classroom is a happy, fun place. I want a POSITIVE classroom culture. Even when things are serious, I want the children to know that I first and foremost care about them.

2. Safe

I want all students to feel safe. Not only physically safe, but emotionally safe. They will be respected and treated with love and compassion. They will not be demeaned or talked down to by any student or any adult, including myself, ever. I also want them to be safe to take educational risks, try new things. I want them to know that it is okay to fail and feel safe in doing so. 

3. Empowering

Students WILL be confident and resourceful. They will do these things together, not exclusively. For example, they will find the answers because they know that they can. They will search and not feel fearful of failure or uncertainty. Try, try, try.

4. Student Led

Students should know that this it THEIR classroom. I would ultimately like them to control as many of the daily routines as possible. I would also like them to take responsibility for their learning, to realize that they have a voice in our classroom.

5. Engaging

I want students to WANT to be in our classroom. I want students to be intrinsically motivated to learn, to crave more, and to be active participants in their own educations.

Kidblog.org

On Twitter, a few classroom teachers that I followed mentioned their students "blogging". My daughter's class dabbled in it last year (3rd grade). I wanted to try it, but...What was my objective? What was the purpose of having students blog? How would it impact them. I came up with the following:

1. It would be a way to communicate with families and the community about what was happening in our classroom.
2. It would be good writing and keyboarding practice for students.
3. It would continue to build and enhance relationships between students and myself, and also between students.

I decided that I would try it with my 2nd graders. I sent a TechSmith Snagit video that I made home over Christmas break. The video showed families step by step how to access the blog and create a post.

A few students wrote and I replied, but it never really got off the ground. Students did not blog regularly. After Christmas break, it took us a bit (as usual) to get back in the swing of things. We had all sorts of exciting things happening - parent volunteering for practicum hours, new student teacher, etc. It simply was not a priority during our ever valuable computer lab time, as we were constantly playing catch up.

I had been thinking about blogging a lot and decided we would give it a try today in the computer lab. I told the kids that I wanted them to write about anything they learned this week, and/or something they liked or didn't like. I anticipated spending 10-15 minutes on our first time blogging. Of course, it took us about 10 minutes to get everyone logged in, "Mrs. Simac, it's not working!!!" Note - it did work, but some of us are still working on our spelling and keyboarding skills. After that, they were quiet as mice blogging away. They absolutely loved it. I promised them that I would read their blogs. They were so excited. I was so excited that they were so engaged!

I encourage (and assign, but that doesn't mean that it gets done) daily journal writing. At one of our inservice days a couple, few (can't remember) years ago, we had a guest speaker talk to us about writing and the 6 + 1 Traits of writing. Something that I took away from that was to let the kids write. Everyday, just let them write. They can write about whatever they want - no spelling corrections, no punctuation corrections, no grammar corrections - just writing with no editing or revisions. Most kids love this. They write to me daily and I write them back. I promise them to keep their journals private, unless of course there is a safety issue. Again, most children love it. However, I have a few that are reluctant. They think they are not "good" writers and they simply don't enjoy it. It is hard work for them.

However, today during our blogging time, everyone was engaged. Every single student. Even my one CD child who cannot read or write. Today he typed. He typed random letters, but he was engaged, happy, and taking risks. He felt successful, because he felt productive. He is normally not in our classroom for literacy activities, as he receives replacement curriculum. This was a great opportunity for him to be a part of the class and be engaged to the best of his ability.

I will definitely continue to have the kids blog on a daily basis. At this point, I am not going to fuss about spelling, grammar, or punctuation errors, but simply encourage and foster their love of writing.

http://kidblog.org/MsSimacsClass/

St. Patrick's Day FUN!

Every year in kindergarten, we read books about leprechauns and then set leprechaun traps to try and catch the mischievous little things! Some of my students had me as their kindergarten teacher and excitedly asked, "Do the leprechauns come to 2nd grade, too?!?". I sadly explained, that they usually only came to the kindergarten classrooms, because 5 and 6 year olds do not set very good traps and they could easily be escaped. On March 17, I decided that I would not "destroy" the room as the leprechauns had done in kindergarten. I would simply move desks. As I started to turn desks around I had an idea - spring cleaning!!! The leprechauns would empty out their desks! This was a great opportunity to get everything out of their desks (including orange peels and other assortments of food - gross). The kids were so excited. No matter what grade I teach for the rest of my career, I will find a way to incorporate the leprechauns. Many of the students probably don't believe, but I realized for many of them that this was one of the few opportunities they had in a day to be a carefree child. Unfortunately the reality is, as it is in many elementary classrooms today, I have students that come to school without their basic needs being met. They are often tired, hungry, and unclean. They do not experience an abundance of joy and carefree time at home. Again, this is the case in many of our classrooms. I am going to continue to be conscious of it and address it the best I can in my room. We did do some educational things about St. Patrick's Day as well on March 17. For example, we made a really neat Flip Book. Each page had a different language arts activity on it. I originally had pictures of the flip book on this post, but quickly deleted them and added the picture of our classroom as I reflected on student impact. While the process to obtain National Board certification was a tedious one, it truly taught me to reflect on everything I do and how it will impact students. The leprechauns coming was the most impactful thing that happened in our classroom on March 17.

Happy Birthday Dr. Seuss!

In honor of Dr. Suess' birthday on March 2, we read "Oh, the Places You'll Go" by Dr. Suess. The kids loved it. We also listened to it on the Smartboard. We have been talking a lot about goals and reflection this year in 2nd grade. These have been hard concepts to teach to such young students; however, I have been trying to do more of both myself. I feel that it's important to start talking with the kids about goals, and reflect on not only what we are doing, but why we are doing it. This was a great little lesson about setting a goal about a "Place You'll Go." It was interesting to read their responses. Some had very detailed and specific plans. For example, I will go to Antarctica to study animals. Others wanted to go to a zoo. The kids (and other classes!) loved seeing themselves floating away, just like in the story!

Twitter!

I have used Twitter as a professional development tool. I have connected with hundreds of educators (and others) all over the country and world. This past year, I have delved into Twitter "chats" and learned even more!

I constantly think of ways that I can connect with parents and the community about what is happening in our classroom. I began to think about how much Twitter has helped me connect and thought I would try it with my 2nd graders.

Note...I did try a daily "Kinder Tweet" in my kindergarten class. It was great writing practice for the kids, but they did not understand the concept of Twitter at all. I also found that parents were not connecting. For this particular class and group of parents, they did not use Twitter. 

I decided that since Twitter has helped me become a more global and connected educator, that I would try to use it to help create more global and connected students in my classroom. This especially resonated with me due to our geographical area.  I did not grow up in the "north woods"; however, as I live here longer and longer I realize that many of the children and families that I work with do not have the opportunities to travel and have "cultured" opportunities (for lack of a better word). 

Little did I know that my students would not only become more connected, they would become excited and LEARN! 

We created a class Twitter account on the Smartboard. I thought I would "teach" the kids all about Twitter, how to use it, internet safety, etc. What I did not anticipate was how engaged the students would be. The most genuine and engaging learning took place during that discussion. We also had an incredible discussion about internet safety, what information to share and not to share, etc.

So far, the kids absolutely LOVE Tweeting. We are also following other 2nd grade classes around the world. We have met some of them via Skype - amazing! Students also think it is "so cool" to follow their favorite sports teams (even though some of them like the Bears...) and pop stars. I hope their excitement continues!