ClassDojo Student Stories

Hey everyone!

ClassDojo is doing some changing and I am pretty excited about it.

The Student Stories tab is a place where students may post pictures or write a little something to their parent.  Similar to an online portfolio for the student.  Well, I didn't use it a ton this past year because...I teach first grade and it was not the easiest for them to do independently.  So, it would end up taking about 3 minutes per kid.  When you have 27 kids....you just don't do it because how on Earth are you going to keep all the others busy for an hour and a half!?!  Now it will be so much easier.

Now, I will be able to show the steps to the kids as a whole group and then have them complete it independently.

Check out what is changing...

• Upgrades to Student Stories! 🙌

1. Post with any app: students (and teachers!) can post photos and videos to their Story from other apps directly, or by uploading from the camera roll. “App smashing” becomes a reality!
2. Any device: students can post from any device: iOS, Android, Chromebooks or web
3. Easy and secure access: no need to remember usernames or passwords - students can log in instantly by scanning their secure class QR code
4. Journal entries: the easiest way for students to reflect on their work, they can now create written journal entries
5. Draw and annotate on photos: students can add more context to entries with drawn or typed comments
6. Record and upload videos: students can record and share video up to eight minutes in length, or upload saved videos from other apps
7. Drawings: when words fall short, students can let their inner artist shine by creating a drawing all their own!
8. Filters, frames, and stickers: students can add a dash of fun to their posts, creating portfolios as unique as they are
9. Voice notes: students too young to type? All they have to do is speak into their device and add a voice note to their work

I am most excited about the voice notes. This will make it so much easier for my little ones to draft up a cute message to go with a picture of their work.

I am excited to get started. I am trying to think of a first day or first week Student Story that we could do....

Any ideas? Our grade is starting the year with a camping theme, so I thought maybe a picture of them in a tent and they could record a voice note like "I'm loving Camp Roadrunner," or something like that.

Thanks,

Monday Motivation, Word Walls

I am joining Jen over at Teacher by the Beach (click button below to join) for a fun weekly link-up.  

This week is all about word walls.  I missed last week's post on center management.  I may go back and write about that later as I have a lot to say about stations/centers.  That is basically how I teach all day long.

Word Walls:
Well, I read a couple of the blogs that posted on this too and feel similarly about it.  I found that my word wall can be a waste of space.  There are always a good chunk of kids that use it consistently but it takes up such a large space and doesn't feel really useful.

Then, similar to A Teeny Tiny Teacher, I found that I was not proactive about getting the words up on the wall as we were learning them.  The word wall above is on the right...and it is January!!!  We knew way more words than the above by January.  
I work at a STEM Magnet elementary school and this year we are integrating more than we have before.  So, my word wall plan is changing.  I still need to teach the "trick" or sight words from Fundations that our district uses.  I still will have the kids write their words in their "dictionaries."

The change will come in how I organize the wall area/words and how I will integrate it into our STEM learning. 
During our math block, I will be using STEAM stations.  Each letter stands for a center rotation.  Stem bins (from Brooke Brown), Tech time, Enrichment (hands-on games), At your seat (interactive notebooks), and Meet with the teacher (differentiated lessons from the curriculum that is required of us).  During the STEM bins time, the kids have a science notebook that they will be using to complete an activity or job.  They will need to use the sight/trick words from their dictionary in their writing. 

I will also have a small area to post on the wall, just a few of the words that we are learning (maybe a 2-3 week's worth of words) as a resource.  They will need to highlight those words with highlighter (that's the part that will make doing that fun) in their notebooks.   
I will also have a STEM vocabulary area that I will need to organize.  I already have a math vocabulary wall section too!  Phew.  Too much.  I will need to rethink all of those to make them less busy and overwhelming.

Sidenote- I have been purging my house this whole summer.  I'm going through my home, room by room and trying to get rid of as much clutter and unused things as I can to simplify our life at home...because it is really overwhelming for much of the school year.  I am feeling the need to do the same thing at school.  I always have lots of things on the walls and stuff set up in the room to make it "cute" and coordinated.  I am now trying to change that to be more purposeful than ever before.  I want my classroom to feel calm, spacious, and homey.  I need it to be easy to navigate and for everything to have a very specific purpose, use and place...or it needs to go!!!  

Link up with Jen and tell us about your word wall(s).  Maybe it will help people like me who are always looking for new ideas.  

STEM Festival #3

It is June, which means school is out for me and I actually have time to blog!

I teach at a STEM Magnet school in New Mexico. 

We are lucky to have a beautiful space around us with lots of room to play, explore and just enjoy.  The forest environment has become a focus at our school.  We began the journey 3 years ago (my first year with this particular school) to become a STEM school.  We have been going along well, but the time has come to really change things.  Instead of being a school that enriches with STEM we are transforming to a school that truly integrates STEM.  The school year of 2017-18 we will have 3 required integration hours of STEM (starting small makes this a very reasonable goal).  I am very excited to get rolling with this and have lots of ideas I want to try out.  It will take a lot of work and reorganizing and changing of thought processes within the classroom but should be a cool journey.

How we work out initial ideas for the festival:

Every school has committees that teachers are supposed to join...because that is one of those unspoken teacher things.  I have been on the STEM committee for 3 years.  The committee works on organizing the festival.  Below I outline how our school goes about the day.  

How we begin the planning:

The festival planning begins long before the actual presentation day (about a month, sometimes more).  Each class is responsible for presenting something they learned during the year to other classes in an inviting and hands-on way.  Kids teaching kids.  It's so great to watch first grade take ownership of teaching 5th graders what they learned!  This year our class presented about defensible space.  That is the area around buildings that can be used to help reduce risk of forest fires spreading to homes/buildings.  They taught about the 3 zones of defensible space.  I made up a song that helped them remember all the spaces.  Click the picture below to find the song.  The kids originally learned about defensible space from a local community organization made up of forest service, fire personnel and scientists that had been working with our kinder and 1st grade kids.  We wanted to honor their teaching and pass it on to others.  

Once the classes at our school decide upon their topic, they begin figuring out how to present their ideas in an engaging way, preferably hands-on.  This year, my class decided to explain the zones by singing the song, displaying the information, and having the guests create their own defensible space with various materials.  The house pictured below was 3D printed.  The rest of the items were easily found in our classroom or in nature.

How we organize the day:

We were each given notice about what everyone was presenting and then could sign our classes up to visit our top 3 favorites, the rest were assigned.  There were 18 possible stations at our school during the festival.  So, no one gets to see all and as you see below each group would see 6 stations in total but they may differ from the other group's viewings.  I feel the hardest part of planning this festival is the schedule.  For us, it is important to assign each group where to go so there isn't overlap of classes and so no one has an empty spot where there isn't a group to listen to them.  

How we schedule it:

Our school starts at 8:45 and the STEM Festival began promptly at 9 a.m.  We get as many parent volunteers as possible and request help from EAs that might be available to walk classes around.  We explained the day to those able to help us travel with the kids but below is the time layout of how it rotated.  The "you" indicated below was the volunteer of the classroom.  The "I" was the teacher.  Each class is separated into thirds.  A third of the class presents to the class guests and two-thirds rotates to other presentations in other rooms.  

You will have group B and C.  I will have group A.

9-9:20                    1^st rotation

9:20-9:40              2^nd rotation

9:40-10:00           3^rd rotation

You will have group A and C.  I will have group B.

10:00-10:20         4^th rotation

10:20-10:40         5^th rotation

10:40-11:00         6^th rotation

You will have group A and B.  I will have group C.

11:00-11:20         7^th rotation

11:20-11:40         8^th rotation

11:40- 12:00        9^th rotation

There is a problem we have found with this schedule.  The teachers do not get to see the other classes present.  The teachers are in the classroom the whole time helping the presenters of their classroom. Each rotation is 18 minutes long and has a 2 minute passing period.  This made the timing snug but no one seemed to have a second to be bored and get into trouble!  Next year, we will try to figure out a different schedule that might allow for teachers to view some of the stations along with their class.  Why does it matter if teachers get to see some of the stations?  Inspiration and encouragement of others makes for a great staff environment! 

Above my students are singing to the audience... yes on a table! Taking after their teacher!!! Ha.

What do student audiences do:

Each student had a passport with 6 squares on the front.  Each station gave a sticker or stamp to the attendees.  Then on the back of the passport were questions about what they learned during the festival.  Once completed at the end of the event all the students turned their passports in to the office for a drawing.  We were able to get donations from Lakeshore of various STEM prizes.  We had 2 prizes per grade level and they were pretty cool.  I wanted several of the prizes!  :) 

What about lunch:

At the end of the event all students got sack lunches and ate on the field for a picnic, weather permitting.  It was followed by a whole school recess (about 330 kids) and then students went back to their classes and wrapped up their days.  The festival happens on a Wednesday, which is our early release day.  It took up most of that particular school day. 

Some of the stations other teachers presented included: pollination of flowers from bees, student inventions, bee body parts, recycled material instruments, local fish (NM Cutthroat trout), magnet experiments, etc. 

Last year, my students presented about critically endangered animals (they researched them and wrote reports about them).  They created a stop motion video about how to help endangered animals.  When students learn about a problem they tend to want to solve it.  I love that because it gets us started on activism and global/local citizenship.  The video we created last year can be found by clicking the picture below.

Next year, I am sure we will change and improve more.  Although, each year has felt successful because students learned a lot, gained skills in presenting to others, and improved their confidence.  

Have a great June!!!

Lego Transformation and ClassFlow

Part I
My kids came to school last Friday to find that it was a surprise classroom transformation.  If you don't know what that means, you need to follow Hope King and Kim Bearden from The Ron Clark Academy.  They are EVERYTHING!!!
My kids walked in to see me looking like this....

The room was decorated in Lego colors and in a way that would help transport my cute little mini-figs into the land of Lego!

There were lots of ewwwws and ahhhhs.  I heard the phrases "This was is the best day ever!" and "I love this!" a lot.  It made my day.  I had a lot planned and a big need for serious rules.
When you go about a day like this, especially for young students, you have to be really tough.  I promise, the kids will still go home and say they had the best day...but you have to be very strict or you WILL lose control of the room and it will be a free for all with no learning.  Start off (just like the beginning of the year) super tough and loosen the reins as they perform better and better through the day.
I began by reminding the kids of my expectation, "If you can't handle the fun, you won't get to do the fun."
I give super boring packets to those who get too loud at inappropriate times, who lose control of their bodies, who talk while the speaker is talking, or who ignore my directions.  It usually only takes once for my students to figure out that I mean business.
I always have a new cheer/chant to go with the day.  A call and response that connects with what we are doing.  I do that for the holidays too, why fight what they are excited about...use it to your advantage.
For this Lego Day, I said "Mini-Figs" and they responded with motions of robot arms 3xs and then stopped and stared at me.  Normally I have them say something, but this one was cracking us up...so we went with it.  I use ClassDojo for behavior management, but I added another level this day.  For the "house" or team that earned the most points by the end of the day, they would win a Lego themed notepad.  They were hyped and they worked hard for it!  I got a pack of 24 on Amazon for $7.  Although I have 26 (27 as of this Monday), so got 2 packs.  Turned out they tied!  And not because I gave all groups the same pts because I didn't want a group to feel sad....I am ok with that.  It's how people learn to work harder... but they really tied.

For each house, dependent on the amount of points earned the people in the group would earn "bricks" of Legos to create with at the end of the day.  So, if a house had 5 pts by the end of the day, all the members of the group would get to pick 5 Legos and then the group would create something as a team using all the pieces chosen.

We also had brand new STEM materials that I had ordered that we were going to use at the end of the day if all houses hit a certain number.

 During the day, we were working on hard concepts in math and this fun day allowed them to persevere during the hard lessons.  We discussed topics such as how to create an equation out of word problems, how to create a subtraction equation by looking at a picture, matching a story or word problem to an equation, and comparing double digit numbers.  In reading, we worked on understanding setting and how it may change in a story, vowel team ea and long e, and numerical lists (text feature) in a story.
I used ClassFlow as the delivery system for our math lessons...see below for info about ClassFlow.
After one of the hard lessons, I had embedded the Lego movie song, "Everything is Awesome" for us to dance to for a brain break and a reward for the hard work.

Part II:
Have you ever used ClassFlow?

It's a web based program that has a lot of flexibility in presenting to students or adults.  It is like a really awesome version of Powerpoint but WAY better.  It allows you to "shoot out" slides you have created to students, they can annotate on it and then "shoot it" back to you.  You can take immediate polls.  You can insert music, Youtube clips, etc.  I really like it but find I don't use it very often because I teach 1st and we have 1 iPad in the room for 26 kids.  I do use it whole group, but to really use it to the full potential, the kids need a gadget in their hands or per small group.  To use it the way I want to, I have to bring the whole iPad cart that belongs to the school into my room.  I am working on simplifying that process by getting more tablets in the classroom through a Donor's Choose project.  That would allow me to have a few more tablets to use in small groups with ClassFlow and several other programs we use in the class.

Well, last week a ClassFlow Ambassador randomly contacted me!  She emailed me (on my school email) mentioning that she "noticed I use ClassFlow" and offered to meet me to support any needs I might have.  She was super flexible with her timing, as I didn't want to take off work.  She let me meet her later in the day after work hours.

When we met up we discussed some ways I could use the program in the class that I hadn't thought about.  I will be trying several of the "learning activities" such as flash card and categorize soon.  Looks easy and fun!

Have a great weekend!

Hogwarts 5 for Friday

Hey everyone!  Click the link below to join in the fun of Five for Friday by Doodle Bugs Teaching.

 

I'm doing a bit of a flash back.  I never posted about our end of the year party back in May.
My class celebrated with our End of the Year STEM party.  It was themed Harry Potter/Hogwarts.
We had the following stations:
*Caramel sorting hat creation
*Gringott's Bank vault trolley engineering
*Potions class
*Diagon Alley math/buying of items

My last day was May 25th.  It's been a month of break so far, and now I have about 5 weeks left before we begin our PD.  I have a lot to do in the room.
I left my room a disaster!  I will start working on that fun stuff in awhile but for right now I am organizing a planner I won from Sheila Jane Teaching.  If you don't know who she is... check out iteachtvnetwork.com .  She is a Teach Happy guru!  Being a Teach Happy Member, I find I am thinking about things differently lately.  If you need to re-establish or find your happier teacher-self, check it out.

The last week of school in May, I did a special surprise Pirate Day!  I wanted to send them off with one last "hurrah" of a theme.  It was so much fun!

I am working on the Professional Development presentation that I will do for the staff at my school, in regards to Ron Clark Academy.  There is so much information to organize.  So much that is hard to express in words.  I will have it completed by the end of July, as that is when I will share it with my principal.  Wish me luck in finding the right words and ways to make the impact that I feel is so necessary for the information I learned.

Anyone know about Meow Wolf?  It is the craziest "museum" place ever.  I don't know how to explain it, so go look at pictures {HERE} to get an idea.  Our family loved it!!!

Have a fabulous weekend!!!

Queen of Hearts Valentine STEAM Party

We had a Queen of Hearts Valentine's Party in my class yesterday.  It was full of fun things.
So of course, I took the opportunity to dress a bit differently!

Here are each of our STEAM station activities...

Science
The kids learned about pollination through a cute little song.  They dissected parts of a carnation and when there was time, labeled the parts.  They discussed how seeds are made and enjoyed taking a peek inside something they hadn't before.

Engineering/Math
The kids built a house of cards with the challenge to make them 3 levels high...no one got to that high but a few got to 2 levels.

The kids built a rabbit tunnel with the game marble run.  Their challenge was to make the rabbit hole as fast as possible, so the White Rabbit would not be late.  They were timed and then had revision time to try to make it faster.

Art
The kids used fat needles and yarn for thread to sew cute little hearts (and sneak in some good fine motor work).  They were pretty little cards when they were finished.

I hope your Valentine's Parties were a good time.
Have a great weekend!

Underwater Class Flip

I, really quick, did a classroom flip.  I set up my classroom (with some help from a parent) with a couple tarps, an "aquarium" of sea animals on my Promethean that also played underwater sounds with music, and a super cool light that makes whatever you shine it on, look like it has water ripples on it.

It's not perfect, but the kids had a good time with it!  I sent a message to my class the night before on ClassDojo showing them what to look forward to when they came.

They used finger lights to read with when they first entered the room.

We explored and sorted math facts deciding which strategy we would use to solve them such as count-on, doubles, and make-ten.  During ELA, we continued work on character and setting but we added plot to the mix.  We watched a short video on BrainPop Jr. about plot.  I read a fictional ocean story and then the kids used a story map to explain the characters, setting and plot.

During Fundations practice, we used a dolphin ring toss.  I would ask a student to tap out a word, spell it on the Promethean using my letter tile board flipchart and then the student would have a turn tossing 2 rings to the dolphin's nose.  We decided the dolphin's name was Frank.  :)
EVERYONE wanted to have a turn....so all were thoroughly engaged.

It was a fun day.

GingerSTEM Party and Grinch Day

I'm joining Doodle Bugs Teaching in a 5 for Friday...finally/again...and on a Saturday.  It's been a awhile.

My class had their holiday class party on Wednesday.  I created a green screen movie with the kids, so we watched the completed movie together while the kids ate.  The following are the stations we did for the winter STEAM party:

Our first STEAM station was to help the GingerSTEM Man get across a river without getting wet.  They had to engineer a boat using recycled materials, popsicle sticks, straws, tin foil, and coffee filters. 

 

Our second STEAM station was creating an artistic Gingerbread Man cookies and tree.

Our third STEAM station was engineering a trap to catch the Gingerbread Man using recycled materials.

Our fourth and final STEAM station was measuring ingredients for the gingerbread playdough that they got to keep.  

We had a fun surprise day.....

Since our class party was on Wednesday, I had Friday to have a bit of fun.  I decided to surprise the kids with a Grinch Day.  Here is what they saw when they walked into my room.

We watched a read aloud style video of How the Grinch Stole Christmas on Kidtastic Apps, using the Promethean.  We ate popcorn, had hot apple cider, and Christmas cookies.  

We also discussed (using the Grinch theme) place value, doubles plus 1 and 2, character analysis, text evidence and phonics.

It was a VERY busy day and the kids were super energetic, but on the whole, they did a great job with getting their work done.  

Finally- #6, tehe

I gave the kids their presents from Anna (our elf) and myself.

They were able to pick a holiday or winter pencil, a hackey sack style ball and stationary with a pen (which made them all beg to write....yup 1st graders were begging to write- love it!)

 

It really was a good week before holiday break.  I am happy to have some time with my daughters but will certainly miss those crazy kiddos for the next 2 weeks.  

Happy break teachers!!!