Today's post is not really about an actual teacher blog. This one is a link to some Common Core 'blogs' that are a helping teachers and probably some administrators keep up with the dialog about Common Core.
The district I have been working in has been very tied to the adopted curriculum for many, many years. Fidelity is the word that came up all the time. Now that would be awesome if the developers of the curriculum we are using were actually people who taught in classrooms.
But there have been holes in the curriculum and children who have been falling in these holes. It's a bummer that these developers haven't sat in a 1st grade classroom and haven't sat and watched the eyes of a 1st grader haze over as you read the scripted language they have provided in the teacher's manual.
The kids look at you and think and sometimes have actually said..."you don't sound like yourself teacher." No, I sound just like the robot that I try to not have you be when you read to me! lol
Granted, the scripted material is very helpful when you have an inexperienced teacher as a sub, but for the real world teacher? not so much!
I stuck to the text for awhile....a short while. But with Saxon and Houghton Mifflin's Reading Street...they just don't include the terms, expression and just downright fun that I know I can add to teaching the skills.
So...I swayed from the manuals. Sometimes a little and sometimes a whole lot. And you know what happened? My students learned! I felt like I had to do it undercover and I felt like I had to fib a little. Perhaps many of us fibbed and that is why the fidelity word stuck for so long. Everyone was afraid to admit that they actually used their ability and skill as a teacher to teach their students rather than doing the scripted lesson in the book.
But with the adoption of Common Core, we have been given more liberties with how we fill the academic holes in our students' knowledge. It's a lot of work to tie everything to the new standards...especially in a state where these standards are increasing what our kids need to know in a year. For me I have already been teaching at that level because I have worked in another state where we were already there...saves me some learning curve time. But for some, it's going to take a bit longer to catch up.
I think Common Core is a good thing and I'm glad it came into our state and our district. It will only benefit our students. Now, one thing I do believe is that there will be a second wave to this tsunami. I think that once we get comfortable with Common Core, my district, and eventually our state will think the next step is to come up with our own power standards to fill in where the Common Core is kind of loose. I think we will have more standards that address what wasn't addressed by Common Core...for first grade it will be things like; actual words read per minute, perhaps specific fiction books, and more details in what a first grade writer looks like...to name just a couple.
The question is...will we be allowed to get comfortable with the first changes before our state or districts throw the next step at us?
Here are some Common Core Blogs I've found. There are some interesting articles and debates on some of them. These are not classroom teacher blogs...but blogs with lots of research, resources, strategies, and some debate. I particularly like #5....if for no other reason but its subtitle! :-)
1. Core Knowledge
2. Common Core 360
3. Common Core
4. Tools for the Common Core Standards
5. Teaching the Core (subtitled: How to not freak out about teaching the core)
6. All Things Common Core
Showing posts with label teaching. Show all posts
Showing posts with label teaching. Show all posts
Saturday, February 2, 2013
Sunday, December 30, 2012
Martin Luther King Day Ideas
Here are some links to ideas to use when studying about Martin Luther King...
You have to start with a good book. Here are a couple good ones I've used:
A Picture Book of Martin Luther King, Jr
Here are some other teachers with some fun and clever ideas...plus some other sites too:
You have to start with a good book. Here are a couple good ones I've used:
A Picture Book of Martin Luther King, Jr
Then after you've read a good book or two to build schema...then you can move on to planning and plotting and writing and interpreting.
Here is a freebie I made...this is a sample of what the finished product could look like. It is on my TpT store with the writing template. Feel free to use it :) Click HERE to download.
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Free coloring page on TeacherVision
This is a good video on Brain Pop (I had never found this site before. It's cool!)
Check out this Fingerprint Peace Dove art project. It's amazing!
This site has a historical narrative for you to read if you are rusty on the details of Martin Luther King Jr's life.
Well, that should get just about anybody started. If you still haven't found what you need, then pop over to TpT and search for free Martin Luther King stuff. There is quite a bit more on the site.
Friday, November 2, 2012
Constructing some Deconstructing
I gave up my valuable report card day to attend a district level workshop about creating effective assessment. It was a good workshop for getting my brain thinking, but I didn't walk away with more answers than questions. Good formative assessments are in important to have in light of new Common Core State Standards (CCSS). Unless you teach on the moon, or perhaps Texas or Alaska, you have to have been impacted by the CCSS by now.
Most of the states, except for the two mentioned above plus a few more, are in the process of changing their state standards and state testing to follow the guidelines of the CCSS. So far they have ELA and Math. The CCSS are a new set of universal standards that follow a scope and sequence throughout the grade levels, K-12.
Quite a few states have been swimming in the sea of CCSS for a few years now. Our state, Idaho, has been a little shy of jumping in. Our state sat on the sidelines for a bit just to make sure they really had to jump in. They decided at the end of last school year to dive in....head first...with no flotation device and pretty much no swim trunks either!
The frustrating part is that Idaho doesn't have an ESD (education service district) or a COE (county office of ed) to help oversee this process of changing over. In states like Arizona, Washington, California, Kentucky, and North Carolina (among others) there is a 'middle man' --the county office of education--that helps organize the big stuff. In Idaho, the individual school districts deal directly with the state. Which means they administration passes the buck to the teaching staff. I suppose there is a positive side to that, but when it comes to huge tasks like new state standards, it would be nice to have some education organization to help unify the districts so we are all doing the same thing. It also means that we have to take time away from lesson planning and our students to come up with new learning targets and new assessments.
As it is now, each school district has been left to interpret the standards and create local assessments to measure student growth. Don't get me wrong. We will still have an annual common state test through The Smarter Balance Assessment Consortium. I don't know what those of us in K-2 will be seeing. I personally won't miss the IRI (Idaho's state reading test for k-2). It is an assessment tool that can only be improved upon in my opinion.
For those of you new to education, or maybe teaching in a school district that is dragging its heels...here are some sites to visit for more information about Common Core and creating assessment.
Arizona Department of Education -- they have been working on this for quite some time and have a lot of information on their state's website.
North Carolina has come up with Extended Common Core State Standards. They took the CCSS and added to it. They aren't exactly Learner objectives or deconstructed standards. It looks like they just added things that they thought CCSS was missing at each grade level.
Here are some sites with lots of support information about the CCSS:
Common Core State Standards Initiative
Achieve the Core -- I like the name of this one although it's not my favorite resource.
Education Northwest --Great resource for finding some meaningful assessment tools, both formative and summative. Dig around the site...it's full of lots of treasures!
School Improvement.com Here is a free webinar to help you learn how to create learning targets from the common core standards.
I could go on forever listing resources...but these are a good start. I now have to put the whole assessment piece on the back burner for now and complete my 1st quarter report cards! If you have a great resource that you find to help wade through common core, please share!
Most of the states, except for the two mentioned above plus a few more, are in the process of changing their state standards and state testing to follow the guidelines of the CCSS. So far they have ELA and Math. The CCSS are a new set of universal standards that follow a scope and sequence throughout the grade levels, K-12.
Quite a few states have been swimming in the sea of CCSS for a few years now. Our state, Idaho, has been a little shy of jumping in. Our state sat on the sidelines for a bit just to make sure they really had to jump in. They decided at the end of last school year to dive in....head first...with no flotation device and pretty much no swim trunks either!
The frustrating part is that Idaho doesn't have an ESD (education service district) or a COE (county office of ed) to help oversee this process of changing over. In states like Arizona, Washington, California, Kentucky, and North Carolina (among others) there is a 'middle man' --the county office of education--that helps organize the big stuff. In Idaho, the individual school districts deal directly with the state. Which means they administration passes the buck to the teaching staff. I suppose there is a positive side to that, but when it comes to huge tasks like new state standards, it would be nice to have some education organization to help unify the districts so we are all doing the same thing. It also means that we have to take time away from lesson planning and our students to come up with new learning targets and new assessments.
As it is now, each school district has been left to interpret the standards and create local assessments to measure student growth. Don't get me wrong. We will still have an annual common state test through The Smarter Balance Assessment Consortium. I don't know what those of us in K-2 will be seeing. I personally won't miss the IRI (Idaho's state reading test for k-2). It is an assessment tool that can only be improved upon in my opinion.
For those of you new to education, or maybe teaching in a school district that is dragging its heels...here are some sites to visit for more information about Common Core and creating assessment.
Arizona Department of Education -- they have been working on this for quite some time and have a lot of information on their state's website.
North Carolina has come up with Extended Common Core State Standards. They took the CCSS and added to it. They aren't exactly Learner objectives or deconstructed standards. It looks like they just added things that they thought CCSS was missing at each grade level.
Here are some sites with lots of support information about the CCSS:
Common Core State Standards Initiative
Achieve the Core -- I like the name of this one although it's not my favorite resource.
Education Northwest --Great resource for finding some meaningful assessment tools, both formative and summative. Dig around the site...it's full of lots of treasures!
School Improvement.com Here is a free webinar to help you learn how to create learning targets from the common core standards.
I could go on forever listing resources...but these are a good start. I now have to put the whole assessment piece on the back burner for now and complete my 1st quarter report cards! If you have a great resource that you find to help wade through common core, please share!
Monday, August 27, 2012
In the Middle of the Mess
Moving, unpacking, sorting, re-organizing...that is how the last few weeks have been. Just plain crazy. And this new school has an alarm system that I can't wrap my mind around yet so I have only been there while the office staff is there--which of course never seems like enough time.
But it's starting to look like a classroom. with a cozy little reading area...
The 1st graders love these chairs. They are covered in that soft corduroy and they are big enough for two of them to sit together. I found them last summer at Walmart for $10 each. It has been well worth the money!
A writing center with all the supplies at their fingertips...well they will be soon enough.
This is my meeting area...it's still in progress. I don't like the way my math wall is coming together yet. And I'm still missing my little table that goes up front. My dear husband is sanding off all the old paint and layers of ugly contact paper and repainting it for me.
But it's starting to look like a classroom. with a cozy little reading area...
Notice my bulletin boards. They are all covered with fabric. I love it so much more than the rolls of paper. Even "fadeless" paper seems to fade. But the fabric stays vibrant and I leave it up all year. Plus it doesn't show the pushpin and staple holes like paper does.
Then there is the always favorite computer center. I will have to get rid of these chairs. They are like 6th grade sized and the three chairs don't fit together under the table...I see problems this could cause down the road.
You see the white tubs next to the computer center? That's my math. I hate this math. It takes up so much room for storing it. But you will see more of these tubs around the room. They are my hidden storage bins. Most of them have a little fabric table cloth over the top to camouflage fancy them up. I thought my last room was bad, but there is less storage in this room.
This is my meeting area...it's still in progress. I don't like the way my math wall is coming together yet. And I'm still missing my little table that goes up front. My dear husband is sanding off all the old paint and layers of ugly contact paper and repainting it for me.
Here are my desks...I mourn the loss of my tables in my last school. Perhaps if the levy passes I can get some again. Desks are dirty (they shove all sorts of stuff in them), they are uneven and most of all they take away the feeling of being a group. They are all individuals pushed together...not the feeling I try to instill in them.
Next problem....managing all my books. After teaching for almost 20 years, I have gained quite a collection. I don't fault myself for this, but I do have to work around this 'problem'. I guess on the list of top problems--a first grade teacher having more books than her students could read in a year--isn't too bad. :-)
My husband is also making me an extra shelf for that bookcase so I can put another row on it.
The math center...still a dumping ground at this point...give me a few more days to tackle this corner.
More pretty fabric to brighten up the blah white walls...
Not the fanciest curtains I've ever made but they make a nice color splash over the backpack/coat hooks. Behind it is a big shelf with tons more books (my monthly stash is hidden back there...I have to save a few 'new' books to share each month to keep my readers inspired.) I also have more boxes of things stored up there as well. Oh yeah, and the 5 sets of Anthologies that go with the Scott Foresman reading curriculum for our district. They take up half the shelf all on their own!
More books...these come with the classroom. I'm trying to figure out how to store them for easy use as well. One of my problems with this classroom is the heating system. It's baseboard heaters. So we can't put anything that's not metal near them. I am trying not to stress out our wonderful building custodian...but I'm also trying to stretch the limits a bit as well!
This is the one and only closet. It's stuffed full in an organized way. It should be better as the supplies get used up. This school isn't one that instills hoarding. In my last school we were taught to hoard our supplies in our classroom. In this school, they have a supply room that is stocked and not locked! So I may be able to clean out a few boxes soon.
"If the Levy passes"....that's how many sentences begin around here. But if it does, this wall will become a whiteboard. Then it will be the 'front' of my room because 'if the Levy passes' you will also see a projector hanging from the ceiling from in between those ugly light fixtures. Which would be a good thing because I have a document camera (Elmo) collecting dust until it does.
This is a good sign...empty baskets and boxes!
These are the bad signs....
My desk and my reading table are still full of piles!
Well soon I will be done...I have to be because the new group of 1st graders will be walking in the door in just over a week!
Friday, August 17, 2012
And So It Begins...
I have been a teacher for 19 years. I have worked in three school districts, but most of those years have been in 1st grade. I have dabbled in 2nd, 3rd, 4th and even kindergarten...but my favorite and my home is in 1st grade.
I'm not new to the teaching world, but there is nothing that will knock you back down to that very first year than...
So after I get the cupboards and the closet cleaned out...I stop and cry...because I finally have a minute. I mourn the traditions, the friends, the parents and mostly the kids I will miss at my previous school. I probably would have thrown a few things if they weren't all mostly packed in boxes and then I would have had to pick them up :(
I say to myself, "be thankful you have a job and it's even at the same grade level!" My best friend and teaching partner also had to move schools, but she is at a different school and has to teach 4th grade!
But the other, inwardly shy part of me, has to put on her big girl panties and do the new kid on the block...again! That's the hardest part for me. Nobody realizes that I'm actually kind of shy...lol.
So new parents, new kids, new staff, new building, new traditions to learn, new ones to make...and I'm still not sure where the grownup bathroom is yet....
and then there is still that huge pile of boxes to go empty out and put away! ugh!
Did I say that my classroom is on the south side of the building and there is no cool air and I'm sweating like I'm in a dang sauna!?
ok...enough whining and back to work!
I will post pictures once I get things looking halfway decent!
I'm not new to the teaching world, but there is nothing that will knock you back down to that very first year than...
Setting up a classroom!
Fluctuation in student populations within a larger district can apparently cause this. I am not used to it though because I worked for so long in a smaller district. Big districts are a different beast. So now instead of a 10 minute drive to work, I have a 25 minute drive to work.
Instead of enjoying my last month of summer, I am cleaning out the closet and cupboards of all the 'stuff' left in them from countless previous teachers. Three huge black garbage bags full of old outdated stuff!
So after I get the cupboards and the closet cleaned out...I stop and cry...because I finally have a minute. I mourn the traditions, the friends, the parents and mostly the kids I will miss at my previous school. I probably would have thrown a few things if they weren't all mostly packed in boxes and then I would have had to pick them up :(
I say to myself, "be thankful you have a job and it's even at the same grade level!" My best friend and teaching partner also had to move schools, but she is at a different school and has to teach 4th grade!
But the other, inwardly shy part of me, has to put on her big girl panties and do the new kid on the block...again! That's the hardest part for me. Nobody realizes that I'm actually kind of shy...lol.
So new parents, new kids, new staff, new building, new traditions to learn, new ones to make...and I'm still not sure where the grownup bathroom is yet....
and then there is still that huge pile of boxes to go empty out and put away! ugh!
Did I say that my classroom is on the south side of the building and there is no cool air and I'm sweating like I'm in a dang sauna!?
ok...enough whining and back to work!
I will post pictures once I get things looking halfway decent!
Saturday, August 4, 2012
Discovering Pinterest
I have just figured out this Pinterest thing. It is the current rage! For each holiday or season or topic I have a Pinterest Board and I'm posting fun stuff on it that I find on the internet. I figured this could be a useful way to find a lot of things quickly, plus it's a better way for me to keep track of what I found online and where.
I don't know about you, but I get so lost blog hopping and I have no idea where I started and where I'm trying to go. Then I find some really cool idea and I can't find it again! So Pinterest is helping me out...hope it helps you too!
Here is my Pinterest Board: Life in Idaho
Sunday, July 29, 2012
Summer Planning
For teachers, summer means rest...
NOT!
I am sure there are some that rest, but I have a hard time kicking back for long. My mind is constantly wrapping around new ideas that pop into my head. Many happen during the morning shower...lol...but more often it's when I'm in the garden, or driving in the car, or laying my head down to go to sleep at night.
It's funny how they tend to pop out of my head when I have something to write on or when I sit down at my computer!
But I love Pinterest and my bookmark folders. They are my saving grace. I find things and can save them for when I have more time to dive into the depths of my thoughts.
Here is one that I actually first found two years ago...yup, thank goodness they sent me an email the other day to remind me that I had liked the site and its possibilities.
Planbook.com
I have to change school sites for the upcoming year. It's not as close to home and it's in another town...which I won't have a reason to pop into over the weekend. Oh, and that school has an alarm system that I don't want to have to disarm...ugh! So most of my work will be done at home on the weekends. My DH will be happy about that.
One of the things that drive me crazy is my lesson plan book. I buy one each year. I write everything in it and rewrite each week. I hate having to add everything to every page by hand. For someone who likes organization and making the best use of my time...it is like a thorn in my foot!
There are few reasons why I'm going to give it a try this year:
NOT!
I am sure there are some that rest, but I have a hard time kicking back for long. My mind is constantly wrapping around new ideas that pop into my head. Many happen during the morning shower...lol...but more often it's when I'm in the garden, or driving in the car, or laying my head down to go to sleep at night.
It's funny how they tend to pop out of my head when I have something to write on or when I sit down at my computer!
But I love Pinterest and my bookmark folders. They are my saving grace. I find things and can save them for when I have more time to dive into the depths of my thoughts.
Here is one that I actually first found two years ago...yup, thank goodness they sent me an email the other day to remind me that I had liked the site and its possibilities.
Planbook.com
I have to change school sites for the upcoming year. It's not as close to home and it's in another town...which I won't have a reason to pop into over the weekend. Oh, and that school has an alarm system that I don't want to have to disarm...ugh! So most of my work will be done at home on the weekends. My DH will be happy about that.
One of the things that drive me crazy is my lesson plan book. I buy one each year. I write everything in it and rewrite each week. I hate having to add everything to every page by hand. For someone who likes organization and making the best use of my time...it is like a thorn in my foot!
There are few reasons why I'm going to give it a try this year:
- The lesson plans I set up in Publisher have to be reformatted for the schedule in my new school (so this is the perfect time to try something new)
- I like to leave my lesson plan book at school...but now school is farther away.
- I can share my lesson plans with my principal, other teachers or even a substitute if I get sick.
- It allows me to include the CCSS on my plans.
- If I have to change something...it is really easy and quick...I won't have to have sticky notes everywhere in my lesson plan book.
So I'm going to try it. You can try it free for 30 days and if you like it, it only costs $12 for a year of use. I will let you know how it goes...I suppose I should go get busy on my lesson plans now :)
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