Me: Magical, this is a numeral 3. Can you find the card with 3 dots?
Magical: Hmmmmmmm
Long pause
Magical: HMMMMMMMM
Me: this is the numeral 3. Can you find the card with 3 dots?
Magical: (moves hand toward the cards and then stops suddenly while making an electrical dying noise) oh no! My computer just died. The batteries are dead. I have to recharge. Can't find it 'til I recharge.
Me: Guess what? I have the secret power of being able to re-charge kids! Ready?
I put my hands over his head and made some noises.
Me: All re-charged. Now, this card has the numeral 3. Which card has 3 dots?
Magical: Oh no! My hair is too long, I can't see, I can't see- my hair is falling in my eyes, oh no, oh no.
Me: Why don't I help you?
I pull his bangs back (which are not long at all and are no where near his eyes).
Me: There, now find it.
Magical: Here it is. 3 dots. Phew, that was a close one.
**** really? Some days I think it is amazing that my head does not literally explode. ***
Thursday, December 9, 2010
Tuesday, December 7, 2010
Are you golden?
Once PJ left Partner-in-Crime (my awesome co-teacher) and I knew we needed to re-visit the rules and our classroom community. We adored PJ and worked hard to meet his needs, but from the uniformed kindergarten student's point of view it sure looked like we let him get away with a lot of behavior that just isn't ok for most kids. We wanted to remind our friends that it really, really is not ok to climb onto a shelf in the teacher's coat closet to hide, yet still wave your index finger out from behind the door screaming, "shut up stupid lady" as loud as possible. Yeah. Not really ok. Or breaking crayons into teeny tiny pieces to throw at the teacher. Not ok either.
So partner-in-crime came up with a fabulous idea, sort of a twist on the 'crumpled heart' idea from responsive classroom. Every year our kids come up with a team name. Last year they were the Magical Bloomers- (because kindergarten is magic and they were learning to bloom like Leo the Late Bloomer) . This year they came up with Team Golden.
To re-visit our rules and our community Partner-in-Crime made a huge gold poster and had all the kids sign their names. She put it up in the front of the class and had all the children ohhh and ahhhh over it's fabulous shiny color (it's amazing what works in kindergarten).
Then her voice got soft and dark. She began talking about things that could happen in our classroom like when children push each other, or call each other mean names, or *gasp* don't share. For each tragic kindergarten event she quickly placed a black piece of paper over the golden poster. In the end the entire shiny gold was covered in black.
The class sat silently staring at what had been a beautiful, shiny, eye catching poster.
Then partner-in-crime's voice changed. She calmly and warmly began talking about ways the class could fix the problems, what they could do to remember to share- what they could do instead of pushing. Each solution meant a child could come up and take a black piece of paper off our puzzle to make it shiny again.
Now the poster is hanging up behind the easel. When something happens that just "isn't golden" all Partner-in-Crime has to do is silently pick up a black piece of paper and put it over the golden poster. "Let's see if we can be golden again" she whispers, and the class silently watches the poster, fixing their behavior so we can eventually take the black piece down.
It's magic and worked beautifully in re-integrating our class with our rules post-PJ.
So partner-in-crime came up with a fabulous idea, sort of a twist on the 'crumpled heart' idea from responsive classroom. Every year our kids come up with a team name. Last year they were the Magical Bloomers- (because kindergarten is magic and they were learning to bloom like Leo the Late Bloomer) . This year they came up with Team Golden.
To re-visit our rules and our community Partner-in-Crime made a huge gold poster and had all the kids sign their names. She put it up in the front of the class and had all the children ohhh and ahhhh over it's fabulous shiny color (it's amazing what works in kindergarten).
Then her voice got soft and dark. She began talking about things that could happen in our classroom like when children push each other, or call each other mean names, or *gasp* don't share. For each tragic kindergarten event she quickly placed a black piece of paper over the golden poster. In the end the entire shiny gold was covered in black.
The class sat silently staring at what had been a beautiful, shiny, eye catching poster.
Then partner-in-crime's voice changed. She calmly and warmly began talking about ways the class could fix the problems, what they could do to remember to share- what they could do instead of pushing. Each solution meant a child could come up and take a black piece of paper off our puzzle to make it shiny again.
Now the poster is hanging up behind the easel. When something happens that just "isn't golden" all Partner-in-Crime has to do is silently pick up a black piece of paper and put it over the golden poster. "Let's see if we can be golden again" she whispers, and the class silently watches the poster, fixing their behavior so we can eventually take the black piece down.
It's magic and worked beautifully in re-integrating our class with our rules post-PJ.
see or no?
btw- the question was "Do you like Justin Beber?"
ack
Monday, December 6, 2010
stress & something to think about...
I am currently holed away in my home office writing papers. Somehow I have 5 (FIVE) papers due this week. I am not a happy camper as I would much rather be sipping on hot coco by the Christmas tree. But alas, instead I am crouched over my netbook writing about the brain. I'm not sure I can put together sentences coherently anymore. SO, if I can't, ignore this post. Perhaps tomorrow my brain will have recovered.
Anyway, as I was writing away I came across some research that I found startling that I want to keep in mind when working with kids.
Research was conducted on how abused and non-abused children detect facial emotions. Children who had a history of abuse were far quicker than the children who had not been abused to detect anger in a picture of someone's face, even if that person simply was not showing emotion. Children who have been abused are quicker to detect anger with less information
*What this indicates to me is that as teachers we need to understand that not all our kids see us in the same way. To some kids our Monday morning "I am SO not excited to be here" faces may be interpreted as hostile, while others simply understand we're still waking up just like them. Not that we have to be fake-chipper all the time, but I think we need to be conscious that some children might perceive us as angry when we're not.*
The research went on to look at how the children's brains reacted when shown an angry face. Children who had a history of abuse showed far more brain activity than children who had not been abused when they looked at angry faces.
*What this says to me is that our children who have experienced abuse are going to be more alert and aware when we're angry. Which isn't a good thing (we can't get angry just to wake them up) but it shows they are not having typical responses to anger and emotion. When a non-abused student is able to calm himself down from an angry-teacher moment quicker children who experienced abuse will most likely experience a more heightened sensory-reaction. Their central nervous system will kick into the fight or flight mode much faster than 'normal' reactions*
*I am drawing these implications based on nothing but my own thinking, which at this moment isn't too strong, take it like the hmmmm.... what if.... pondering I intended.*
Anyway, as I was writing away I came across some research that I found startling that I want to keep in mind when working with kids.
Research was conducted on how abused and non-abused children detect facial emotions. Children who had a history of abuse were far quicker than the children who had not been abused to detect anger in a picture of someone's face, even if that person simply was not showing emotion. Children who have been abused are quicker to detect anger with less information
*What this indicates to me is that as teachers we need to understand that not all our kids see us in the same way. To some kids our Monday morning "I am SO not excited to be here" faces may be interpreted as hostile, while others simply understand we're still waking up just like them. Not that we have to be fake-chipper all the time, but I think we need to be conscious that some children might perceive us as angry when we're not.*
The research went on to look at how the children's brains reacted when shown an angry face. Children who had a history of abuse showed far more brain activity than children who had not been abused when they looked at angry faces.
*What this says to me is that our children who have experienced abuse are going to be more alert and aware when we're angry. Which isn't a good thing (we can't get angry just to wake them up) but it shows they are not having typical responses to anger and emotion. When a non-abused student is able to calm himself down from an angry-teacher moment quicker children who experienced abuse will most likely experience a more heightened sensory-reaction. Their central nervous system will kick into the fight or flight mode much faster than 'normal' reactions*
*I am drawing these implications based on nothing but my own thinking, which at this moment isn't too strong, take it like the hmmmm.... what if.... pondering I intended.*
Sunday, December 5, 2010
Magic wand #4, collaboration for creativity & achievement
I've written about collaboration a lot but the more I work in a collaborative environment the more I see how it may be the most important 'magic wand' to improving education. Collaborative teaching encourages us to always look for new magic wands- new ways to teach, new ways to approach learning, test current research, and be willing to take risks. Collaboration is what moves us forward.
My magic-wand series began a few weeks ago after I attended the Learning & the Brain conference in Boston. All of the sessions caused me to reflect on what we're doing at the think-tank (my amazing school) and let me realize why what we're doing works (the research behind the practice). I regret calling it 'magic wands' because it implies that it is magic- which it isn't. It's hard work, and it's not just one magic wand- it's many- all working hard together to improve learning outcomes.
Sunday morning we listened to Keith Sawyer present on 'Educating for innovation' (Thinking Skills and Creativity 1 (2006) 41-48). His spirited talk referred to what happens inside Google with their 10% time and how that it's not just one person being given 10% time but those people all working together that drives progress. He called collaboration "general tinkering" and called teachers to realize the importance of being creative professionals who are collaborating together to create knowledge.
Collaboration is truly what drives the think-tank. The elementary schools in our county have "half-day Mondays" when children leave a few hours early so the teachers have a chance to plan. At our school that time is expected to be done together- we have an hour of "sacred planning" where nothing else can be scheduled so that co-teachers can sit down together to analyze the lessons from the past week, decide where to go next, and how best to teach it.
In many ways collaboration frees us up to not be driven by a set path of teaching the same thing each day. Instead it lets us look at what the kids need and set up "if this, then this" plans. A lot of times we feel safe saying "If we teach this Tuesday and Wednesday then let's look and see what needs to happen Thursday. If they don't get it we'll do X activity. If they do get it we'll do Y. And we'll know whether or not they'll get it because we'll look at Z."
So instead of just heading on with our plans because we have to cover content and we have to all be on the same page, we're able to actually drive our instruction based on the kids we teach. Shocking, right? Because we're working with another adult somehow we feel a sense of freedom to be able to plan our lessons around the kids, instead of planning lessons around what the other adults in the building are doing.
There are schools out there that use "collaboration" as a way to force everyone to teach the same thing on the same day. It's a very top-down version of collaboration and in truth, isn't collaboration at all, but creating factory models. I understand how tempting it is to want to know that on December 2nd every third grader learned how to multiply by 5s, but what if one class was ready to multiply by 10s and one was still working on understanding the concept of multiplying and needed another day to use manipulatives? Teachers collaborating can identify how to measure when children are ready to learn the next step and when it needs to be re-taught.
My awesome co-teachers and I are currently using Google Docs to collaborate in real-time. It is amazing and I plan to write more about this later. Our writing workshop is a dream because of it and we're leading a conversation on it in January at EduCon. Stay tuned for more...
To be licensed in special education you have to take a class on collaborating with other teachers. In the beginning of this class I made a lot of fun of it and called it the "how to be nice to people" requirement. By the end of the class I realized how important it was to my professional development, and found it upsetting that only special educators are required to take a course on collaboration. We're trained to collaborate with gen ed teachers, but the gen ed teachers have no requirement to collaborate with us. Kind of an uphill battle...
Regardless, I am lucky to work at a school that values teacher collaboration so highly. It might not be the 10% time at Google where they get to work on anything they like, but we are encouraged to work together to be innovative in order to improve student achievement. And so, we do. In the end we watch our kids and find the best methods to teach the information we need to teach to the kids we've been hired to teach. Not the kids we taught last year, not the kids in Kansas who the text books were normed on, not the kids someone in central office observed in a classroom 10 years ago. We're teaching the kids in front of us and because we are able to be collaborate creativity we're able to truly engage them and make sure knowledge gets into their long-term memory.
My magic-wand series began a few weeks ago after I attended the Learning & the Brain conference in Boston. All of the sessions caused me to reflect on what we're doing at the think-tank (my amazing school) and let me realize why what we're doing works (the research behind the practice). I regret calling it 'magic wands' because it implies that it is magic- which it isn't. It's hard work, and it's not just one magic wand- it's many- all working hard together to improve learning outcomes.
Sunday morning we listened to Keith Sawyer present on 'Educating for innovation' (Thinking Skills and Creativity 1 (2006) 41-48). His spirited talk referred to what happens inside Google with their 10% time and how that it's not just one person being given 10% time but those people all working together that drives progress. He called collaboration "general tinkering" and called teachers to realize the importance of being creative professionals who are collaborating together to create knowledge.
Collaboration is truly what drives the think-tank. The elementary schools in our county have "half-day Mondays" when children leave a few hours early so the teachers have a chance to plan. At our school that time is expected to be done together- we have an hour of "sacred planning" where nothing else can be scheduled so that co-teachers can sit down together to analyze the lessons from the past week, decide where to go next, and how best to teach it.
In many ways collaboration frees us up to not be driven by a set path of teaching the same thing each day. Instead it lets us look at what the kids need and set up "if this, then this" plans. A lot of times we feel safe saying "If we teach this Tuesday and Wednesday then let's look and see what needs to happen Thursday. If they don't get it we'll do X activity. If they do get it we'll do Y. And we'll know whether or not they'll get it because we'll look at Z."
So instead of just heading on with our plans because we have to cover content and we have to all be on the same page, we're able to actually drive our instruction based on the kids we teach. Shocking, right? Because we're working with another adult somehow we feel a sense of freedom to be able to plan our lessons around the kids, instead of planning lessons around what the other adults in the building are doing.
There are schools out there that use "collaboration" as a way to force everyone to teach the same thing on the same day. It's a very top-down version of collaboration and in truth, isn't collaboration at all, but creating factory models. I understand how tempting it is to want to know that on December 2nd every third grader learned how to multiply by 5s, but what if one class was ready to multiply by 10s and one was still working on understanding the concept of multiplying and needed another day to use manipulatives? Teachers collaborating can identify how to measure when children are ready to learn the next step and when it needs to be re-taught.
My awesome co-teachers and I are currently using Google Docs to collaborate in real-time. It is amazing and I plan to write more about this later. Our writing workshop is a dream because of it and we're leading a conversation on it in January at EduCon. Stay tuned for more...
To be licensed in special education you have to take a class on collaborating with other teachers. In the beginning of this class I made a lot of fun of it and called it the "how to be nice to people" requirement. By the end of the class I realized how important it was to my professional development, and found it upsetting that only special educators are required to take a course on collaboration. We're trained to collaborate with gen ed teachers, but the gen ed teachers have no requirement to collaborate with us. Kind of an uphill battle...
Regardless, I am lucky to work at a school that values teacher collaboration so highly. It might not be the 10% time at Google where they get to work on anything they like, but we are encouraged to work together to be innovative in order to improve student achievement. And so, we do. In the end we watch our kids and find the best methods to teach the information we need to teach to the kids we've been hired to teach. Not the kids we taught last year, not the kids in Kansas who the text books were normed on, not the kids someone in central office observed in a classroom 10 years ago. We're teaching the kids in front of us and because we are able to be collaborate creativity we're able to truly engage them and make sure knowledge gets into their long-term memory.
Saturday, December 4, 2010
run, girls, run
I've finally de-thawed from my morning Girls on the Run race. GOTR is a fabulous organization that trains elementary and middle school girls for a 5k while also working on their self-esteem. As a former college (D3) cross country runner it combines two of my great loves- working with kids and running. I absolutely love the program and the twice-a-year races always prove to be true adventures. (They tend to make me very, very thankful that I work with the students I do- every year I am horrified by how the upper class parents treat each other, their girls, and the teachers out helping.)
This year I ran with Fabulous Friend's big sister, who is equally fabulous. However, Fabulous-Sister forgot to run. Not the whole time- I mean, we'd start running and then she'd get distracted by something and stop.
"What's the school bus doing here?" she asked, slowing her jog to a walk, "I wonder what's heavier, an elephant or a school bus. You know how to find out? We need a lever. So let's get a see-saw. And we'll put a rock in the middle of the see-saw and we'll put a school bus on one side but we'll have to go to the zoo to get the elephant. Do you think they'd let us borrow the elephant? Well, if they did, then we'd put the elephant on the other side and we'd see which one is heavier. Hmmmm...."
Somewhere in this monologue she actually started walking backwards. It's amazing we finished at all.
The ubber-competitive parents pushed their daughters past us yelling things like "This isn't girls running like slugs! Run, Run!" but Fabulous-Sister didn't notice at all.
"Hmmmm... why do they call that Best Buy and not Buy Best?" she asked, slowing down again.
"Why are we throwing our cups on the floor? That hurts the Earth's heart. We have to take care of the Earth. I saw it on a movie. Ew, that man spit- that is disgusting. Thing what would happen if we all spit. Instead of spitting you need to swallow. My heart told me."
"This is so weird. All these people are throwing things on the ground, they don't care that they are losing their expensive things like gloves, we are running in the road and the police are not arresting us, and men are spitting."
"This is the best race ever! This is so fun!"
"I don't want to win. Sometimes when you win you hurt someone's feelings. What does that sign say? Oh, This is fun!"
"That guy cheering- he didn't say the right thing- he left off the ing. Do you know other words with ing?"
"Maybe I should take my hat off so people will know who I am. Oh, you don't have to hold it for me- you're not my mom! I'll hold it myself!"
For over an hour.
It was a glorious- yet cold- hour inside Fabulous Sister's head, which I learned is a very busy but imaginative place.
Fabulous Sister fell twice- the first time she picked herself right up and brushed herself off. A parent running by smiled, "What a trooper!" she commented.
Fabulous Sister looked at me. "I was a tripper!" she laughed, not at all hurt that a complete stranger had just called her a 'tripper'. I tried my best to explain the phrase trooper, as well as why Best Buy is called Best Buy, why it was ok to throw the water cups just this once, why the water on the ground was freezing, why I said "Oh, man!" when she pointed out the many lost gloves on the course, or why we were running at all.
All I can say is that it was fabulous, and was even better to watch Fabulous Friend herself give her sister a bear hug at the end.
This year I ran with Fabulous Friend's big sister, who is equally fabulous. However, Fabulous-Sister forgot to run. Not the whole time- I mean, we'd start running and then she'd get distracted by something and stop.
"What's the school bus doing here?" she asked, slowing her jog to a walk, "I wonder what's heavier, an elephant or a school bus. You know how to find out? We need a lever. So let's get a see-saw. And we'll put a rock in the middle of the see-saw and we'll put a school bus on one side but we'll have to go to the zoo to get the elephant. Do you think they'd let us borrow the elephant? Well, if they did, then we'd put the elephant on the other side and we'd see which one is heavier. Hmmmm...."
Somewhere in this monologue she actually started walking backwards. It's amazing we finished at all.
The ubber-competitive parents pushed their daughters past us yelling things like "This isn't girls running like slugs! Run, Run!" but Fabulous-Sister didn't notice at all.
"Hmmmm... why do they call that Best Buy and not Buy Best?" she asked, slowing down again.
"Why are we throwing our cups on the floor? That hurts the Earth's heart. We have to take care of the Earth. I saw it on a movie. Ew, that man spit- that is disgusting. Thing what would happen if we all spit. Instead of spitting you need to swallow. My heart told me."
"This is so weird. All these people are throwing things on the ground, they don't care that they are losing their expensive things like gloves, we are running in the road and the police are not arresting us, and men are spitting."
"This is the best race ever! This is so fun!"
"I don't want to win. Sometimes when you win you hurt someone's feelings. What does that sign say? Oh, This is fun!"
"That guy cheering- he didn't say the right thing- he left off the ing. Do you know other words with ing?"
"Maybe I should take my hat off so people will know who I am. Oh, you don't have to hold it for me- you're not my mom! I'll hold it myself!"
For over an hour.
It was a glorious- yet cold- hour inside Fabulous Sister's head, which I learned is a very busy but imaginative place.
Fabulous Sister fell twice- the first time she picked herself right up and brushed herself off. A parent running by smiled, "What a trooper!" she commented.
Fabulous Sister looked at me. "I was a tripper!" she laughed, not at all hurt that a complete stranger had just called her a 'tripper'. I tried my best to explain the phrase trooper, as well as why Best Buy is called Best Buy, why it was ok to throw the water cups just this once, why the water on the ground was freezing, why I said "Oh, man!" when she pointed out the many lost gloves on the course, or why we were running at all.
All I can say is that it was fabulous, and was even better to watch Fabulous Friend herself give her sister a bear hug at the end.
Friday, December 3, 2010
*it's friday*
Monday afternoon we sat down to hold an IEP meeting for our friend with the magical stroller. A lot of people were involved and there was a large agenda so as the meeting began we settled in, knowing we'd likely be there for a few hours. Magical, of course, had joined us at the meeting since it was held after school hours and we were the only option for child care.
For the first half hour he sat on the floor, surrounded by toys, crayons, and paper, glaring at me. I've never been glared at by Magical before, so I wasn't sure what was happening. It was one of those one-eyed glares, more like a stink-eye, as though he was letting me know he was watching me and he wasn't thrilled with what he saw.
Then right around the half hour mark the robot showed up. And we proceeded to have the rest of the meeting ignoring the fact that Magical was lively engaged in games with his robot. Do you have any idea how hard it is to seriously go over the legal wording of a Free and Appropriate Public Education, or the Least Restrictive Environment, while trying to ignore the fact that a magical robot is carrying on with one of your students? Yet none of us blinked an eye.
Somehow, to us it became normal.
Which leads me to question not Magical's sanity but ours.
It's meetings like that that make me love my job even more. Because without a magical robot, a meeting really is just a dreadfully boring meeting.
For the first half hour he sat on the floor, surrounded by toys, crayons, and paper, glaring at me. I've never been glared at by Magical before, so I wasn't sure what was happening. It was one of those one-eyed glares, more like a stink-eye, as though he was letting me know he was watching me and he wasn't thrilled with what he saw.
Then right around the half hour mark the robot showed up. And we proceeded to have the rest of the meeting ignoring the fact that Magical was lively engaged in games with his robot. Do you have any idea how hard it is to seriously go over the legal wording of a Free and Appropriate Public Education, or the Least Restrictive Environment, while trying to ignore the fact that a magical robot is carrying on with one of your students? Yet none of us blinked an eye.
Somehow, to us it became normal.
Which leads me to question not Magical's sanity but ours.
It's meetings like that that make me love my job even more. Because without a magical robot, a meeting really is just a dreadfully boring meeting.
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