Blog Post 12

How can curriculum mapping assist you?  Do you have one?  Does your school/district curriculum map?  Where would/will you start in creating a useful curriculum map for your classroom? 

Curriculum Mapping (CM) is very important for me. If I was traveling to another country or place I want to know where I’m going. When I’m there or even during the trip I could make detours and side trips ut the map keeps me on track. CM’s are the same. I have my entire year planned out for me. I fill in the detail but the basic journey is mapped.

My school district uses Beyond Textbooks (BT). All my weekly, monthly and yearly units are planned. If I did not have a map I would look to online resources or set up a  meeting (or three) with other Social Studies Teachers in the district to plan out our year. 

Blog Post 11

Do you differentiate instruction? Why? Why not? What is the important for differentiating instruction? 

What impact does it have on student learning?

I differentiate my instruction because I have many different learners both in style and ability. By creating different levels throughout the lesson it enables all students to learn. When students learn, it increases their self-esteem. Once a student has tasted success they want more. It can become a cycle that perpetuates itself. Because they can build on their ability and yet see there is more to learn they will want to grow. 

Blog post 7

How prepared do you feel in effectively teaching your students in reading? Is this one of your strengths? A weakness?

Honestly, I don't know how to teach students to read. I haven't had to focus on this at all. All my students have the basics and I help them add layers with vocabulary. I am good at that. I try to raise their academic language lexicon by restating large words and using them in sentences. I would say this is a weakness.

I was surprised on Friday when not a single student knew the meaning of euphemism. It shocked me. I spent 4 minutes teaching that word/concept.

Have you started to plan to the Common Core Standards? If you have, how is that going? If

you haven’t, why not? What support do you need?

I do plan to these standards. We use Beyond Textbooks and the struggle the 7th grade social studies teacher and I have is that BT does not match the garde level standards. Half my content is 7th grade standards and hers is about half 8th grade standards. It is frustrating but it is what the district wants. The standards I have are easy to meet.

Blog Post#6

Go to educationworld.com and read one article on some aspect of Classroom Management (type Classroom Management into the search box in the upper left hand corner). Post a reflection to your blog based on your practice as it relates to what you learn from the article.

How effectively is your well classroom management system working at this point in the year? What are your struggles? What are your successes?

Reflect with honest hearts and minds!

Classroom Management Reflection:

Based on the Article "10 ways to Sabotoge Classroom Management" found here. The article focuses on small things teachers do that undermine their authority and CM. Two of the areas are things I do. First is smiling or even chuckling when a student make a funny, yet off task comment.  I have to spend time getting students back on task. The other thing I see myself doing is not waiting until all students are quiet. If I have 27 out of 28 quiet I'll start instruction. I know that one will either quiet down or I'll remind her to shhh. The article says "Students who don’t hear what you say will either (a) turn to a neighbor to ask, or (b) follow instructions incorrectly." That is time that I has to spend reteaching unnecessarily or have students not turn in work. Waiting 5 seconds is a good technique to get students ready to learn.

Management reflection.

My classroom management is pretty good. It helps that I have students who've been doing MYD for 8 years. They know the system. It is easy to head off problems before they become big ones. I use step as a reflection moment and not as a punishment. I have the fewest Step 4's of all the middle school teachers. I slam kids into higher step unless it is needed.

I do struggle with about 5 students across the grade level consistently. One of my teammates calls one of them a waste of space and air. I hate to say it but I agree. I struggle with not letting my feeling known to him or the other students. He is always in step.

ELD Session 10

When working with ELD students, what are your challenges? Strengths? What could be done to increase your skills in this area?

I think my biggest struggle is trying to explain ideas to an ELD student if they don't understand the English. My Spanish is very "street" and I comprehend a lot more than I can speak. Hablo alemán y holandés no español. This also extends to the parents. Many of my students parents are Spanish only speakers and this doesn't help with homework or communication. I feel odd using the student to translate for me. 

My wife is a fluent Spanish speaker and I've been using her to improve my one semester of Spanish  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ngRq82c8Baw 

Technology--session 9

When using technology with your students, what are your challenges?  Strengths? What could be done to increase your usage of technology in the classroom?

I love using technology in the class. I've used laptops, cell phones and tablets for student projects. I show you tube video each day to support my direct instruction. I don't think there is more I can do. 

Session 8 Reading Strengths

How prepared do you feel in effectively teaching your students in reading?  Is this one of your strengths?  A weakness?

Have you started to plan to the Common Core Standards?  If you have, how is that going?  If you haven’t, why not?  What support do you need?

I struggle with this but I think it has more to do with my students than me. I started out the year assuming that the students could read at the 8th grade level. I've made adjustments as they read on average at the 4-5th grade level. I used adaptive texts and break them down sentence by sentence with them. Lately I've been having them do more and more pairs works, something they are doing in their ELA class. 

I'm using the AZCCRS in class in so much that the district curriculum has them. We use Beyond Textbooks and some of they things I have to teach are from grade seven standards and some from grade 8 (the 7th grade teacher has the same issue). Things are going well and I have no issues. 

Assessments--post# 5

“Reflect on your use of assessment in the classroom.  On a scale of 1 – 10, ten being highest, how would you rate yourself.  What are your plans for becoming a “10” if you are not there already? How are you using assessment in the classroom to guide your instruction?  Describe how assessment results are used to differentiate instruction within your class.”

I would rank myself an 8. My students complain there are too many test. I have shifted recent from largely multiple choice to a majority short answer. Its making them think and they don't like it. HAHA. 

I use frequent weekly assessments as part of the district curriculum. These are mostly five question test. I do need to create larger tests in the future. 

Classroom time Prompt 4

“Reflect on your time in the classroom to this point.  How are you feeling emotionally, physically?  Do you feel that you are getting through to your most difficult students? What strategies are working?  What strategies are not?   What are your next steps with student engagement within your classroom?”

I am feeling very tired but happy. I feel that I have the students engaged and have bonded with the students. I sometimes use my prep to go and play dodgeball with my kids if I'm prepared. 

I do struggle with a couple of students but it is manageable. I general pull them aside and speak to them privately before or after class. 

I need to find things to engage the students from their generation. Vines and short YouTube videos that they create might be the next step.  

Regular Education prompt 3 from session 4

“What are you doing to meet the needs of your special education students?   If you do not have special education students, how are you meeting the needs of your low students?  Have you met with your school’s pre-referral group about these students?”

I have a SPED team that is supposed to take my SPED students during the enrichment time block. They are not very good at communicating accommodations I am supposed to make. I have to track them down myself.

My SPED teacher hates the students, swears at them and sends them back to them class when they are too hard to handle. Luckily, my wife is a SPED teacher with 10 years of experience. She helps me with strategies for them. The student who do stay see it as party time and just quietly talk and avoid work. 

Most of my students (80% reading, 90% math) are at a 4-5th grade level. I try to have them learn at the 6th grade level and introduce text so they can read them. We have no writing teacher and the ELA teacher is so focused on reading that I do a lot of writing in my class. For 6 weeks we worked on creating thesis statements instead of writing 3-5 paragraph essays. 

Test post

This is a test for Melyssa! Does it work now?