On Teamwork

Last night, we had a team dinner for my home team, the Babes of Wrath.  We've recently had quite a few changes to our roster, so it was nice to get everyone together and hang out.  Our captain ran us through a couple of party mixer type games.  One of them happened to be called "Protect Your Egg."  In a nutshell: teams get a bag full of random supplies (each bag contains the same supplies) and using only those supplies, you must construct something that will keep an egg from breaking when it is dropped onto your construction from atop a ladder (approximately 15 feet).  In our bag we had: 3 clothespins, a napkin, a small snack bag, two zip ties, a wooden skewer, a paper straw, 3 candy corn, a couple of zip ties, a piece of parchment, a glue stick, a piece of a plastic bottle, and a piece of masking tape (perhaps there was more, I'm not sure).  My awesome team won.  Check the photos below.

It wasn't 5 minutes into construction with my team that I knew this would be a great team work project for my AVID classes.  So, I pulled it together and we did it today.  Here are some great photos from today.

What's In The Bag?

Tongue depressor, business card, piece of string, binder clip, 1 piece of printer paper, 1 napkin, a lifesaver, a twist tie, a toothpick, a bendy straw, a sandwich bag, a piece of masking tape, a paperclip, a Q-tip

8th Graders

7th Grade

Winners!!!

Watching the kids do this was so much fun.  It was cool to see the very different ideas they all came up with.  Some of them came up with things that my team didn't think of last night and made me feel really stupid.  (Why didn't we blow the bag up like a balloon for cushioning???). 1 more day until we get a (VERY WELL DESERVED) week off for Fall Break.  I can't wait to visit my nephew!  I'm also going to see Lesley for the first time since she moved.  Bring it on, Fall!

On paying it forward

I blogged a couple of days ago about something exciting that is happening in my AVID classes and I am enthused to be able to share it here now.

You may or may not know that my students and I are huge fans of Kid President.  I have used a few of his videos in my classroom.  I recently saw his Awesome Year Challenge video and knew that I wanted to bring that concept to my AVID kids to start and possibly extend it to my Leadership class.  I decided to make it into a year-long project.  Kid Prez gives us 25 things we can do to make the year awesome for someone else.  Some of them are not very practical (mail someone a corn dog), but some are effortless (smile, high five someone, free hugs).  I made a chart with some of my favorite of Kid Prez's ideas and left spaces for my students to come up with their own.

On Tuesday, when they came into class, I told them I had an exciting project for our class.  I showed them the Awesome Year Challenge video, and then I presented the chart I had made.  I told them we would be keeping track of the good we were doing for others.  It would not be for a grade and there was no pressure.  Doing things for others should not be done for a reward.  I encouraged them to go outside of their comfort zones.  Smiling/high-fiving/hugging your bff doesn't count (unless they're having a really bad day and need a pick-me-up).  I also made sure to point out that not everyone was okay with physical contact and that you shouldn't go around hugging strangers without their permission.  I hung up the chart and some stickers next to it.  Whenever they did something to make someone else's year awesome, they should put a sticker on the box.  Our goal is to make so many awesome years that we cover the whole poster.

 I then gave them time to discuss other things we could add with the people around them.  And while they were doing that, I gave them--cupcakes for no reason!

We brainstormed our own things to add to the chart.  After my 8th grade AVID class yesterday, the chart looked like this:

And undoubtedly, kids in my other classes want to get involved too.  I invited them to add their own stickers for doing nice things.  After 24 hours, our chart looks like this:

Anyone who tweets or instagrams about our project is using the hashtag #AVIDawesomeyear.  We are having a great time.  My heart is full.  My students are awesome.  I can't wait to see what this looks like at the end of the year!

On...

Exciting things are going to be happening in my AVID classroom. I can't wait to post all about it here, but my students don't know about it yet, so for now you'll just have to guess. 

On technology

I am not ashamed to admit that I'm pretty on top of current pop culture.  I rarely hear my students talking about something and think, what is that? while smiling like I get it.  (Exception being Twerking and Kik--both of which I now know all about, though I wish I knew nothing of twerking and could unsee Miley Cyrus's infamous twerking at the VMA's).

The point of this tangent on technology is that I use it in my classroom as much as possible.  I'm always looking for new ways to use it, new apps, new devices.  I would kill for an interactive whiteboard and a set of student clickers.

I was introduced to Edmodo about 4 years ago and at the time, it was kind of lame and not very user friendly.  However, I randomly thought of it the other day and decided to check it out again.  It looked a lot more appealing.

Edmodo is like facebook for classes.  A teacher creates an account and sets up groups--I chose to have one group for each of my classes.  Edmodo creates a Group Code for each group, which the students will need in order to sign up.  A student cannot create an account without a group to join.  They don't even need to input an email address, but they can if they want to receive email alerts.

With Edmodo, kids can post things, upload files, add files to their "Backpack," which is a place to store work electronically that they can access again.  As a teacher, you can send alerts, take polls, create quizzes and close them on a certain day so that students must take them by a certain time, upload assignments and documents, etc.  There are even apps that you can add to the site.  I added a flashcards app and created a stack using their vocab words.  I shared this with them and now they have an online study tool--in addition to the cards they make in class.  There's also a (free!) app for iPhone and Android.  It's not the best, but it's functional.

It has been a slow process getting my AVID kids and my 8th grade grade-level English class to all get on the site, but my honors 8th graders are obsessed with it.  They post silly pun-ny jokes and hashtag everything ironically.  I'm having a blast using it with them.  I have already used it to post homework, give them a quiz, have them all respond to a discussion question, and even post a grammatically incorrect sentence to see who would find the errors.  My 7th grade AVID class has been using it to ask each other homework questions.  As the teacher, you have the ability to delete anything they post, and you can even change the settings so that you have to approve every post before it goes up, but #Ain'tNobodyGotTimeForThat. :)

Some of my kids are not allowed to have Facebook pages, so this is the only social networking they get to do.  And so they blow it up.  They will come into the room and say, "Ms. T, check the edmodo site! Someone posted the most ridiculous joke."

Here are a couple of screen shots:

SMSS

Sh!t My Students Say:

 My Leadership class had a game day since no activities are planned at the moment.

"Candy land is too intense!!!!" - P.L.

On redecorating

Thought it might be fun to do a little classroom tour! I wish I had really taken before pictures of my classroom.  I spent all summer painting it. Here are a couple of "before" pictures.

BEFORE:

My desk area

Can you see that disgusting teal color and the dingy color of the walls and door? 

Gross.

AFTER:

Grey and yellow.  So much more soothing.  I wish I could get rid of those hideous shades that can be pulled across the top windows. 

 Of course it's not this neat anymore.  This was before 200+ teenagers graced my classroom with their presence every day.

 God, those shades are so ugly.

Aaaaaaand a great shot of today's Exit Ticket board (I got your engagement strategies right here, mister).

Direct or Indirect Characterization?

On the mend

I returned to school today after having been out for two days with a terrible cold.  All day long kids would walk by my door, peek in and yell, "YESS!!!!!!!" or "THANK GOD!" upon seeing me sitting there.

It's nice to be missed.  :)

I still felt like crap all day, but the homemade cheese enchiladas that a students' mother brought me (and the rest of her teachers) made the day brighter!

I used my voice so much today that I sound like some of my male students who are going through puberty right now!