Getting through to the end...

Spring break has probably either come and gone for you, or it is ending this week. Insert tears, screams and large glasses of wine here.

The stretch of school between spring break and the end of the year can be BRUTAL. There are little to no days off, warmer weather which means antsy kids, and still SO much to do. Keeping kids engaged gets harder because (1) they know the end is coming and they've started to mentally check out and (2) you know the end is coming and your eagerness to spend every free moment planning and creating amazing lessons is dwindling. Ok, so maybe you haven't ever wanted to spend every free moment planning, but you get my drift.

Here are some tips to help get your students (and yourself) through these last few weeks.

1. Movies. If your school allows movies, play the doggone movies. Of course, make sure they relate to your content... you can find a movie that goes with ANY topic. Play it in sections and stop to ask questions. The students will appreciate the break. Erin uses movies - and you should too! 
2. Get more hands on. Even if you haven't been an INB fan or taken the time to really push foldables in your classroom... this may be a good time to try. Interactive activities keep students more engaged because they require cutting, coloring, glueing and creativity... more than basic worksheets. Mel & Gerdy have an End of Year Interactive Notebook Activities resource that works for ANY (yep) subject. 
3. Projects, projects, projects. Give your students assignments that span a few days. It's great for them to work on something that comes together over a period of time - plus projects provide great opportunities for collaboration. Students can explore a topic on their own and then work together (or alone) to demonstrate their understanding or complete a task. 
4. Choice boards. Give your students choices as the year is coming to an end. They've been required to show understanding in ways you've chosen (graphically, written, using technology, worksheets, etc.) so why not give them the choice. You don't have to use something formal - just provide them with a few different options for demonstrating their understanding of a specific topic or skill. I personally LOVE choice boards because students have a little bit more excitement about what they are doing since they were able to pick what to do. 
5. Plan as many outdoor activities as possible. Kids are wiggly and distracted in the room. Outside they are often more focused. Consider taking them out for a few minutes just to review notes or complete activities using clipboard.
6. Just enjoy your students. They'll be moving on soon so try to carve out a little time to do something enjoyable with them. Take the last 5-10 minutes of class one day a week to just let go and take a break. Play a quick game together or just chat!
7. Have them write letters to future students about your class. These are SO funny to read! I have a template for the letter in my EOY Activities resource. 
8. Put them to work! Getting your room organized at the end of the year can be (and often is) a nightmare. Give the students small tasks (especially if they are early finishers) such as labeling bins, counting supplies, etc. They'll feel needed and be on task and your end of year clean up list will get shorter and shorter! 
9. Testing is over - so just stop teaching ok? Seriously - read Erin's post about it! 

Student Created Webpages

Hope everyone who is in the snow zone is staying toasty warm! My area just missed getting slammed, but it still didn't stop our school from having a snow day yesterday. Part of me was cheering for the day off, but another part of me was disappointed. Why in the world would a teacher be disappointed about having a snow day? Well, my students just started a project on Thursday, and I am bummed that I didn't get to see the excitement from Thursday carry over into Friday. I know come Monday that excitement will be there, but have you ever had that feeling of starting a project with your kiddos, and you just didn't want class to end?

What are we doing that is so exciting this teacher was *slightly* bummed about having a snow day? We are in the beginning of our Latin America unit, and we are getting into the history. I knew I wanted to have my advanced students create some type of project because our first topics are the Aztecs and Incas. And even though not all of my students would find the Aztecs and Incas as fascinating as I do, I did want to get my students excited about learning. They are going to build a website about the Aztecs and Incas.

**Side note- I teach 5 classes of 6th grade social studies. Three of those classes are advanced and two are on-level. I differentiate for my advanced classes, so I either come up with a variation of an activity my on-level students are doing (or sometimes I come up with something for my advanced kids and tier it for my on-level kiddos), or I plan something completely different for them. As long as my lessons are standards-based, I have complete freedom in the activities I plan for my kiddos, and I can vary the activities as much as I want between the two levels of classes.

**Another side note- I am totally fine with turning my kiddos loose on a project I have never done before. I like to live dangerously. And my administration fully supports us teachers. If this project turns out a flop, I am OK with that. I take note of what worked, what didn't work, and tweak it for the next go around.  I know my kids will learn the knowledge they need to from this project, it just may or may not be a pretty process!

I planned this project just for my advanced kids. Why? Well, because this project is very much self-directed, and students will be learning without me. I know my advanced students can do this. My on-level students will need more involvement from me to learn the content.  I totally know that my on-level kids will enjoy creating a webpage just as much as my advanced kids, so they are going to have a project like this later on this year with information they have already learned.

Let's Get To It!
I chose Weebly, but you could also use Wikispaces. I have never used Weebly before because my district uses an on-line learning platform. All of my class correspondence and resources are uploaded there. However, I wanted my kids to create their own webpages.

Why a webpage? It's very real world, and most of them are technologically savvy enough to figure out how (in other words, they know how to tinker really well with technology). I wanted them to explore the Aztecs and Incas on their own because they would be way more engaged than if I led the discussion, and I wanted them to have some type of record of what they learned. They have made posters before, but not very many have made their own webpage, so I knew this would be a very intriguing project for them. My students have completed anticipatory activities before learning about specific content, but I honestly just wanted them to be able to explore on their own with a few guidelines. I wanted to keep this portion of Latin America history as self-directed as possible with as little as me as possible.

Independently or groups? I explained the project to my kiddos and let them decide if they were confident enough to create their own by themselves, or if they wanted to team up with a pal. I allowed up to 3 in a group because I wanted to make sure each member put in work. Thankfully my school as plenty of technology to go around, and I am able to check out one Chrome Book per kid. If you don't have one-to-one technology, your students may not have the choice to work alone. I *gently* persuaded most of my students to team up with at least one other person because you can only get 40 free students accounts with a teacher Weebly account. I have WAY more than 40 advanced students, so I knew I needed some groups. Yes, students can create their own Weebly account for free, BUT I wanted easy access to their webpages. Per district policy, the webpages must be set to private, so the only way I will be able to assess their webpages is to have 90 usernames and passwords. Um, no. With student accounts under my teacher account, all I have to do is log into mine and I can simply click theirs. Easier and time saver.

Putting it into action. I feel like my advanced kiddos are pretty independent and the majority are very motivated, so my intro was really just explaining the project to them, giving them the project guidelines/rubric page, provided some text resources, gave them some reliable online resource sites, gave a quick overview of Weebly, and I turned them loose. This may not work for everyone. You may need to give a more detailed intro to your kiddos. You know them best. I knew that the time of year (snow day, no snow day???) leaves my kiddos pretty wiggly and restless if I talk for too long. Letting them tinker may take a bit more time, but at least I know they are engaged in the task at hand, and I don't have to struggle to maintain their attention. I also have no problem letting my kids take the reins. One of the biggest lessons I learned moving from elementary to middle school was that I had to give up a lot of control. In elementary school I did tons of centers, my students moved a lot, it was not quiet. But for the most part, I couldn't give an overview and turn them loose and let them have complete reign to tinker and hope that academic work would get accomplished. In middle school I can. One more reason I love middle school and will not go back to elementary school without crying, screaming, and kicking.

Reliable websites- Biography, History, Discovery,  and National Geographic. I gave my kiddos a run down on why Wikipedia is not the *most* reliable source of information out there.

How it's going. I feel like so far it has gone very well. Granted we are only going to be on day 2 when we return to school, but my kids tinkered with Weebly for about 15 minutes, felt comfortable, and started researching. They used library books I checked out, the websites I listed above, and whatever else they searched on line. Many of them working in groups created a Google doc to share their research and simultaneously add information. I didn't even tell them to do this. They just did it on their own! #winning

How long it will take. I am giving my students 6 full class periods to work on this. Each class is 55 minutes long, so I am hoping this is plenty of time. I did tell them, though, if they are making this elaborate webpage, they might have to work on it at home. Keep in mind, many of my kiddos will work on it at home. If push comes to shove, and it is nearing the 6th day and most of my kids aren't anywhere close to being done, I will give them extra days. I am OK with that. Yes, we have set curriculum we have to get through, but I fully believe that to become a better teacher, you have to be willing to take risks and sometimes just fly by the seat of your pants. See where the adventure takes you. Jot notes of what went well and what went horribly wrong, and improve with the next project.

Project page and rubric. Here is the project detail page and rubric I gave to my kiddos. Nothing fancy, and it would be easy for you to create something similar if you didn't want to have the topic be the Aztecs and Incas.

I will be back when we finish to post some screen shots of my daughter's webpage when she finishes (yes, I do get to teach my daughter since she needs advanced SS and I am the only advanced SS teacher.....difficult at times? Yes. Would I trade it for anything in the world? Never!). I promise I will show it whether good, bad, or ugly because teaching is messy sometimes, and so are student created projects!

Have you had your students create their own webpages before? What were your biggest victories and defeats?

Happy Teaching!

Heather- Brainy Apples

Hands on Learning in the Middle Grades

Middle School is the divide between High School and Elementary School. It is the bridge from childhood to adulthood. Students grow and our expectations of what they can handle in the classroom grow along with them. Many teachers feel as though students should learn to listen to lectures, take notes while the teacher is talking and be able to function in a more "grown up student" environment.

When I started teaching 8th grade math, I had that philosophy. My students were getting ready to go into high school, so why not treat them that way? Rarely did I incorporate "fun" in my classroom. I followed along with the scope and sequence perfectly and used on the resources provided for me by the district. My students that year only worked from their textbook, note-taking guide or chapter resource book. I think this HUGE mistake on my part may have been one reason my first year as a middle school teacher was absolutely horrible less than stellar.

It's true that students in middle school are no longer "babies". They're also not quite adults either. When I started incorporating hands on activities in my classroom, I saw a HUGE change in student engagement, success and behavior. My assumption that 8th graders would think coloring was stupid was very, very wrong. The first time I gave my students a coloring worksheet as classwork, they looked at me like I was crazy. "But Mrs. Perro, we are in 8th grade. We don't color anymore." My reply, "Oh really? You do today!" Even the students who acted like my coloring worksheets were silly sat there and made sure their work was nothing short of a masterpiece. Did I use up a little bit of instructional time by having them color? Yep, I sure did. Was it worth it? Absolutely. Students in middle school have SO much pressure on them. They're pressured by their bodies, that are changing every single day. They're pressured by their peers to be "cool." They're pressured by their teachers to grow up. They're pressured by coaches and parents to keep grades up and participate in extra curricular activities. Giving them a 5 minute break to color isn't going to make the difference between whether or not they pass or fail that class or that standardized test.

My coloring pages eventually progressed to classroom competition games, puzzles and stations. Yep, stations in 8th grade. Insane right? Nope! My students LOVED being able to get up and move around the classroom. I started working with the theory that, if I was bored making an answer key, my students would be bored doing the work in class. Of course, there's a time and a place for seat work that doesn't involve coloring or scissors. There is a time for formal assessment, independent learning and quiet time. But, there is also a time for fun. I challenge you this school year, if you don't already, to incorporate more hands on activities in your classroom. Whether you teach science, history, Spanish, music, math, or any of the other classes offered in the middle grades, there are plenty of activities you can find or create to keep your students engaged.

Other In The Middle bloggers incorporate Hands on Learning in their classrooms below:

In middle school, if Social Studies isn't hands-on, interactive, and engaging, the kids simply aren't interested.  No matter what the content is, my number one goal is to get students excited and genuinely interested about what they are learning.  In my classroom, students are producers, detectives, and debaters.  We complete video projects and murder mystery investigations, while conducting simulations and class debates.  Students explain ideas and concepts through weekly "town meetings," write historical essays with document-based evidence, and compile weekly learning goal logs where they demonstrate on-going understandings.  To go along with my teaching style, this will be the fifth year my students will be participating in the National History Day program. All of this places students at the center of instruction to create an active, hands-on learning experience.   I am not a lecture teacher.  I am not a textbook teacher.  I am not a PowerPoint teacher.  Not that there is anything "wrong" with these methods, but I simply believe there are better, more interactive ways to get students involved in their learning.  After all, what truly is more exciting: listening to a teacher speak for 45 minutes about what happened on England's first attempt to setup a colony in North America or placing students in the role of CSI investigators as they investigate what happened to the "Lost Colony?  

Science naturally lends itself to hands-on learning, but nothing is more hands-on and current in the science education world than Interactive Notebooks.  While some have been notebooking for years, others are just beginning to try it out in their classrooms.  For those novices just starting out, you may want to consider the Interactive Science Notebook as a different way to take notes, organize information, and provide your students with a one-stop location for all important reference materials. With this in mind, transitioning to interactive notebooks won't be much of a stretch for you.  We all know that middle schoolers are the WORST at keeping up with everything, but your odds of having organized students are drastically increased, simply by having all of the information glued into one location, instead of spread between binders, backpacks, and lockers.  

If you have started using notebooks already, but are looking to do more with them in the current school year, I would suggest checking out these resources:

     

Science Interactive Notebook Resources:

     Science Teaching Junkie’s Interactive Notebook products

     The Science Penguin's Interactive Notebook products

ELA Interactive Notebook Resources:

     Lovin' Lit's Interactive Notebook products

     Middle Grades Maven's Interactive Notebook products

Math Interactive Notebook Resources:

     Lindsay Perro's Foldables and Graphic Organizers

     Runde's Room Interactive Math Journal

Social Studies Interactive Notebook Resources:

     Brain Wrinkles' Reflections for the Interactive Notebook

     To The Square Inch's Interactive Notebook products

If you are the expert at notebooking, I would still encourage you to check out what's new and current out there.  After many years of notebooking, I thought I'd probably seen it all and done it all, but I am continually amazed at the resources being created everyday and the new ideas popping up.  Just two years ago I was shown FlipOuts and I was amazed at the possibilities.  Check out my blog post about FlipOuts.  

Bottom line - continue to learn, grow, and share your knowledge and ideas with other teachers.  Don't be afraid to try something new in your classroom, especially the things that are working well in millions of other classrooms.  Get your students actively learning with Interactive Notebooks!