Pre-Test and an Outlier

     I learned today that students really need a good understanding of the purpose of a pre-test. I gave them a “show what you know,” as I called it, for morning work today and they didn’t quite seem to get the point. I handed the paper to each one as they came in, and told them, since they have certain duties to take care of when they first get there, “once you get settled in, answer what you can and write any questions about the topic (The American Civil War) you would like to find out about. This is just a little ‘show what you know’ pre-test to help me plan for the Civil War unit.” Some of them went straight into a panic and some of them wouldn’t have even touched it if the teacher and I had not kept reminding them of it. I was hoping it would be something casual enough for them to not worry, and they would be responsible enough to take care of it. I was wrong. Everyone got it done, but it was like pulling teeth for half the class that was either worried too much, or didn’t care enough. I really think this is due to the possibility that nobody has ever really explained to them the real purpose of a pre-test. It also wasn’t multiple choice like the scantron pre-tests they have been taking for the past two weeks. It could also be that a pre-test is not good morning work. I’ll have to explain things to them when a good opportunity arises, and everyone is in the room, and then see how the next pretest goes.

     Our advanced math class took a quiz over the rules of division for 2, 3, 5, 9, and 10. Nobody in the class scored what they could have potentially scored. We explained to them today that the quiz grade was not going to be recorded, and then we showed them their quizzes. Nobody was happy. We explained how they are all smart, but sometimes quick and easy is chosen over thorough. They were allowed to use the rules they had written down for those five numbers, but I do not believe anyone actually used them. Many of them also rushed to “sure” answers without checking for other possibilities. After explaining these things to them, we gave them the same quiz, but with different numbers to test the divisibility rules of the above five numbers, and the class grades increased by an average of 20-30 percent. Unfortunately, there is one student who did not improve any. If someone is talking to him about a procedure, rule, or algorithm, he completely understands and can explain it back to that person. However, when it comes time to do actual pencil to paper work, it’s almost like he is subconsciously, or consciously, refusing to do what he knows how to do, and take the easiest (which ends up being incorrect) rout. My mentor teacher and I have been discussing possible ways of improving this situation.

Surprise!

     My mentor teacher was a part of an unofficial, observation, of which he was not informed. It was neat to see, but I found myself getting just as nervous as when I am being observed. It only lasted about twenty minutes because it was an informal observation. It was the principal and vice principal observing, and they each had Ipads to record information on or use as a check list. They observed my mentor while he was addressing the whole group. When it was time for a student work period, they began to ask students questions. I heard them ask what the children were learning about, what standard was being covered, or even questions about the specific problems on which they were working. There was no interaction with the teacher, only students. It was quite funny to see the student look up at the standard then back to the AP and recite it to her word for word. How else would we know the student is learning, right?

     I believe we will get to start working on our second piece of writing tomorrow. We did an organization activity today, working with organizing your ideas by content. The lead teacher read When I was Young in the Mountains, and then we made idea webs about a specific topic, or content, about ourselves. I didn’t get to talk to the writing coach afterwards, but I am predicting we will be using our idea webs to develop personal narratives.

     We finally finished Scantron testing, a norm reference test, today. What I’ve learned from this is that apparently you have to take away the kids learning time in order to see what they should be learning. We’ve missed three days of science and social studies because of this test, and the kicker is, half the kids don’t want to be taking the test and know it doesn’t count towards their grade so they just blow through it, doing poorly, and you don’t get a true reading. There will be little correlation between the test scores and what a lot of these children actually know or can do.

     One thing that I am taking home from lit centers today is that a vocal, creative group is certainly a great thing, but I’m going to have to figure out some way to make sure the imaginations are focused and we can chase a few less rabbits. It’s a golden problem as I like to say.

One Can Make a Difference

     We received a twenty third student today. The student is not new to our school, but this is the first time he has been there this year. The most important lesson I learned today is that one can make a difference. Nothing bad happened today, but it’s easy to see the wheels turning for some drama. The kid has done nothing wrong and seems like a pretty nice guy. Where the potential problem lies is the influence he has. He seems to be pretty popular with the rest of the class. So, it didn’t take long to see some of the girls become a little flirty and some of the other guys trying to act too cool for school to impress him.  I believe we will be working hard to engage our new student because, if he does have some pull with some of the others, we can hopefully turn this into a positive instead of a negative. I really hope to have him in my reading group because we have all been really open about our ideas and have enjoyed it. I think if he can take an active role in my reading group, it could translate into the classroom where everyone can be influenced.

      On another note, we did an activity in writing that I really enjoyed. The focus was “organizing your ideas.” The lead teacher gave an overview of four common ways writers order their writing: time, space, perspective, and content. After doing think-pair-share to discuss what each was in their own words, the children wrote on a post-it which way they like or think they are best. We all then posted our note on the board in the particular category, and told the class why we chose that category. This gave the kids an opportunity to thing about which organizational approach may be best for them, and we all got a better understanding of what each approach means when we explain why we chose a certain strategy.

Eventful Day

            I am currently at the SLC (MLC) so that I can have internet to post. I have not had internet at home for the past two days. No good…

Second day of Lit Circle and it went pretty great. We didn’t get to finish reading the chapter we are on because the kids kept making so many great connections, predictions, and inferences. I had sticky notes in my book to remind me to bring up certain topics or make certain worldly connections, but I didn’t even get to use half of them…because they were bringing up these topics and issues themselves!

Example one:  I had written a note to myself to bring up the issue of population control in China as it relates to the novel we are reading. Two pages before I was going to do that, we inferred there must be some kind of rule that parents can only have a certain amount of kids. At that moment, one of the students said something along the lines of, “Isn’t it like in China where parents can only have a certain amount of kids and they have to pay for or get rid of any other kids they have?” To say the least, I was pretty darn excited to hear that student bring it up instead of me.

          Example two:  A wonderful text-to-world, and possibly text-to-self, connection. He brought up the topic of government assistance, but in other words.  He was thinking that maybe, in the book, the government was limiting the number of children per family because the government didn’t want to have to give families extra money because they had a lot of kids. Another student then asked if that was like “when parents get money back from the government a couple of weeks after new year (assistance and/or tax returns). It’s amazing to see what knowledge of such mature matters these kids have that I certainly did not have a clue about when I was that age.

          I could go on about lit circle, but I won’t. Another great part of our day was when the DARE officer came. I could tell the kids really look up to him, and I believe he has the kind of personality and position in the community to have a very positive effect on them.

         The day ended with a professional learning staff meeting on “cultural awareness.” I have had lots of lessons on cultural awareness at UGA and learned so many things. I was a little weary at first because I thought I would be hearing the same things one more time. However, the discussion leader brought up a couple of perspectives and issues that I had never heard of or thought about. We got to discuss things in small groups so it was nice to get to somewhat participate in the meeting.

Wednesdays are now officially “Data Team” days. We meet in the morning during planning and in the afternoon after school. We have pretty much been discussing tracking of student progress and trying to figure out a model for ELT. The purpose of data team, from what I can gather, is to track the student’s progress in math and see what kind of accommodations they need to receive during ELT. I don’t know if ELT was originally set up this way, but it is basically an extra math period at my school. Even though Reading, and starting this year, science, are a part of the CRCT, math seems to be the main focus at this school, and I am assuming this county.

On a less “red tapeish” note, the students put on skits that they have been preparing to portray amendments 2-6 of the Bill of Rights. They were of course goofy and couldn’t keep from laughing most of the time (I almost couldn’t contain myself at times also), the groups presenting seemed to hit the nail on the head. The group presenting the right to a fair and speedy trial did really well once they got done laughing through the awkwardness of being in front of everyone. Their trail was very speedy, and it ended with the judge asking if the verdict seems fair. If only we got the same treatment for speeding tickets…

We had science centers today to explore microorganisms. Each group seemed to enjoy the station they were at. There were a few technology stations and physical “creating of a cell station” the kids seemed to really enjoy. I think many of them still have trouble associating computers with learning because whenever the kids are using them, they just want to know how they can win…even when there’s no competition. That could be what they are use to at home.

A couple kids who are in my reading group asked if they could read ahead since they finished chapter one and their job last night. I kind of wanted to say no so everyone could stay on the same pace, but in the end I decided it would be worse to stifle their excitement for reading. So, I told them they could read the next two chapters that we would be reading in our next meeting, and they had to bring questions along with them for us to discuss after reading as a group.

Gots me a readin group!

Today, we started reading groups. I’ve been very excited about this because, even though it’s a small group, I get to lead teach them, and I really enjoy literature.

Now that we have had our first day, I am even more excited! The groups have been made according to ability, but not strictly determined by or limited to that. I have a group of four mid-range ability students. However, I can already sense great things coming from these guys. These four guys always have an opinion or inference about something so I know our discussions will be great, and probably more challenging for me to accommodate them then for them to contribute. I really believe we will all push each other.

Since this was our first day, I allowed them to come up with some rules and guidelines specifically for OUR reading group. Not just, “Mr. Cooper’s Group.” A couple of great ideas they came up with were to have sticky notes present for observations during reading group, and establish an order at the beginning of each meeting so everyone gets a chance to read, and they will know when they read. After those great ideas and more, I knew I probably wouldn’t need to worry about my ideas, but I gave them a few guidelines that I believe should always be explicitly stated in this kind of intimate setting where we can feel vulnerable reading aloud and sharing ideas and inferences: Respect for the reader/speaker. Respect for others ideas, although it is okay to politely disagree. Complete our lit circle jobs for the week (literary luminary, connector, summarizer, vocab enricher, and illustrator). And finally, but very important, keep an open mind about what we are reading.

Next, we dove right into the middle of the story. Nope, that’s not a typo. The first two pages we read were 66 pages into the book. One of our current main focuses in reading is “conflict/resolution.” This excerpt had a great short example of that to get them ready to identify the main conflict once we began reading from the beginning. I also selected this excerpt because it was a pretty intense moment in the novel and I knew it would grab their attention, and hopefully get them excited about the book. The guys quickly identified the conflict and how it was resolved, and we are now off to the races with chapter 1!

This novel will also be a great connection for the Bill of Rights unit we are on in SS right now. I can't wait till one of them makes that text-to-world connection! 

Here is a link to our novel Among the Hidden, by Margaret Haddix:

http://www.haddixbooks.com/books/hidden.html

What does it make when we assume?

MONDAY:

I had a pretty valuable lesson reinforced today. Never assume what the students know and do not know.

During ELT we did a couple of place value activities, and I figured this would just be review for everyone and we would be able to move onto the next number sense topic. I have the feeling my mentor teacher and the support team teacher who was in the room at that time had the same feeling as well. Turns out I was wrong. We played a game with two teams, 10 on each team. Each student had a large number, any digit 0-9. When the teacher called out a number, 342,891 for example, the teams had to order themselves to make that number. In short, mistakes were made by the children when lining up. Even the ones who seem to have a pretty good grasp on everything dealing with place value didn’t seem confident enough to help their team correct mistakes in their order. The biggest problem seemed to be putting a 0 where it shouldn’t be or leaving one out to fill an empty place value.

After the game was over, we went over a couple of examples similar to the ones they were having trouble with in the game. After an explanation, it seemed to either click with, or come back to, some of the students. Still, after doing a group activity today there were a few students getting a little mixed up when including, or not including, a zero.

Listless Student List

Now that I have been in my class for five total days, I feel I know all the students so I will try this suggested reflective practice from the syllabus:  From memory, try to list the name of every student in your classroom.  Who do you name first?  Who is forgotten?  What might this tell you about your interactions about certain students?

Because I am posting on the internet, I won’t list all the student’s names, but I was successful in listing all 22 with pen and paper.

The first student that came to mind was “Brad.” Brad sits in front of my desk, is the largest kid in the class, and has one of the largest personalities. I have had time to get to know him because he is near to me and can be a little mischievous, but still has a great personality. He is bright and fairly charismatic at times. He is often singing quietly, or loudly at times, likes to joke, and horse around in line, or whenever he has something up his sleeve. When it comes to academics, when Brad is on, he is on. He is actually the one who came up with the interpretation about the picture from my 8/15/11 post. He is in the advanced math class, enjoys when we read aloud, and can comprehend very well. These qualities, however, only prevail when he is “on,” as a said earlier. Sometimes, Brad can “space out” pretty intensely. Every now and then, I can look at him and tell he has slipped of f to somewhere else in his mind. When that happens, he doesn’t even hear what’s going on. I feel like he may be a child who, even if his grades aren’t great in class, he is bright enough to test well.  He is also a very likeable child that really knows how to use his personality.

I did not leave anyone out, but the last child I listed was Tamia. Tamia is actually a very good student and has a likeable personality. However, she doesn’t have many questions and never looks to be distressed. She is certainly one student I should spend more time with to get to know her. I know she enjoys dancing from what I’ve seen at recess, and she aspires to be 4-H president. That’s all I can really say about her. This tells me I am not spending enough time with her outside, or inside, of class. I have only seen a couple samples of her work because she never raises her hand for help, so I should be checking in more on her and a couple others similar to her.

Speaking of 4-H, elections are coming up soon. Children began to write their speeches for whatever offices they are running for. Most are excited, but pretty laid back about it, but there are a few who are completely stressed about the election. One child was getting very upset while trying to write her speech today when she realized some people were finishing and she only had a couple lines so far. I let her know she shouldn’t worry because the more thought she put into it, the better it would probably be, and she could probably even get her parents to help her point out her good qualities.

Well, today was a pretty hectic day in some areas, but it was also a pretty productive day in other areas.

I’ll begin with the former. One child had a really tough day due to one instance that he could not put behind him. Here’s the scenario: It’s ELT time, around 10:00, my mentor teacher is speaking with another student, I am on the other side of the room helping another student, and then I hear something along the lines of, “John Doe, go pull your red strip,” the child then raises voice to teacher in a fairly disrespectful manner. I then also hear, “and pull a green strip for being disrespectful.” I have never seen a fifth grader shut down or cry so much. I can’t say it was because the teacher was too stern or unfair at all, but perhaps the child is use to getting his way or is worried about punishment at home. A little later that day during the science lesson, the child tried to plead his case to the teacher, and the teacher told him that it wasn’t a good time and he should come talk at a more appropriate time when a lesson is not in progress. The child shut down and began to cry again. When it was time to pack up and get ready to leave, I was in charge of signing agendas, where the color of the strips children had to pull is indicated. Unfortunately, this sent him into his final spiral. After I signed his agenda, he began to plead his case to me. I tried to sympathize with him, and then tell him to, if there’s a next time he has to pull a strip, accept it for the time being and wait for a good time to discuss the situation with the teacher.  This was not what he wanted to hear so the crying continued all the way to the bus. It ended up being about a 5 minute walk for him and me to walk about ninety yards down the hall…

On a positive note, again dealing with classroom and hallway management, the class made some positive strides today.  For one, transitions were addressed again today. After a noisy first transition, the teacher set up a system on the board (pretty much a 3 strikes deal), where if the kids couldn’t transition quietly and quickly, they would spend recess time practicing. While my mentor teacher was addressing transitions, he went ahead and addressed hallway behavior, setting up the same system. I don’t really care for recess time being taken away, but it seems to be the most popular leverage for many teachers. However, I will say the transitions and hallway behavior for the rest of the day were the best so far. Let’s hope the system and behaviors can remain consistent.

Another positive for today was reading and writing time. During reading, the children were learning the job of “vocabulary enricher” for when we begin reading groups. The teacher read a chapter from, The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe, to the class and they were to list unfamiliar words and the page numbers they were on. After reading, children shared their words with the class, and we all went back to the page and used context clues to figure out their meanings. This was a positive experience because the children were all pretty excited to find out what their words meant, and asked if they could do that for extra reading homework tonight (along with a request for a bonus, but hey, it’s a step forward).

In writing, the children were given time to work on a “Challenge Piece,” where they were given three images the day before, and they are challenged to create an imaginative narrative connecting ideas inspired from the three pictures. The children, my mentor, and I, were so into the writing, all you could hear were sniffs, coughs, and pencil on paper. This is not an extended piece, but just an exercise for practicing generating ideas, but I am excited to see what they have come up with when they publish by Friday!

ST

Today, the second day, I was able to begin to start getting a sense of certain small things. For example, I was able to get a sense of how some students will truly act. One girl who is very pleasant, will always act very pleasant, including the times when she is lying to you about something. Another girl is very bright and can become bored before moving on to the next section or example, and miss small things.

I have also been able to catch on to some things that pertain to teaching and classroom management. Transitions are hard. Period. During the afternoon, we have three subjects in a row. It’s probably pretty tough to have all materials prepared for the next subject so there will be some down time while things are being prepared. Even when the kids are given a task during that time, they still get fidgety and chatty, making it hard to get the next lesson started once everything is prepared. This is one thing that I am apprehensive about when looking forward to my full time teaching.

Thus far, my class seems to get along pretty well with each other. This works out nicely because there aren’t constant arguments disrupting class. However, when everyone gets along they like to chat and joke too much, and going back to the transitions, that can sometimes be a problem. I don’t say this to be misleading, because my mentor and I love to joke around and have fun with the kids. The kids just haven’t figured out the appropriate time for certain things. That’s the only reason I bring that up. Also, another golden problem is that many of the students love to read, but they can distract themselves with it during inappropriate times.

To end this post, I will tell about a fun activity we did today. It was titled, “Willy Wonka Needs Your Help!” My mentor teacher was able to integrate Math and Literature into this activity, which made it all the more fun. He read a passage from Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, where Willy Wonka was sending out boxes of chocolate bars. The children then had to arrange tiles in as many ways possible to make an array for a certain multiple, thus finding all the factors of that multiple. They then cut out grid paper with the dimensions of their arrays and glued it to construction paper to be hung on the walls as references.

The First Day and the Official First Day

I attended the first day of school this past Monday. It was pretty hectic. I think what I took most from the experience is that teachers probably need more than one week of pre-planning if you wish to be close to fully prepared on the first day. I believe this is largely due to new mandates of required curriculum that everyone is expected to keep pace with. So, it becomes a team effort since you have to stay together as teachers and assistants. If it were just one person planning for one class, you could do that on your own throughout the summer, but with so much collaboration needed, it’s hard to get it all done in one week.

Today was my first official day. I tried to spend time getting to know different students whenever opportunities presented themselves. Media center time was great for this because many of them needed help searching for a book on the new search engine, “Destiny Quest,” which is a great way for children to research books and locate them in the library.  When they were having trouble deciding, a natural question that helps me get to know some of them was, “What are you interested in or like to do?”

I got my first great surprise when a kid, who is usually a goofball and not very serious, gave a wonderful interpretation of a photograph during writing today. Here’s the image:

The student said, and I’m paraphrasing, “It looks dark behind him, where he is coming from, like he might have had a bad life there. In front of him, it looks like there is light, like it might be brighter and a better place for him to go and have a good life.”  I could not help but be impressed and wonder if they had previously studied “light and dark” themes/representations, or possibly from what experiences this student could have been drawing.

Something else that I have quickly noticed, as far as teacher duties goes, is that there lots of meetings involved in such a collaborative effort. Just today we had a morning planning meeting with all fifth grade teachers, interventionists, and special ed. teachers. During planning, there was a data team meeting with the Principal and Asst. Principal.  Also, to end the day, another data team meeting that did not include the Principal or Asst. Principal.