This May Be a Terrible Idea...But Let's Blog 180

Initially, I was going to write: I don't know if I can do this, it might fail, blah blah blah, but you know what?  Screw the negativity!  Let's make this more positive and just start it off right.  I'm going to do this, it's going to be a thing, and I'll do my darn best.

I'm going to attempt to Blog 180.  But my way.

Basically, they told us about this in grad school.  The concept is to write a post every day of school, which ends up being about 180 days. 

Here's my plan and goal:  I'm going to Cartoon 180.  I have some new notebooks ready to go, and this will be a way for me to reflect on this year and stay creative and push myself to think about my teaching practice.  I have been teaching for 5 years and it needs to happen.  I need to try new stuff and this is how I'm going to attempt to do that and actually record it.  Here's a few things.

1.  I want to do a daily doodle.
2.  Posts will be short.  Usually anyway.
3.  I want to reflect and how things went and not vent.

Hopefully, this will happen, I will love it, and I won't be making extra work for myself.

Ha. Ha. Ha.

Anyway, who else wants to Blog 180 with me?

Let's Make Grading Homework Smarter-Better-Faster-Stronger

I'm a new mom and a teacher, both of which are time consuming and rewarding.  Saying that, I've been trying to find ways to squeeze as much out of my workday in terms of time as I can to make it so I have more time at home focused on family.  I also want to find ways to give students better, more timely and more focused feedback.  Now herein lies a conundrum:  what can I use to do this?  Should I stick with my tried and true homework grading method or should I try a new application of edtech?  Which has the highest benefit to students and myself?

Tried and True
I can't take credit for my current system.  I totally stole parts of it from my mentor teacher when I was a student teacher, old and current teaching team mates.  Each table has a folder.  One side is for students to turn in work, the other side is for returned work.  In the folder are also their Plickers (plickers.com) which they use every day for feedback and attendance.  Right now, I do a quick skim of their homework for completion, give them the appropriate stamp and then enter it into my paper gradebook.  My paper gradebook is actually the seating chart, and I highlight any grade that isn't full credit.  That way, I enter those grades into our online system and autofill full credit for every other student.

Pros: It's fast and efficient to do marking by seating chart.  Students get feedback faster, and I have less of an issue of late work not getting marked as late.  I also have two copies of grades (hard copy and digital) in case a student has an issue and needs to check in with me.

Cons: I have to go through and transfer information from one source to another, which means mistakes happen.  Also, when a student submits late work, I have to mark it on the paper and then remember to transfer it to the digital gradebook.  Basically, there's a larger margin of error with this method.  Anything that has human input tends to have this.

A New Idea
Our school uses a multiple choice system called Gradecam.  It's great for tests and we've just started using for quizzes, and there is a rubric option which we will be using for giving students point values for their short answer questions on tests to eliminate the human adding error I usually have.  I'm pretty good, but I'm not perfect.  I've seen some interesting applications of Gradecam to do lab notebooks and homework by giving students a laminated copy of the form, and I'm curious about this.  The basic idea is you mark their score on the form with an Expo marker, scan it and give them their notebook back.

Pros: Grades get quickly entered into the digital gradebook, and you still have some separation based on like different parts of the criteria if you want if it's a rubric form.  Data is nice.  I like data.  Plus, the lab notebook part sounds awesome.

Cons: There's a lot of work to set up, and I wonder if it would be a new assignment every time and how much planning would it take.  Also, like making Plickers work, would I have to do a ton of paper set up as well?  Like the laminated ones sounded fantastic, but how much work is that for me.

Online Homework
A few other options could be based around the concept of online assignments.  One would be to buy a license through a company and have students complete all work through that.  Another would be to have them upload those assignments to Google Classroom or Turnitin.com, both which have really strong submission softwares.  It's becoming increasingly easy for kids to do work on their computers, and with an increase in touch screens on like everything (including this laptop), showing work is easier than ever. 

Pros: Less paper is always good, for me and them.  I already use Google Classroom for a ton of stuff, and Webassign has a database of problems that we could just pick through.  I also had a few students submit their homework accidentally on Google Classroom early on, so they already have a concept of how to do it.

Cons:  Programs like Webassign are costly, and I wouldn't want to make a ton more work or equity issues for students who might not have the ability to scan/photograph work and upload it.  Kids are also so used to turning in hard copies, I feel like a few weird errors would come up that I couldn't foresee.

My Conclusion as of Right Now

As it stands, I'm sticking with tried and true.  I am going to meet with some teachers that have used some of these methods to streamline work submission and get advice for next year.  I might try a few things out, like making some online Google Form quizzes and see if that would be realistic to do.  I also have made a form for students to create like "problem write ups," so that could be fun to play around with.  Basically, we have a work in progress, but I like feeling inspired by this kind of stuff.

Because I am a weirdo.

Year 4-HOW DID THIS HAPPEN

Why hello there world.  It's been a while.  School year has started, I'm teaching a single prep this year, which is a big change, and it's my fourth year teaching.

Fourth year.  Let that sink in.  Because it's still weird to me and it's week 5 at school.

Statistically speaking, the fourth year is about when teachers start to leave the profession due to burn out.  And I have seen this happen.  A good friend of mine gave me a ton of equipment because they are no longer going to be in the classroom, which I found somewhat heartbreaking.  The person is one of the best teachers I knew from my early camp days, but this does happen for many reasons.

Which brings me to why I'm writing this.  How did I get here?  How did I become one of the ones who sticks with it?  I think it's luck as much as skill.  I went into teaching with no illusions on what a teacher's life looks like.  My dad was a teacher, my mother-in-law is a teacher, my grandmother was a teacher's aide, my great-grandmother was a teacher.  It's genetic and in my family.  I also have had a lot of support through various programs I've found, like SFTR and the Exploratorium Teacher Institute.

I kind of hope to act as a beacon for some of my friends who are just starting their teaching journey.  A realistic beacon.  Teaching doesn't get easier, you just learn more and get better.  Ask for help, be authentic and listen.

I don't quite feel like this is year four because I did switch schools.  But it is better than my first year.  I have great coworkers who love and support me and genuinely want me to be successful, and I want the exact same thing for them.  One of them has seen me at some low points this year, which speaks more to how much I trust her than anything else.

In teaching, to stay you need love and support.  If you don't have it where you are, try and find it as soon as you can.  The world needs good teachers, even if it doesn't act like it.

Animating and Physics

I just realized that, while my title has both animation and education, this has been fairly one sided.  So, for my new Exploratorium followers that I name dropped this blog to (Hi!), this is for you.

First, the basics of animation.  A really great video to start with is a Ted Talk on animation.  It shows some cool examples of different types, because I feel people forget that animation is not just Mickey Mouse.

What I do in my class is show them the basics of animation and then talk about vectors.  The powerpoint, as I went over it in a demo, needs a lot of work, but the basic idea is fun.  Students need to be able to add the velocity vectors to the bouncing ball path as well as acceleration vectors.  A common issue with acceleration in this case is that students forget what acceleration they're really working with and which direction.  After this assessment, they seemed to understand better about vectors and gravity.
Animation Presentation
Basically:
1.  Introduce animation
2.  Discuss vectors
3.  Practice with bouncing ball
4.  Add colorful vectors to bouncing ball

What you end up with is some really cool artwork for the classroom.

I'm Still Here

And by still here, I mean in the classroom. This year so far has been NUTS.  Like legitimately a ton of work.  This is a short post for me to say that more regular ones shortly.  Today, all I want to go home.  I'm stoked by how much planning I got done for the week. I've really gotten into the habit of going through my little planner and typing things up and writing, writing, writing.  I grade, I write, I grade, I write, I sleep and I am so lucky to have an amazing family.  I promise next entry will be funnier.  I'm nothing if not funny.  Well, cute.  Well, spunky.  Let's just say I'm a snarky sassmaster, a title I have stolen from my boyfriend.

Like a Kettle, But Not of Fish

Fair warning, these may become less frequent.  It hppens for many reasons, but I still plan to write.  It's a nice outlet for what happens and how it makes me feel.

Right now, thinking about two things: one, planning my first activity all by myself, which I will lead 3 times, and two, I got upset yesterday.  The students came in from lunch riled up and talking over me, and so I kind of yelled to be heard over them.  I gave them a talk, trying to remain in the restorative justice theme, about my feelings and how I know they can do better and I want to see them do better.  For the most part, it seemed to work.  I don't know how much they understood, so the impact may have been tiny.  My demo teacher said I did the right thing, as did another teacher I spoke with.  I really hope I did.  The language thing can be so tough, and students love to play around with science, and it can be fun, when it's safe and directions are being followed.

Part two of my current anxiety is the activity I planned.  It's the first one I'm doing all on my own, and here's hoping it works.  I tried to focus on making it relevant to their lives and a phenonmenon that they can all relate to, which is moving furniture.  They move the chairs beneath them every single day, they push tables and desks arounds rooms.  I think it may work, and I'm hopeful.  But anxious.

Getting Visual

So my job was to mod yesterday's lesson plan to suit me.  I turned the page into a worksheet, which we shall call part 1.  I also made large visual aides about distance and displacement, which we shall call part 2.  Or part a and part b.  Reminds me of a good joke.  "What comes before part b...?" "PART-AAAAY."  I digress.  

Anyway, part a/1 was beneficial because it made it so they didn't have to copy everything down and have misunderstandings.  The was nice for all of us involved.  Part 2/b was awesome because I got to draw something and it eactly helped them understand easier.  And I got to talk about Superman and how he follows displacement vectors when he's trying to save people and it kind of made my day, even if it didn't resonate with some students.  Overall, it felt good.

A Walk to the Park

Today's activity was using vectors on maps and talking about distance and displacement.  Honestly, I feel like this would have been a stronger activity earlier, but what are you going to do.  It makes vectors more relevant to their lives, especially when you add a story to it.  Which I always do.  I spent most of  the day with one student in particular.  She's having a difficult time with the language and so taking directions for her is hard.  Giving directions to her is no picnic either.  But little by little, we got her there.  Overall this class has a lot of bright students, some with more drive than others.  The GATE identified boy just could not care less.  His work is becoming sloppier, and I know it's because he needs more of a challenge, but what can we do to challenge him without giving him significantly more work than the other students?  I suppose we could modify it so it's more challenging, but I don't know exactly how that would work with the language thing.  

I feel like half of my dreams are in Spanish now.  Or the Chinese I hear every day on the bus about exiting through the rear doors.

Adding Even More Vectors

Powerpoint is a weird animal.  Sometimes it's useful, sometimes it's a tease.  Today, it was fairly helpful for me.  I love in my class doing chorus responses.  They love to tell me when I'm being ridiculous, and I love when they do that.  It adds to the interaction between us.  So we did the whiteboard vector adding activity, and I must say I was impressed.  I love how they talk to each other and get help from one another, often in their home language or across cultural lines.  For the most part, they seemed to understand what was going on with adding vectors.  I think almost all of them got about 70% of the problems right on the worksheet.  The things I kept repeating were "nose and tail."  "Every vector has a nose."  "Where's the nose?"  I think I tapped my nose so many times, it may have turned reddish.

Blast from the Past

I love that as the blog has gone on, I have seriously lost count of how many days of school there have been.  Like, I have no clue.  I could go back through and check, but what would the point of that be?  

Anyway day of the field trip.  I waited for the seniors in the gym at my most recent alma mater and as one rounded the corner, she yelled out my name.  Here's what I really love about highschoolers above all else:  they don't hug me.  I love that they are happy to see me, but I love even more that they don't hug me.  This was a field trip for a college fair, which was neat for me to see at my old college.  However, at this point most seniors know where they are going to apply, so this felt a little late.  But it was a great way to transition into my long weekend.

A Fade into a Long Weekend

So Friday is a field trip for both groups of students, and so we couldn't let the periods get out of order. Therefore, today's class engaged in the age old time spender:  a video!  To be exact, Mythbusters.  Not sure what they got out of it, and I'm guessing we'll find out when we read the homework.  Overall, because there wasn't a whole lot of teaching going on, not much to report.

My Turn

There is nothing more awkward than standing up in front of a classroom when students are unresponsive.  How does it feel, you ask?  Like standing in front of a group of unresponsive people.  Let's not get too terribly poetic about it.  Anyway, my ability to relate language to the students has become stronger, so I felt understood and I used wait time, which is powerful.  Students need time to think, but man do you feel your time get eaten away rather quickly.  

Anyway, the activity overal went over well, but they had less time in the classroom to do the vector worksheet, so we shall see next week who finished it and who didn't.  They may have time then to finish it if it wasn't done, but I doubt it.  It's up to them to finish it.  I'm trying to decide if I'm doing right by them sometimes.  I have a lot of growing to do, and I don't want to drag down my students because of it.  

On a lighter note, my boy with some of the weakest language just absolutely loves math and so this portion is ringing true with him.  It's amazing how universal a language math can be sometimes.  As a literacy, it's one of my favorite to have.  I don't know what I personally would do without mathematics.

On to My Favorite Things

Here they come!

The moment every physics teacher loves and hates...

VECTORS!!!!

Why do we love them, you ask?  When understood, there is nothing more useful in the world.  Why do we hate them?  Understanding vectors takes a ton of time that most classes don't have.  The activity we did today felt pretty good though.  We walked different steps in the vector process, and the students seemed pretty engaged in it.  I don't know how well it was related to them that what we did today was look at components to vectors and drawing based on that.  I'm hoping in this class we will be looking mostly at vectors in the cardinal direction, but we shall see.  The students in this class (second period) seem to react well to direct instruction.  Their language is a bit higher than the other class, so things in general seem to go faster.  Most even finished the worksheet by the end of the period.  They were also pretty quick to give directions to each other, which was part of the in class activity that was very heavily language based.

Feeling Doctory

For Friday, I did rounds, and so I wasn't directly with my students that day.  I got to observe different classes around my school.  Always fun, and it reminded of how much I love love love calculus.  Which is a lot.  I also got to connect more with some of the classmates I see less often, so that was amusing. I know this is a short response, but it's due to the fact that I wasn't in the classroom too much this day.  If you're worried about my students, it was the second day of unit exam, so they didn't miss me much.

Testing 1-2-3

Not a great deal to report today.  We had the first unit exam, and it went overall well.  We did have a bit of a snafu with someone copying someone else's test and talking, so he received a zero.  How do I know he copied?  Every single answer was identical to the boy sitting next to him for the multiple choice, which is all he answered.  We try to have a collaborative classroom culture, but tests are individual affairs.  It's the weird nature of tests, and while I was a good test-taker, that's not a common trait in students.  I think a test is ok, but you have to understand what you're assessing and how to communicate that to your students.

Rolling Dice, Not in the Alley

Another day of the board game, but this time, as we say in poker, the students were all in (See what I did there.  Clever?)  In this class, the students tend to work together better and followed most directions better.  While they were louder, it was a good louder.  There was a great deal less catcalling and putdowns and it was really wonderful to watch.  I didn't mind talking over them actually, because their discussions were based on answers to the questions.  Some students had some issues with understanding and lost a bit of focus during the game, but we started a sub game for him where he would roll the dice for me and guess how much he would roll.  I think the next step to this activity would be to keep track of how many times each number was rolled and how many times he was correct, and use that to do math stuff later.

The last period, of course, was faster moving.  We even got to watch some Mythbusters.  So much less stressful.  For the most part they're so mellow and it's very relaxing.  Good way to end my long day.    

A Duck Above Water

I understand how the government is supposed to function.  I took civics courses in high school and college, I get it.  I know the history, I know the meaning of our laws and why they are the way they are. However, this fact doesn't make it any easier when the government is shut down for the day and it actually affects the way class runs.  The aide we were supposed to use was on a goverment website, which of course was down.  So I ran around like a crazy person for my own health, after waking up late and being a tad stressed and tired.  I woke up when I'm usually supposed to catch my bus, so I had to drive.  Knocked me off kilter more than I thought it would.  And then I messed up my breakfast and spilled my juice for lunch.  I just feel like nothing was going right.  Luckily, there was a back up video, that a good portion of the class slept through.  At least a back up plan existed at all.  

Second period was a classwide game, and my kindergartener was at his best.  I have never in my life had to tell a student about the age of 8 multiple times "Take that out of your mouth.  It's yucky and dirty."  Seriously, he's mentally 5.   And he was gloating with his team all the time, and mouthing off so he perpetually lost points for his team, which his competitive teammates did not appreciate.  He wore me out.  I wish there were activities that I loved as much as the students.  This game grew on me, but I think it was the personalities in the class that just wore me down.  And not even all of them!  Just those boys in that group.  I dedicate my nap later to them.  

A Treatise in How to Stay Sane

It's interesting to see my perspective shift as I go from student to teacher.  The biggest shift: birthday cake.  It was a student's birthday today, and she brought in a tres leches cake.  It was my first tres leches cake, and it was pretty good.  If you haven't had the priviledge to try one, it's like a sponge cake that is soaked in sweetened and codensed milk and topped with whipped cream frosting.  Pretty tasty.  Anyway, it would be an understatemet to say that students were distracted by the cake.  They lost all concentration on their unit review for the most part.  The focused students remained focused, the non-focused became even more excitable.  Most students had to take the worksheet home to finish it on their own time, but that's ok.  When I was their age, I loved the easier days when cake came in.  Now, I'm a little depressed about it because I know work won't get done, even if it makes the kids happier.

The next class, my primary, was more focused.  They also have a better community for learning.  They tend to help each other more, and there's more cross-cultural friendships.  I sat a Latino boy next to a Chinese boy, and they were so happy to be next to each other.  So the title was how to stay sane: find joy in the small things.  I love watching my students work together and I love when they teach me their language and I can teach them mine.  It's not exactly what I would assume to be culturally conscious teaching, but I feel like we're making more connections, which seems to help them work together better.  

Teaching is so much about feeling for your students.  It's like  being a raw nerve a lot of the time, feeling exactly what's going on with your kids and yourself.  I now understad my father a lot better.  Both of us feeling things deeply, but don't show it to others often out of survival.  I care, I just can't show it often, and that is both a strength and a weakness.

Surprise!

So my lesson on Wednesday that I thought was a bomb...wasn't.  You can imagine my shock face.  Wide eyes and all.  Most of my students got more than half of a very substantial worksheet.  And by most, I mean all but one.  I guess it meant that they just needed to digest the information and practice. I'm ot sure how much they enjoyed it, because this is not something many do end up enjoying.  I'm just glad they got something out of it.  Later in the day was a tad disappointing though.  I wish I could just sleep on my classes and get somehting out of it.

Uh...Stabbing?

I know the title is kind of scary, but don't worry.  None of my blood was shed, nor that of my students.  It was a crazy thing, someone came down yelling "Security!  Security!"  All I saw after that was my friend and fellow studet teacher protecting a bit of blood spatter on the ground.  All of my kids came into class shaken up and a bit scared, but they did start on their work pretty efficiently.  Turns out it was  a fight that resulted in a bloody nose for one boy.  I was more worried about my own kids, so I just did my best to help them through a worksheet they had and fiish up some other work that had to be done.  This was a day when my professional life was overwhelmed by my own scholastic life.  I wish that my classes were more directly supportive of my school day.  I just feel like there's so may things going on that bog me down outside of everything, that I lose focus occasionaly.  It's rough, it really is, and it can hurt my performance in everything.  Just got to keep moving forward.