Now, transparency as an adjective describing the bulging handbag slung over a shoulder detailing all the sordid details of one’s life – not so good.  But transparency during waiting is good.  Apparently, Starbucks has started steaming each customer’s milk individually.  This new way of producing coffee actually takes longer but customers appreciate seeing each step of their coffee and are willing to wait it out.  Now, this I can relate to.  Not to Starbucks, mind you – I’m more of a Panera gal myself.  But with Kayak.  Have you every looked for flights on Kayak?  Those flipping windows telling me which airlines they are currently checking with – they certainly keep me engaged in the process.  Now, I realize that they are not actually checking with the airline at that exact moment.  No, more likely than not, it’s just the sweet mouse inside my computer running around his wheel.  But the fact, remains that the transparency of the situation makes me feel better as a consumer.

Let’s talk about this satisfied and comfortable feeling a customer gets as their milk is being foamed and they see each step of their coffee being made.  In reality, just how transparent is this?  Did customers see the beans being picked, roasted, or shipped.  Customers don’t actually see much of their coffee production.  This transparency, despite garnering warm and fuzzy feelings, is essentially fake transparency.

All of this got me thinking – lots of time to think on flights, as your legs are cramping up and the drink cart is still 7 rows away.  I’ve always been a fan of rubrics – particularly student created or student friendly rubrics.  Rubrics like this:

tell students exactly what they need to do in order to be at or above grade level – the expectations are transparent.  Does a student know what they are likely going to score on their assignment?  Yes.  Did the teacher have to throw the papers down the stairs to randomly assign grades?  No.  Did it matter whether the teacher had made it to Starbucks that day to enjoy their transparently made coffee and was feeling the love?  No.  Rubrics like the one above are transparent.  I like them.

‘Rubrics’ like this, my friends:

ARE. NOT. RUBRICS.  Yes, despite the word rubric in the title.

Rubrics allow increased consistency in assessment and provide students with specific feedback about work.  What does ‘organized plan’ mean in the rubric above?  What does the student have to do to get 2 points for an organized plan in the rubric above?  A paper could score 1 or 2 points depending on the amount of caffeine in one’s system or whether dinner had been overcooked that night.

It comes back to transparency.  Assessment of standards is not about arbitrary numbers or a sweet and cuddly feeling about a student’s handwriting or whether the paper was not wrinkled.  Did the student meet grade level standards?  Yes or No.  Should we be making these expectations known to students ahead of time?  Yes, yes, and yes. The pseudo rubric above is, in reality, fake transparency.  Students are given a ‘rubric’ but said rubric does little to help them adjust their performance.

The moral of the story?  As educators we must be transparent with students.  No gimmicks, no tricks, just plain old levels of performance based on actual expectations shared with students.  And the best transparent rubric, in my mind?  The kind where students help create the expectations for the rubric.  More often than not, I find that students have very high expectations and are hard on themselves.  And why shouldn’t they have high expectations for themselves?  But that, my friends, is a different blog post …

Happy Week!

No related posts.

I spent the summer of 2002 in London, alternating between shopping on the high street, reading Guiding Readers and Writers, playing solitaire on our laptop, and enjoying pub dinners – I know!  Who could ask for more?  The first time I read GR&W I read it from start to finish – for 2 reasons: 1) I was genuinely interested in drastically changing my literacy instruction (and GR&W was the latest rage); 2) There was no way I was lugging that book across the Atlantic and not reading it.  Each subsequent summer, I’ve browsed GW&W as a refresher referring to certain sections only.

Some of the changes I made that September were:

-all students (and myself) had a writer’s notebook

-Writing Workshop would operate in a 3 part structure (Mini Lesson, Writing, Sharing)

-drafts and final drafts would be done on Fountas and Pinnell’s paper (appendices in book)

Since my GR&W summer, I’ve expanded my literacy guru book selection (lucky for my instruction, not so lucky for my pocketbook):

After melding all of these authors, using classroom trial & error, and listening to student suggestions, I’ve found an organizational system that works best with my upper elementary students.  I acknowledge that it may not be the best system for you, however, I share it so that you may take and tweak any bit that works for you.

We each have a Writer’s Notebook:

The Writer’s Notebook is called the Ideas Notebook (thanks to Aimee Buckner) and is used for ideas, story mountains, daily pages, and other observations…anything that may be of use in a story at some point.  It’s the book we put in our handbag and take to the grocery store with us, I tell students.  More often than not, students will go through a few of these books a year.  I send a letter home after sharing my own notebook asking that families spend sometime during the upcoming weekend finding a notebook that speaks to the student, for it is a notebook of choice that will allow the student to fully embrace the Ideas Notebook.  If students cannot afford a notebook or wish to personalize their own notebook, I provide students with a spiral notebook that they cover with personal photos, etc. (like the examples above).

Each student has a Power Folder – a binder with tabbed sections – that is brought each day to the meeting area for Mini Lessons and which also houses drafts (still on GR&W paper):

The sections of the Power Folder are:

1) Forms – Daily Writing Record, a list of completed writing, and what I learned as an author reflections (see this post for more)

2) Tools – special word lists, editing charts, etc.

3) Mini Lessons – where students document each Mini Lesson’s teaching point, take notes, and add any handouts from Mini Lessons

4) Drafts (a 10 cent) folder from summer sales

5) Comments – where the student and I have a written dialogue once a week about their work

Source: Banks School Supply

-with a pencil pouch for revising and editing pens, post-its for revision, etc.

Each student has a Completed Writing file:

This is the folder which holds the artifacts of a piece (drafts, checklists, etc.) in backwards chronological order.  Students maintain a table of contents for the Completed Writing File.  This file is what ensures that a student’s drafts folder (in the Power Folder) does not become over-burdened.  Only current pieces (and there are typically several) stay in the drafts folder.

Each student has a spot on the Published Wall:

This is where each student’s latest published piece is posted until they finish their next piece.  Students write at different paces and typically have both a piece from our ‘official unit’ and a choice piece on the go, so what’s on the wall at a given time is a mixed bag.

Finally, all students have a Published Writing Binder which houses the published versions of their work.  Students are responsible for moving their published writing onto the wall and into their binders, maintaining their checklists in all locations (what I learned as an author, completed writing file, and published writing binder).

The Published Writing Binders are located on a rain gutter my husband installed under the front board.

I used to use fewer locations for writing but I found that adding specific tools and room sections actually helped my writers better organize themselves.   So that’s it!  My Writing Workshop Organization – Part 1.  Stay tuned for Part 2 soon.  I can’t wait to hear how others organize their Writing Workshop!

Happy Writing!

Related posts:

1. Mentor Texts
2. The Power of Reflection

And thus, it was to be that I found myself relishing the first few relaxing moments of summer vacation this morning…watching a marathon of Criminal Minds, of course!  But could I stay away from school thinking for too long?  No, my friends, no.  It all started when Hotch (anyone remember Dharma and Greg?) said: “Sometimes what we don’t do is every bit as powerful as what we do.” [Season 1, Episode 11]

Initiate school thinking now.  One would think that a trip to the Target $1 spot would satisfy the school urge.  But no, I really started thinking when I read this post by Bud the Teacher a few hours later.

Quite often, we model the behavior and habits that we’d like students to emulate.  For example, I will model a form of writing for students before I send them off the carpet to try it themselves.  I model proper etiquette when a student holds the door for me so that other students will do the same.

This afternoon I began to ask myself what it is that I don’t do that may be having a powerful impact on my students?  The first that came to mind (as a result of reading Bud’s post) was that I don’t give tangible rewards for positive behavior and academic excellence.  No candies and gummies here.  Nope, you get a big ol’ smile and congratulatory clap from Ms. Straus.  Clearly, my lack of goodies was noticed by students – as evidenced by this conversation between a Team Straus student and a visiting student during a bingo game:

Student A: What do we get if we win?

Student B: (one of my darlings): A smile and knowledge.

My darlings had received the powerful message that knowledge was a reward.  Good.

But what else don’t I do?  After thinking for a moment I came up with this quick list:

I don’t stop a lesson if students are engaged and the time (indicated on the lesson plan) is up.

I don’t start a lesson if all students aren’t ready.

I don’t expect all students to master material at the same pace.

I don’t pretend to know everything.

I don’t monopolize the talking in a lesson.

What powerful messages am I sending students?  I hope it is that I have a passion for learning that I hope to transfer to them – individuals with their own thoughts, visions, abilities, and passions.

Can you think of anything that you don’t do which sends a powerful message to your students?

And with that Food for Thought – have a great weekend everyone!

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1. Student Experts
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There are blogs that I go to for a printable, to marvel at a photo of classroom, or for a laughable anecdote from the teacher’s day.  But there are other blogs – ones that make me reflect on my practice, ones that make me question how I do something, and ones that ultimately make me change the way I teach.

A few weeks ago I was humbled when a former student shared in his high school valedictorian speech that I left an imprint on him in grade 5 – by teaching him that we can always be better.  Interestingly, I distinctly remember the first parent/student/teacher conference that this student had in grade 5 where I shared that  although X had made good progress, there was certainly  much more inside him that he could develop.

I think of the different blogs I read — the ones which show me photos and the others that fuel my passion for students and teaching.  As a teacher, I’d rather be the latter — one that inspires my students to push themselves, to never be done learning…to help students love learning the way I do.

I think of the last day of school last week.  There was food ordered, a movie to watch, and an assembly to get to.  But that didn’t stop us from having our usual morning conversations – the ones where we all catch up on what happened last night and how we can help each other with something.  Looking around the room last Friday at 8:05 a.m., I’d have thought that it was just a regular school day.  I try to remember that the small conversations that I have with students are meaningful to them – that when I talk with them, I look them in the eye, for it is those moments that my students will remember.  Somedays it’s hard, but I remind myself to my students, these conversations are important.  And for that reason, the conversations are important to me too.

The twelfth grader who was valedictorian is now off to college.  But one day, not too long ago, he sat in Team Straus and was inspired to learn.  I can’t wait to see where life takes him.

Related posts:

1. Learning Communities
2. Why, oh Why?
3. passion + skill (+ a hint of desperation) = success!

As part of writing their final piece, some students have been creating space for their mystery on the writing wall — by moving their most recent piece of writing off the writing wall and into their published writing binders.  Just was with other pieces, students will soon reflect on what they’ve learned during this writing project.

As readers may have inferred, reflection by myself and my students is critical in the learning environment we’ve created together.  Reflection can’t begin early enough, as evidenced by the great video available on YouTube below – check it out!

With such great reflection and words of wisdom, this boy made it to Good Morning America! Check out that clip:

This tool is sure to inspire students!

Related posts:

1. Reflection – Student Style
2. Getting them out of the ZONE…

I wanted to share a group work board/mat that I created that has really helped students know their jobs in an activity — particularly the Fan N’ Pick activity. My students love Fan N’ Pick (and wanted my assurance that I’d share the following information with teachers in the blog world: “We really like Fan N’ Pick because it expects us to verbalize our thinking.” (as quoted by a student yesterday). In fact, when I reminded students yesterday that we’d done Fan N’ Pick before and we were going to do it in Math, several students launched into the list of which lesson topics we’d used it on. Wowsers!

Fan N’ Pick is an activity that has students interact with content through the form of questions and answers.  The materials per group?  A set of questions and 4 students.  Each person has a role in the group:

Person 1: Fan cards and state, “Pick a card, any card.”

Person 2: Select a card and read question orally to Person 3.

Person 3: Answers the question.

Person 4: Restates, clarifies, and praises.

Rotate roles by one person (1 becomes 2, 2 becomes 3, 3 becomes 4, and 4 becomes 1)

As I said, my students love this activity — they are engaged, focused on the content, utilizing social skills (and their talking protocols) and it gives them an opportunity to assist others.

The activity has gone smoothly in the past, but there was a tweak that I wanted to make.  I wanted to ensure that everyone in the group knew exactly what their role was…and so, I created a Fan N’ Pick Board for each group:

After each question round, students rotate the board 1 role and begin again…this time, with their new role.  The boards were a hit!  The students knew their roles and would have kept doing Fan N’ Pick through lunch if I had not stopped them!

You can see a Fan N’ Pick in action with my students:

I created a set of blank question cards which I use for the Fan N’ Pick:

Fan N Pick Cards

Interested in trying Fan N’ Pick? Go for it! The students enjoy it, they are practicing content, the engagement is high, and students are working as a team to support one another.

Feel free to download any of the resources I’ve made below, making sure to comment below that you’ve done so! Enjoy!

Fan N’ Pick Board Link

(download pdf under Interaction)

Fan N Pick Blank Cards

Related posts:

1. Send a Problem
2. Let’s Hear it for the Team
3. Problems? Send them away!

Each student has a page with a clock on it, such as the one below:

I like to change clocks about once a month, so we get new clock buddies each month.  This is how:

All students stand behind their desk and upon “go” they set off to find a 12:00 buddy.  Because of modeling and fish bowling done in September, students use questions such as, “Do you have an opening at 12:00?” or “Are you looking for a 12:00 buddy?”   Then, it’s back to their desks.  Upon the signal ‘go’ students set off to find another buddy.  Over the years, I’ve found that fewer mistakes are made if I procedurally scaffold each hour and have students return to their desks after each hour’s buddy is found.  Of course, it’s certainly a fun challenge to find all buddies in a solid run with no mistakes being made.  One mistake students tend to make is getting their buddy to sign their clock…but then not getting their buddy to sign their own clock…which means that Person A is Person B’s buddy, but Person B is Person C’s buddy.

I like clock buddies because they are easily implemented, are easy to for students to understand, and provide partnering options quickly during an activity.  If I want to implement Sage and Scribe, I can just ask students to find their x:xx buddy.  With lower elementary students I’ve used simplified clocks such as these:

And with middle and high school students, an agenda page (available here) works well.

When students have finished collecting their buddies for that month’s clock (takes about an hour to get names) clocks look like this: (I’ve pulled one from the Internet, as I didn’t want to show one of my student’s clocks for privacy reasons)

Feel free to grab any of the images above and create your own clock buddies paper.  Or you can download the clock buddies sheet I use:

Clock Buddies Pdf

Clock Buddies Doc

Please comment if you download!   Have a great weekend, everyone!

Related posts:

1. Send a Problem

First, students brainstormed desk configurations.  They came up with rows in pairs, U, and groups.

Second, we voted on the desired configuration — groups being the winner.

Third, we did a quick area measurement of the space and also estimated how many students could be in each group.

Then, students moved their desks, as I sat back and watched it happen.

After that, students labeled a post-it note with their name and we rolled a dice to see the order in which groups would be able to place their post-it notes on their ideal desk in the new configuration.

You know what we found?  The majority of the class wanted to sit in the front groups!  With up to 5 post-it notes on each desk, students began negotiating with others to see who could keep the desk.

The new student groups spent a few minutes finding at least 3 things they had in common with each other and creating a group name and sign.  Team Straus is now pleased to be made up of The Cookie Monsters, the Fearless Dragons, the Orange Panthers, and Yoshi Fall.

The kid watching I got to do during this exercise was fantastic and gave me great insight into how this bunch likes to learn and how they’ve changed over the year.  So far, the groups have been very attentive and eager to help their fellow group members.

The only caveat?  One group asked for team points.  Before I could even say anything, another group responded with, “We don’t need team points.  We’re young adults.”

How do you handle personal learning spaces?

Hope your week started off well,

Related posts:

1. Reflection – Student Style

Flow maps are a favorite in our class — we use them to show the order of events.  They’re used in Social Studies, Reading Workshop — you name the subject, chances are that we use a flow map.  Students know that the flow map is the tool we use to show sequence of events.  Boxes with arrows.  At first, students didn’t know what to do with the flow map; however, after modeling and doing flow maps together (see the partially and completed Jamestown flow maps below), students quickly got the hang of it.

Partial Jamestown Flow Map

Completed Jamestown Flow Map

For each flow map, we briefly describe the event and then sketch a picture that will help us remember that event.  I scaffold the flow maps for language by providing some text already in their flow map, while other students summarize the text on their own and complete the flow map annotation independently.

This morning, we used a flow map during a poetry lesson.  While reading and analyzing My Mother Saw a Dancing Bear by Charles Causley, we sketched the movie scenes of the poem that we visualized in our heads.

Poem Flow Map

Flow maps work for my students because they are an easy to remember structure that students can quickly (after modeling and practicing) apply to most any sequential group of events.  Thanks to Jaana (a follower) who suggested in a comment on this post that I share the charts I use with students, I decided to share my flow maps!   Often, we’ll do a shared write of a chart paper flow map that is then posted in the room as a reminder throughout a unit (e.g. Jamestown Flow Map above).

I’ve attached a sample Word document flow map (the Pilgrim and Puritan map) that you can download and rework for your needs.  Also stay tuned for more posts on the other thinking tools that I use with my students.  Have you tried the game I shared in this post?  Get it and try it out…it’s student-tested and a winner!

Pilgrim Puritan Flow Map Word .doc

Happy mid-week, my friends!

No related posts.

We play a lot of collaborative team games in our class because they allow students to develop their content understanding while also practicing the content language.  Once they get started, students tend to stay on task and are engaged for the duration of the game.  I also like games because they allow me to work with particular groups while the rest of the class is engaged in meaningful practice.

Although we’re fresh off Spring Break, you’ll see a game that we played prior to Spring Break below:

I created this game to review converting fractions, decimals, and percents.  The game contains a game board, question cards, counters, and an answer card.  In partners or small groups, students answered a quesiton (converting between fractions, decimals, percents) and then moved the number of spaces indicated on the question card.  With the object of the game being to reach the finish line, students encountered obstacles (e.g. skip a turn) along the way.

Sample Card

Students loved this game!

And so, my faithful readers, I’ve created a generic game board that you can use for games in your classroom!  Simply download it below and attach some question cards.  The cards don’t have to be fancy — just make sure that they indicate how many spaces the student moves upon a correct answer.  This generic game board can be used for any subject!

Do you love it?  Let me know!  Follow me on Twitter here or using my fancy Twitter icon above.  Be sure to return for more great resources you can use in your classrooms.  Have you checked the Teacher Talk Teacher site lately?  If not, take a look – you may just find something you can use tomorrow!

And as for Let’s Hear it for the Boy?  Well, they dance around at school during the video.  Maybe your students will dance around when playing this game?!

Generic Game Board (2 mb)

Happy Monday, everyone!

Related posts:

1. Just what will they do?
2. Send a Problem
3. Problems? Send them away!