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Reading and Re-reading and writing

8/31/2017

We had back to school night last week, and it’s exciting to talk about the start of the school year with our amazing community. I usually start my language arts spheel with what I hope is a calming tonic to their ears.

Students’ reading practices can change in middle school. For many, students keep reading as they always have. Many of them though, back off a bit. Even the passionate readers.

It’s all a function of topic, reading level, hormones, lack of sitting still long enough, etc.

My mantra is that parents should keep modeling a reading lifestyle, reading to each other, talking about books, and avoiding too much pressure or any, about reading. They will come out of this. That’s what I promise. Every time I promise this I worry a bit about the few who may not. But those are other conversations and interventions.

More than the slow down for many in reading, parents worry about how often their student re-reads books, especially “lower level” books.

Here is where I get enervated and absolutely confident. Re-reading is what writers do.

I’m going to repeat this. Re-reading is what writers do. I know this as a writer, but also from patterns over time as a teacher. I will be frank, though, about where my absolute confidence comes from. Stephen King writes about this in his book on Writing, “On Writing”. One of his biggest premises is how writers grow through in-depth study of worlds crafted by others. When students want to keep living in these most-often fictional worlds, they are creating a sense of how they want the world to be in the worlds that they live in within their imaginations.

I’m a writer, and I re-read far more than I pick up new books. To push myself, I read new books and poems, but I mostly revert to the worlds that make sense to me in their style, flourish, feeling.

I’m currently listening to James Herriots’ All Creatures Great and Small Books on Audible. I have a 20+ minute drive to and from work, and I love listening to books as I drive. So, I’m listening to these books (I’m on the third in the series), and I own the entire set in paperback (maybe my DH will buy me a nice hardback set one of these days). I’ve read them all no fewer than five times each. The first one, I have read over fifteen times. I have also binge-watched the BBC series a few times. I love this world. It’s about history, England, animals, and amazing characters.

But just today, I realized, as I finished the second book, as James Herriot is headed off to serve in the Royal Air Force during WW1, ten minutes from school, tears running down my cheeks, why I love these books so much. I thought it was the stories of animals, history, charming real-life characters, and the portrait of the rugged Yorkshire landscape. But today, at the end of the book, as he is describing his gratitude for living as he does, I realized that what I love about his books is his lens on gratitude. He’s a storyteller, brilliant, amusing, hilarious, heart-warming and heart-wrenching. But all of his stories have the theme of his gratitude. Even when he is trudging through a blizzard after no sleep, and no idea where he is, he appreciates life. Even after yet another crusty farmer disrespects his work and aggravates the situation, he has gratitude. Even when the lonely old widower has to have his long-time companion, his dog, put down, he has gratitude for being a part of this.

He appreciates life. All of life. His self-deprecation, eye for raw beauty, and his wry wit are all a part of the appreciation he has for everything.

When I started blogging when Danny was hospitalized in 2011, I created a theme of gratitude.

I did not know it then, but I had learned that in many ways, through my family, through friends, through Danny. And I learned it as my soul learns, through stories. Through narratives that are more real than life.

It is why I love those books by James Herriot.

It is why I am blogging about teaching. I have deep gratitude for every moment I learn from others, from my students who gift me with their hearts, minds, and souls.

I wish I could express myself as James Herriot does, but I’m grateful that I can keep working at honing that craft.

I have gratitude for re-learning through rereading. I appreciate how much I understand because I have lived in so many lives outside my own through the gift of others. It’s why I know students who love to read will always love to read if things stay positive, and if they have choice about what they read, and how often they re-read, even if those stories, those ideas are maybe “lower”. A story is a story, and reading is reading. We’ll all keep reading if we enjoy it.

Goal: Keep writing and sharing and learning. Keep these lessons in my heart. Keep learning and growing with my students.

Gratitude: Oh, everything. The deer eating our garden tonight, munching and looking at us with complete innocence. Our cats who silly up our lives. My family and Danny’s family. Our friends and colleagues. This night sky that is slow to darken tonight. The fresh dill I bought at the farm stand tonight.

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meeting them where they are right then and there

8/25/2017

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I’ve had a pretty exciting first few weeks of school. All of it is about the students, but I’m going to start with being self-centered.

First: I just discovered, and I’m pretty sure this is accurate: this is my 25th year of teaching. I think I’ve spent the last five years telling my students I’ve taught for 20, 25, a hundred, a million, 23, and over 22 years. I’m going to try to to be consistent this year about the exact year.

On to the really exiciting news from the past few weeks. When I started a million, I mean, 25 years ago, I was revved up by Nancie Atwells’ “In the Middle.” I started out teaching with the workshop model, and I’ve never looked back.

Then, Ralph Fletcher entered the Writer’s Workshop realm and my sphere with “What a Writer Needs.” His work innovated and pushed my current workshop model.

Nancie Atwell and Ralph Fletcher have been my gurus for the last 25+ years.

I have long fantasized that I would meet Nancie Atwell sometime while I’m back in my homestate, which is her homestate: Maine. My sister lives not far from her school, and I keep hounding my sister to find someone who knows her, who can get me in to meet her.

I don’t have that geographical connection with Ralph Fletcher. I have something better. Twitter. Over the past few years, I’ve built up my online PLNs through Twitter. I’ve built a community and sub-communities of shared colleagiality on Twitter. Some of my communities are all about writer’s workshop models, but all of them are about personalized learning, student agency, and student choice.

I’ve been so lucky to meet and know so many amazing educators who inspire me daily, and usually, minute by minute.

Okay, I need to go back 25 years ago again. When I started my classroom with the writer’s workshop model, there were only a few of us that I knew of in the district who embraced the model. Over time, I had lost any connections with other workshop model teachers.

Over time, I did that cliche teacherly thing, and I “hid” how I taught and avoided being collegial. I couldn’t relate to other teachers because, though so many did (and do!) amazing things that I learned from, I had nothing to give them. I had a model and modality. I did not have “stuff.” I did not have resources or lessons. I had nothing to give them.

Social media: blogs and Twitter have changed me. I am now contributing and learning because I’m connecting with others who use a workshop/constructivist model of teaching, and we’re learning from each other. I’m energized.

I need to back up yet again. This all started when my former student became my teaching partner, and grassphopper became the master. She nudged me like a stubborn mule to elevate the workshop model into a more streamlined approach, leveraging all of our technology.

My philosopy and practice and ideology has not changed. What’s different is using technology to enhance the workshop model. So, though it’s the same, technology allows the true nature of a workshop, the organic nature workshop, to thrive.

A few weeks ago, I came across a tweet from Ralph Fletcher:

I was so excited. First, I did not even think about finding my guru on Twitter. Second, here he was in real time honoring what I do: plan on the fly.

My teaching is organic, and many people think that means “winging it.” I’ve had a lot of people ask me the difference, and it’s a good question. Superficially, they seem similar. All good teachers are good at winging it and enjoying it (usually) when it happens. The difference is in intent.

Winging it is when you have a plan and something goes wrong, so you have to wing it. This is a much needed skill most teachers have.
Winging it is when you don’t have a plan and need to wing it. All teachers have had to do this for some reason.
- In this scenario, and in the above scenario, there is an organic component, and it’s why when it happens, it’s not a terrible thing. All teachers can do this and feel the success of holding things together and even having teachable moments.
Organic teaching is a planned approach to reacting and interacting with the dynamic nature of class. It is that “plan-on-the-fly” Ralph Fletcher refers to.
Organic teaching starts with a goal (daily,weekly, etc.), but allows daily class dynamic to ebb and flow the work and focus.
It’s individualized. It’s reactive not just to daily feedback, but to class feedback. It informs instruction daily. The teacher needs to change plans “on the fly.”

Conversely, many teachers plan tightly, and understandably, but they say things like, “I can’t do such-and-such on this date because my students will be doing X,Y, or Z (presenting, testing, etc.).” My idea of the organic approach (and yea, Ralph Flettcher for supporting this!), is that the goals of learning flow with the needs of the students. I cannot imagine honing a presentation date for something for all students into a certain time chunk.

I keep using the pronoun “I,” but I speak for Emily too. She reads through all of these blogs and gives me content and editing feedback.

I speak for both of us when I speak of what we do in the classroom and what we believe. Most of our cohort meetings are about philosophy, not minutiae. Most of what we communicate about are stories of what our students share with us.

I started this blog post with my two exciting things. The first was actually pinning down how many years I’ve taught. The second is about how exciting it was to follow Ralph Fletcher on Twitter.

Dorking out here. Following Ralph Fletcher is exciting, but I’m human, and I’m just dorking out about this:

My guru is following me on Twitter! I don’t know how it happened, but it did. The amazing thing is, he is only following a few hundred people, and thousands are following him. I’m just….I’m just...swooning!

And better still, I was enboldened to thank him for his leadership, and I did. I tweeted directly to him. And then this:

In all the million years I’ve taught, I’ve never been so humbled and excited and dorked out.

Goal: stop the hyperbole about how long I’ve taught. Keep feeling the gratitiude.
Gratitude: the people who push me and lift me up and make me better, the people in my in-person and online communities who lead and encourage and help us all to empathize with the humanity in the classroom.

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Weekly Emails

7/4/2017

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I’m currently working on a book project about the procedures Emily and I have incorporated with technology. I’m re-reading some of my blog posts to make sure I keep my voice in this project. The book will be part theory (the why) and part nuts and bolts (the how). The thing about the how is that it’s really quite simple. We don’t employ all kinds of crazy-great technology; we use the technology to allow students full voice and choice.

Some of the things that have evolved in our procedures cannot be extricated from the why to the how. One of our favorite new procedures is having our students write an email every week to their parents.

I’ve mentioned this in a few blog posts, but I thought it deserved its own post. The inception for this idea came from a recent ed-tech discussion. I was engaging with the TG2chat this past Sunday, and one of my responses was about the emails. Today is Tuesday, and I keep getting notifications of retweets and likes on that tweet. I’ve had people contact me for more information, and I’ve somehow, from that one tweet, built up my followers by 50+ educators.

In my book project, I had a section devoted to the email, so I thought I’d kill two birds and blog about it and use part of this for my chapter on emailing.

So, here goes.

With our class structure, we have Mondays and Tuesdays devoted to “writing” days. Because students have almost full choice in what they are working on every day, they can write any and all days (or read, or research), but we have our daily questions focused on writing on Mondays and Tuesdays. Tuesdays is email day, so usually our question is geared toward getting them to reflect on themselves as learners, so they can incorporate some deeper, metacognitive ideas into their emails.

The purpose of the emails:

To inform their parents about what they’re learning.
For students to feel more empowered with their learning experiences.
To include teachers who need insight into what kind of help they need.
For students to self-reflect on where they are and where they need to go.
To keep the dialogue from school to family focused on the student’s perspectives.
To practice writing in a semi-formal style with a platform they’ll be using for a long time.

Those are the “whys” of the email, but it has evolved into so many unforeseen advantages.

Parents have embraced the email and usually “reply all” with information about themselves in this education triangle. This insight into the family life broadens and deepens my understanding of the student’s needs.
Students are beyond empowered. They take such pride in their emails, and they show their style and can practice honing their communication style. Some of my students bend over backwards trying to entertain us all, some attempt to be as concise as possible while still delivering an entire picture of what they’re learning. Conversely, others try to use so much detail that they don’t just show what they’re learning; they are teaching us all the concepts. Others use days to craft the email to ensure it is their very best work. This blog post describes these processes.
Students share their thoughts in their emails in their fresh, unique voice, and all of their teachers benefit from what they share. It’s sometimes as simple as “I don’t understand how to find the area of a surface,” but more often, it’s feedback about the class, about the structure of school, about their fears and stresses, and what they enjoy. All of that perspective allows us to help them individually, but more often as a whole. We have changed things that students don’t like, done more of what they do like, and it’s all moving and changing.
The insight we get into students from their self-evaluation of their learning is deeply impactful to us in our instruction and in our humanity. I had one student who wrote about how he loved language arts now, and he had, in the past, struggled and been below grade level. He wrote about how well he was doing and how he was now “at grade level,” and he was proud and inspired. This student “tested” still at just below grade level, but his work was proficient and advanced. I will never tell this student his “test” scores. They are a programmed test that I have no control over. I do have control over how he feels in the classroom. His confidence and pride will take him where he needs to go.
Having the students’ perspectives, from their voice, fully explained, of course delivers an amazing insight. What became a nice surprise is how often parents got to hear things they didn’t hear when they asked, “how was school today?” Having students explain their perspective opened up the communication. The idea to have the onus on students helped parents step back more from the “helicopter role.”
Any writing is good writing practice, and it has always felt good, as an ELA teacher, to have students have authentic purpose for their writing. We allow students full choice in their daily writing, and the email was, of course, a great practice for a different style. They’ve incorporated everything they’re learning in all of their classes into these emails. They structure it carefully, as they’ve learned to in science and social studies, they pay attention to audience and work on voice and word choice, as they’ve learned in ELA.

I’ve had some educators ask how this can happen during the class time, given how much “other” we have to do. I contend there is no other work more important than having students self-reflect and reach out to others with their perspectives. As an ELA teacher, I’m not concerned with curriculum; I’m concerned with students growing as readers, writers, and thinkers. I don’t see any way that writing an email, with an authentic purpose and audience, isn’t essential. They are pulling together so many skills: developing ideas, organization, voice, word choice, purpose, topic, audience, and they are doing this on a continual basis. Besides the obvious writing practice, there are so many beneficial aftershocks. I can help students so much more, having this insight into their thoughts. This blog post about student agency explains that part a lot.

That’s all the why. Here’s for the how.

Our students use a daily work Google Doc (think spiral).
Every day, they answer a “big question.”
On email day, the question is about writing or a self-reflection that will help guide them in crafting their email.
They put the answer to that day’s question in their email.
They compose the email there and make revisions/edits.
They copy and paste their email into their school email account.
They CC me and any other teacher who needs to be contacted (for help or because of struggles in that class).

This is the email document that contains directions, exemplars, rubric.

Almost finally, for the why, I must quote a response on Twitter, “Writing for an audience you understand & care about nurtures better writing & relationships.All around”. Connie Blomgren @Docblom. I could not have summed this all up better!

And for fun. Here are just a few of the many great lines I get to read in these weekly emails:

Liewe Moeder Vader Suster,

I hope you all are having a splendid day. I started my email with
“Dear Mother, Father, and Sister,” in Afrikaans . my room is very
messy which as you know is rare. I hate it! I plan on taking care of
it tomorrow. Yesterday when I was making work, I look over, and the
next thing I know, my room has turned into a disaster!

Dear Mama,
How was your walk this morning with your friend? Was it nice?

Dear Mom,
I hope you are having a great day if not I hope this will make you day better. I am having an amazing day i can't wait for my concert.

Science
We’re learning about our carbon fiber footprint. Today we learned about how many earths it would take for everyone in the world to live like me. And it would take 8.1. That's not a good thing apparently.

P.S Can you make my bed?

Goal: Keep learning new ways to help students find their voices.
Gratitude: Getting to hear my students’ voices.

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I'm not quite ready to end this school year

5/17/2017

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I’m almost done with school. Smackah, track, documentation of goals, a huge round of feedback to students (and so many other things) have finally rounded a bend, and I can actually choose what to do next. I can choose what is important and not urgent. I was on my computer, chatting with students online about their work today, and I looked up.

I immediately made eye-contact with a student and we smiled at each other.

I watched my students. I watched them all focused on crafting their weekly emails, and I watched them quietly talk, point to their screens, smiling. I circulated the room and saw how engrossed they were in their emails, where they were telling their parents (and extended family for many) about their work and learning in all classes. They were uploading links to their work. I clicked open their documents and the links to their final projects.

Almost every student reflected that they loved writing. Almost every student said that first.

I’m not ready for the end of the year. Oh, I’m ready to sleep in, and I’m ready to choose each and every moment of my day, but I’m really not ready to be done. I’m tired and overwhelmed, but I’m not pushed to my limit. I’m still peddling faster than I’m going forward, but I’m still good with peddling.

For weeks, people have been asking me if I’m ready for the end of the year, and I am always so uncomfortable with that question. I’ve been all-out for months with teaching, track, and Smackah. I’ve been behind in just about everything (feedback and grading for students, emails, laundry, cleaning, calling my parents, texting my brother and sister, helping out my team and grade level, feeding the cats (kidding)). But that just makes me less than ready to be done. I want to settle back in to a relatively normal school life, where I can enjoy moments.

I’m exhuasted, but that doesn’t mean I’m ready to be done with the school year. Oh, I’ll get used to it once school is done for the year, but I’m never ready to end the school year.

I also feel awkward when teachers pass by me and say, “Hey, it’s almost Friday.”
I also feel awkward when people gripe about Mondays (well, except I do simply because I don’t know how to get out of bed in the morning and get myself going:).

I love my job, so I don’t look for the weekend and again, I enjoy it once it comes, but I don’t wait all week for it. And I don’t hate Mondays.

And I don’t need the end of the year. Well, I do. I’ll decompress and re-energize, and it will be so good and so needed. But I don’t see that through the trees.

When I looked up today, finally, at my students, not at their words on their documents, and their pictures on my screen, I realized I needed some real time with them again. We’ve all been so busy working, we’re not interacting in a relaxed, human way. So, I will spend as much time as I can this last week to see their faces as they work, as they interact with their peers.

It is gratifying, in a way, to realize how seriously my students take their work. To realize how the classroom feels like a place of business, with everyone doing their jobs. But we’ve all been so busy that I’ve missed being silly with them.

That’s important. But it’s feeling urgent too. There are only 6 days left.

Gratitude: getting back to important.
Goal: pack in as much interaction with my students as I can in this short time before summer break.

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Happy Smackah Love

5/11/2017

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I am stepping away from some urgent for some important. I learned that expression quite a few years ago at a leadership conference. We often have to focus on urgent, not important. My urgent is finishing up some grading I’m behind on, emails, laundry…

My important now is some pretty important things. Saturday is our seventh annual Happy Smackah. Braden Stevenson is our recipient this year, and he and his family are in need of our help, and we are honored to have a part in helping.

I always get reflective this time of year, as the Smackah approaches. Our friends and community created this for us. Most of the original crew are still involved, and others have eagerly joined to make the Happy Smackah a St.Vrain Valley tradition. I’m so humbled by how hard this community, our friends, and so many people I don’t even know, work to come together to make someone else’s life better.

And, of course, I remember where I was, when Danny and I needed so much support.

My memories of Danny’s hospitalization, the trauma, have been brought a little too close to home though. My cousin’s daughter is in critical condition, in a coma, fighting for her life, and she has been for weeks. My cousin just posted that she finally went home from her bedside vigil for her daughter today after three weeks.

I’ve been in contact with her and her brother, who is back down in Texas with her. I’ve privately asked her brother about a few things, a few thoughts I had about coping during these times. They both latched on to my advice. At one point, I said, in a private message, that I understood, but that wasn’t much help. My cousin said, “It absolutely is.”

That brought me to some big tears. That brought me a humility I felt with my whole being.

I have been sending every single fiber of prayer and positive thinking to my cousins. To my little cousin fighting for her life, to my (still think of as little cousins but who are now amazing adults) cousins every day, throughout the day.

At the risk of sounding cliche, philosophical, or spiritual, or trite, Danny and I often recognize that what he went through, what we went through, is a gift. It’s a gift to be recognizable and relatable to others who are going through suffering.

My cousins are suffering, and it is all too familiar. I have said this often: when I felt at my lowest when Danny was battling, I would go over to Children’s Hospital and get a reality check. Danny and I have been lucky to have what we have. To have a child fight...well, that’s different.

So, here are my cousins, fighting, fearing. I don’t have any wisdom, and yet they do find comfort in knowing I know. It’s so deeply humbling.

Danny and I have an expression for these moments, when we feel this grace, this connection to others simply because people trust that we understand. It happens in our lives with friends, old friends and strangers. We say, “It’s a lot.” We mean it in every sense of what that sounds like. We mostly mean it’s a lot that we are gifted with and humbled by.

And on Saturday, the seventh annual Happy Smackah is for a young man who embodies the spirit of the Happy Smackah. He is a fighter and happy and brave. We are all so pleased to come together to help Braden and his family.

Goal: reach out to others more. Healing, hope, and love for my cousins.
Gratitude: others who reach out to us.

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NEW SOL Post

5/1/2017

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A few weeks ago was my first Slice of Life post, and it was funny. Well, I tried to make it funny. Today’s is not.

I have horrible hearing. I have to blast the tv to hear it. My husband is the opposite. He gets up in the morning and rides the exercise bike in the loft, watching sports center on the tv, which is below, in the great room.

I can’t hear the tv standing next to it while he’s on the bike. He can hear it just fine over the spin of the wheels. Yes, I’m hard of hearing. Though, I do manage to still have that great teacher hearing. That’s right, kiddos. I can hear you just fine!

Back to my hearing. Aside from the classroom kid hearing, I have a new gift. I’m Radar.

Probably most of you don’t know who Radar O’Reilly is.

The popular 70’s show MASH, was set in Korea at a mobile army hospital. It had a wonderful cast of characters, and Radar was the company clerk, and he could hear the choppers before anyone else. Pre-nowadays-technology, he was the first to say, “Choppers.” A huge gift that prepared the nurses and surgeons for the incoming wounded they would treat at mobile hospital.

I can hear choppers now too, before anyone else. Even Danny.

When Danny got sick, after hours of surgery, his surgeons said his only chance would be to be airlifted to Anschutz in Denver. After hours of being told he wouldn’t survive, this last chance was a desperate hope. My friends drove me to their house, where they had to look up the address for Anschutz hospital, and where we had to grab supplies for what we knew would be a long days and weeks at the hospital. Luckily, it was months, not days. He survived. But. That was a long time to fight.

So, when we left the hospital as they were preparing him for the flight, we drove to our friends’. I had no idea that he hadn’t left the hospital yet. I was standing alone in their driveway, on February 11th, 2011. The flight for life chopper went right overhead, and I looked up, feeling like he’d just touched me and said, come and get me. For the first time that day, after being told with solemn assurance that he would die, I had hope. It was a distant hope, nebulous and surreal.

And I heard “Fortunate Son” by Credence Clearwater Revival.

A lot of people ask me if I had hope right away, and I tell them honestly, that I didn’t. The doctors were quite clear how sick he was. They operated for hours and called surgeons across the country. All of the brilliant doctors said he didn’t have a chance.

But a surgeon at Anschutz said he’d still try to save him. He would have to do aggressive surgery, and if it worked, he’d have weeks and months of lots of touch and go...and. Likely, he still wouldn’t survive.

I was asked if they could try to save him.

I remember being in shock and being concerned about what they might need to do. But I asked them to try.

But when Danny flew right over me. Well. That was a sign.

And I’m reminded of that every time I hear a chopper.

I just heard one. I’m home, and I heard it coming. I heard the thumping before it became the resonating deep timber of the rotating blades.

I hear like Radar. I’m the first out the door, scanning the skies.

It hits me first with a deep traumatic sensory memory. Then it shifts as I look to see if it’s military, other. Or flight for life.

It was flight for life, and I stilled myself, praying that the person in the chopper would be okay, and sending bountiful gratitude for the flight for life crew and the doctors, nurses, everyone. All these people who deal with trauma day in and day out. All in service to others.

Gratitude: medical people.
Goals: remind myself of my gratitude for everything.

Self-evaluation:
I cried when I wrote this, so I’m guessing some of my emotion got through in this. I like to feel moved when I write. I should always smile, cry, laugh, wonder, when I’m writing. I don’t think that I stayed enough on topic though. The slice of life was supposed to be about hearing choppers well, and I feel like I didn’t come around to that as well as I should have. It was also hard to reference being “Radar” to an audience who is unfamiliar with the impact of that. But, my audience can internet search “MASH” and “Fortunate Son”.

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April 25th, 2017

4/25/2017

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I just had a moment with a student where I doubted and feared. I feared I was doing the wrong thing. I haven’t felt that intensity in a long time. It’s not that I don’t reflect and think constantly. It’s not that I don’t do something wrong or not ideal almost daily. It’s just that this doubt was big and scary.

The level of personalization Emily and I have created in our classroom is making me reflect constantly (hence this blog). It fills me with wonder, how much our students can experience and grow. It’s awe-inspiring, and I get so much more insight into their thought process, and I learn so much from them.

Once in a while though, because it’s evolving in what feels like a lightning quickness, I have doubts.

Here’s what happened today. It’s our email day, and we wanted to have students share their work on their yearlong “Expert Author” project. We’ve built the project through the lens and theme of “We’re all becoming better thinkers, readers, and writers.”

They’ve fully bought into this and daily self-reflection is a huge part of this.

Today, we showed them the rough draft of their final “showing” of what they’ve learned and where they are and where they’re going. It was purposefully very open, as daily class is, and we knew some of them would want more structure. As always, we wanted them to grapple first. We knew some of them wouldn’t like it.

One of my students approached me, agonizing over how he could possibly make a movie (one of the suggested platforms) showcasing his growth. I gave him a couple of broad ideas. He got more confused. I told him not to use a video platform if he didn’t have a vision for that. He repeated his concern and wanted to be told how he could do it. He wanted it to make sense. I told him it didn’t need to make sense right now. I heard my words. I saw his struggle. I knew he hated my answers.

I stayed firm. If we’re going to meet students where they are, then we can’t make everything make sense. It should not. If learning is personalized, it looks different for everyone. That means a movie makes perfect sense to someone and no sense to someone else.

I told him if he thought about it and couldn’t figure out how, that he should think of another platform. I sent him away.

My heart constricted. I thought about talking to him at the end of class and trying to reassure him that it was okay that a movie made no sense to him.

Two minutes later, he approached me, a calm and satisfied expression on his face. “I’m going to make a website. A movie needs a theme, and I don’t have a theme yet. With a website, I can showcase all the ways I’ve grown as a writer and reader.”

He sauntered away.

My heart constricted in a good way. Wow. Just wow. He barely grappled with it, and he came to an amazing wisdom and truth. A knowledge I could not give him. He had to make the meaning himself.

A few weeks ago, I was involved in an impromptu collegial discussion that started as a question about competition affecting learning, and it meandered into how learners need to make their own meaning. A long time ago, that philosophy was labeled “constructivism,” and a long time ago, I identified with that philosophy. A long time ago, it was my greatest dream for all the learners in my classroom (including me). Now, I say this yet again, the ideal can be realized. I’m learning so much from my students, and I’m so excited to have their learning be so much more transparent to me.

And, on a completely unrelated note, some of my STEM students were having trouble finding video of moving mice for their PSA on showing students the dangers of leaving food in lockers. We brainstormed search terms. I suggested scurrying mice. “Scurrying!” They all yelled. Then yelled it again. Then, they kept repeating “scurrying mice.” Ah, the beauty of perfect word choice.

Goal: moments like these every day.
Gratitude: moments like these every day.

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Slice of Life

3/28/2017

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Here I go with my first Slice of Life blog post. It’s funny because I consider myself a storyteller, and I’m a blogger, so this shouldn’t be hard. But. I find I’m daunted. I just read a funny blog. Well written, perfectly modulated in tone and length. And it was funny.

My story is supposed to be funny. Just to give you context and a goal.

We have two cats: a male (10 years old) and a female (4+ years old). They have a very unique relationship. When we first got Thea (pronounced Tia), Cecil was an excellent big brother, and he protected her from the wrath of our alpha female Scout (who we sadly had to put down over a year ago). He protected her, and he taught her the lay of the land. He showed her where the treats were; he showed her how to let us know if we let the food or water bowls go unfilled for too long. In case you’re interested, the technique is to rub up against us, meow, and then make us follow them to the bowls.

The best thing he showed her though, was the basket of toys. He would go to the basket of cat toys and pull one out, play with it, then make sure he left it for her. He would bring her toys until he saw her play with them.

Cats are nocturnal, and I have long thought that we had the noisiest cats ever. I’ve been assured that there are a lot of noisy cats (my insomniac friend Kris has told me some funny stories about not being able to sleep at her friends’ house because of the antics of the cats). So, one night the cats were making a racket like I’d never heard before. Both my husband and I kept waking up. We never got up to see what they were up to. We just kept dozing back to sleep. The next morning, we saw what the racket was about.

Every single cat toy was out of the basket and strewn about the entire main floor of our house. The basket was on its side, rolled far from its spot on the hearth. Backstory here: we have no kids.

We have cats.

The cats have a lot of toys.

Literally, every cat toy had been played with. Every single toy was strewn about from near the basket, through the kitchen and bathroom and into the downstairs den. But most of them were still relatively together like a deck of cards dropped for a game of 52 pickup.

Thea, then a kitten, sat proudly next to one of the stuffed birds, as if she single-handedly had killed it.

Cecil, the tutor and instigator, looked at us with guilt. He slunked away from the mess, but not too far. He kept his eye on his protege. When he heard our tones of laughter and delight, he stretched and came back out. He even gave a stuffed mouse a shove, letting us know he was complicit in the midnight kitty party.

Goal: Introduce the SOL to my students for more authentic writing and sharing.
Gratitude: Cats that make me laugh.

For my students (who I ask to self-evaluate everything they do): Here is my self-evaluation: I tried to use sentence fluency (especially the use of short and incomplete sentences) and short paragraphs to make the story have more of an impact. I did not spend a lot of time revising it. Most of my revisions were on the sentence fluency. If I took more time on it, I would try to also revise the word choice. I’m sure I could have used different words for better impact. I did struggle to write this story as funny stories are hard to write. I usually tell funny stories and use my tone of voice and gestures. I have another story I’m working on, but I do think I’d like to get back to this and see how much I can make it better.

I went back about three hours after my initial drafting and revising and added more paragraphs (to break it up and slow it down more as I would if I were orally telling the story). I also added that simile with the 52 pickup card game. I’m not sure if I like it, but I do think it adds a needed picture.

Of course, I would benefit from some feedback.

Further note: please note I did not self-evaluate with a grade. I self-evaluated how I worked, what I worked on, and what I could do better.

P.S. My photo re-enecactment was a big success. Thea played with just about every toy. The funniest thing to me is how she plays with that big orange ball that I think is a dog toy left here from a dogsitting stint.

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Let's just read

3/20/2017

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I’ve been thinking more and more about grades and how they get in the way with authentic, passionate learning. I’ve been fortunate these past few months to have conversations with educators who are a heck of a lot smarter than I am. I felt a window to share my thoughts, and I did.

I’m also fortunate to be connected to amazing teachers, including my online Professional Learning Networks.

My first question to two district coaches was about grades and “accountability.” I put that in quotes because so many educators use that word to draw a line in the sand with what students need to do. That word has always made me feel uncomfortable.

I don’t mean we don’t all need to be accountable for what we commit to doing. As a teacher, I’m accountable for making sure my students learn and are safe (physcially and emotionally). I also believe I’m accountable for making sure they’re happy and love learning.

That’s really all I care about. If I’m going to be honest. I want my students to love learning. There are a lot of educational practices that get in the way of every student loving learning. I’m getting more and more confident in stopping all educational practices that get in the way of that.

So, I was particulary pleased to read the thought process of these teacher bloggers whom I follow. Three teachers talk is an amazing blog by teachers who are constantly self-reflective. In this particular blog, the author, Shana Karnes, writes about how she learned not to attach a grade to free reading. She was afraid that no grades would make some kids not read, and she was right. But then she realized that her priorities were not in order. Grades and logs got in the way of what she really wanted, to foster the love of reading. Yup.

I was so honored when they asked me to be a guest blogger a few years ago. This is the blog I shared. I made a lot more online connections with like-minded educators from that experience. All of these connections keep me learning!

This blog really sealed the deal on my opening up more about my beliefs. I have been following Shana Karnes for a long time. I loved her honesty and self-reflection in this post. She makes me wish I blogged a long time ago, as in twenty years ago. It’s so hard to think about my process, given I’ve been teaching for 25 years. I love reading her blog.

So, here is my attempt to backtrack and show my own learning. These are things I have not done in years or have never done in the spirit of creating life-long learners:

Reading logs/journals
Parent sign-off sheets for reading
Any accountabiltiy for reading minutes/pages
Any accountability for reading levels/lexiles

All of those things do not help humans want to read. They might force grade-driven students to read, or they may give us something to measure, but is that our goal?

It’s not my goal. I write a lot about writing and mentor texts. That’s the relationship I want to encourage.

Anytime educators pull out the word “accountability,” I feel like they’re looking for ways to categorize learning and students.

This might sound loosey-goosey. My classroom has clear and high level expectations. But I believe in giving students the structure they need with the choice that is vital. They are held accountable to learn. And I help them support their claims for what that means.

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Lessons the not so hard way

3/7/2017

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It takes a lot for me to take a book from a student. I can probably count on one hand how many books I’ve taken from students in the past twenty-five years. Taking a book from a student is tantamount to saying, “stop reading,” and that is abhorrent to me.

But I took a book from a student yesterday. Nearly every day, Preston asks me if he can “just finish this chapter?!” before he settles into the daily question. Given the routine of the class, that usually works fine. It’s a workshop, and there is always time for reading and writing.

He approached me yesterday and asked if I’d help him get caught up at lunch. “I’m about a week behind on the fire-ups”. I gave him that look. “Really,” I said. “You want me to give up my lunch because you keep making the wrong choices?” He hung his head. I told him I’d be happy to help him at lunch if he got right to today’s question. His next sentence put me over the edge. “I’ll just have my parents help me.”

That’s when I decided I had to help him make better choices. I took his book, which he’d opened back up. “Nope, I ask you every day if you’re making the right choice, and you tell me you are. I’m going to help you.” So, I walked away with his book, and I told him I’d give it back to him when he got today’s question thoroughly answered.

A student behind him looked at me and said, “You’re suffocating him.”

I gave her a nod of agreement and a look of dismay.

A little backstory. I was talking to a district coach a few months ago about our classroom procedures. We talked about the student-led workshop. We talked about how often students ask…”Can I…”, and we answer with “Is this going to help you to do that?” Most often, the answer is yes.

So, I’d been saying yes to this student, but he wasn’t being completly honest about if that reading was going to help him.

Or, maybe he was. Maybe he’s okay with having to make up a bunch of work because he got the joy of liivng in his book.

Today, he came in, sat down, opening his computer, and he tapped his book. “I’m using restraint.”

“Good.” I said.

So, I do wonder how he feels about his choice. I’m assuming he realized he went too far.

I read a great quote from an educator on Twitter. ““We must all suffer one of two things: the pain of discipline or the pain of regret.” -Jim Rohn. I’m assuming he learned both of these things.

Preston just approached me and said, “I did learn a lesson! I should start with answering the question.”

Gratitude: Students who love reading
Goal: Keeping the best practice to fuel that flame, so I don’t suffocate any students.

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7th grade language arts teacher at Westview Middle School in the St. Vrain Valley School District

Old dog learning new tricks

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educator of middle schoolers and self

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April 25th, 2017

Slice of Life

Let's just read

Lessons the not so hard way

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