Making for the #SummerLS

So I am doing the Summer Learning Series and have been studying making by reading Invent to Learn. In doing so one of the challenges asked me to look into making, reflect on what I have learned, and actually try my hand at making.  I am still in the process of reading Invent to Learn, and am participating in the #ITLchat for the next two Mondays at 8:30 CST, but I have a few thoughts here to reflect on while still in the process and something I have made (or fixed).

Let's start first with my own making inspiration. I first started with a problem ... my 16 month old son discovered it was fun to play with our clothes steamer and began dragging it around. I thought it was harmless until he tipped it over repeatedly and the top broke. The real problem wasn't that it broke, but that it created a top with sharp edges he wanted to scratch the walls to our new apartment with.  We just moved halfway across the country to Texas and the first thing he wanted to to do was destroy I guess.

Well, I put it away and he forgot about it. So did I, until I started reflecting on how I was going to complete this maker challenge that I was falling behind on. It had been a busy time moving and we still had an entire room in our new apartment to set up. Anyway, I was working on cleaning up that room to start setting up the file cabinet when it hit me. I need to fix this problem by making. 

My first thought was to use duct tape, but we had none I could find. I did find a container of Krazy Glue and was going to use that, but it was too old and had dried up. Two tries and two failures. However, we did have plenty of one supply ... PACKING TAPE! So I used that to tape it back together. It really doesn't need to hold much weight as long as I don't let my son get a hold of it.

I taped it together and gave it a trial run. It worked nicely and I have solved a problem by making! It was a simple problem, but I implemented the maker mindset!

Now time to move on and reflect on my learning so far from reading Invent to Learn, #ITLchat, a webinar I watched today by Erin Klein on Setting Up a Brain-Friendly Beautiful Classroom, and exploring the Instructables website. From these I realized one thing I can do as a maker this year. My students need to learn about electrical circuits for one of their science standards, and there are some great resources on the Instructables website about making lighting. Well Erin mentioned how lighting and student involvement should be part of classroom design. So I can have my students design some lighting structures to use in the classroom. That sets up a challenge for students, will meet science standards, and improve my classroom design. Not to mention all of the teachable moments that will arise out of the challenge.

Gamification with ClassDojo

On the last day of school I gamified my class using ClassDojo. 

It was the last day of the year and I was defeated. I had just received word that my math scores were not very good on the end of year state tests (I know test scores aren't everything). Don't get me wrong, I can teach math, but I must have been doing something wrong. The worst part was there was one day of school left and nothing I could do about it ... right? 

Wrong! I did a Twitter chat that night and it was all about gamification. So I collected some resources, read some blogs, and had a pretty good idea about gamification. It was all about a state of mind and was something I had passion for. So I rewrote my last day lesson plans.

I decided to create a list of ten geometric challenges involving some math concepts we struggled with this year.

The next morning, just before launching the lesson, I realized that I could add even more to this using weighted points in ClassDojo. I created a system where all group members received points for completing challenges in addition to the stickers. The Dojo points really made this lesson work. Students really enjoyed seeing their point totals rise for each challenge. 

I grouped my students heterogeniusly and set some rules. Each person much solve every other challenge or rotate if you had a group of three. They then brought me completed challenges and I gave them a sticker and Dojo points or feedback on why it didn't meat the challenge. For example several students brought me a square for a quadrilateral that isn't a rectangle. 

The next thing I knew I was standing at my computer awarding Dojo points, giving feedback, and stickers. Students were engaged, communicating, collaborating, and solving math problems. I also set a timer every five minutes when I would stop and teach a quick lesson on each challenge. By the time I got through all ten lessons most everyone was done, but it helped reinforce the concepts I wanted to practice.

Did I mention this was all on the last day of school when everyone else was having parties and watching movies? We were working hard, having fun, failing, and getting better at math. 

I finished my year strong, proved, I could teach kids math (every group finished the challenge), and the students had a great time. 

This lesson was really something I can build off of going into next year and adding more gamification type elements to my classroom. 

Connected, Passionate, Reflective: How Twitter changed my life

So I changed the title of my blog and the URL.  This is why ...

In January 2014 I finished reading Drive by Daniel Pink and was thinking of how to apply this in my classroom, but also in my teaching.  I realized that I had the autonomy I needed to be successful and enjoy my career, but I wasn't sure how to do it.  I chose to apply for the LearnZillion Dream Team because I was teaching using flipped videos.  Plus I really liked LearnZillion.  I completed both parts of the application, followed the rubrics to the best of my ability, and had submitted an awesome application. I just had to wait until early April to hear back about my acceptance and then go down to New Orleans June 6-8.  My career was about to take off, I was actually going to accomplish something worthwhile that people would notice, and it would make a big impact on education.

Meanwhile, my wife and I were searching for jobs to leave North Carolina.  This was for a variety of reasons beyond just the pay and treatment, but that isn't a topic I plan on covering in this post.  Our search was focused in on several counties in Maryland.

Then April came and we had spring break that we spent the first several days in Baltimore exploring the area and attending a job fair.  It was great, I took my son to his first baseball game.  Although I still hope he becomes a Met's fan.  I also am sure some people would debate calling a game with a DH baseball.  Again, a topic for another post.  I did get to play with my new iPad Air (see the picture) which helped me become connected. 

We returned home from Baltimore and that Friday night I received the rejection email from LearnZillion.  How in the world did I not get accepted? I tried to ask them, but I guess when you have thousands of applicants and only take 200 it is hard to provide feedback to everyone.  I moved on by trying to find my own feedback.  I finally went to Twitter.  I had an account, had heard about the Twitter chats for education, and had even followed a bunch of educators.  I just never really tweeted, or looked beyond the few people I had followed.  I honestly didn't think I knew enough, had proven myself, or was capable of putting myself out there.  Especially after the huge rejection I just received.  This time I wanted to see and figured it couldn't be any worse.  Maybe I was an awful teacher and just didn't know it.

That weekend I got on Twitter (my new iPad really helped to encourage this) and started looking for education chats to just read and see how I could hold up.  I found a list and later a calendar that I enjoy too.  I also found Sean Junkins who was moderating several chats that weekend.  That is where I got started.  I planned to just lurk, but found I actually had ideas to contribute.  People agreed with and challenged my thinking, but it was positive and fun.  I even realized that weekend that I was not asking good questions in my classroom.  I started to connect and reflect to become better.

As I found more educators on Twitter, I came back to some ideas I had to start the school year involving Augmented Reality.  I wanted to use it in my room, but we had these computers that were older than the kids.  At least we were 1:1 and had devices at all.  What I realized though was that close to half of my kids had their own devices at home they could use.  Although our school network wasn't the best I decided to go forward with using Augmented Reality.  Thanks largely impart to the passion and no excuses attitude from the Two Guys Brad Waid and Drew Minock.

This is what changed it all.  My confidence grew, my passion grew, I became more and more connected on Twitter.  I realized this is why I became a teacher.  All of the other nonsense became easier to deal with. I found ways to get it all done and still have time to focus on my passion of meaningful technology integration in the classroom.

The big change started on a Friday night in May.  I was going through my Twitter feed, after my son had gone to bed (7:00 bed time is wonderful), and I saw a blog post by Todd Nesloney about #YouMatter day.  I thought it was neat and a really easy idea.  I had heard about it on Twitter some, but am just not a very sentimental person and probably don't tell people that they matter enough.  You can read most of this story on my #YouMatter day post.

I left out part of that story because when I wrote it I was going through a lot and wanted to keep most of it private so my wife and I could work through this process.  The day after we had planned to have our own #YouMatter day I decided I should put my name in the hat for a position at Navasota Intermediate school where Todd was going to become principal next year.  We were already looking to relocate and applying for jobs like crazy, so what was one more?  The location wasn't ideal, but honestly, if LearnZillion wouldn't take me why would Todd Nesloney?  I applied on Saturday and quickly was offered a position at the school.  Unfortunately, I wasn't sure if this was best for my wife and son.  It would be crazy to just up and move to Texas for a teaching job.  I mean I can teach anywhere, right? Even if I decided this was best for us, what if my wife couldn't get a job?

Then I realized this was more than a teaching job, this was a chance to connect, to reflect, and to join up with like minded passionate educators.  Todd was probably one of my first follows in Twitter way back when I was looking for ideas on flipping my classroom.  Not to mention that Drew Minock and Brad Waid practically worship him and talk about how great he is in every episode of their pod cast.

It was the weekend of the LearnZillion Dream Team and I was about to get on a plane.  Not to go to New Orleans, but this time to go out to Navasota, TX.  I had downloaded Teach Like a Pirate by Dave Burgess and was ready to travel. I actually finished this book in my trip and it made me finally realize what I was missing when I applied to LearnZillion and what I now had that made me a much better teacher.  I now had passion.  I was already reflective, I was becoming connected, and now I realized I was passionate about what I was doing.  These three are why I have renamed my blog.

After the trip I was sold.  There was nothing, not even 1:1 iPads or some other device, that would fit me better than working at Navasota Intermediate. Unfortunately, we were close to the deadline.  What was I going to do?  How awkward would ISTE be if I had to tell Todd no after making him wait all this time?  I couldn't do anything but plan for the worst and hope for the best.  I was applying for jobs in Maryland and interviewing still as a backup, but knew where I needed to be.  It was one of the most frustrating experiences of my life. Fortunately, in a crazy and exiting way that I couldn't possibly have imagined it worked out and my wife was offered a job.  I let Todd know, and now we are headed to Texas.  

Here is what I learned about not just teaching, but life from this journey.  Be connected, be passionate, and be reflective.  If you do those things you will always be successful.  This is my first "rebranding" and I'll probably have a few more over the years as my ideas develop.  I am really looking forward to the journey the next few years hold.

Dream Bedroom ... More like Nightmare Bedroom

Okay, so it wasn't that bad, but I thought the title sounded funny. This lesson was a failure of mine, and sometimes we don't share our failures.  Although, it wasn't a total failure. My students had fun, and some of them improved and impressed me with their math skills and creativity. Most of them had no clue it was a disaster either.

I recently stole an idea from Lynn Lape (@lmlape) involving having students create a dream bedroom where they use grid paper to calculate the area and perimeter of the bedroom and everything in it. I started out telling kids they would be designing their own dream bedroom with the shoe boxes I had been asking them to bring in for a few weeks. We actually didn't have enough so I had to cut the kids off so I could double the number of bedrooms I had. I let he kids pick their boxes and we were off!

So anyway I went through and modeled how to set up grid paper to match the area of your box and then calculate area and perimeter. So far so good, I was able to facilitate and get kids through it. It was actually going well. The kids were calculating area and perimeter of huge rectangles and now just had to add in the other parts.  

What I left out, and where I think my first misstep was, was part of the timing and order. After I went over the first part, I created a rubric with the students outlining what should be included and how they should be evaluated. It actually went well and we came up with some good guidelines for items to include.  Although, I think next time we will look closer at the idea of the door taking up area in the bedroom along with how big the things should be in comparison to each other. 

So yes, the first lesson/day should have just been building the plan/grid and finding area and perimeter.  What happened when I started suggesting what would go in the room is that kids just went to that step. They skipped the math content I was trying to reteach entirely. I spent the rest of this unit or lesson or whatever trying to recover. My students needed more direction early on than I had predicted. 

So, back to the lesson. The next day I modeled how to find area and perimeter of the big rectangle again and how to put things on our plans. The mistake I made this day was letting students have the boxes back. Again they skipped the planning stage and just started building. Why didn't I think of that?  I do the same thing and just plan as I go but never write it down. When I arrange furniture I just move it around the room until my wife likes it. This lesson was becoming a disaster. Trying to redirect them back from the "fun" part to draw rectangles on grid paper was near impossible.  

I think I should have had them use their plans and grids and then get approval from me. Once a few got approval I could hire them as inspectors to approve others and speed up the process. This way my early finishers are engaged and teaching the students that need help and I essentially clone the teacher while empowering my students. Also, if I sold it as an incentive to get your plan done it would have been an engaging option vs some other busy work while they wait for me to help everyone. Who wants to solve math problems when you have a bedroom ready to be designed? Then, the next day I could pass the boxes back out and students could work on transferring their plans to their houses in the same way. Early finishers can again become inspectors to check that students plans match their bedrooms. 

The final flaw in my lesson was hinted to above. Students weren't building their bedrooms in accordance to the plans they made. The sizes didn't line up and they wanted to add in a lot of extras based on trying to use some extra supplies I had left over from creating ornaments for Christmas. There were a lot of jingle bell room alarms to keep pesky siblings out. 

To make this better I think I should have just left it up to my students to bring in materials like many of them did, or build from paper/drawings. Even showing them the supplies when we talked about making our plans. This way as they plan on the grid paper they are thinking about what supplies they need. 

Now after three days of math instruction students had only improved their knowledge of area and perimeter a little but I had an idea on how to fix it. At the end of fourth day I saw the rooms and plans were a disaster. One student even lost the entire plan, but boy was he having fun.  He even came back at lunch one day to work on his bedroom. Anyway, I wanted to see if the idea of inspector would work.  I had students set up their bedrooms and plans on their desks. Then they went around trying to find mistakes on other people's plans. They were generally engaged (if they knew how to find area and perimeter) and proud to show off when they found a mistake. They also were being bribed with a "wow" Dojo point for being able to explain to me the mistake. That part was awesome and I would include it at the end next time. 

So if you are still reading I hope it helps you. 

Please leave any questions, comments, or suggestions for me.  I am also thinking maybe this could be  outside with meter sticks and sidewalk chalk in groups instead. 

#YouMatter Day

A few weeks ago I saw my friend, who is the art teacher at my school, post on one of her mentee's Facebook about how awesome she was.  Earlier that day I had read Todd Nelsoney's blog about a #YouMatter day he did in his class. It was super easy and had a lot of potential. I put it in the back of my head as something I could do.

Then when I saw the Art teacher's post I jumped in and suggested that we do a #YouMatter day at school. They jumped on and next thing you know there was five of us sitting in the art room Monday morning planning it. 

The plan was simple. I outlined what Todd Nesloney did and sent out links to Angela Maiers' Tedx talk. Then we waited until May 27th, last Tuesday. That morning I had several excited teachers stop by to thank me for the idea (which I totally just stole). That morning my kids watched the video, discussed noticing people who are making significant contributions, and started writing letters. 

At one point a fifth grade teacher brought his entire class to my room, came in, and modeled how to deliver a letter.  This was awesome! Not to mention the inspiring letter he wrote to me. 

I had planned on getting my students to sign the #YouMatter wall that our art teacher put up at lunch time.  However, they had to squeeze in because the paper was full by lunch! There was even a line to sign the poster!

As the day progressed there were teachers from first through fifth grade participating. Just think, as a third grade teacher, I matter to students is 1st-5th grade. One of my favorites thanks me for dressing up as Ash Ketchum for our global field day (to represent Japan). He said it helped restore his love of Pokemon. 

Letters continued to trickle in throughout the week. Teachers began discussing how to leverage this new found motivation. Here are some pictures of what two fifth grade teachers were inspired to do. 

What a great day! When will you schedule your #YouMatter day?

Connecting

This week I was super connected. I loved it and have probably done more work in a single week than I had all year. The best part of all was it didn't feel like work. My passion for being connected and collaborating is making my job easier and I'm much more effective. 

This week I finished writing poems for a collaborative eBook with a few teachers in Ohio and another one in North Carolina. https://twitter.com/theipodteacher/status/468036008874082304 It was an awesome experience and showed me how simple and easy collaboration can be. Not to mention during the project students were motivated and wanted to do their best. Several were sent back to make revisions up to five times. There was no frustration, but just determination to publish an excellent poem. I want to thank @PrimaryTeachNC, Kate Haris, and @theipodteacher for helping this happen. 

I also took some big steps in using PBL more effectively. I had some local training done by my district and completed a course through PBLU on driving questions. This was quite an undertaking, but was actually fun. I even made time to plan a PBL unit around the novel Make Way for Dyamonde Daniel starting next week. I have learned a lot and hopefully the successes and mistakes in this new unit will help more. 

There is a lot more too, but those were two of the highlights from this week in being connected. One other smaller one is that I got a few kids excited about Pixel Press after learning about it on the #2guysshow. We will see where it goes. Next week I'm going to try to squeeze in some creative writing and use he ColAR mix coloring sheets. I have also started a #youmatter movement at my school thanks to some inspiration from @techninjatodd and his blog post http://nesloneyflipped.blogspot.com/2014/05/youmatter-day-2014.html. We will be ironing out the details tomorrow morning. I saw a neat idea on Twitter with area and perimeter designing your dream bedroom. My students need to review those concepts so I'm glad I found that idea. Finally, I need to start planning an Augmented Reality scavenger hunt. I want to do it, but just need to find the right content to work it with. 

It is amazing how driven I am to complete my own self directed projects as a teacher. I really need to spread this passion with my students. It is all from being connected and feeding off of the passion from like minded educators. I am really motivated and just wish I had more than four weeks left to inspire my students this year. Then again ISTE this summer is going to be awesome and transform my teaching even more. 

I want to be the very best

Here it is! My first big jump into Augmented Reality.  Thanks to my Twitter PLN.  Three shout outs need to go to @kinderMI who is going on this journey with me although she might be doing a bit better at this point.  That probably helps me gain more inspiration form her.  Then the two guys @TechMinock and @techbradwaid for providing plenty of passion and inspiration. 

Now let's go back through this process. About a month ago I decided I needed to find people who were passionate about the same things as me.  I was getting really defeated by not being able to find anyone in my building.  I finally dove into twitter.  I found some chats, the two guys, more people for my PLN, and Aurasma.  Then my creativity took over.

How was I going to implement it? My kids have 1:1 but with Dell laptops that are probably close to ten years old using Windows XP, and they can only use IE 8 as their browser.  How was I going to put AR in their hands?  Well, I started to encourage them to bring their own devices in. I have at least six kids every day with a device capable of running Aurasma. During the process we had a lot of issues with connecting and getting triggers to work. Luckily, the kids have dove into this and helped me stay excited.  One student even had his mom create him an Aurasma account and has been making auras at home for fun. 

Now that we had some devices and had gotten it to work once in class and now we needed to design the bulletin board on Japan. The kids first had to defend how Pokemon was connected to Japan and then connect to a Pokemon. I figured this would help them connect with one piece of the rich Japanese culture instead of just memorizing countless facts and traditions.  The kids enjoyed it and once we got past drawing Pokemon pictures they really connected to the Pokemon.   In addition to containing these videos of kids explaining their poke on choices they added five life lessons that you can get from Pokemon on the board.  Inspired by some other Pokemon bulletin boards I found on the web.  Be careful when you google for Pokemon bulletin boards.  You will find the life lessons examples, but most of me are about not catching them all (referring to STD education). That isn't something I think I should be teaching third graders. 

Our first major barrier came the week of finishing the bulletin board.  Our school turned off the public network in the classrooms so students had to connect to the BYOD wifi which blocks a connection with Aurasma studio and required a lengthy login process. Luckily I made some time after school and tried to set up the triggers using my account in my iPad. This transferred over BYOD. I'm not sure why the same triggers wouldn't work when doing it in my studio account, but anyway I got it working again.   This is after several emails trying to trouble shoot with my media specialist, who is awesome. 

So the big day came and went and anyone who saw it was impressed and inspired.  I even had one teacher tell me how she is so excited and her kids with learning disabilities are so excited about AR. I know I have inspired at least one other teacher to improve her practice by using AR so that makes this adventure a success. That and anytime my kids have free time they ask to go watch the videos on the bulletin board.  

Next week my focus shifts to writing poetry for a collaborative ebook we are taking part in. I think my next big AR project is going to be a scavenger hunt.  I'll probably get my two kids with their own iPads to even set up the whole thing. What advice can you give me in taking this on? Even resources I could adapt for third grade would be fantastic. Help me find out what is next in AR. 

Now for the title. I think I know what my goal is as a connected educator. I want to be the best. Although after reading Drive I realize it isn't about being he best, but about working toward mastery. I have a long way to go and am not sure of the path. So I guess I'm asking my PLN to help me. Help inspire me, guide me, and help me find what is next to get better to become the best educator I can be. Instead of a Pokemon Master I want to work on becoming an Education Master. 

I'm not sure how this post will turn out. I'm writing it on my iPad because I think this may be the easier way for me to blog without completely removing me from my family. I've had to stop several times to let my 13 month old son play with my iPad. Fortunately for me his attention span isn't long so he moves on quickly.  Finally, happy Mother's Day to all the moms out there.  Especially my wife and my own mother who I should probably call.