Year 1 Complete

The first year has come to an end!  I cannot believe that one year is done.  As I reflect on my first year, there is so much that I have learned.  A lot of things I plan to keep the same, tweak, and change altogether.  It is amazing how much my kids have taught me this year.  I find myself feeling so bad that they did not get the benefit of my first year of experience, but I have spend some time really thinking about what they did get and accomplish.  My kids grew leaps and bounds from where they started.  Are they where I would love to have them and my students for many years to come, not exactly, but they have improved in many ways and I am excited to hear about where life takes them from here!

What I plan to keep the same:  Not much next year.  At this point, I plan to keep my behavior management system the same (marble jar, money system).  That has been great for individual behaviors and the kids have really enjoyed it.  I finally like my classroom set up and I plan to keep that the same.  I love having my kids in groups and still having a space for the kids to meet on the carpet.  After all, fifth graders are still kids. I also plan to keep my math block the same as I finally have a system that I like which allows me to work with the kids in smaller groups and one-on-one settings everyday.

What I plan to tweak: Many things.  I am going to focus on my Language Arts block this coming year.  I tried the Daily 5/CAFE model in my room for part of the year and it wasn't working well.  I am going to sit down with a colleague this summer and brainstorm some new ideas for our classrooms.  I have also been reading some professional books this summer already to help give me some new ideas.  This part of our day is half the day (all afternoon) so it will be a BIG change!  My team is also changing how we teach science.  We will be rotating for science units, so I am excited to really dive into my topic: Earth and Space Sciences.

Overall, I am excited to dive deeper into the content this year and establish better routines from the beginning.  This summer, I will share with you all of the things I learn from my professional reading (hopefully pool side reading :-) ).

Blogging- Who Would Have Thought?

Why don't I let my kids run with things more often? I introduced our classroom blog to my class on Monday and couldn't be more impressed with my kids! They have jumped on board without hesitation! I have been so afraid to bring this into my classroom all year. I was afraid that it would be too much to handle and become too overwhelming for me to teach the kids how to use the site and then properly "blog."

After my last observation, I decided, what could it hurt? I set up the classroom blog last week and realized that it only took 10 minutes to do! I figured that would be the easy part, but it turns out, it isn't the easiest part. On Monday, I pulled up our classroom blog, showed the kids how to log in, and then we jumped right in and wrote a blog together stating our requirements. We did this as a shared writing and then posted it for them to frequently check back to.

My kids couldn't get to the computers, laptops, and iPads in my room fast enough to start "blogging." I had a few students ask if I knew how to write a blog post because they felt that the writing was different than a typical response. I was immediately taken back by the insight my kids had about this type/style of writing. I thought that the only thing I would get out of this experience was to read their reading responses in a more convenient way for me. Who would have thought that would be the smallest thing I would get from this?

My kids wrote posts this week that were deeper than any other reading response I have read this year (they used to write a response each week in a notebook that was passed between myself and them). My "lowest" readers/writers became examples for classmates on insight and depth in their thinking and writing about their books. I had students who never turned in a reading response (or rarely did so), posting immediately! Now, mind you, the requirements did not get easier, only harder! They still have to write a post once a week, but now they have to respond to at least three classmates. Plus, this is worth more points than their old responses (now 20 points, was 5 points a week).

Why do I think a huge improvement was shown? Well, I think for one, this was of high interest to my kids because it involved technology. They love the technology we have in our room with this pilot program (which I hope I never have to give up this technology), but now they have a way to interact with one another using this technology.

I think that their responses are more insightful and well thought out, because their peers are reading their posts as well! I would love to think that my kids valued my opinion on their writing, but the reality is, I am the teacher. Their peers have "real" opinions that matter to them much more than mine ever will. If the kids are anything like me and my blog posts, they can't wait to log into the blog, open up their recent posts, and see a comment about THEIR writing from THEIR friends.

If I could go back in time and was allowed to make one change to my classroom and instruction this year, it would be to start this classroom blog from the beginning of the year. I have already learned more about my students as readers (and writers) from this first week "experimenting" with this than I think I have learned from many of our conversations. I have also found that they are more excited to talk to one another about their reading and participate and share in our read aloud discussions. I am so excited about this in my room and can't wait to hear what my kids think after our first week is completed and we re-evaluate as promised.

The Power of Observations

As a teacher, we know that observing our students and what they do in the classroom everyday is critical to understanding what they know and how they learn and are progressing towards the learning targets. I do this often in the classroom trying to make a few observations about at least ten students a week in math and reading. I use a great log that I created that works for me. But, this week I learned that the power of an observation lies with more than just watching our students.

I had the opportunity to observe another teacher within my district teach her reading workshop block, Karen Terlecky. Earlier this year I spoke about how valuable observations are here. I find them to be so helpful to my teaching that I felt the need to reflect about them once again.

While on my observation, I found myself feeling so overwhelmed with questions and thinking about my classroom. I mentioned my feeling of grief about not supporting my students in a way that I felt they deserved from me this year. I wanted to be better for them in my classroom and wanted to start the year over to do that. The time I had to observe gave me a fresh perspective on what I am doing well and what I need to reevaluate in my classroom.

I left with so many reflections and questions for myself to consider as I complete this school year and start next year. I spent this year focusing on math, creating a math workshop that was supporting my students in a way they needed, and learning the content. I invested so much time in this that I found my reading block lacking in many ways. Sure, my kids were still getting instruction and are growing as readers this year, but not as much as I want them to.

The funny thing about my focus on math is that I started the year saying that math was my weaker area while language arts... well I had that one figured out. At the end of the year, I am realizing how very wrong that statement was. I can see that I will never have things "figured out" like I thought.

My observation spurred me on to try some new things. The kids are at the end of the year, state testing is almost here and done with, and I need to keep them focused for one more month. I decided the best way to keep their attention was to through something new and exciting into the mix.

I think it is so important for my kids to see how adults are reflective in their practice and decisions. I often try to model this for my class. I decided that I was going to be honest with my kids. I told them that I had been on an observation of another teacher and that I wanted to change some things for next year. I shared with them all the things I saw and learned. I then asked them, which new ideas sounded the most interesting to them for us to "practice" for my class next year. They decided on two focuses: read aloud notebooks and a bi-weekly blog post.

So, I promptly set me kids up on kidblog.com and we are going to jump in feet first on Monday with this. I don't know how it will go, but I have a lot of confidence that my class will teach me a lot that will make next years class better. Since we are going to do a reading blog as a class, I decided my reading notebooks (letters) were too repetitive. So we turned these into our read aloud notebooks. This has been a bit rocky, but after four days of intensive instruction on their use and long conversations around them, I can already see improvement.

Observing not only another teacher, but my students practice these new ideas is only going to make me a better teacher next year and has already made me better for my kids this year. I am finding that this is the time of year to do this! I am learning so much and I get to try it without worry of the failure it could bring. Happy observing in your own classroom!

Student Growth

Along with the middle of the year in my district, comes midpoint diagnostics.  Since fifth grade gets state wide testing for reading, math, and science, our midpoints are in these three areas as well.  My biggest fear starting teaching in my own room this year was that my students would not show much, if any, growth in any content area.  I really lacked confidence in my own teaching.

Well, I was so surprised and excited when I completed the grading of these diagnostics because my class average in all three content areas showed growth.  In some content areas more than others, but growth nonetheless!  I could not be happier.  I am finding myself celebrating this little success and anxious for the next one to come around the corner.

I found it to be funny that I showed this growth because lately I have been feeling like there are so many things I want to change in how I run my classroom daily.  I have talked about my Daily 5 structure during reading workshop time, and have really been wrestling with this concept.  I loved it when I taught 4th grade last year in two long terms (4 months and 3 months).  I loved it when I started the school year, but now am feeling like it is not sufficient enough for my students.  It almost seems too easy for them and like a boring routine that we continue.

All of that being said, I want to change this part of my day, but am nervous to do so because it took us so long to set up this structure.  Some things I do know about what I want to keep: the workshop model, lots of reading and content practice during this time, and of course small and individual student work time with me.  What are some things you are doing in your classrooms?  I am anxious to begin thinking about this, but also want to put a lot more thought into this part of my day than I currently do.

Math is another area that I am finding myself wanting to really make changes.  As part of my resident educator program, I had to write a unit plan and my first one was on a math topic: decimals.  I took our current math program and re-wrote the entire unit.  What did I find?  My students did so much better than they have ever done!  The scored the highest on our unit assessment today than they have ever done, but more importantly, they can explain to you how decimals work and why they work that way.  They have a deeper understanding of the concepts!  I could not be happier, but I want all of my math units to be this way.

This makes me super nervous, because it has taken me forever to re-create that unit and put all of the pieces together.  To do this with every remaining unit (13 to be exact), seems so daunting.  I know the end result will make it so worth it, but finding the time seems almost impossible.  I am going to have to re-read my balancing time post from much earlier this year!

On top of all this newness running around in my head, I am taking part in a new technology pilot program in my school.  It starts in about a week.  I am excited about parts of it and a bit skeptical about other parts.  I am anxious to see how my teaching changes for the better from this and anxious to see what I find works with my teaching style and my classroom routines.  Some things seem like they will be very challenging for me, particularly because of my having to give up some control and that is not a strong suit for me.  I will have so much more to share on this in the near future.  But, in the meantime, how do you use technology in your classroom with your students daily?

The Midpoint

Today officially marked the end of the first half of the school year.  I think that it has finally set in that this is my classroom.  Over winter break a few weeks ago, I found myself excited to go back to my classroom and students.  Now that we have been back for the last few weeks, I have finally felt a bit more settled in for the year.  I feel like I know my students well and I know ways that I can support them in the classroom to help them learn the most they can.

As part of being this far into the school year, I am deep into my first year resident educator work (a mentorship program required for four years to earn a full five year teaching license).  At this point in the year I have to plan, conduct, and reflect on three lesson cycles (mini units).  I have fully completed one entire cycle and have been so thrilled with the deep learning that all of my students have had.  I have been even more thrilled with how much my more challenged students have not only learned but retained.  It was a definite proud teacher moment.  :-)  This has really inspired me to continue this work with the remainder of my math instruction this year.  The only challenge: it was a lot of prep work and planning.  I want to do this, but I am not sure where I am going to find the time on top of my already busy schedule with all of my other job to dos.  I am going to have to get super creative.

To mark the end of the first half of the school year, my team had a release day to work on data review and planning from here.  I was so happy that we completed so much work and planning.  We created an assessment to continue to track student growth and planned a series of 8 lessons that we will conduct as a team in the 8 weeks leading up to our state testing.  Today was so productive and I have a work day again tomorrow.  I am hoping that tomorrow can be just as productive.

I certainly did not think that I would be feeling this calm at this point in my first year teaching full time. I certainly did not think that I would have been learning so much this year either.  If you had asked me at the start of the school year if I thought I would grow a lot as a teacher and learn a lot about being a better teacher, I would have said no, but I am finding that I am a much better teacher than I ever was 4.5 months ago.  I cannot wait to see what the next half of the year brings!