Tuesday, September 4, 2018

Today's Content:

• BOLD Literacy: Reading, Reading Everywhere!

• Instructional Coherency: Help With All the Things

• Campus of Learning: #ObserveMe

Thank you so much for a great second week of learning and instruction at NRMS!  The 2018-19 school year is off to a Falcon-tastic start, and there is so much great work going on already.  Keep on reading to celebrate the hard work of your peers and students and to gain some insight into different instructional priorities.

Falcon Focus: Reading, Reading Everywhere! 

In Birdville we are very focused on Building Opportunities for Literacy Daily, and Falcons have embraced the chance to read, write, think, and discuss.  

All around campus you can catch glimpses of students' and teachers' reading lives, and listen to them sharing in a culture of literacy.  

See below for examples of reading displays, book talks, and other suggestions.

Students cozy up with a good book where ever they can.

Student book talks help students spread the word about reading.

Book displays help students (and teachers) find their next great read.

Brittany Joyner invites students to share their book suggestions.  She also encourages them to read Lone Star Readers by celebrating their progress and reading alongside them.

The Lone Star Reading Program invites students to read their choice of 10 books from a list, after which they get to attend a catered luncheon with an author.  This year, the guest of honor is Jason Reynolds, author of Long Way Down and Ghost.  Want to read alongside the students as well?  Check in the library for this year's list!

Faculty and staff get into the reading fun with a variety of different texts.

Looking for a good book to read?  Below, Sherryl Dickey shares a book talk over the book she just finished, I'll Push You by Patrck Grey.

 jklj

Falcon Focus: Help With All the Things

During our back-to-school professional learning, several teachers led us through instructional campus expectations.  Extra thanks to: Robin Asaff, Lindsey Cato, Felicia Cherry, Kylie Cranford, Teresa Davis, Jonie Dodson, Beverly Goodman, Kathy Harvell, James Hollis, Lori Liles, Karen Sanchez, and Amy Thornton for their leadership and hard work.  

All the presentation materials used can be found in our NRMS Google Classroom, but I've also included a link below to the folder.  There are also a few additional resources to support you with "all the things".  Click on the red titles to get to the Google folder.


Monday, August 13 Professional Learning - In this folder you can find:

• Falcon Culture 2018-19
• Culture of Literacy
• Tier 1 Priorities & Instructional Coherency
• Literacy Strategies
• Continuous Improvement Expectations
• Workshop Model & 5E
• Building Vocabulary

Thursday, August 16 Professional Learning - In this folder you can find:

• Google Classroom for Beginners
• Google Classroom for Experienced Teachers
• Plan-Do-Study-Act
• Making Your SMART Goals Smarter
• Behavior Intervention Strategies
• Mission Statements: Defining Purpose

Instructional Coherency Documents - This is the list of campus instructional expectations for all of our departments.  We will be developing them for Special Ed and Electives through our PLC work this year.

Continuous Improvement Google Site - This Google Site includes examples and how-tos for all of the Continuous Improvement pieces.  I will continue to update it with relevant examples from our campus.




Falcon Focus: #ObserveMe

#ObserveMe originated from the collective realization of many educators that there was an opportunity to learn from each other.  In a Twitter Chat in 2016, one teacher posted the idea of inviting other teachers into their classroom to give targeted feedback. Other educators and groups such as @Robert Kaplinsky and @Teacher2Teacher jumped on this idea and turned it into the movement that it is just two years later.

To participate, determine two to three goals that you are working on in your classroom.  Create a short Google Form that visitors can complete in order to collect your feedback.  Finally, post an invitation to others to come on in and share their observations.  

Jonie Dodson is participating in #ObserveMe this school year.  She has shared her editable #ObserveMe sign here.  She would appreciate you stopping in to share your thoughts about her classroom!

Want to read more?

Robert Kaplinsky started the #ObserveMe movement with this blog post in 2016. 

One year later, Kaplinsky wrote a post reflecting the #ObserveMe movement and different "tricks" he wish he had known at the beginning.

Jennifer Gonzalez, creator of the blog Cult of Pedagogy, wrote a piece on why we need to observe each other. 

If you decide to participate in #ObserveMe, please let me know!  I love visiting classrooms, and would enjoy offering feedback.  I will be creating my own #ObserveMe as well.  Be on the lookout for a sign on my office door!

If have any questions or would like some help implementing these or other strategies, please let me know.  And remember...

It's a great day to be a Falcon!

Monday, April 11

Today's Content:

• Professional Development: Falcon Learning Walks

• Tier 1 Priorities:  Workshop Model/Chunk & Chew

• Digital Learning:  Telling Your Story on Social Media - #LoveMySchoolDay

Falcon Focus: Falcon Learning Walks

In education, we are always striving to learn more, do more, be better teachers for our students.  But sometimes when we hear about an enlightened philosophy, a "breakthrough" strategy, or a new technology, we think, "That sure sounds good...but how would that work in my classroom?" Sometimes, we have to see something in action to really wrap our minds around it.

As a result, many teachers have asked for the opportunity to see how some of our priorities and focus areas work in the real world.  So enter the Falcon Learning Walks, our structure for informal peer observation.  As we discussed on Friday, April 1st, the purpose is to provide teachers with self-determined, collaborative professional development.  You identify the type of observation that will best help you and your students, and then make it happen.  We've outlined 4 simple steps:

• Determine your focus - Which instructional or management areas will help you and your students the most?  Who can help you gain new perspective on this?

• Request an observation - Check with the teacher before you visit.

• Document your observation - Take notes and mindful of the students; how does what they're doing impact their learning?

• Reflect - What does what you saw mean for you and your classroom?

Furthermore, we talked about our Learning Walk Protocols:

• Intentionally plan your observations.
• Walk in with a growth mindset.
• Observe for a minimum of 15 minutes.
• Remember to be an observer and not a participant in the lesson.
• Complete the Falcon Reflection Form to let your Academic Coach know if you need any assistance.

You can also review the Learning Walk handout.

Falcon Focus: Workshop Model/Chunk & Chew

For students to truly own their learning, they need time to process the information.  Kathleen Kryza calls this the "chunk" and "chew" of learning: "For every 10 minutes you teach something new, the brain needs 1 to 2 minutes to chew."  So, new information = chunk, process time = chew.  This fits right along with the workshop model, a major component of our tier 1 priorities.

In Samantha Taylor's math classes, chunk and chew time is built into every activity.  First, she chunks the concept to be learned into smaller, more manageable bits of information.  In a probability lesson last week, Samantha introduced the concept using the "Falcon Downs" - a horse race simulation using dice.

You can see in the video below how the students transition from chunk time as a whole class (learning about many possible outcomes of the horse race) to individual chew time (the opportunity for students to process and think about that new concept).

A way to build in collaborative "chew" time is with classroom discussions.   Samantha uses strategies like Turn and Talk and Stand Up-Hand Up-Pair Up to encourage the students to "chew" on their learning with their peers, and further refine their understanding.

Stand Up - Hand Up - Pair Up

"Chewing" through Collaborative Discussion

 Because this is part of the everyday process, students expect that they will be thinking about math, writing about math, and talking about math with their peers.


Falcon Focus: Tell Your Story

Want a chance to tell the story of your classroom?  This Monday is Love My School Day - the perfect opportunity to start using social media for that very purpose.

Use your Twitter account to showcase great things going on with your students.  Be sure to use the appropriate hashtags - and there are lots!

#LoveMySchoolDay
#CelebrateMonday
#nrms2015
#bisddlp
#BISDShines

You can also follow me @maryterry2015 !

If have any questions or would like some help implementing these or other strategies, please let me know.  And remember...

It's a great day to be a Falcon!

Friday, April 1

Today's Content:

• Building Community: NRMS "Believe" Challenge

• Tier 1 Priorities:  Workshop Model

• Digital Learning:  Quizizz

  
Falcon Focus: Building Community

Now that STAAR, Round 1 is behind us, it is a great time to think about the Believe Challenge.  Some teachers have already started, and I wanted to share one of the conversations.  It may help you get some ideas if you're unsure of how to start, or are thinking the conversation feels awkward.  It is a little awkward - but so worth it!

Filming the conversation is completely optional; a video simply serves as a record of our conversations, a reminder of our impact.  (The video is NOT going to be shared with students.)  Think about what type of conversation is best for you and your student(s).

That said, when I contacted this student's mom to ask permission to share this video, the first thing she wanted to do was to see was the video because she was so honored and proud of her son.  The pride and joy in her voice was incredible; so much so that I felt like I stole a moment away from Mrs. Maupin.  Going forward, I'm going to ask teachers to make the phone calls.

Falcon Focus: Tier 1 Priorities

Workshop Model is an instructional area of focus in almost all of the core content areas.  This week after rocking the STAAR test, 8th grade students in ELAR classes engaged in a workshop lesson over parts of speech.

The workshop model consists of 3 main components: the mini-lesson, student work time, and a debrief.

Mini-lesson - First the 8th Grade ELAR teachers used a Prezi to review basic parts of speech with students.  (Want to see the Prezi?  Click below.)

Student Work Time - After the mini-lesson, students then participated in different sentence analysis activities, manipulating sentence strips with various words and phrases.

Debrief - To close, students were asked a debrief question, which had also served as the essential question to get the activity started.

So why sentence structure immediately after STAAR?  The timing of the content was intentionally planned.  Next week, students will be starting research projects, and the first step is to develop a thoughtful, well-crafted, and structurally correct thesis statement.

Falcon Focus: Tech Formative Assessment

7th Grade Writing recently tried out a new formative assessment tool called Quizizz.  If you're ready for a break from that catchy Kahoot music, you may want to try this.  Quizizz features include randomized question order, the ability for students to self-pace, individualized & funny icons for each student, and downloadable results for the teacher.  Hooray for easy grading!

As the students take their quiz, they can see where they "rank" among their classmates; notice the "whoo-hoos" at the beginning of the video.

To get started on Quizizz, visit their website @ http://quizizz.com/
or click on the image to the right to get a tutorial.

If have any questions or would like some help implementing these or other strategies, please let me know.  And remember...

It's a great day to be a Falcon!