Graphite Lesson:Sentence Combining with Simple Wikipedia

Students practice syntactical complexity with Simple Wikipedia articles. See lesson HERE! 

Graphite Lesson: Counterargument Smackdown!

With ProCon.org, Edmodo, and Socrative, students categorize major points and evidences on given topic in a lesson easily customizable to your goals and curricular needs. See the lesson here!

Creative Writing with Substance

Giving students an opportunity to write fiction is an important and empowering experience. Too often personal narrative, persuasive, and expository trump all other forms of writing in our classrooms. Meanwhile, we read multiple short stories and novels – all examples of creative narratives that we analyze and exalt. Having student analyze fiction, but not create it runs the risk of sending students a terrible message: the fiction they could write is inferior and not worth creating.

In order for students to really understand why authors do what they do, students must take on the role of the author. Good readers read as writers. When deciding the parameters of a creative writing assignment, I look to my reading standards, not just writing.

Pre-writing plays a key role:

Theme: Get short stories with substance by asking students to find an inspirational quotation on http://www.quotationspage.com/  and then create a plot that proves the theme to be true. Model an example, create plot charts, and let students conference just on the plot charts and ideas so they can refine and get feedback.

Character: By creating innovative and realistic characters, student practice characterization. Character profiles, like the one over at National Novel Writing Month’s teacher resources packet, gives students the scaffolding they need to flesh out their ideas. Use my lesson on the coronation scene from Frozen to help show students the versatility of dialogue.

Symbol: My students were really struggling with analyzing symbols. I wanted them to see symbols from the other point of view, as the author. I modeled with my own story – a stunning narrative that involved Brad Pitt buying me flowers.

Stage directions: This year, our district moved drama unit into the same grading period as our narrative reading and writing units, so I took this as an opportunity to change the short story to a script. Capitalizing on the standards for our grade level that asks students to analyze stage directions, we looked at models and students used them to establish characterization and symbols.

What’s more, the kids have fun! The creative process is engaging. Students are energized. The testing genres are killing our kids. They have voices and characters and worlds ready to be unleashed! Creative writing opens the doors to those worlds and lets kids speak through their characters.

Poetry and Tech Unite!

Inspired by the Color Splash that Jonas sees in The Giver and this lesson on ReadWriteThink.org,
students analyze and create imagist poetry. You by no means need to do The Giver to do this lesson, but it is a nice companion lesson.

How to use this technique for Adobe Photoshop (or iPads):

1. Students analyze “The Red Wheelbarrow”. This website is my favorite collection of commentary on the poem and a wonderful resource for upper level students to see there is no one correct way to view a poem. Personally, I tend to analyze it as the poem itself depends upon the image and therefore the role of the poet is to take note of things we might otherwise ignore.
2.  Open Photoshop or Get a free color splash app. I have used the one from Kite Games Studio which let me get rid of the watermark after I reviewed it. 
3. After showing them what a finished product will look like, help students download a large image that allows for use with modification or take their own images using the iPad camera.
   
4. Open the image in Photoshop or upload the image into the app and have students select the focus of the photo by selecting one object to have color. The easiest way to do this is put a black and white layer of the image over it and use the eraser to erase that back and white layer so the color original shows through.
   
5. Once complete, students save the modified photo.
6. Students then write a vivid sentence describing the focus of their image AFTER the teacher has MODELED.
7. Using the handout on ReadWriteThink.org  as a guide, I put students into small groups to answer those questions. When students are able to receive feedback on their writing and hear the writing of others, everyone improves! Students use an app like Pic Collage to put their poem on their image. Don’t forget to have students add name and class period if you need. If you plan on sharing the images online, make sure students use only first name and last name initial.
8.  My favorite way to upload these types of media rich items is to also publish it at the same time. Create a Google Slides with blank slides – I like using a black background on all of them – and then have students upload the image onto a blank slide. (There are some issues with students not being able to access Google Folders on an iPad app. Ugh! I get around this by having students upload and submit their work via Edmodo and then have them take turns on the back PCs to upload on Slides. It is annoying, but I prefer it over me having to take the time to pull them off Edmodo! This year we are switching to Office 365 for the entire district, so I see if we can upload it onto the 365 version of PowerPoint. While putting the finished work on a presentation is not a necessary step, I do feel is rewarding and important part of the publishing process.) 
9. Change the usage rights of the presentation to view only and send a link to parents, Tweet it, and/or show the presentation in presentation mode while parents file in for Open House!
   

How to modify for PCs:

Instead of using color splash app, students can use Photoshop. There are a lot of YouTube videos and websites that feature multiple ways to do this. They can add the text on Photoshop as well!

The Only Way You Will Need to Teach Symbolism

I finally got around to making and posting this video!

Use Technology to Make Exit Tickets Easier

If you’re like me, closure activities can easily fall by the wayside. I believe wholeheartedly in the power of debriefing. I know exit tickets can provide important reflection for students as well valuable feedback for my own teaching. All the research points to the importance of this part of the lesson cycle, but it also my own area of weakness. The three biggest roadblocks for me can easily be solved with technology:

Roadblock #1: We Forget!

I tend to teach until the bell interrupts me. Why not set an alarm 4 minutes prior to each bell to give students a chance to do the exit ticket? Set alarms on Outlook, cell phone or even your FitBit! FitBit vibrates on your wrist which lets you know you need to wrap up without the students thinking an alarm is the thing ending the lesson.

Roadblock #2: The Mountain of Paper!

With over 180 students, giving each student a Post-It creates a mountain that – admittedly – I usually hardly even read. Why not take advantage of a BYOD classroom? Use Padlet for groups or partners to post the exit ticket. Use the QR code already created within Padlet to share, create a shortened URL with a Chrome extension like bit.ly, or post a link to the class Edmodo or similar service. Keep exit tickets open like:

•           Each group posts the thing they feel they most understand and then the least
•           Post a picture - pile of rocks, a leaf, a bunch of puppies - and ask students to relate it to the day’s lesson.
•         Groups post their own question and answer. For example, working on character traits? Students create a character trait of a common text all the group members know (class novel, Disney movie, etc) and write the character’s name, a trait, and a piece of evidence.

 

Left side: My exit ticket prompt of a logical fallacy with various groups responding.
Right side: Setting to "lock" the padlet to "Can View" so people can't add to finished Padlet.

Roadblock #3: Accountability for students AND teacher

Nothing holds me more accountable than having an outside audience. Create a class Twitter account, encourage parents to follow - even for parents who do not have Twitter accounts, knowing that you are inviting people into your classroom digitally is a great way to leave a strong impression on parents! - and at the end of the school day Tweet out a selected response to your closure activity or the Padlet but make sure to CHANGE THE PRIVACY SETTING TO VIEW! Hashtag your school district when you have a particularly strong example, especially if there is a cute picture with it. Just be aware of privacy laws and don’t use students’ faces.

Shakespeare's Globe App

Stop lecturing about Shakespeare's Globe Theatre and instead have your students participate in a walking tour. Not able to make it to London, you say? Enter the app Globe 360. Students can use the marker - downloadable from the website - or use it without a marker and students can still explore the globe, watch video, and tour the building.

By using ipads, students will be able to look up at the bright blue sky by lifting the ipad above their heads and make a complete 360. So much fun to incorporate into a webquest (appquest?)!

5 Ways to Help Reluctant Writers

Reluctant writers will fight, flight, or freeze when confronted with writing. The same system the brain uses to deal with the threat of the saber-toothed tiger is the same system that tried to protect them from the threat of writing. But we as teachers can show them that writing doesn’t have to be scary!

Model

First and foremost, modeling writing helps students understand that writing A. isn’t the easiest thing. It takes thinking. My student love to try to “help” me by telling me what I should write, but when I say, “This is my essay, let me think!” it shows the reluctant writers in the class that writing isn’t magic. It is okay to pause. Additionally, you are using also sorts of positive brain theory – like mirror neurons – to help bypass anxiety. I usually write for about 5 minutes with my students when beginning a rough draft and then circulate around the room.

Empathize

Brené Brown has a wonderful explanation of what empathy – as opposed to sympathy – is and how to express it. If you have a student with acute anxiety, it is a perfect time to tap into your own experiences with writing anxiety or writer’s block. My go to story involves my BFA thesis. Once I’m able to say, “I know how you feel. I felt the same way when X, Y, Z happened. Do you want me to show you some of my tricks to overcome it?” it usually makes them way more open to some of the other tricks below. I think it is very easy for teachers to make it look like writing is easy. Showing we go through the same emotions and struggles shows that anxiety is actually totally part of a writer’s process!

Change up the paper

“I know sometimes when I need to write the scariest thing about it is the big white paper and me filling out how to fill it up. Want me to give you some special paper?” It is amazing how much giving a child a smaller piece of paper can help. These are my absolute favorite Special Papers. They combat the two scariest things about a piece of notebook paper: color and size. And the lines let my students write neatly and in an organized fashion.

Aromatherapy

You can find sprays, gel beads, and even car fresheners that have lavender scent. Finding your class as a whole a bit stressed? Breakdown the word parts of aromatherapy, explain science has shown lavender is a calming scent, and spray a bit (make sure you know if any of your kids have allergies or are sensitive to strong smells). Don’t want to spray the whole room? Put a bit on a Kleenex and give it to the kiddos who need it. No lie, I have sprayed lavender scented air freshener on the paper mentioned above.

Be flexible

When dealing with a students who fight you on writing, have no mistake they are scared. I’ve had the students before that would instantly become highly confrontational anytime there was writing. One child in particular, read at a second grade reading level and was fourteen in 8^th grade, sported tattoos, and had some rather dubious older friends. He would turn from “kind of a smart alec” into “get out of the chair confrontational with me” when writing would come into play. When he really wanted was for me to kick him out of the room so he wouldn’t be forced to write. In the fight, flight, or freeze response, he picked the fight. This is where private conversations with the kid that are very honest and the teacher being flexible are very important. Over the years I’ve had quite a few of these private conversations that began the same way, “I am totally open to being flexible with you. Tell me what you need from me or what your concerns are and I will work with you.” Concerns and my flexibility have been the following:

Concern: Grammar and mechanics are weak  

Flexible: “I’ll work with you one-on-one when we get to the editing stage, but for right now you don’t have to worry because grammar and all that stuff isn’t the focus with a rough draft. Yes, author’s try to use proper grammar on their rough drafts, but if they aren’t sure how to spell something or were the comma goes, they don’t let that stop them. They know they can come back to it after all their ideas are on paper.”

Concern: Peers may make fun of writing/grammar (this is especially a concern for workshop style classes)

Flexible: In conferencing, my students read their essays aloud so this is easy enough to explain this. However, I have allowed students not to conference their work with peers. I still ask them to give feedback for the other students’ works and then offer to conference with them one-on-one. But most of the time once the kids start conferencing and the reluctant writer sees how supportive the other group members are they are willing to go last. I reinforce this bravery with positive feedback.

Concern: I don’t want to write about myself. (for personal narratives)

Flexible: This is a biggie for some of my kids who have hard lives and learned early on to internalize those feelings instead of expressing them. I do let these kids make up realistic stories of themselves, tell a well known family story of a family member, or write a story about a fun time they had with a friend.

Concern: I can’t write that much (for length requirements)

Flexible: I tell the kids I won’t deduct points for short essays. That my length suggestion is just a suggestion.

Unique Items for a Teacher Survival Kit

Don't forget if you buy from amazon part of the proceeds can go to St. Jude's if you begin browsing with smile.amazon.com! 

A DampRid product

Being fiscally responsible, our district turns off A/C when the building isn’t in use resulting in a sauna during nights and weekends. Combine that with the Gulf Coast region, and we get major humidity during off hours as well as in the afternoon during out hotter months. DampRid in the classroom might not be required in every classroom, but the new AirScapes™ White Marble Fresh ScentStarter Kit, is perfect for classrooms like mine.

A deck of cards

I use them for quick grouping. Because they are durable, they last way longer than homemade grouping cards. Need more than 4 people per group? Hand out the cards and make the students group where each card has to be different, giving them a little choice.

Non-electronic airfreshners

Kids can be stinky after PE/recess. Our fire safety code prevents us from having heat sources plugged in, so we rely on airfreshners like Renuzit. I put one on the back bookcase and one on the front one. On weekends, I just close it up so it isn’t wasted.   I use the aromatherapy “tranquil” and the kids love the smell. Lysol Neutra Air Freshmatic Automatic Spray Air Freshener is also a great one that keeps the spread of germs away, but make sure you aren’t spraying kids!

Mini-fan AND shawl

Classrooms tend to either run cold or hot, but for most of the country what they run depends on the weather outside. Having a shawl that can stay at school is extremely handy when it starts to heat up outside resulting in an A/C-induced refrigerator in the school. Likewise, while dressed in winter garb, the heat in the building may be cranked up.

Command Strips Refills

The little refill of Command Strips are great for cinder-block walls or finished walls that you don’t want to staple. They last all year, they survive humid weekend conditions, and they can be removed without damaging a surface. They also hold the heavier items (like little whiteboards) really well. Love them!

Emotional Support Emergency Kit

At some point, things will happen that will make teachers doubt their skills – new and veteran teachers alike! – or something will go awry with a lesson or maybe it will just be a stressful time of year. Buy a sweet “just because” card, write a meaningful and encouraging letter on the inside and write “Open in Case of Emergency!” on the outside. Pair it with a wrapped box of something the person likes (chocolate, pretty stationary, cute nail polish, etc.) and it will be the gift they need when they need it the most!

What other must-haves are on your list?

Digital Tools Review Site with Lesson Plans: Graphite.org

Looking for tech savvy lessons? Found a new app or website and not sure how to use it for your class?  Need to know if an app or website is right for your students? Common Sense's graphite.org to the rescue!

Reviews 

What I like the about the teacher-created reviews is the way you can use buttons to easily narrow a
search depending on needs. So if you have iPads and know you need a free app for your fourth grade reading class, reviews will show up for that. Or if you have a computer lab and need a website for high school history students, results are easily narrowed. You can even combine elements if you want to widen selections. Then the reviews written by educators in the field give authentic reviews to help you explore what suits your needs.

Lesson Flows

Graphite's term for lesson plans! Flexible in what technology tools you will be using? Use the lesson flow search feature to see lessons written by educators. 

Common Core Explorer

Want to search by standard? They have English and Math (with Science coming soon!) Searches will provide you with a list of technology resources that have lesson flows with those TEKS listed.

Check out my lessons and reviews!

Adobe Voice - Hero's Journey Analysis for Full Tilt

I love apps that are versatile and Adobe Voice does NOT disappoint! It is one of the easiest ways to digital storytelling. Use it in science to create a digital record of a lab or in history class to explain important events or a foreign language course to practice pronunciation.

Why Adobe Voice?

It offers little options – just 5 layouts and a dozen themes, with no ability to alter things like locations of text boxes or transitions – students weren’t as bogged down with selecting visual effects. The focus was able to be on the content, while the technological components kept kids engaged.

How did I use it?

To analyze Hero’s Journey in Full Tilt! Students enjoyed themselves and it was great to see them try to think metaphorically about the colors and images used.  

Issues with Images?

When adding images, students can add from their camera roll or use the search function in Adobe Voice, which in turn searches the internet for images marked Creative Commons and labeled that search term. Issue is that images are not vetted for appropriateness of children, so in an effort to ensure inappropriate images would not appear, I asked students to only use the icons that were uploaded. It gives the presentation a very polished, clean look. Problem is there are some icons that are not appropriate either! Images “love” had some raunchy results. Solution? I think that a teacher would need to consider the age of their students and the way they would want images to be searched and collected. It would be absolutely perfect for having students act things out or draw their own images. 

Teaching Hero’s Journey with Big Hero 6

I select movies*, like any text, very purposefully. When it comes to something like the Hero’s Journey, I don’t want to endlessly lecture on it. Likewise, I want the students to find the tasks and trials from their novel, and not just give them the answers. So I need a quick example that all students can quickly use to see the stages in one text and apply them over to the written text of their novel. Enter Big Hero 6. No matter the nomenclature of Joseph Campbell’s monomyth, Big Hero 6 has every stage! Plus there are a few way to bump up the rigor of discussion!

1. All my students get a little handout that looks like a chart. One column has each stage and the definition, another column is for Big Hero 6 examples, and the third will be for the novel
2. Introduce the concept of archetypes by breaking down the word into parts and getting students to infer what it means. Arche means “mold” and type means “a type of, a kind of”
3. Start off watching the TED-Ed talk “What Makes a Hero?”
4. Break down Monomyth as a term. I like to also make a little timeline, starting with Gilgamesh, to Hercules, to Beowulf, to present day Big Hero 6. The idea that once you have these patterns in your head to can apply them to everything from Narnia to Harry Potter to Jesus.
5. We watch Big Hero 6 until the point where Hiro and Baymax are sitting on the techno dirigibles right before he scans and finds the island. I let them work in groups to fill out what has happened thus far. I check for understanding and then we watch to the end and the groups finish. (There is a part right before the big boss part where Hiro says, “Is this what Abigail would have wanted?” and Callahan responds that she is dead. This perfectly mirrors an earlier conversation between Baymax and Hiro in terms of Tadashi. This is when I introduce the literary term foil and we analyze what the real difference is between Hiro and Callahan: Baymax and friends. We then have a conversation about what that creators may be trying to convey about friendship and loneliness and what Baymax may therefore symbolize. (Seriously, you can analyze this movie so deeply! Even kids who have watched it a million times will start to uncover layers of understanding. This is so good for them!*)
   
6. When we have finished and the students confirm that Baymax is the elixir and Abigail is the resurrection, inevitably a kid asks why isn’t Baymax the resurrection. That’s when I like to have a challenge questions: What if this isn’t just Hiro’s Hero’s Journey? What is this is ALSO Baymax’s? The kids will discuss how that makes Hiro the mentor and the other variations. This is a higher-level, nerdy question that blows their minds!
7. I also take this opportunity to explore Christ Figure. Baymax is such perfect one and the kids see Christ imagery all the time – Katniss is obvious in the movies with her arms stretched out at the end of the second! I go through a list of potential Christ Figure Traits and students record which apply to Baymax.
8. Then my students apply the Hero’s Journey to the whole class novel.

Big Hero 6 is also great for reinforcing Notice and NoteSignposts.

* I know sometimes we can face push-back from admin and parents about movies. However, I think there is a very big difference between pressing play and having the kids do an assignment in silence versus having a rich discussion about the movie. I feel strongly that when we have these sort of conversations analyzing a movie instead of just reacting to a movie, we are modeling a better way to view movies. Many of our students go to the movies with their families and have very little discussion. I know I enjoy rich post-viewing discussion with friends or my hubby. I had an extensive conversation about Utilitarianism vs. Kantianism ideals in Resident Evil after a friend and I watched it in college! I truly believe in explicitly teaching students to view movies as another text. I also know brain research supports that analyzing helps build analysis skills and that analyzing one thing (like playing chess) and improve analysis elsewhere (reading). This, of course, doesn’t mean we don’t have to have the kids read, but many students watch movies and television shows. What if, instead of just being a passive audience, they were analyzing? What if they had no idea looking for plot holes, thinking about symbols, and examining character motivation is not supposed to be limited to the written word?  I’m married to an English teacher. Post-movie, we are usually having an hour long discussion breaking down plot, character, style, and choices the director made. Imagine if our students did the same after watching a movie? How much deeper would their analysis skills grow?

Tech Tuesday!

vi hart (I love this woman! One day I will be able to make videos as well as she does....I just need to be able to doodle!) teamed up with Nicky Case to brought to life the 1971 paper that examines the issue, not just of bias, but of tolerance in a post-biased society. Playing the challenges on the interactive website, some major themes appear. Themes, which, as a teacher who uses a novel set in the Jim Crow Era South in 7th grade and Holocaust literature in 8th, I saw instant applications to ELA.

I wrote up a lesson on graphite.org.  See the lesson here! Or go directly to Parable of the Polygons to play!

Kahoots, PowerPoint Jeopardy Games, or the traditional Q&A paper review requires a good amount of prep on a teacher’s part. But what to do when you don’t have time to set up a review game? Create a review that is student-centered and fun without having to do more than give instructions and use a few supplies! The following are all inspired by getting to know you activities or party games.

Character Analysis Who Am I?

Materials: note cards

Students sit in groups. They secretly write the name of a character from the book on a note card and pass it facedown to the person on their right. They can hold it on their foreheads or just show the rest of the group and then put it facedown. Students take turns asking hypothetical questions. They way it becomes analysis is not that they are asking comprehension questions (like the traditional game), but creating hypothetical scenarios and asking what the character would do. Example:

Student with Romeo on forehead: What class would my character like in school?

Other student: Your character would probably like English. He’d probably enjoy writing the poetry.

Two Truths and a Lie

Materials: note cards

My middle school kids love this and I find it hilarious because it is just a true false quiz but they think it is so fun! (Note: there are two ways of doing this. One where they do it in groups and pass the cards with an answer key and one where they walk around and find people in the classroom.)

I assign chapters. Students get three index cards each and have to write two truths from the chapter and one lie. I review how best to get away with a lie (it should be partially true and specific). I request they put the page number down in case someone needs to check for accuracy. If groups, I divide the kids up in the amount of chapters I have and have them coordinate the answers and then create and answer key card after the number. They then pass the groups of cards from group to group, checking the answer key, and only using the book if they get them wrong. If my kids are doing this individually, I have them number the chapters on the back of one of the cards. Then I have them walk around the classroom, trying other people’s cards in pairs. They sign off on the chapter number. I require them to get two signatures per chapter.

Whole Book Heads Up!

Materials: note cards

Every Student has 5-8 note cards. Have students write words and phrases on their cards that have to do with the book. With the right prodding, students can do analysis ones. “Try to make it where one card is a symbol, one a character, one a theme, one a plot point, one vocabulary word, one a literary element, etc.” Have students in groups of three collect all the cards facing down in a stack. The students place the card on the forehead. The two other members have to give clues. The person with the cards on the foreheads have to figure out what is on the card. If they get it right, it goes in the “correct” pile. Give students 3 minutes and have each group report how many cards they got right. Switch by having the groups rotate cards and the next person in the trio be the one with the cards on the forehead. NOTE: a rule needs to be established that they slues need to come from the book. Students should not use rhyming or outside references to do the clues. Example, if a student has the word allusion for Full Tilt. The group mates should no say “rhymes with confusion” or “an example would be if I said ‘My hair is so crazy, you could call me Medusa”. It would need to be, “the literary element when Blake called another character Quasimodo.”

Whole Book Bingo

Supplies: Blank bingo cards (or just have the kids make their own by creating a 5x5 grid on notebook paper

Students fill in Bingo cards by requesting they write certain concepts for each letter. For example, B will be character names, I will be themes, N vocabulary words, G literary elements, O is objects from the story. As you walk around, glance at the cards to draw inspiration and call out elements where the BINGO blanks are the answers. Example from The Outsiders, “This a symbol of violence.” Or “This is the protagonist” Or “When Ponyboy tells Cherry about the night Johnny was assaulted and we are able to see what happened.” OR “This is a theme that would be supported by the actions of Johnny when he went in to save the children.” Because it is more about the review than the actual winning of the bingo, I like to let the kids discuss in groups with the directions to ask me if they seem unsure. After you have a kid win Bingo, inform the class that you will be doing a second Bingo for someone who has a filled up board or double bingo. That will keep the game going. I pass out little treats for the kids who win.

Student Led Socrative

Supplies: smart phones/ipads/laptops

Don't have the ability for every child to have a device? Have student partner up using phones! Divide the class up into small groups. Have groups come up with questions for the book. I like the rules where the team that creates the question get a certain amount of bonus points for every group they stump. This encourages them to create deeper, thoughtful questions. You can give them parameters as needed since Socrative lets you use multiple choice, true/false, or short answer. Open up a socrative session that is quick question. Each team presents their question, have students keep their own score, each team gets a point for every questions they get right. 

Digital Writing Roulette!

I am super stoked to tell you about how a teacher-friend and I used technology to re-imagine how Writing Roulette can be used in classrooms today.

My writing in black and Miss M's in red

I first did Writing Roulette when I took Abydos Three-Week institute about ten years before. It starts off with everyone having an image, typically I've seen The Mysteries of Harris Burdick, and then begin writing a story inspired by that image. After a little time, the teacher tells the students to stop and pass the image and paper to the next person. Everyone gets a new image with a piece of paper that began a story. The task is to pick up where the writer left off and continue the story. Four or five minutes later, they pass again, and get another new image. At the end they have created this new story. It is fun, kids have to adapt to different writing styles, they have to think imaginatively, and it helps our kids who may be more "uptight" writers learn to let go.

How to do it:

Have I got a cool way to do writing roulette using video-conferencing equipment and Google Docs! Before I get into the steps, I'll just tell you how yesterday went: A teacher-pal on another campus and I coordinated to try this out on our 7th period kiddos. In each of our respective computer labs, we had the kids assigned numbers. When the logged onto the Google drive I set up, they opened up the document that had their corresponding number. On the first page, labeled Page A, Miss M's class began typing their story about their image. On Page B, my kiddos used their image to create a story. Every 4 minutes we switched. Her kids would scroll down to B, mine up to A. And then switch again. Miss M and I helped the kids along by going over what we would want to do in each section: establish character and setting, develop conflict, build up to a climatic event, climactic event should be working to resolve main problem, resolve loose ends. at the very end we had some of the kids talk via the video conferencing equipment answering questions like : What was most challenging? How did it go for you? Which of the two did you like the most and why? Why do you think we had you do this? It was AWESOME!

What my Google folder looks like when it is ready to go! 

Afterward, I'm changing the settings to read only so that way the kids can show their parents what they did and read each other's work without accidentally deleting it. My next goal is to try this out of district. Then I want to try doing this out of state. Imagine a student in Texas and a student in Colorado writing stories together at the same time? Awesome! 

Set up:

1. Find another teacher who wants to do it with you. My first time, I decided to just do 1 class period as a trial. Coordinate lab and video-conferencing equipment (no video conferencing equipment, see if you can skype, Facetime, or even just call over the phone!)
2. Pinterest pictures like a mad dog! Here is my collection. 
3. Create a Google Drive account. In the account create a folder with a sharing setting of whoever has the link can edit. That way you can just share 1 link to the folder instead of individual doc links.
4. Create a doc file in the folder labeled 01. MAKE SURE THE FILE HAS THE SAME SHARE SETTING! On the first page have it say "Page A" nice and big. This will allow you to see if kids are on the correct pages in the computer lab. Under "Page A" write: Writer A: Examine the photo and write for the time allotted. When time is called, switch to the second page. Start writing here:
5. Add image from Pinterest. Don't forget to wrap text and adjust size.
6. Where it says "Star writing here:" press the enter button a couple times. Then hold down "ctrl+enter" This will ensure your page 2 doesn't move as the person on page A types.
7. Set up your page B just like A but with a different picture.
8. In the folder, make copies of 01. I made 16 because we had a class of 32 and I wanted us to only repeat twice. 
9. Renumber these 01-16. Change out the pictures. I then have 16 unique docs.
10. Then I just copied all 16 of them and numbered 1-32.
11. Find the link for sharing the folder in the drive by pressing the share button. Copy that. Log out of Google and test the link. Test that you can select the docs and press the pop-out so you can edit.
12. If it works, send the link to your counterpart to share with her class day of the activity. 

While you do the lesson have one teacher be in charge of having a timer. Miss M used her cell as the alarm (Ghostbusters Theme!). She and I wrote one as well. I've color coded where we switched just to give you an idea.

Pro Tip: make a template folder of all your writing roulette docs and then just copy them into a folder for your class. That way you don;t have to keep recreating the files every time you do it. 

Enjoy!

Perfect Pairings

Peanut Butter and Jelly. Chocolate and Strawberries. Steak and chimichurri.

Sometimes two things are just destined to go together. When you find two books that just make sense as pairings, an English teacher can't help but get a little excited. The Giver has long been on our district list of approved whole class novels as well as a core text (one of the two books we must teach) as well as the only book that is core for both on-level and Pre-AP ELA. Our 8th grade team put it on the summer reading last year to make room in the year for other text throughout the year. Dissatisfied with last year's pairing to How to Read Literature Like a Professor for Kids*, I was on the search for the perfect match.

 I started with my list of wants: female protagonist (all the core books have male protagonists!), can be easily connected to The Giver, and is preferably non-fiction. So what better to pair with a futuristic dystopia in which all people are the same than to pair it with a memoir in which entire groups of people were being threatened with annihilation to make the world Hitler's version of his "perfect place"? Enter one of the most beautifully written Holocaust memoirs I have ever read: The Cage by Ruth Minsky Sender.

It is obvious something major happened prior to The Community coming into being, and that major thing was most likely a genocide. What a great way to root us in the purpose of The Giver - to warn us against giving up rights for the "safety" of sameness - in the very real tragedy of The Holocaust. Add in that Jonas and Riva share much in common (character traits, the position of having to take on a parental role to siblings, etc) while the plots and settings being radically different. Match made in literary heaven!

While my students read, they will be comparing and contrasting the texts. A copy of this assignment is in my TpT store for FREE!

*Make sure you do preview How to Read Literature Like a Professor for Kids prior to ever assigning it. I purposefully had students only read the 10 chapters that applied to The Giver, which made students skip the two chapters that unfortunately reference sex, the vampires and ghosts chapter (which  while I wish they had done more hinting than blatant talk, I understood keeping the topic int he kids version), and The Shakespeare chapter that references a Woody Allen movie for no reason. Ugh! I wouldn't know of any middle schooler that would even watch a Woody Allen movie and there are so many better references to Shakespeare kids would get. And referencing the phrase "sex party" anywhere in a book designed for tweens? What editor let that go through?! I can't imagine the amount of teachers that have not assigned that book because of those two chapters, which is really unfortunate.

Abydos Conference 2015

Top three highlights of Abydos Conference 2015:
3. Alana Morris of Vocabulary Unplugged fame in one chart explained what I've been trying to explain to non-ELA teachers since the adoption of the new TEKS: all those old comprehension strategies we used to teach: Using Prior Knowledge, Making Connections, Questioning, Visualizing, Inferring, Summarizing, Evaluating and Synthesizing. When you look at the STAAR test questions, minus a handful in summarization and comparing, the questions all pop in inferencial thinking. Big takeaway: Number 12 is never coming back. The question stem will probably never be seen again. We need to move past looking at number 12 from the released test and toward the type of thinking we need to train our students to become. In order for our scores to grow instead of stagnate, we have to train the kids to be inferential thinkers.

2. Anne Stone's Classical Evaluation. Brilliant! I created a quick video on it for absent students (I literally just put my iPhone on my document cam, hit record, and posted in my conference period. AKA I totally am guilty of the black blank sides of doom. I hold my head in shame.) It helps to address the issue of under-developed support paragraphs in expository writing.
1. Kaye Price-Hawkins referred to me as "My friend, Sara" when I answered a question. Granted she was just reading my nametag, but still, squee! She took us through Dialogue with the Text which she adapted and put on a nifty bookmark for kids right here. Her website is full of priceless goodies! Go, go!

Using Technology to Effectively Plan Narratives

As March approaches, I think about how we can revisit narrative in a fresh and exciting way. How to maximize my time before STAAR while re-energizing my students and not sending them toward burnout? Enter technology! Using Answer Garden and Make Beliefs Comix, students can create prewriting that focuses on depth and reflection in a small package (exactly what the 26 line essay needs to be!) while also showing students how to have unique topics.

PROCEDURES:

1.     Post a narrative writing prompt. For example, a released STAAR prompt: http://bit.ly/1vSFLlq

2.     Send students to an Answer Garden (http://answergarden.ch/  ) you have created. Make the question where it asks students to brainstorm possible answers for the prompt. For example, if the prompt is “Write a personal narrative about a time when you had fun participating in an activity with other people. Be sure to write about your experience in detail and describe why it was memorable.” The Answer Garden question would be, “List the activity as only one or two words. EX: "fishing" For the settings of your answer garden make sure to select brainstorm.

3.     Encourage students to submit at least 5 possible answer choices. (More than 3 is important. When students brainstorm for prompts they tend to brainstorm the same top three things. The fourth and fifth ideas tend to be unique and thoughtful. )

4.     Post the results of the Answer Garden on the board. As a class, analyze the topics through a series of questions: What do you notice? Imagine if you are a rater and read hundreds of essays answering this prompt; how would you feel when you come across yet another essay on one of the most popular topics? Which topic would you like to read about and why? What do you notice about our less common topics? When did they come up in your brainstorming? How many topics should you brainstorm? How should you make the decision when selecting the topic to pick for your essay?

5.     Have each student select the topic they will pick for their prewriting.

6.     Direct students to  Make Beliefs Comix http://www.makebeliefscomix.com/ and pick the three panel.

7.     Instruct students to put the narrative outline in the three boxes. You may want to post these as the directions:

·         Think of your three boxes as one representing the three parts of your story: beginning, middle, end.

·         In the first panel, use “panel prompt” to write the setting and establish characters.

·         Write dialogue that is important/memorable.

·         Select appropriate emotions.

8.     Set an expectation of time (10-15 minutes) to complete these three panels. Give verbal reminders as you go to help students who fall behind. (i.e. By this time your should be done with your first panel and onto your second.)

9.     After the set time, instruct students to change the panel count from 3 to 4.

10.  Direct students to the rubric for the essay. You may want to bring them to STAAR Composition Rubric Way Oversimplified by Gretchen Bernabei:  http://bit.ly/1z76A61 Bring attention to what makes a 4, highlighting the depth of thought and reflective aspect of the rubric. Panel 4 will describe this reflection.

11.  Revisit the prompt. Determine the part that is asking you to be reflective. EX: “Write a personal narrative about a time when you had fun participating in an activity with other people. Be sure to write about your experience in detail and describe why it was memorable.”

12.  Instruct students to use panel four for this purpose.

13.  Students can then print a copy. To make PDF, press print and then change the settings to create a PDF that can be stored on student’s electronic portfolios.

14.  This product can then be used to use as an outline as students write their narratives.

Freebie! Questions for the ELA Classroom

My Student Teacher wanted to work on her questioning so I threw this together.

Analysis and higher level questions for in class discussion of prose. There are questions chains that scaffold upward, that are indented to reach high level analysis. Perfect "cheat sheet" to go on a clipboard or poster for your back wall. Bloom's levels of analysis and higher.

Analysis Question Stems for ELA Here!

4 Ways to Use Discovery Education Board Builder

Did you know that if your district adopted Discovery Education resources, your students can create boards on DE Streaming that give students a chance to make what is akin to webpages? Students have a unique login and are already synced up to your teacher account making it really easy for students to create their boards and then share those boards with you. No printing out or submitting to an electronic dropbox needed. Students think it is pretty neat to be able to customize the page, embed video and pictures, and work with tools that are very similar to setting up a blog. This keeps them engaged as well as gives some good techy skills. So what is DE Streaming ideal for?

Revamping a Classic

Instead of doing a brochure/poster/PowerPoint project that has been done before, have students create DE Boards. Let's face it, by the time my students have reached me, they have made brochures for multiple subjects and PowerPoints galore. I was easily able to convert a career research brochure project into a DE Board by simply adding a multimedia component. Instead of pictures, students are able to use video segments as well.

Converting Boring Assignments to Engaging

Sample of Summary Board

I know that I can't make everything thrilling. Sometimes skill-building involves practicing a skill that is itself fairly boring. When it comes to a skill like summarization - something the kids have been working on for years - it can be a little "blah". Enter DE! After introducing a couple expository summarization skills in class, I had students apply them to video segments from DE. The videos definitely held their interest. They were studying space at the time, so students were able to research concepts from the unit that interested them. It was also a great way of me offering an extension to that leaning as students watched videos on concepts - like Space-Time - far beyond the required curriculum.

My Poetry Board

Publishing Work

The final stage of the writing process is publishing. Taping over 150 essays to a wall isn't really a viable or logical form of publishing. Having students convert their essays into DE pages (students could have 1 page and add to throughout the year or have a different page each essay) is a fun way of having the student feel like they really made something special. They can even press the print button, make it PDF, and post it to the class Edmodo or what have you. 

Creating Own Teacher Board

Create your own board for an interactive lesson complete with videos. You can also add documents, quizzes, and writing prompts.

Narrative and Expository Project

I am a huge fan of pairing books. I'm also a huge fan of kids getting to choose what they read. How to give kids freedom but also pair? Enter the brainchild of my first year teaching 7th grade! After teaching narrative the first quarter and expository the second, I knew I wanted to have the kids do something with both in the third quarter - the very same quarter leading up to writing STAAR where kids would have to write in both modes.

Students read the narrative of their choice and then pair it with an expository book to check it for accuracy. I then had them present their findings by finding quotations from each, writing an overall thesis statement of accuracy, and compiling it all on a presentation. Some kids used Prezi and others PowerPoint.

Examples of pairings:
Colin Fischer paired with a book about autism
Lightening Thief paired with a book about Greek Mythology
Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry paired with a book on the Jim Crow Era

Get the handout for free here!