Month: November 2009

advisory, MSM, Podcast, TechBy Troy Patterson

MSM-98 NMSA09 Follow up 3 Get Your Wave ON!

Jokes:

Real Teachers:

  • cheer when April 1 doesn’t fall on a school day
  • Clutch a pencil when thinking
  • never teach the conjugations of lie and lay to 8th graders.
  • can’t walk past a group of students without straightening up the line.
  • have disjointed necks from constantly looking around 180 degrees
  • can eat lunch in under 3 minutes
  • can predict exactly which parents will show up at Conferences.
  • know the shortest route to the office, bathroom (all of them) and caffeine
  • know that secretaries and custodians run the school.

From the Twitterverse:

Advisory:

Pictures of our World. Have students take pictures of “their world”. Have the students narrow down their choices to 1 picture. Discuss why the picture is important.

On Our Mind:

MAMSE: Contact your local MAMSE board member and volunteer to be a Regional Coordinator!

Charter Colleges: Marvin Olasky proposes charter colleges to further democratize education.

Grown Up Digital by Don Tapscott

Webspotlight:

Students live in a Digital World. Are schools ready to join them?

Seale and educators across the country are employing an array of digital tools—blogs, wikis, videos, and social media—to tap into their passion for collaborating, creating, and sharing.

“It’s about initiating higher levels of engagement,” says Seale, “and making the learning more self-directed and self-motivated.” “Let’s face it,” she adds, “being literate today means more than reading words on a printed page and writing an essay.”

“I don’t think we yet have a handle on what it really means to be literate in the 21st century,” Fisch acknowledges.

So don’t throw away your copies of To Kill a Mockingbird; even the most fervent Web evangelists believe there is still space for the Great Books. But the bottom line remains: We can’t stop there. Our students are living in a different world.

http://www.nea.org/home/35939.htm

FastPencil: Turn your blog posts into a book. http://ow.ly/E8z3

One of the laments of librarians and English teachers about blogs is the lack of permenance. Once the electrons go away, so does the content. FastPencil can turn blog posts into chapter books for paper books.

What happened to Second Life? BBC questions current model of marketing in virtual environment.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/magazine/8367957.stm

ANKI:

Spaced Repetition

Anki is a spaced repetition system (SRS). It helps you remember things by intelligently scheduling flashcards, so that you can learn a lot of information with a minimum amount of effort. (Available for Mac/Linux/iPhone-iPod Touch/Windows)

http://ichi2.net/anki/index.html

NMSA09:

Strategies That Motivate Students

Mark McLeod

*Notes from Todd Williamson who took much better notes than I (any errors in transcription though are mine alone):

Session Description: Student engagement is the key to learning for middle school students. This session will explore many teaching strategies and techniques that encourage students to get excited about learning. The presenter will model various strategies that can be used immediately in the classroom. Both veteran and new teachers will leave this session with many powerful, yet practical strategies to motivate today’s middle school students.

Idea of emotional bank account Attitude is the most important thing. There are 2 feat which interfere with success:

• Fear of Embarrassment

• Fear of Failure

Personal life needs to be in order. The kids bring enough baggage. Kids need to be involved or the drop out later. What is the #1 Quality you want in your students?

• • •

Positive Attitude Treat Others with Respect Motivated to Want to Learn

Am I treating everyone in here with the attitudes I expect?

We can’t change other people, we can only change ourselves…so make sure you do that and enjoy what you do.

No one forces anyone to have a great attitude. It’s your choice.

Has everyone spend a few minute encouraging others…return to seats when we hear YMCA, and do YMCAtogether. FUNTIMES!!

Teachers have to be willing to step out and take risks. Take ideas, tweak them to work for yourself, and take the chance to use them.

Many teachers are afraid of embarassment and failure, so they never take risks.

BIGGEST MOTIVATOR: RELATIONSHIPS

Kids bring enough baggage, teacher doesn’t need to bring more into the picture. Make desposits into kids emotional bank accounts. Are we making deposits or withdrawals from our kids accounts? These are not accounts we want closed.

You can’t change what’s in the past, so don’t let it stop you. If you’ve made too many withdrawals in the past, don’t dwell on it, just start making deposits from then on.

Sometimes we have to INTENTIONALLY make deposits until it becomes habit. WE ARE SO INGRAINED AS TEACHERS TO LOOK FOR THINGS TO CORRECT, SOMETIMES WE JUST NEED TO FOCUS ON WHAT ALREADY IS GOOD.

Developing positive relationships doesn’t just happen in the classroom, we have to do it everywhere in life so it becomes habit.

It’s not the teacher that sends students to the office, it’s the environment. Free time and inappropriate conversations happen when positive relationships aren’t established.

AGREE WITH A TWEET BY @MSMATTERS…MARK MCLEOD IS GIVING GREAT ADVICE FOR LIFE AS WELL AS THE CLASSROOM

Students AND Adults both need deposits into their emotional bank accounts. What are some ways to make deposits into students emotional bank accounts?

1. ATTEND GAMES

2. GIVE JOB IN CLASSROOM

3. POSITIVE PARENT CONTACT

4. DISCUSS INTERESTS

5. PRAISE

6. RECOGNIZE BIRTHDAYS

7. STICKERS (haha)

8. REWARDS

9. FOOD

10.NOTICE THINGS FROM OTHER CLASSES SUBJECTS

Adults

1. FOOD

2. SHOW UP FOR SIGNIFICANT EVENTS (DEATHS, ILLNESS, WEDDINGS)

3. LISTEN

4. REWARDS

5. KNOWING WHO KIDS ARE

6. RECOGNITION

Practice attention getting strategies in the classroom…bells, sayings, etc…don’t just tell them, actually practice it.

Students don’t know how to make deposits…we have to help teach them. “Cha-ching” shirts…on the back “Have you made a deposit today?”

2nd Biggest Motivator: Success

Set up students for success…self-motivated students blurt out because they want the thrill of victory

Don’t worry about the blurtter-outers…they’re self-motivated and will learn anyway. Target the kids who never raise their hands and set them up for success.

#1 Questioning Technique to add Tension: Ask, Pause, Call…Tension keeps all engaged, don’t start question with “Suzy, what is…” everyone else tunes out and learning stops. Random name generators add to tension as well. This keeps kids engaged…and no one has to know for sure who’s name is pulled out if you really want to call on a particular student.

#2 Questioning Technique is “Volunteers”…This gives a bad sampling because you get the same volunteers every time. Ask Pause Call with random name generator causes more thinking, from a larger number of students, and allows you to climb up Blooms.

#3 QuestioningTechnique: Choral Response…Have a signal when you want students to respond together, otherwise they won’t know when to start or stop.

#4 Questioning Technique: Signal Response…Thumbs Up/Thumbs Down/Windshield Wiper… Whiteboards…SHOWING WHITEBOARDS WITH A HANDLE, MARKER, AND 4 DIFFERENT COLORS.

Notes: Ross Burkhardt on Writing for Real Reasons

Quote: “Our sincere interest in students’ lives and their opinions is one of the strongest motivators we have. Nothing on earth is so irresistible to a writer as the knowledge that her writing might actually influence someone else’s thoughts or feelings.”

CEU code: EQ7

Why are we using writing as punishment? (Cartoon reference)

NCTE quote: “Conventions of writing are best taught in the context of writing.”

NCTE quote: “When writers actually write, they think of things that they did not have in mind before they begin writing.”

“Writers need a classroom culture that supports writing, a culture in which everyone, including the teacher, is part of a writing community.” Vicki Spandel

“You can’t be what you can’t see.” Dr. Joycelyn Elders, Nov. 2003 in an Atlanta Speech.

The Teacher As Writer

“Almost nothing does more to sustain a culture of writing than a teacher who writes with students, thereby underscoring the importance of writing, and also allowing students to see the process.” Vicki Spandel

“Save all drafts!”

What Ross did in his classroom will not work in our classrooms.

Adapt these writing strategies to your own:

Students

style

setting

Take out a sheet of paper . . .

Activity: Letter of appreciation or acknowlegement.

On the sheet of paper, identify three people that are important to you and why.

It doesn’t matter who they put down on the paper.

Letter to Jack Berckemeyer . . .

Share/Pair instructions

Decide who goes first.

First person shares – 1 minute

Switch

Second Person shares – 1 minute (or so)

Teacher reads a letter of gratitude and then seals it in an envelope.

Real audience

Real person

Shows authenticity

Choose principal, AP, fellow teacher, etc.

Send the student to the person in the sealed envelope that they saw sealed and then point out that they came back empty handed.

Assignment

You’ve identified three people, now write a letter like this to one of those three people.

“Grade is an A. I will not read it.” “If you’d like me to read your letter to help with your grammar and punctuation, I will read it.”

“Tomorrow I will be at the door. Have your letter ready to go when you walk into class tomorrow. Your grade goes down from there if you didn’t turn it in.”

Part Two:

Make three columns on a piece of paper.

Put the number 8 at the top left column.

Put all the things you did (best stuff) in a column. Things you did in 8th grade.

Wherever you stop, draw a line. Write down the best stuff from 7th Grade.

Go around the room and mention one thing. Kids can add as each contributes.

Do the same for 6th Grade

Look over the entire list and pick the three best things you ever did in middle school.

Identify the staff member who was most responsible for making that activity happen.

It’s the last week of school kids, you have a list in front of you the best stuff in middle school and the people who made it happen. What could we do with that information?

Assignment: Write two letters of acknowlegement to staff.

If they want to write to you, they have to write a third letter.

HMP: Holiday Memory Piece

Monday before Friday before Christmas Break.

“Kids, I’m going to read you something and then I’m going to ask you some questions”

There are no questions, lol!

Christmas Eve Exchange . . .

Questions are a little bit about the story . . .

“Ok kids, we’ve got a holiday coming up . . . ” shows a list of holidays.

“On Friday of this week you’re going to share one of your holiday memories.”

Let the Jehovah’s Witness kid talk about not celebrating holidays.

Can’t fail because they can pick from any memory.

They’ve experienced it and it has already happened.

Tell them that they are going to create a public piece of writing.

GOW: Gift of Writing

identify three people who are important to you and briefly describe them.

Share a model of what this writing will look like.

“Tears on the Turnpike”

“In what way is your experience different than your experience of the story?”

She’s in it. She’s a participant.

He gave this piece of writing to his sister as a gift.

Assignment:

Your job is to create a gift of writing to give to an intended audience.

Letter to Self: LTS

The Grade is a B and I will not read it.

Minimum of two pages on the next 5 topics.

Put the heading at the top of the page and you turn in two pages in to me at the door.

Want an A? Turn in three pages.

This honors the narcissism of the adolescent.

This could address the GLCE about creating writers who “want” to write.

Belief informs Action

The 10 Assertions.

Events & Happenings:

Calendar of Events:

NMSA News:

Other News:

  • ISTE Eduverse Talks are the recorded sessions held on ISTE Island every week. Join ISTE in their Second Life conference location for their weekly talks on education.
  • The Ohio Middle Level Association will hold their annual conference February 18 & 19, 2010. Jack Berckemeyer will be keynoting.

“The Prince, the Wolf and the Firebird”

By Jackson Lacey

Directed by Pam Cardell

December 4, 5, 10, 11 at 7PM

December 5, 6, 12 at 3PM

School Matinees: December 9 and 10 at 10:00 am. Tickets $4.00 for students and every 15 students gets a chaparone in for free.

  • Second Life:
  • No Events specified. Regular Tuesday meetings are scheduled. See the board on the ISTE Island for up to the minute details.
  • Video: Educational Uses of Second Life

UncategorizedBy Troy Patterson

MSM 97 – NMSA09 Wrap Up 2, New “Pair-a-dimes” For Schools

Jokes:

I’m a 7th grade life science teacher, so we often use microscopes.  My room is a retro-fitted science classroom, so I don’t have big lab benches for microscopes – instead I bring in my power cords from Christmas lights. The first time any class uses microscopes, we spend a good ten minutes of class going over the procedure for plugging in and turning on the microscopes.  One particular fifth period I had just instructed the students to plug in the microscope and turn them on – and after sufficient wait time announced “At this point, everybody should be turned on.”  This is when I got some very strange looks from a group of boys in the corner, and all I could do was laugh.

Earlier this year, I was reviewing Celsius/Fahrenheit conversions.  I was explaining to the kids that there was a messy mathematical formula we could use to do these conversions, but for our purposes I helped them out and gave them a side-by-side picture of the two thermometers that they could draw lines across to make the conversions. “This way you all can avoid the getting your hands dirt with all the math for now.”  To which one of my smartalic boys blurted out “But what if we want to do it the dirty way?”  As the rest of the class burst into laughter, I chuckled inwardly and then explained that we’ll have plenty of chances to get our hands dirty in science this year, but this won’t be one of those times.

Kate K.

From the Twitterverse:

  • Ransomtech “If a podcast can capture everything you do in class, you deserve to have nobody coming.”
  • SimpleK12: Don’t miss this: Exclusive4 Admins/Tech Coords The importance of ur teachers using Virtual Field Trips in the classroom
  • blairteach: RT@colonelb Do we need a new high school model? Will our K-12 culture even allow us?
  • zoe1971: RT @web20classroom: An Interesting Graphic from #edchat on Information Overload….http://is.gd/4YQzQ
  • kate_k: Best example I’ve seen of using Facebook for course-management! The teacher even uses ‘events’ for due dates
  • TWilliamson15: Just Posted: We’re Talking…But Who’s Listening? A rambling piece generated from numerous conversations today…
  • web20classroom RT @kelleygarbero: RT @MATH_IS_IT: Great Algebra activities to reinforce learning,
  • kjarrett: Love this too – @mcleod’s Don’t teach your kids this stuff. Please? – Dangerously Irrelevant http://ow.ly/CrGQ
  • russeltarr Mathematics in Movies: Nice list for Maths teachers building up a DVD collection!: http://tinyurl.com/mahrna
  • web20classroom RT @stevejmoore: #ncte everyone follow my colleague @kristinlhoward ! She just joined Twitter and needs your connections!
  • drmmtatom Education Week: Bill Would Replace Key Federal Literacy Programs: via @addthis
  • AngelaMaiers What Does Learning Mean 2 U? New 30 sec. vid/post Would love to hear/see your response #WDLM2U
  • web20classroom Yep…Santa Claus is following me…I hope I get coal this year…with the price of fuel going up and up and everything….

Advisory:

MOYA:  Artwork due March 12, 2010

On Our Mind:

MAMSE:  Contact your local MAMSE board member and volunteer to be a Regional Coordinator!

iTunes Comments

iTunes App:  Coverup

Webspotlight:

Students live in a Digital World. Are schools ready to join them?

Seale and educators across the country are employing an array of digital tools—blogs, wikis, videos, and social media—to tap into their passion for collaborating, creating, and sharing.
“It’s about initiating higher levels of engagement,” says Seale, “and making the learning more self-directed and self-motivated.” “Let’s face it,” she adds, “being literate today means more than reading words on a printed page and writing an essay.”
“I don’t think we yet have a handle on what it really means to be literate in the 21st century,” Fisch acknowledges.
So don’t throw away your copies of To Kill a Mockingbird; even the most fervent Web evangelists believe there is still space for the Great Books. But the bottom line remains: We can’t stop there. Our students are living in a different world.
http://www.nea.org/home/35939.htm

NMSA09:

Taking the Challenge Out of Challenging Students – Unlocking the Mystery of Hard-to-Manage Kids

Diana Day
Session Description: You will be prepared to work with disruptive, aggressive, disrespectful, attention-demanding, and unmotivated youngsters. Rather than hearing descriptors of misbehavior, you will leave knowing what to do about it! Learn where to seat them, motivate and set limits for each of these types of students who challenge your authority daily. Knowledge is power. Empower yourself, going home happy and fulfilled. There are ways to deal with difficult students.

adversity reveals character.

Comprehending Massive Psychological Drives

  • Needs massive attention
  • Grow up to be on your faculty
  • No attention – they will act out.
  • Touches, annoys
  • No malice
  • They like their teachers.
  • Need complete attention though.

Typical Adult Reaction:

  • Annoyance
  • Stops but only temporarily.
  • You are their fix for attention.

Response:

  • Always place these students near the area where you teach
  • Praise them in front of the group.
    • Praise a specific, desired behavior.
    • Give praise immediately after the desired response.
  • Never reprimand in front of the group.
    • Explain in advance what you will do when he acts out and then swiftly carry it out.
    • Is helpful if a signal can be given. Give no extra attention during the correction so it doesn’t become reinforcement
  • Time with you is important and should be planned.
    • Earn a privilege for the group
    • As to tell a story about himself or a joke to the entire group.
    • Give awards, commendations, certificates in front of a group.
  • Don’t put multiple of them right next to each other.
  • Less Large Group or Lecture Format Lessons
    • Large group creates opportunities for spotlight.
  • Rotate Leadership
    • Attention Demanders may take over the small group. Change leadership frequently. Assign each person an assigned number 1-4. Change leadership by choosing different numbers to lead the group.
  • You are _______, I want_______ Use this as a redirect.
  • Have a refocus area. Not a time out.

Prime Time activity (Bellwork).
The less you talk when doing discipline, the better. The more you can signal, the better.

Limit Seeking Behavior

  • Have anger or resentment towards authority with malice because of:
  1. Abuse-
  2. Being over-managed at home
  3. Living in home where there are no limits.

Urgent – they want what they want when they want it Talks back – dismisses correction as silly or not about them. Lies- becomes verbally abusive – will talk a lot about simple questions. Fights- power struggles, threatens, cusses, throws things.
Limit Seeking Behavior:
you’ve got to fight all of the battles, you just choose when you fight them.
They want to make you mad. They win by engagement.
Send the kid to the “Buddy Room” – have a card with another room number written on it. Send the kid to another room. Tell the kid that it’s not working with us. Talk later.
This is a specific program.
Kid 3 Motivation lacking student.
Good teacher with lots of information. Not sure how much is actually useable by all of us.

Dr. Debbie Silver:  Helping Teachers Find the “Beat of Their Different Marchers”

The Greatest Teacher Activitiy
Objectives:  To help participants focus on the importance of having the “courage of one’s convictions.”
Time:  13-20 mins.
Materials:  Pre-assigned note cards (for participants to select and list 5 great teachers)
Of those five identify their characteristics and share in a group.
“Who’s got that vision?”  Monte Selby
A young boy carves on the walls of the cave, (check lyrics online)
Pictures shown during the “show”
Ghandi
Mother Theresa.
Mr. Rogers
One of the things we’ve lost is telling our stories about our teaching, growth and experience.  Retell the stories, retell the fundamentals.
Personal Teaching Vision
Objective:  To challenge teachers to fullfill their personal . . .
Sheet:
My Vision for Myself
Name:
Date
Why I became a Teacher . . .
My most noble vision of myself as a teacher ….
What am I going to do over the next few months to reconcile my vision of myself at my greatest with my present circumstances?
Not a group activity.
Have them write this letter to themselves and seal it in an envelope.  Pass it back in three months or so.
Hearing a Different Drummer/Marcher
Directions
1.  On signal close your eyes and keep them closed until instructed to open them.
2.  Follow the directions carefully, but ask no questions and make no comments.
3.  If you find it hard to complete a task, just do the best you can.
Hand on paper
Fold in half and make a crease.
Fold it in half again.
Fold it in half again.
Tear off the right corner.  (unfold if you need to to find the right corner and then refold to tear it folded.)
Flip paper over and tear the right hand corner.
Unfold the paper completely.
Hold it up and look around.
None of the papers should be uniform to the teacher’s “paper”.
What do we need to know about our students in order to give them a REASONABLE chance for success?
Notecard activity.
Handout:  I can do something! (Debbie Silver, 2006).
Student Profiles
What do we need to know?
Reading level
English language proficiency.
Level of adult supervision and involvement at home.
Personal interests
Preferred learning styles
Least favorite things
Fears
Strength areas (Multiple Intelligences)
“Great teachers never lose their Marvels!”
Recognizing differences
Objectives:  to introduce the concept of differentiation
Materials:  Many lemons, one per participant.
Procedures:
Give each teacher a lemon as they come into the meeting and then have them hold it for a while.  Tell them to bond with the lemon and examine the lemon.  Collect part way through the meeting and then at the end dump them out on a table and have them find their lemon.
Even though they are similar, they will find differences and find their lemon.
What does the following run-on sentence say?
i a m n o w h e r e
I am now here
I am no where
Practicing Safe Stress
Two Wolves Inside story
an elder Cherokee Natie American was teaching his grandchildren about life . . .
IALAC  Activity
100 ways to enhance self concept in the classroom.
Killer Statements
I Am Loved And Capable
Tell a story of people having a bad day . . .
Tear away the paper with IALAC on it as you tell all the terrible events of the story or day.
Don’t take stuff away that you don’t give back emotionally to the teacher.
CEU Code LZ9
Website:  www.debbiesilver.com  password:  iamateacher  NMSA 2009 zip file.

Events & Happenings:

Calendar of Events:
NMSA News:

  1. NMSA Annual Conference:  Baltimore 2010.
  2. Month of the Young Adolescent (MOYA) Artwork due March 12, 2010.

Other News:

  1. ISTE Eduverse Talks are the recorded sessions held on ISTE Island every week.  Join ISTE in their Second Life conference location for their weekly talks on education.
  2. The Ohio Middle Level Association will hold their annual conference February 18 & 19, 2010.  Jack Berckemeyer will be keynoting.
  3. The Michigan Association of Middle School Educators Annual Conference is coming up March 4-5, 2010 in Dexter, MI.  MAMSE will be celebrating its 40th Anniversary!
  4. Theater Education Opportunity:  Eastern Michigan University’s Quirk-Sponberg Theater has announced their Fall 2009 Season.

    “The Prince, the Wolf and the Firebird”
    By Jackson Lacey
    Directed by Pam Cardell
    December 4, 5, 10, 11 at 7PM
    December 5, 6, 12 at 3PM
    School Matinees: December 9 and 10 at 10:00 am.  Tickets $4.00 for students and every 15 students gets a chaparone in for free.

  5. Classroom 2.0’s Live Calendar.
  6. Classroom 2.0’s Ning Blog:  Archived content is available. 
  7. Second Life:
    • No Events specified.  Regular Tuesday meetings are scheduled.  See the board on the ISTE Island for up to the minute details.
    • Video:  Educational Uses of Second Life

UncategorizedBy Troy Patterson

Podcast 96 NMSA09 Wrap UP #1: Summaries & Why Middle Schools Matter!

From the Twitterverse:

Advisory:

2 Truths & a lie – have students make 3 statements: 2 are true, 1 is a lie. Section the room into thirds. Have the other students move to one of sections that they think is the lie.

On Our Mind:

Shout out to March Wells III:  Thanks for being on the podcast with us!
Shout out to our NMSA traveling buddies:  Jennifer Fryzel, Andrea Melaragni, Nancy Kiefer, Kathy MacDonald, March Wells III, Fran Delaney, Vickie Molnar!
Shout out to Dr. M. Monte Tatom and Susie Highley for saying, “HI!”, at the NMSA conference.

MAMSE:  Contact your local MAMSE board member and volunteer to be a Regional Coordinator!

Webspotlight:

Breakthrough Learning Conference:

https://sites.google.com/site/breakthroughforum/home

Triand:

Trusted by thousands, Triand is the
national, state-standards based,
social teaching tool.

Find resources, share lesson plans,
create tests, view reports, make teaching fun.

http://my.triand.com/

NMSA09:

Session 1- 10 ways to scaffold super summaries across the curriculum.

Dr. Lori G. Wilfong Kent State Unversity
Thursday 10:30 am

5 words or less.

  1. Tear a piece of paper into 10 pieces.
  2. Write 1 word on a piece of paper that describes you.
  3. Arrange the words in a way that makes sense to you.
  4. Share with someone.

Write about themselves first. This gets them going.
Scaffold summary writing by having students subtract out the 10 (teacher picks the number) on pieces of paper. Have them arrange the words in a way that makes sense. They then use those 10 words and only those 10 words to create a summary – in full sentences. Can use notecards, sticky notes, scratch paper, etc.

Strategy #2: Class Trip by David Lubar
SWBST: Somebody Wanted But So Then: (Something Wanted But So Now)

Somebody Wanted But So Then
Mr. Pegler To go to the museum
Congress Reform healthcare They can’t agree They keep arguing We still don’t have reform.

One sentence summaries are made easy.
Can also remove the Then if that is a repeated item.

Strategy #3: (See The Most Important Thing by Margaret Wise-Brown)
The Most Important Thing:

  • The Most Important Thing about __________________________ is ____________________
  • Detail
  • Detail
  • Detail
  • But, the most important thing about ____________ is ________________________

Leads to the structure that helps kids do well on standardized tests.

Strategy #4: Found Poetry

  • Taking any piece of prose and turning it into poetry
  • Choose a passage that feels important to you or that exemplifies the text in 75 to 100 words. Write that passage on a piece of paper.
  • Carefully discard the words or phrases that are not that important.
  • Pretend that you have to pay for each word you are keeping and want to pay the minimum.
  • Copy your saved words onto a page.
  • Cite the author

Works with a wide variety of sources. Works with fiction and content.

Strategy #5: Fishbones

  • backbone main idea
  • Supporting details.

Strategy #6: Four-Two-One

  • Individually, generate 4 words or concepts that summarize your learning.
  • With a partner, share 2 words. Together, come up with 2 common words or concepts about the story.
  • In a small team, Share your words. Together, come up with one word or concept that best summarizes your learning about your learning.
  • As a whole group.

Strategy # 7: Final Countdown
(Large Triangle with 1 space on top, 2 in the middle, 3 on the bottom). This is a reverse 3-2-1.

  • Using the Final Countdown template, write the 3 most important details from the story.
  • Write the 2 questions you still have about the story.
  • One way this relates or connects to material previously learned.

Strategy # 8: Vanity Plates

  • Create a personalized license plate about the material.
  • Limited to 8 characters
  • Can expand to symbols as well

Strategy # 9: Magnet Summaries: Similar to 10 words or less.

  • After each paragraph, they substract out the most important word on a sticky.
  • Take each of the words to put them in order.

Strategy # 10 Shaping Up Review Four shapes. Heart, square, triangle, circle:

  • Heart – one thing that you loved learning
  • Square – Four concepts that are important
  • Triangle – 3 most important facts
  • Circle – One all encompassing statement that summarizes all of the important concepts and facts.

All of these strategies can be used to facilitate a written summary.

Shawn’s Session 1:  Dr. Robert Balfanz on Why Middle Grades Matter!
Why Middle Grades Matter
Finding 1 half or more of eventual dropouts can fall off the path to graduation in the middle grades.
Asked how early in the middle grades could we identify students who, without intervention, likely would not graduate.
Wanted reliable and valid inidcators
Collectively wanted the indicators to produce a high yield of future non-graduates.
Four sixth grade indicators emerged
1. Attending less than 80% of the time.
2.  Receiving a poor final behavior grade in a core course.
3.  Failing Mth.
4.  Failing English.
Sixth graders with any one of this indicators had 25% or lower graduation rates.
Colectively indicators identified 40% of all dropouts.
Failed English.
Sixth-graders who fail English have a 1 in 8 chance of making it to the 11th grade on time.
Only 16% graduate on time or with one extra year.
Failed Math
Sixth-graders who fail math have a less than 1 in 5 chance.
Attendance and Behavior are porwerful components of course fialure in 6th Grade.
85% of 6th graders who failed English and 75% of those who failed math also received a poor final behavior mark and/or attended less than 80% of the time.
Note:  There’s usually both a behavior and a grade failure component.  Not happening in isolation.
This is a school engagement issue.
By comparision, students who enter middle school with basic skills, attend regularly, behave and pass their courses are likeley to graduate.
Sixth graders who came to school most days got good behavior makres, passed math and ?English and had basic (not proficient) academic skills had a 69% graduation rate.
In short, middle grades (even high poverty) schools work much better for the students for whom they were tradtionally designed.
The key is that the schools are designed for the kids.
In many large cities or high poverty areas these students are in short supply.  Less than a quarter of the sixth graders might match this description.
Comparison group.
6th graders with 90% attendance, excellent behavior do well.
Extension and replication studies.
Have looked at additional cohorts in Philly.
Analysis has been replicated in six schools.
Major finding
Students in high poverty school districts who successfully navigate grades 6-9 by and large graduate from high school 75% or higher grad rates.
In high poverty school districts 75% of eventual dropouts can be identified in sixth grade.
Students are knocked off course in the early secondary grade by the A,B,C’s
Attendance
Behavior
Course failure
Attendance
No common thresholds across the districts – philly needede to be below 80% attendance to get 75% yield.  Boston needed to be below 90%.
Where you are in the attendance distribution may be a factor, as well as total days missed.
States and districts will need to do their own analyses to identify key attendance thresholds.
Behavior
Philly data indicates that sustained, mild misbehavior is a problematic as behavior that generates suspensions.
Challenge-most districts do not systematically collect data on mild misbehavior, only on suspensions.
Suspensions were predictive through number and type varied by school district, ut may more students in Philadelphia had poor behavior grades than were suspended.  thus suspensions as only behavior indicator may miss a significant number of off-track students.
We need a way to tack mild misbehavior.  This is a key to identification.
Course Perforance
Failing courses in the middle grades was consistently predictive of non-graduation and ropping out across districts.
In most districts, 6th Graders failed only one or two courses.  Failing a single core course typically signaled off-track status.
Only extremely low test scores- below the 5th percetile- on nationally normed tests had predictive power that produced high yields.
The earlier student develop off-track behavior . . .
The onset of adoleescence combined with concentrated, inter-generational poverty creates its own set of risk factors.
The developmental and cognitive challenges all middle grade studetns face-magnified by the freedoms of urban environments and large numbers of studetns with below grade level academic skills,
Neighborhood challenges-gangs and criminal enterprises need young adolescent males.
Family responsibilities brought on by poverty increase in adolescence.
Males are in an empty house somewhere playing x-box and the girls are mostly helping at home.

Thses challenges are met with an inadequate educational response, making matters worese.
Large numbers of studetns with demanding emotional, social, and academic needs in a sub set of middle schools
Insufficient numbers of skilled, stable adults in these schools and neighborhoods.
As a result, middle grade students in high poverty schools begin to disengage from school in large numbers and at a n accelerating rate.
Some stop attending school on regulary.
Flight
Some start acting out and being distruptive
Fight
Some just stop trying and start failing courses
Withdrawl.
Student disengagement precedes involvement with the juvenile justice system and teenage pregnancy.
4-years of resilience.
Finding 2:  Students who enter High School two or more years below grade level struggle to pass standards based courses and exit exams.
Attendance and behavior are the key to achievement over time and graduation.
Effective instruction PLUS student engagement – achievement gains.
Having a good teacher made the largest difference.
Attendance and behavior had additive effects beyond just having a good teacher.
As attendance and behavior improve, it has a doubling effect on achievement.
Implications for Practice
Most of the things we think matters, does matter but with limited impact.
To make progress will need comprehensive strategies.
In addition to good teachers, stron ginstrucitonal programs, and safe and supportive learning environments we will need to pay attention to the ABC’s to improve achievement.
Attendance
We need to measure attendance in informative and actionable manners- Every Absence Needs to Bring a Problem Solving response.
We need to track attendance closer than the average daily attendance.
We need acknowledge good attendance.
Social recognition is better than physical reward.
Half of kids absences are discretionary absences.  They chose to be absent.
Good attendance needs to be recognized regularly through public acknowledgement and social rewards.
For better or wrose need to acknowledge that middle grade students are making independent decisions about rather they are engaged by school.
“How many students are missing 20 or more days a year?”
Behavior and Effort
Need high engagement electives that provide avenues for short term success and positively recognize asymmetrical skill levels in students.
We need to build in short cycle activities to provide recognition.
Need activities that honor and use middle grade students desire for adventure and camaraderie.
Why are they skipping school?  They’re getting adventure and friendship out of it.
Positive behavior needs to be recognized.
Same as attendance.
Organizational and self-management skills need to be taught.
PRAGMATICS!
Course Performance
Quality course work involves the ability to integrate a series of skills and a set of knowledge to produce and intellectual product.  Common benchmark assessments may not measure this.
We need to acknowledge the implication of course grades being more predictivie of eventual success than standardized test scores.  Need common grading rubrics.
We are pressured to make middle school like high school, but this is not right.
We need to create standards that fit the maturation level and cognitive ability.
We need to create high school and college readiness indicators that are meaningful and engaging to middle grade students, and understood by parents.  Think Academic Merit Badges.
We need to get Extra Help Right.
Standard model is to provide extra help by someone else.
Providing extra help on what he doesn’t know isn’t helpful for his need on the test on Friday.  Aim extra help at the stuff he needs for the test coming up in class.
Putting it all together with early warning and Intervention systems.
Focus on effective intervention is not just identification.
Recognize and build on student strengths.
Provide time, training, and support to teachers.
We’ve gone from just teaching to teaching and making sure that kids are staying on track.
Match resources to student needs but practice intervention discipline.
Evaluate the effectiveness of interventions
Measure which ones work and drop the ones that don’t by looking at them with a microscope.
Remember you can get started with the data in your school.
Diplomas Now is designed for the middle and high schools with the greatest number of “off-track” students
1.  Combine whole school reform, national service, and integrated student supports with an early warning indicator system and on-site coordination to provide a full school tiered system for supporting all students.
2.  Continuous monitoring of student performance related to key early warning indicators.
3.  Identification of students who are veering off track by indicator.
Used Americorps volunteers to follow kids as a cohort.
4.  Provide the appropriate interventions.
Diplomas Now Schol Design.
Providing the right support to students at the right time.
information:  See Robert Balfanz’s website to get the powerpoint.
http://www.every1graduates.org  (Presentation Here)
rbalfanz@csos.jhu.edu

Events & Happenings:

Calendar of Events:
NMSA News:

  1. NMSA Annual Conference:  Baltimore 2010.

Other News:

  1. ISTE Eduverse Talks are the recorded sessions held on ISTE Island every week.  Join ISTE in their Second Life conference location for their weekly talks on education.
  2. The Ohio Middle Level Association will hold their annual conference February 18 & 19, 2010.  Jack Berckemeyer will be keynoting.
  3. The Michigan Association of Middle School Educators Annual Conference is coming up March 4-5, 2010 in Dexter, MI.  MAMSE will be celebrating its 40th Anniversary!
  4. Theater Education Opportunity:  Eastern Michigan University’s Quirk-Sponberg Theater has announced their Fall 2009 Season.

    “The Prince, the Wolf and the Firebird”
    By Jackson Lacey
    Directed by Pam Cardell
    December 4, 5, 10, 11 at 7PM
    December 5, 6, 12 at 3PM
    School Matinees: December 9 and 10 at 10:00 am.  Tickets $4.00 for students and every 15 students gets a chaparone in for free.

  5. Classroom 2.0’s Live Calendar.
  6. Classroom 2.0’s Ning Blog:  Archived content is available. 
  7. Second Life:
    • No Events specified.  Regular Tuesday meetings are scheduled.  See the board on the ISTE Island for up to the minute details.
    • Video:  Educational Uses of Second Life