Middle School Matters

Jokes:

Frogs
A guy was walking beside a pond when a frog jumped out and told him that she was really a beautiful princess and if he were to kiss her, she would make him VERY happy! He picked up the frog and put it into his pocket. A few minutes later, the frog poked her head out and said, “Didn’t you hear me?! I’m a beautiful princess and if you kiss me I will stay with you and do ANYTHING you want!” The guy took the frog out and said, “Look, I understand what you are saying, but I am a computer programmer and right now I don’t have time for a girlfriend… but a talking FROG is REALLY, REALLY COOL!”

Scotland
Over a remote Scottish island a helicopter lost power and was forced to make an emergency landing. Luckily there was a small cottage nearby. The pilot walked over to it and knocked on the door. “Is there a mechanic in the area?” he asked the woman who answered the door. She scratched her head and thought for a few seconds. “No,” she finally said, pointing down the road, “but we do have a McArdle and a McKay.”

On Our Mind:

NMSA 2010 Conference

Middle School Science Minute

by Dave Bydlowski (k12science or davidbydlowski@mac.com)
“Heliophysics.” and more.

From the Twitterverse:

* NMSAnews NMSA RMLE Online: Influences of High-Stakes Testing on Middle School Mission and Practice

* rguthrie Rachel Guthrie Is school a selective process where students need to be ranked, sorted and culled? or an experience meant to encourage and promote learning?

*chadratliff Ouch: The 20 worst-paying college degrees in 2010 http://yhoo.it/b8ESfk

*PrometheanUSA THANK A TEACHER MERCHANDISE AVAILABLE IN ON PROMETHEAN PLANET STORE GET 10% OFF ALL ADULT T-SHIRTS +15% ON yr ORDER $40 OR MORE**code TY15

*presentationzen Mac News reporting that Pearson/Peachpit books, including my books, now on iBookstore. http://snipurl.com/1hb5uc

*DianeRavitch Is teacher experience important? “Reformers” say no. Research says yes: http://shankerblog.org/?p=1319

*go2publicschool Professor gives an exam, analyzes the grades, realizes 1/3rd of his class cheated. Proceeds to call them out: #badass

*doctorjeff #EDUCATION VIEW: LET’S TEST to see if testing has taken all joy out of our classrooms, and if we find it hasn’t, let us test until it does.

*drmmtatom Official Google Docs Blog googledocs.blogspot.com/?spref=tw #fhucid

This Part for Infamous40000 . . . :
Waiting to hear back from Infamous40000 . . .

NSMA 2010 Session 2:

Session 2:
1267
Sharon Faber
Ms. Sandra Dutemple
Motivating Students

Great Strategies that Increase Positive Behavior & Motivate Students

“Not every child has an equal talent or an equal ability or equal motivation, but children have the equal right to develop their talent, their ability and their motivation”
John F. Kennedy

Kids are different. They are smarter -they know stuff, just not necessarily what we want them to know.

• Reaffirm
• Reinforce
• New learning

Kids come to school to see their friends – we just happen to be there.
Research says 4th grade is crucial. Once they feel dumb- they need to save face.

Insanity – Doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results .

When the horse dies – get off.

“The goal of teachers is to meet all students at their starting points and to move each one along a continuum of growth as far and as quickly as possible. Learning has no ceiling. ”
Tomlinson

Vocabulary & Prior Knowledge are required to increase knowledge.
Need to have a personality to be a good teacher.
Teachers need to be enthusiastic.

BA  or BS – Borrow and Adjust or Borrow Straight.

Use a different noise to bring kids back. Not all of the kids will hear your voice. Then the good

Email for handout

You teach like you learn.

“For these are all our children. we either profit or pay for what they become.” James Baldwin

Successful teaching is an evolving process.
It is important to keep an open mind because new and promising ideas are constantly emerging.
When a strategy or method clearly increases student learning, follow the practice as early as possible so that the students become accustomed to the specific way of thinking and acting.

Teachers make a tremendous difference in student achievement.
The key trait of effective teachers is that use systematic and explicit instructional strategies that work in any content.

Systemic
Skills and con pets are taught in a planned, logically progressive sequence.
Explicit
Direct explanation: stories, example
Teacher modeling: show them
Guided practice: pairs think together
Independent practice: formative assessment
Application: own, understood, useable

More than pairs allows for “slugs”
Too often the cooperative group allow for training kids to not think. (Time keeper, etc. )

Common Behaviors

• Acting Out
• Impatience & Impulsive
• Gaps in politeness & social graces
• Increased absences
• Tardiness
• Incidents of illness during class.
• Academic learning and achievement problems (va
• Inattentive & easily districted
• Short attention span
• Low self-esteem
• Narrow range of interest
• Fear failure
• Lack structure & organization
• Avoid responsibility

What you can do:

• Model behavior

Hardwired by DNA:

Teach:

• Humility
• Forgiveness
• Empathy
• Optimism
• Compassion
• Sympathy
• Patience
• Shame
• Cooperation
• Gratitude

• Give respect to students when they seem to least deserve it.
• Share decision making with the class. Maintain expectations while offering choices and getting input.
Avoid sarcasm.
Model the process of adult thinking. Keep voice calm
Discipline through positive relationships instead of exerting power or authority.
Embed social skills like meet and greet skills, turn taking, thanking others.
Be inclusive
Celebrate efforts as well as achievement.

Actions that DON”T help:
Focus only on the basics.
Maintain order through force.
Eliminate or reduce time for arts, sports & PE.
Decrease interaction among students.
Deliver heavy handed, top down lectures. ( Kids know what your buttons are and will use them).

Actions that DO help:
Teach in 15 to 20 minute blocks and then let them share.
Routine & Consistency are crucial

Motivation always revolves around good teaching.

Davis Sousa – How the Brain Learns to Read. 2005

sharonfaber.com

Get their attention
emotion drives attention
focus their attention
maintain their attention
Keep them on task.

How long until I retire?
OR
What miracles can I create today?

NMSA 2010:  Summarization in Any Subject

Part Two:
Rick Wormeli, 2010  (Handout provided)

Break
Summarization Strategies:
Reading Notations
Annotated text is one of the best things we can teach according to research.
(Check Mark)          I agree with this.
X                I disagree with this.
??                I don’t understand this.
!!                Wow!  (‘Elicits a strong emotion)
CL                General Claim
EV                Evidence for the Claim
(These can be numbered to indicate their sequence, too:  EV1, EV2, EV3…)

Journalistic vs. Encyclopedic Writing
Read the journalistic version first then read the encyclopedic version is workable.
They’ll hang on the encyclopedic version if they read the journalistic stuff first.
Create narrative versions of boring stuff that we have to teach.
Reading Notations
EV for evidence
Annotated text is one of the best things we can teach according to research.
Journalistic vs. Encyclopedic writing.
Read the journalistic version first then read the encyclopedia version is workable.
They’ll hang on the encyclopedic version if they read the journalistic stuff first.
Create narrative versions of boring stuff that we have to teach.
Text structure:  The kids memorize the key words for each structure to identify it in class.
Chronological Order
Definition and Key words:
Compare and contrast
Proposition and support
Enumeration
Virtual Metaphors:  Graphic Organizers
Matrix
Venn Diagram
Writing is 98% thinking!
“If I had more time, I’d have written less.”  -Pascal
Kids need feedback in 1 – 3 days to internalize it.
Shorter is better, less is more.
T-Chart/T-List
Cornell Note-Taking format
T-Chart with summarization at the bottom.
Somebody wanted but so
Somebody (characters)
wanted (plot motivation)
but (conflict)
so (resolution)
Something Happened and Then
Something (independent variable)
happened (change in that independent variable) …
and (effect on the dependent variable) …
then (conclusion)  …
Narrowing the Topic
Is the topic narrow enough to be focused , but broad enough to have plenty to write about?
When we summarize, we:
Delete some elements
Keep some elements
Substitute for some elements.  (DKS) Ask students to memorize these three actions.

TaRGeTS
Trivia
Redundancies
Generalize
Determine Topic Sentence (Subject and author’s claim about it)
(What’s the headline for this?)
Writing Concisely
Avoid redundancies and saying the same thing in different ways:  see slide.
-Write Tight, 1993 by William Brohaugh
More Summarization Tips.
Use reading notations.
Allow students to mark consumable and non-consumable text.  (Highlighting tape)   Eraseable highlighters and wikisticks
Emphasize opinion free summaries – no commentaries.
Teach students to evaluate their own summarizations.
Set length slimit of 10 to 25% of the original text, <1% for longer text.
Encourage two or more readings or exposures.
Evaluating our Summaries (see handout)
Does it convey the information accurately?
Is it too narrow or too broad?  Does it convey . . . .
Help with Paraphrasing
Build students’ vocabulary and verbal dexterity.  Post word banks.  Use vocabulary immersion.
Provide repeated experiences with varied sentence combinations and word play.
Use repeated think-alludes
Play renaming and clue games such as Password, Taboo, and $25,000 Pyramid.
3-2-1
3: Identify
2:  List
1:  Name/What
Unique Summarization Formats/Products
See slide on handout.
Endless list of writing possibilities  see slide
RAFTS
Raise the complexity:
Lower the complexity:
Change the verb:
See the verb list from the slides.
Backwards Summaries
“Make the web from which this paragraph came.”
Save the Last Word for Me
Read a passage, making notations as they go.
They identify three or more sentences to which they have a response.
Place students in groups of 3 to 5, then one member of each group to read a line that he has identified.  He reads; there is no commentary or reason for choosing it given.
Each group member other than the reading person responds to … see slides.
Change the point of view
Tell the story from the points of view of other objects/people . . .
Bloom’s Taxonomy.
Frayer Model
“Word Link”
Each student gets a word and they have to find someone to join with and explain the connection.
Summarization Pyramid.
Great prompts for each line:  Synonmy, analogy, question, three attributes, alternative title, causes, effects, reasons . . .
One word summaries
Exclusion Brainstorming
Premise: Ther eis not any curriculum so symbolic or abstract that we cannot “physicalize” it for better student learning.
Funny:  Yelling Movie in a crowded Firehouse …
Physicalizing Process:
Identify essential pieces
Physicalize those pieces and present them to the class.
Class critiques the physicalization in terms of accuracy, comprehensiveness.
see slides
Statues (Body Sculture)
Line-up
“If I get the kids to say it, they hear it.”
Summary Ball
The ones left standing are declared the winners.
Human Bingo
Always put something in there that’s crazy.
Human Continuum (Mobile Socratic seminar)
Masking tape on the floor (winding)
A=Gree
D= Duh, or disagree
Middle Line is uncomfortable to respond.
It’s ok to tell little white lies to protect the kid.
$25,000 Pyramid
Pictionary
Taboo Cards
Share one, Get one
We think primarily in physical terms.  Over time we become adept at translating symbolic and abstract concepts into meaningful structures or experiences.
Metaphor
Make one!
________ is/are a _____________ because ____________ .
Ask students …
Metaphors Break Down
Descriptions with and without metaphors.
Common Analougous Relationships (kids memorize)
4-Square Synectics
Brainstorm four objects from a particular category
How is the human digestive system like each household item:  sink, old carpet, microwave, broom.
Highly Recommended and Scummarization Ideas
Go to NCTE’s ReadWriteThink website.
Where do we go from today?
3x3x3!
Three Strategies/principles/aspects that will be in your thinking in the next three weeks for four weeks.
Three topics/ skills . .

Webspotlight:

DisUnion

One-hundred-and-fifty years ago, Americans went to war with themselves. Disunion revisits and reconsiders America’s most perilous period — using contemporary accounts, diaries, images and historical assessments to follow the Civil War as it unfolded.
http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/category/disunion/

ViewChange

Using the power of video to tell stories about real people and progress in global development.
Varied length of videos. Videos can be downloaded. Some really great videos can be found. You can change the view from an interesting circle to a list view. Many different subject areas are represented.
http://www.viewchange.org/

Google Lit Trips:

http://www.googlelittrips.com/GoogleLit/Home.html

When Pictures Make History

A timeline of image-makers who have shaped world history
Excerpted from the book, TIME History’s Greatest Events
Read more:
http://www.time.com/time/photogallery/0,29307,2031505,00.html#ixzz15pzqxYhq

http://www.time.com/time/photogallery/0,29307,2031505,00.html

Events & Happenings:

Calendar of Events:

NMSA News:

• National Conference: Thursday, November 08, 2010 —Saturday, November 10, 2010 Louisville, Kentucky.
  • Need a letter to your administrator explaining the benefits of attending NMSA? How about this one?
  • Promotional Materials:
    • Crossword Puzzle! (Maryland Conference)

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 ISTE Special Interest Group:  Virtual Environments is holding meetings on Mondays from 4:00 – 6:00 pm (SLT) on ISTE Island.
• The Ohio Middle Level Association will hold their annual conference February 17 – 18, 2011.

• • OMLA Registration Form
  • OMLA Presentation Proposal Form

• The Michigan Association of Middle School Educators Annual Conference is coming up March 17-18, 2011 in Coopersville, MI. Coopersville Middle School is a National Schools to Watch School.   (Phone:  (616) 997-3400)
  • MAMSE Exhibitor Form
  • MAMSE Registration Form

• • MAMSE Presentation Form  (Presenter Deadline Extended!)
• The North Carolina Middle School Association’s Annual Conference March 13-15, 2011
  • Conference Brochure
  • Presenter’s Application
  • Who They Are . . .

• Classroom 2.0’s Live Calendar.

• • Classroom 2.0’s Ning Blog: Archived content is available.

• Second Life:
  • Regular Tuesday meetings are scheduled. See the board on the ISTE Island for up to the minute details.  Check frequently this week as the ISTE Annual Convention is this week.
  • Video: Educational Uses of Second Life