First week

A kindergarten teacher and myself have committed to posting our blogs on Wednesdays.  This Wednesday I am home sick and will post it by myself (sorry Nicole!).  Wednesdays work well because school started on Thursday so I have a week in already.

What have we done?  This trimester I work with the 2nd and 5th grade teachers on technology projects.

First up, 2nd grade.  Our big project is for the three 2nd grade classes to have the students gather and write what our Lowell Positive Behavior Expectations look like.  For example, what does it look like when we are safely walking in the hallways?  The students figure out what everything looks like, then we take pictures of what they have decided, add some words maybe, as a little reminder, and publish posters (professional looking posters from the print shop) that will be hung up all around the school.  We met as teachers to divide the responsibilities, and had a first meeting with students to explain what they are doing.  That's all!  My plan after we do the posters is to use the posters as a storyboard and have the students make a video of the expectations also.  I am a big video fan, and believe that if pictures are more helpful that just words to show how to do something, then videos are even MORE helpful because they show the whole process.  We will see. The videos would be great review to show after winter and spring break.

5th grade.  We have a program called Read Write Gold put on all of our computers in the computer lab.  This program is helpful to special needs students doing research and writing.  It will read text in web pages and PDFs, highlight and organize text, and do lots of other helpful things for research.  I will be teaching the students to use this program as part of helping them do research.  The teachers and I met and decided to have the students research either the Winnebago Tribe or early 19th century Iowa life as a precursor to their annual trip to Ft Atkinson, a fort in Iowa that re-enacts life during 1840's.  This sounds like a great idea.  My problems so far have been it is very general.  I want some specific topics that I can use as an example to show how to use the program, and I want to be able to give the students more specific topics to study.  I expect this will gain more focus as the teachers and I talk about it.

Again, what have we done?

Well, we are talking.  That is more helpful than it may sound.  Teachers always say we don't have enough time to process things, and we are right.  I feel like the extra time I am being given this year will give me some process time, and even if the teachers and I don't talk every day, I can get information to them and get more immediate feedback when we talk face-to-face.  And the projects have been introduced and begun, and it is only 5 days into school!

There have been some little things that I am very grateful for.  Because I was up talking to one of the 5th grade teachers, she asked me an unrelated question about showing student work on her interactive whiteboard, and I was able to help her do that.  She will now be using her IWB more and so will her students.  I spent a half hour in a 5th grade classroom for math, and learned something about teaching that I hadn't tried before, and will try now. I have a great project that I will be planning and scheming for the kindergarten to do as a result of my conversations with the kindergarten teacher who wants to do a blog.  And the whole 2nd grade is going to get instruction from the district about making a class webpage as a result of just spending time with them talking about it.

Feeling scared and excited simultaneously about this school year.  This is a familiar feeling at the start of projects.