Field Experience and PLN Day

                       

Today was such a great day!   I went and shadowed the Media Specialist at the Middle School.  It was so neat to work with middle grade students.  I have always worked with primary students K-2, so working with teenagers was quite a change.  The library was quieter than at my school.  Although I noticed 13 year old were just as silly as 6 year olds.  While shadowing Mrs. Merrick, she showed me how they use Destiny at their school. She showed me around the library ( all the nooks and crannies)  She showed me the budget for 2011, and how she worked around it.  SHe said her funding has got lower and lower over the last 7 years.  Here is a link to our budget that Mrs. Merrick shared with me.  It was quite eye opening.http://pikecountytimes.com/2011SchoolBudget.pdf 

During Lunch, I hung out in the computer lab, while I was there- I made my PLN something that I can be proud of.  I added my favorite feeds.  I love Ilearntechnology from Kelly Tenkely.  She has been part of my PLN on Twitter since I joined a few years back.  I also like Kevin Jarrett.  I learn so many things from these 2 educators.  Although Twitter is blocked from school- I use it ALL the time.  It has made me a better educator.  Another social tool I added to my PLN was Pinterest.  WOW!!  Pinterest has given me a creative side to teaching that I never knew I had!  I get so inspired to create things for my students every single time I click within Pinterest.  Our Kindergarten teachers are going to create a Kindergarten boards in Pinterest and share that account among themselves.  What a SUPER way to collaborate!!  You should see the Kindergarten hall- Pinterest has made it look a lot more creative than it did last year!  I think Social Tools are great for education's future.  I just wonder when everyone will jump on the bandwagon!

Catching Up!



According to the Practicum Portfolio checklist for February 20th, I am on schedule.  I only have a few things left to embed.  Then, I can start with some more of the checklist items.  I have been working hard on the portfolio the past few weeks trying to make sure everything is in order. I was a little confused on where to embed all my key assessments, but I finally got everything figured out.  HOORAY!!   For valentines this week I showed my class http://www.thisissand.com/  They were so excited- it was a great Valentines present for me to give them.  During the time they were playing on the sand, I spent that time catching up with my class blog reading task.  The class has all read "The Mitten", and I made a display board for our school about the author.  The class made Wordles about the story and we printed them and took them home.  Above you can see a picture of a class working on their wordles.  Wordle is such an excellent Web 2.0 tool to show what you have learned about a story.  The students particularly like it because they can write words instead of sentences.  It seems students are always looking for shortcuts in the world of education- so technology makes it easy to learn, show, and assess!  Between the class blog and our wordle projects our reading unit has been lots of FUN!   I am working on a rubric to grade my students motivation, effort, and work on the reading enrichment unit.  So far, everyones motivation is through the roof- technology does that to students!  I love being an educator in today's time.  Taking my students to the 21st century is an awesome experience.

Severe Weather Awareness Week

From The Wizard of Oz -Dorothy-[singing] "The wind began to switch / The house, to pitch / And suddenly the hinges started to unhitch"

Everywhere I turn this week I seem to hear something about weather.  During the Pike Couty Primary School's Faculty Meeting, the Assistant Principal discussed the weather and the procedures that follow each situation.  The weather channel is showing a special segments on severe weather types as I speak.  I just found myself searching for ways to expose my students to "real" weather.  I want to show them something authentic.  I have all the potential in the world!!  I have 25 computers in ONE room!  I went to the http://www.livewxradar.com/  and visited the live radar. and then visited youtube and looked up a video of authentic pictures for severe weather(there were many to choose from).  I mixed these 2 types of media and it seems to be the perfect mixture for an engaging lesson for 6-7 year olds.  I am sure I hit an array of standards.  Chart reading, geography, and the curiousity of science.  The most important standard I will hit- will be my own!  I always have the biggest desire to satisfy my stuudents engagement.  When my students are quiet, amazed, and engaged in what they see and do- I have hit MY standard. 

Second Grade Level Meeting

                                                                

I will be a guest in our second grade team meeting today.  I am so excited to be included in the team.  I started a wiki for for each of our grade levels.  Kindergarten, First, and Second.  I started the wikis and made the grade chair persons editors of the wikis and made our Principal and instructional coach the administrators of the wikis.  We have 12 teachers per grade level and 1 EIP teacher per grade level.  I made each of them a member of the wiki.  Today in the grade level meeting I will show the wiki to all the teachers in second grade.  I will show them a few how tos on ways to navigate and add data and documents to the grade wiki.  For right now we are going to to save all our grade unit materials on the wiki.  This will save printing and copying; it will also allow for easier sharing and collaborating.  I truly think this will be a great idea.  We have teachers that have never heard of wiki- so I am crossing my fingers that they will embrace this new technology and like it.  Here is the link to our second grade wiki. I named it Primary Second.  http://primarysecond.pbworks.com/   It is still a newborn, but I am sure by next year it will be as awesome as our second grade team!!

Joined American Library Association

Today I joined American Library Association online.  What an experience that was!!  It was quite lenghty.  First I had to go on the site and create an online profile within the site.  I had to fill out the membership application- which consisted of the regualr items like email and my preferred mailing address so I can get the mail, demographics, etc...  In my email preferences I choose to receive communications from ALA, chapters and affliates.  I wonder how that is going to fill my inbox. I might go back later and change some of that.  Time will tell.  One cool thing about membership is I am now connected to ALA connect!  I choose the membership type of regular member.  The price of a regular membership is $65.00.  You can learn more about the American Library Association from their website.  http://www.ala.org/aasl/    I found myself lost for about an hour on the site.  The links within the site are awesome too.  I found a site that I am going to show my students within ALA  http://www.ipl.org/div/kidspace/.  It was filled with goodies!  Thanks ALA!  You rock!!

Leading My Teachers

This week I planned to help train my teachers with a testing program we are using at our school by a company called NWEA.  The test is called MAP.  That stands for Measures of Academic Progress.  All first and second grade students will be administered the test by computer.  All teachers will have access to a score report 24 hours after their students take the test.  My job is to help the teachers utilize their score reports better.  Also, they need help accessing the reports that the nwea site has to offer.  Too often teachers are bogged down with too things to learn so I thought I would take advantage of my candidate as a leader requirements and create a staff development unit to teach the teachers with their MAP scoring.  I created pdfs and documents as well as a PowerPoint to aid them in learning.  It was quite rewarding making all these tools for the teachers.  I think they really appreciated the help.  We scheduled grade-level meetings and taught each grade separately.  The meetings were quite a success, and each teacher received a PLU for attending the meetings.  I am so excited at how successful things went- I am now working with second grade, first grade and kindergarten to create grade-level wikis to store their units.  If these things are the job of the Media Specialist then I LOVE IT!!!
Link to Wiki site>>>   http://pikeprimarymaptest.pbworks.com/w/page/50484242/FrontPage

Jan Brett Display for our School.

I was reading my expectations for my practicum and one of them was to create a display that the entire school was working on.  That was so easy!!  After talking with my Media Specialist, she told me the entire school would be reading The Mitten by Jan Brett.  Well, my virtual component was an even easier choice.  www.janbrett.com is the most fabulous website I had to include it in my display.  Because I work in Early Childhood, I tried to make my board nontraditional than just the regular butcher paper and die cuts.  I made my snow out of cotton balls and sprinkled the cotton with glitter for an extra glimmer.  I included the website URL so all could see.  I made sure to include all the characters from the story in two different sections of the board.  I had so much fun making the board.  The best part was the fact I made the board for the ENTIRE school.  How cool!!!   I truly felt like a Media Specialist while making something for everyone.  I have taken a picture to share.  I hope you enjoy!!  And, don't forget to go to www.janbrett.com that site is totally AWESOME!!  Way to go Jan, your site is equally as cool as your books.  I hope my board is worthy of your name.  Our studnets love The Mitten and all the cool characters.