What I have learned...

I have loved writing this blog for class. I have learned a lot about differentiation by reading the text and listening in class. All my blog posts have either referred to something we did in class or from the readings. My blogging has helped me fully understand differentiation. I liked reading a chapter and then blogging about it. I think that it helped me try to apply what I learned through the readings and in class. I like that I will now be able to refer back to my blog posts and remember what I have learned. I love that I have put videos on some of my blog posts that will help me be a better teacher in the future. I will continue to add different things on my blog.

Rick Wormeli

Today in class we were shown a video on Rick Wormeli's class and how he differentiated a unit. It was really great to be able to see a unit being differentiated. It did look like a lot of work, but like he says it is only upfront work and will save time in the long run. I like how after we watched the video on Mr. Wormeli's class, we all felt like differentiating was completely doable. On YouTube, I found a series of videos he did on differentiation. Here is the first in that series...

I would definitely suggest going through his videos! He is an amazing teacher!

Funny Video

I found this funny video on Differentiation! 

Curriculum and Instruction

There was a definite "Aha moment" while reading this chapter. When I am a teacher, my role will not just to be a teacher. I will inevitably need to be a counselor, parent, coach, social worker, and many more. I loved how Chapter 5 begins with stating, "the teacher agrees to form that bond with the student."

So what does that mean? I think it means that when we sign up to be a teacher we are agreeing to not just be teachers that teach a couple of different subjects, but we need to actually get to know our students.

What kind of teachers will we be if we just teach subject matter? We would be BAD teachers if this is all we did, we wouldn't know our students and we wouldn't know how to differentiate for them.

So how do you create that bond with our students? One simple way would be MORNING MEETINGS!! I think that the sharing in our morning meetings makes a huge difference in our students lives. We will actually get to know each student if we take the time to do morning meetings and get to know our students. The teachers that I remember really well are the teachers that actually try to create this bond.

My fourth grade teacher Mrs. Williams stands out to me the most with this. I struggled in my early elementary years. I remember not doing very well in class and not getting the best grades. The first time I ever got straight A's was in fourth grade. Mrs. Williams made me feel special and that I could actually achieve great things. I struggled in math until her class. I remember learning long division and she told me I had mastered it so well that I should teach the class how to do it. So I did and I remember thinking that I was so great and in reality I don't actually think I did well on that until she gave me the confidence that I could actually do it.

That is the type of teacher I want to be. I want to make each of my students feel special and able to accomplish anything that they set their minds to.

Morning Meetings

Once again here I am again talking about morning meetings, but every time I here someone talk about how morning meetings work so well in their class I just get so excited about it. Last week two teachers from the Wasatch School District discussed how they did their morning meetings. One of the teachers has done morning meetings every single day except maybe twice. The 1st grade teacher has not been as consistent because they do the immersion classes so she has to try to fit everything in. They showed us videos of their classroom doing morning meetings. I loved their class creeds that they did and I think I would want to find or come up with a class creed that they recite and that we discuss it in my class. The teacher who teaches the older grade had her class actually write their class creed. I thought that would be a great idea if I taught an older grade. These two teachers made such an influence on their district that now the Wasatch School District gives their new teachers a packet with morning meetings in it.

The following week, we got to hear from Jentry Youd about his experience with morning meetings. The way he does morning meetings is that they do a game for 10-15 minutes and then sharing for 10-15 minutes. Then they will discuss a goal to work on and see how their goal for the previous day was done. I like seeing how everyone does it differently and he stressed that you need to make morning meetings work for your personality. They aren't going to look the exact same for every teacher. Jentry also said that parents love morning meetings and that there will always be teacher that put you down for doing them. He also said that there will be days when you walk down the hall and see everyone else doing bell work and silent reading and will be tempted to do that instead because it is so much easier. I think that it would be easier, but our students will benefit so much from morning meetings. Another thing that stood out for me while he was talking to us was that his class is really close. They are the only class in the whole school that all get along. He doesn't have bullying problems or anything.

I seriously don't understand why people wouldn't want to do morning meetings in their classroom after they see all the benefits. I realize that they can take a lot of work, but we can keep them simple and they are just as affective.

He is a fun little video that Jentry talked about in class. He showed us a video of his class singing this song with different lyrics.

Blogs

Today I read through Leah and Kylee's blogs.

I am first going to discuss Leah's. I loved her post titled "tame me." I really loved her reflection on Chapter 5 from the book. One of the things she discussed was an example in the book on how a student felt that a certain teacher taught algebra and not her. I had never thought how teacher's could be so focused on their subject matter that they completely forget what is truly important. Our students need to be our number one priority. Leah worried about this, but I know she will be a fabulous teacher and has nothing to worry about!

Kylee's blogpost that I enjoyed reading the most was her post on the Hallmarks. She went through each Hallmark that was presented in class and discussed what each of us did. I loved this because I still need to take the quiz so I think it will serve as a great reminder of all the presentations. I also loved how she went through the story of the fox tamer. This is such a great metaphor from the book!

I loved going through the different blog posts of my classmates. I was able to see the things that I could improve on in my own blog and I got some great ideas.

Classroom enviroment

vs

Chapter 4 in Fulfilling the Promise started out by talking about the classroom environment. I feel like this is huge! Over the last couple of years I have gone into many different classrooms. It is interesting to me how you can see the teacher's personality come through from their classroom. If I were to walk into a room completely organized and everything in place, then you know that teacher is that way as well. Now of course throughout the day this changes as students are interacting and using the classroom, but at the start of the day it is easily recognized what that teacher is like. Last year for my fieldwork in first grade, the first time I walked into that classroom all I saw was chaos. There were things everywhere. Guess how that teacher was? She was not organized at all!! All her bulletins were actually very neat and well done, but it was all of her work and none of the students! I feel like the class needs to represent the students not the teacher! If you have a word wall in your class, then you should actually use it otherwise what's the point?
I think of classroom environments kind of the way I think of my home environment. When I have order at home and things are mostly picked up then I am a much better wife and mom rather than the opposite, I just am not the best wife and mom. I want my 8 month old daughter to love her environment because she spends most of her time there so I have changed my entire apartment to meet her needs. Teachers need to do the same for their students. We have to assess the needs of our students and make sure the environment reflects that. All of our students need to feel comfortable and need an environment that will help them learn.

Live What You Believe

While reading Chapter 3 in Fulfilling the Promise of the Differentiated Classroom by Carol Ann Tomlinson, I came across the quote, "Live what you believe." That was pretty powerful to me. I think we all want to be amazing teachers that touch the lives of our many students, but not everyone ends up doing this. In the chapter it emphasized focusing on what you can change versus what you cannot change. Students have needs for affirmation, purpose, contribution, power, and challenge. So how do teachers meet these needs?

The Response of Invitation
I think it is important as teachers to really respect our students. I think that it is very easy for teachers to look past some students. A lot of times teachers are responsible for over 30 students so it would be easy for some to get overlooked, but it is our responsibility to make each and every student feel special and to make sure they know that we have time for them and that we believe in them.

The Response of Opportunity
It is important for students to be given opportunity. They need to know that what they are doing in school is important and they can provide new possibilities to them. They need to know that they will be pushed in the right direction and all these things will help them become all that they can be. We as teachers need to help our students become better learners and students.

The Response of Investment 
Teachers spend a lot of time in teaching and putting together lesson plans, the classroom, etc. Students need to understand that we work hard to make the classroom work for them. It is important to have the classroom reflect the students. That could mean putting their work around the room. Students need to understand that we want them to succeed and to grow as learners. It is important to notice when the students are not understanding the concept. Go to the students and tell them that you noticed that the majority are struggling and its okay to have to reteach some things.

The Response of Persistent
It is important to know that procedures needs to be in place for the class to work. Sometimes students will not understand for a while but it is important to keep at it. It is okay to adjust procedures if they are not working. Students will always be growing. Never give up!

The Response of Reflection
It is always good to reflect on what is working and what isn't working. This should probably happen on a daily basis. It is necessary to ask the questions, "How can I make this better?" I love that because none of us are perfect and we can always be improving.

How can you do it all?

One of the most overwhelming things about becoming a teacher is wondering how you are going to do it all. How am I going to meet the needs of each and every one of my students? It seems near impossible and it seems that we are going to have to really know each of our students really well. One of my past teachers mentioned how she tried to do this. She thought it was helpful to carry around post-it notes with her throughout the class. Anytime she noticed something about a student, their interests, their struggles, etc. she wrote it down on the post-in with their name on it. At the end of the day she got out this big binder with those clear protectors and each student's name with many other post-its was on it. This is where she kept all her notes about each student. Whenever she had parent/teacher conference she would pull out the binder and she would have many things to talk with parents. I never thought much about this idea until last week's class. It seems to me like a genius idea.

I really want to be an awesome teacher and want each of my student's to feel like they are my favorite student. I had many teachers that made me feel that way and I wonder now how many other students thought that they were their favorite.

ESL

While I was doing my reading for my ESL class, I couldn't help but realize that all of the strategies we can use for ELLS, we can use with each of our students. One of the biggest things I noticed while reading was that students learned their second language so much quicker by talking. This got me to thinking about all the opportunities our students have to actually talk while in class. Sure this varies from class to class, but I honestly think that most students don't do a lot of talking in class. It could be for various reasons like shyness or that there just are not those opportunities to talk.

I reflected that this is just another reason for us as teacher to implement morning meetings. It is so important for students to learn to communicate with one another and also for students to learn different social skills such as looking into each others eyes while talking. It is especially important for ELLs to get talked to directly. Sure they will learn the language by observing, but more importantly, they learn so much more when someone is talking directly to them.

I am so happy that I have learned about morning meetings and am more excited to continue to see the benefits of it! I think it will all in all make me a better teacher.

PS 22 Chorus

In differentiation this week, we were shown the PS 22 Chorus.
This is their story...

This story was very touching to me. I absolutely loved it! I love the part where the principal of the school says that no one in the chorus has had to go to summer school. They are all excelling in school. It is amazing to me how caring so deeply for your students can go a long way. Mr. B had no idea that doing what he did would end up like this, he just cared for each of his students and loved his job. 

To me, Mr. B differentiates naturally. He can see what each of his students' needs are and he makes sure to meet those needs. I hope to one day be the kind of teacher that touches the lives of my students. I know that I had teachers like this and am so grateful for them. 

YouTube Videos of Morning Meetings

Here are some good examples of morning meetings.

The students are learning great communication skills.

Sylvia Long

Last week during Differentiation, my class got the opportunity to listen to Sylvia Allan, the principal of Vineyard Elementary school. It was such a fascinating class discussing the importance of morning meetings. I had never really thought of morning meetings being some amazing thing in the classroom. To me it mostly looked like it was fluff. I never really understood the benefits until Sylvia Allan came and told us what amazing things morning meetings can do.

Sylvia uses morning meetings in her elementary school. The entire school gathers together Monday mornings. She said that it is the only time that 100% of the students are successful. I loved the way she said that.

Going back to when I said that I thought that morning meetings were 'fluff,' well they definitely are not. They can be a great educational tool.

The model we are using in class is called the creed model. The following format is

• Greeting
• Sharing
• Group Activity
• News/Announcements

Sylvia Allan follows a different format. 

• Class Creed
• Greeting (Mornings only)
• Pledge
• Memorization
• Class Business
• Vegetables
• Dessert
• Medicine
• News
• Share
• Class Cheer

Her format gets the kids thinking and they learn a great deal in the process. I love that she has the students memorizing by simply just reading the poem over each morning. She doesn't want them taking it home and practicing. She makes it all so doable in her class. 

Sylvia talked about how her morning meetings got the students to trust her. They knew they could talk to her about anything and she would help them. She made a point to not embarrass anyone in her class. 

In the end, Sylvia had me thoroughly convinced that I would implement morning meetings in my future classroom.