Boston! Engineering! Clam Chowder!

 It was an exciting week for me as I got to head to Boston for the first time ever!  Although the Nor'easter was coming, the trip was still a good time!  Way back in April I blogged about winning a grant from Raytheon to attend a workshop at the Museum of Science in Boston.  I was awarded $3,000 to pay for the training, my travel expenses, and to buy some of the products I would learn about.

Okay, so I was by myself...maybe not the most fun, but still a very worthwhile experience.  Below is a picture from a window in our training room.  Remember, I'm from Indiana and drive by cornfields to get to work, so to see this view for 2 days was A-mazing!  Can you say beautiful or what?  This is the Charles River.  The people at the Museum of Science said that in the warmer weather people are rowing and the water is busy.  How cool to see this on a daily basis!?

The one bad thing about Boston in November is that it gets dark REALLY quickly...as in 4:45 or 5:00.  Traveling by myself, I didn't really want to be out and about in the dark but I had to see Harvard.  It was beautiful, as imagined, and I felt smarter just walking on campus!  Hmm...how do I create this feel in my school?  How do I make my kids feel like they are walking into Harvard everyday?

Okay, so onto my teaching and learning adventures in Boston.  The program is called Engineering is Elementary.  They have 20 units ranging in content areas from rocks and minerals to solids and liquids. They aren't just science units, though, they involve engineering, a design process, and collaboration among classmates.

To begin, we discussed what technology is...anything that helps us solve a problem...and then we had to create a technology that would help us solve the problem of a dog statue (bean animal) needing a 24 inch pedestal.  The materials we could use?  One pack of notecards and 12 inches of tape.  Oh, and 18 minutes.  I have to say that the friends I met at the training were awesome...I do believe we created the best tower!  I know, I know, there is no right way to make it as long as it supports the statue.  Not all groups were successful in the height requirement, and not all designs could support the weight of the animal.  The last part of the engineering design process is to improve what we created.  This reflection piece is crucial, and when I've done this with students, it's the source of some really great conversations!

From here, we read a story book that introduced a character who fell in the woods and hurt his knee.  They needed to create a knee brace to help him get out of the woods.  Learning from a biomedical engineer, we looked at the range of motion of a healthy knee, and then created a knee brace out of different materials to limit the motion of an injured" knee.  Each unit starts with a storybook that states a problem, introduces a specific field of engineering (mechanical, green, biomedical, environmental, etc.), gives them background knowledge, and then presents them with materials to solve the problem with their group.  Below are some of the books from the units.

I can not wait to get our units to school so that we can begin engineering!  The best part, as you can see from the pic above, is that the characters from the books are a mix between boys and girls, ethnicities, continents, etc.  They really stress that engineers can be anyone!  If want to see the grant I wrote to be able to do all of this, click here to go to TPT and get them for free.

Oh, and the next best part of my trip?  The food! Clam Chowder!  I was told that Legal Sea Foods was a good place to go, so I walked from my hotel to the location on Long Wharf where you can see the boats and the coast, and all the pretty things I don't see in Indiana.  I had to get the New England Clam Chowder, and I'm glad I did.  Of course, it's accompanied by a class of wine, but it was a Friday night!

And now, I'm safely home with the hubs and the pups getting ready for the week.  Oh, and did I tell you I get to go back to Boston in 3 weeks for a different conference?!  

Giveaway Alert!

Oh, and one last thing...Lisa Mattes at Growing Firsties is having a Pete the Cat giveaway that also supports Hurricane Sandy!  She'll donate different amounts of money depending on how many followers she gets!  Not only will you get Pete the Cat and a gift card, you'll also boost her followers, which will boost her donation!  Thanks Lisa for a great giveaway.  

Reading Incentive Chart and November Currently

As the ESL teacher in my building, I have always felt that my time is limited with these kids and I'm never able to do everything I want to do with them in just 30 minutes a day.  One large thing I have noticed is that many of my students are not reading at home.  The reason?  Many of their parents can't help them decode words or talk about their understanding.  I have wanted a way to encourage my students (grades 1-4) to read more.  More than the minimum requirement of their classroom.

As I've stepped into this role, there have been many things that I've wanted to go back and change in my previous classrooms, such as minimum reading requirements.  Why would I limit my readers to just 15 or 20 minutes a night if they would have read 30?  Why wouldn't I encourage my reluctant readers through high-interest text selection and work on finding good books for them rather than counting minutes?  So...I've taken one day during the week to talk about books we've read, do a book talk, and go to the library to find good fit books with high-interest levels.  Yes, this is an entire 30 minutes where the mini-lesson is directed toward determining the central message or theme, finding rhythm and rhyme in words, or responding to our reading through writing.

 To encourage reading, I of course, headed to Pinterest and blogs to see what other people had created for reading incentives.  I came across The Teacher Wife's reading incentive chart and liked the concept, but wasn't sure my 3rd and 4th grade boys would want necklaces.  From this, I started thinking what I could do that would visually encourage reading.  I made a tag for each of my ESL kiddos, bought some ribbon, and went to town.  The title of our board?  Real.Hard.Reading.Work.

First of all, they just love to see their name, and they all get their own ribbon.  I lined all of them up on the wall, and each time they get to another 100, they get a new card to put on their ribbon, but they also get a ticket in our school-wide positive behavior system.  Those tickets are like gold, so the kids are really excited!

Can you tell that I ran out of the wide ribbon?  Apparently when you get excited about the wide and thin grosgrain ribbon being the same price, you don't actually get the same length of it. Haha.  Since this picture, I have returned to Hobby Lobby (only of course when their ribbon is 50% off) to get more of the pink and orange.  The title above it looks much better in person, but the laminate doesn't help!

Lastly is my November Currently!  I can't believe it's already November, but then again, I think I say this every month. I hope you all will join Farley's Currently and enjoy the fun.  I love to see what other people are doing!  Click the link above or the image below to link up!

Happy Fall, and enjoy your extra hour of sleep tonight with Daylight Savings Time!

The 10 Minute Reading Challenge!

For part of our professional development, my principal and I had spoken about how much time our students are spending with their eyes-on-print during the day and at home.  During our PD today, we asked grade levels to determine the number of minutes their students spend with a book in their hand and eyes on the page.  We also are trying to align our at-home expectations to encourage reading, rather than set time limits, and up the ante for each grade level.  What was our motivation?  Lucy Calkins!!

This book is a great resource for the transition to common core standards, but Lucy also shares some pretty great things.  This is, of course, is status quo for Lucy (do you like how I'm referencing her on a first-name basis...I wish we were that close!).  One of the things she talks about is that all students should have 45 minutes of eyes-on-print at school and at home every day!

As we were discussing this, it made me think about how I apply this to my own learning.  Do I read 45 minutes every day between home and school? No.  Do I even open a book and read on my own every day?  Sadly, no.  How can I set an example for my students if I can't even make connections about my own current reading? So I presented myself with a challenge.  Read for 10 minutes, just 10 minutes everyday.

And here is your challenge: to join me!

Justification for the rules:
1. Setting a goal allows you to recognize that you are striving toward something to better yourself.
2. 10 minutes is a manageable amount of time that you could get done waiting for the doctor, waiting for the water to boil for your spaghetti noodles, or before going to bed.  Also, as I've noticed over the past few days of my own challenge, you might... just happen to...by accident...unintentionally...not on purpose... by chance get really into your reading and spend more than 10 minutes reading!
3. Don't sweat it if you miss a day.  When you start adding time, it will make a day or two of built up time seem unmanageable.
4. It doesn't matter what you're reading...just read!
5. 10 minutes...simplify it!
6.  Yes, I would love to hear your stories and reflections about how the challenge is going for you.  Reflecting and thinking about our reading is important, just as we teach our kids to do. Spread the word of the reading challenge so that we can encourage our students through the reading we do ourselves, and to learn from each other!  So pay The 10 Minute Reading Challenge forward, tell others about it, and let's get reading!

Oh, and it was intentional that I waited until October 10th (10/10) to share my 10 Minute Reading Challenge!  I know I'm corny, but it just seemed to fit with all of the 10s.

My 10-minutes of reading on Monday and Tuesday have been with Lucy and the Pathways to the Common Core book.  Tonight, I read People magazine, but am hoping to get in some more time with Pathways.  It really is a good book!

Until my next update about my journey with the 10-Minute Reading Challenge

Pete the Popcorn and the last day of my TpT Anniversary Sale!

On Friday, we had the two authors of Pete the Popcorn visit our school!  Although I had never heard of the book beforehand, we are always honored to have authors come visit and talk.  As most author visits go, the students really enjoy hearing from "real" authors and seeing that authors are just like us.  They are able to ask questions, see the writing and illustrating process, and see how a thought becomes a book.  

Our visit from Joe and Nick, the authors, wasn't only about their road to becoming an author and the writing process, but more about the message behind the book!  The character, Pete, is a popcorn kernel who wants to be popped some day and eaten.  The lesson is that through encouragement of others, we can all "pop" and become whoever we want to be.  It can fit in with any anti-bullying unit, too!  To make their visit even better, in their 4th and 5th grade presentation, they called up a pretty "cool" 4th grade boy and asked him to call someone else up to give this person a compliment and encourage them.    Unknown to the authors, the boy picked a girl with special needs who has always struggled making friends and hasn't had many peer encouragers.  For her to go up in front of all of our 4th and 5th graders and see this boy give her a compliment brought tears to many teachers' eyes.  

The authors also use alliteration throughout the whole book.  I can imagine the repeated readings and mini-lessons that this book could bring into a classroom!  They've already started writing more books that have encouraging themes and lessons as well.  It's definitely a book with multiple uses in any elementary classroom!

TpT Sale

It's the last day of my celebratory TpT Sale!  20% off of all products for my 1 year TpT anniversary.  Enjoy!

You can even come visit and check out some of my freebies!  The one below is a customer favorite, and easy to use!  Download it today and use later.

Enjoy your weekends!  I'll be back on Wednesday for a great 10-10 challenge!  Not sure what 10-10 is?  You'll have to wait. :)

ELL lessons, my TPT Anniversary, and Currently!!!

ELL Lesson Planning: Make your intro matter!
So I'm sure many of you have learned about the SIOP model, how to implement it in your classroom, and why it's best for your students, but I have really enjoyed being able to see this unfold with my ELL students this year.  With 1/2 of my job as an ELL teacher, I have really been able to see the effects of thoughtful and intentional lesson planning with SIOP in mind.  If you aren't familiar, however, here are the basic components. When I plan my lessons, I now use this as my format.

• Lesson Preparation
• Building Background
• Comprehensible Input
• Strategies
• Interaction
• Practice/Application
• Lesson Delivery
• Review/Assessment

My biggest aha, especially with small group reading, is that your anticipatory set, background knowledge, and preview of the text, may take more than one session.  With your "typical" students, your intro may be short and quick.  In order to make texts comprehensible, this is one of the greatest areas of impact to allow students to make meaning.  Don't forget to make your introduction matter!

TPT 1 Year Anniversary...and a sale!
I must first say thank you, thank you, thank you!  Today marks my 1st full year on TpT, and it has been an absolute ride!  Not only do I feel grateful to everyone for your comments, ratings, and purchases, but the personal notes about how it has helped your class or a specific student just warms my heart.

In honor of all of YOU...I'm having an Anniversary Party!

Come on by to visit the sale here!

October Currently
Well it's the beginning of a new month, so what else is to be expected, but Farley's monthly Currently!  I am always baffled with her creativity and the seasonal theme she integrates.  Another home run, Farley! Visit her site, and link up to share your own Currently.

Evaluations, Halloween Writing, and a Giveaway!

Well Fall is officially here, my jackets are out, and morning bus duty has been a bit chilly...I know it's only September.

Evaluations
Now that school is in full swing, my principal and I are beginning our observations as a part of our new evaluation system.  Indiana has put a a new evaluation plan in place, which is rather complex, but the teachers in my building are awesome, and are going along with ALL of it!  **Lucky me!**
As I begin entering classrooms, I hesitate a bit because I remember the feeling when someone walked into my room.  Sometimes I was ecstatic, because I wanted my principal to see the awesome things happening.  Other times, my thoughts were a bit different.  As I begin my routing of walk-throughs, observations, etc. I wanted to get your feedback.  In one word, how would reflect on your feelings when your evaluator walks in?  I'd love to read your comments, since I only know what my feelings were!

Halloween Writing!
My very first unit on TpT was created almost one year ago...and it was awful!  I didn't realize it was awful at the time.  I actually thought it was great, out of this world, ahh...my first time to use licensed clipart.  Holy cow!  Ever since then I have improved, edited, and revised.  When I looked back at my Halloween Writing unit, I realized how far I've come.  When I say this, I don't mean that my cover looks better, or the pages are more creative, but they are designed for real, student work.  I revamped my writing unit to make it better for my students, and more thought out.  Click on the pic below, check it out, and see what you think!

Giveaway!
Finally, my good friend Natalie over at Teachery Tidbits has hit 500 followers!  I know! She is awesome! She is having a week long giveaway with a winner everyday!  She has so many ways to enter that are easy and fast.  You can even win my Student Led Conference Binder for her Day 2 giveaway.  Head on over to her blog to show Natalie some love and congrats for getting to 500! Click Natalie's link below to go to rafflecopter and enter!

I hope you all have a great end to your week!!

I placed 1st in my Age Group*!!!

Yep!  You read it right!  I placed 1st in my age group for a 5K I did yesterday! But let's go back a bit...

My school district has a foundation that supports educational grants and school initiatives.  They were holding a 5K as a fundraiser yesterday.  We were highly encouraged to participate in one of two ways. We could either volunteer at a water station or split timing location or we could run the 5K.  Well the choice seemed pretty obvious for me, especially when I heard that volunteers had to show up at 5:30am!  My start time wasn't until 8:00!

I called a friend to run it with me, and we headed for the start line.  As I looked around, it was a decent turnout, but definitely not the largest crowd I've run alongside.  My friend, Lindsey, and I finished the race, grabbed water and a banana and headed for the car.  Later that day, I received a text message that we had won our age group!

Okay, now I've run, but I'm not a great runner.  I've done a lot of different distances, but I'm not a sprinter by any means.  I was shocked!  I ran to my computer, pulled up the results, and this is what I saw:

Ha! Yes, go back and look at that.   Go on.  Study it.  Look really hard.  Yep, you got it!  There were only 4 in my age group! At a whopping pace of of 9:19/minute I placed 1st.  Notice the asterisk in the title of my post?  Well that's because there were only 4.  Since I left early I didn't get the trophy, but I'll be back later in the week to show off my hardware after beating 3 people!

Lesson of the run...and placing 1st:
If you ever need a confidence boost or something to reenergize your running (or teaching) efforts, sign up for something small and casual.  Sometimes going in without expectations makes both the task and the result even more enjoyable.

And yes, now you can laugh again about having only 4 people on my age group!

Enjoy your week, and set some small goals along the way!