Type A Personalities and Planning a New School Year

Perhaps I’m generalizing, but I think most teachers are planners.

By mid August, I usually have my bulletin boards done. Last week, I went to 8 stores (wearing a mask) to find just the right lesson plan book and then dated all the pages and put tabs for each week. That gave me a sense of control that I’ve missed during COVID.

Any other summer, I would have had my seating charts done, first few weeks of lesson plans written and copies made. I would have bought new school clothes and gotten my hair cut.

At school, I’m a planner. I am at my most comfortable when I know what I’m going to be doing, and when I have planned what to do for every eventuality. I like being able to relax once everything is in place.

But nothing is in place this year. There’s so much ambiguity about the new school year – when’s the first day? Is it hybrid, remote, or in person? How many students are opting to be fully remote? Will there be an outbreak in my state in the next week, causing schools to go fully remote again? Will classes by 60 minutes long for a full day of school or 40 minutes long because students can’t eat in school and have to have half days? How long before we have our first case of COVID?

NEA Today, before the pandemic, said that a “majority of teachers are feeling a high level of stress” as well as low ability to cope. I don’t know about you, but I find teaching under the best circumstances stressful. I love love love my job, but it is stressful. And teaching remotely was ten times worse, Now, they’re asking me to do them both at the same time. (What is it they said about Ginger Rogers – she did the same thing as Fred Astaire, only backwards and in heels.)

Social media and the news are overloaded with the debate to open schools. Yesterday, I saw a group of parents protesting a town not far from me whose school board had decided to open remotely. Parents were screaming to make the teachers get to work and demanding their taxes be refunded.

I wish I were one of those people who can roll with it. I know teachers who haven’t checked their emails all summer. I’m trying, I really am. I know I should let it go. But I’m going to start school with mid-year stress levels.

woman in black leather jacket wearing white framed eyeglasses covering her face

Woman in mask Photo by engin akyurt on Unsplash

Women on bed Photo by Kinga Cichewicz on Unsplash

Informational Texts to Build Scientific Literacy

One thing on my back to school list is sub plans. My admin usually ask for 3-4 days of sub plans by the second week of school and I’m always in a moral quandary. Do I throw together something meaningless but time filling? Or do I invest the time to make meaningful, content rich, standards based activities that require no prep and can be squeezed into the curriculum whenever I need a day off? Using informational text, I can build scientific literacy even in my sub plans.

You know me so well.

I have no time to “just give kids a study” or “tell them to read the next chapter.” There are only 180 days of school and my kids need every single one of them to cover the content and the standards.

I’ve found that a great sub plan is an enrichment activity that incorporates informational text into scientific literacy. Not only does it address NGSS skills, it also addresses Common Core skills. I give students a scientific passage to read like scientists and engage with the text. Have them analyze and evaluate data and form opinions. Ideally, let them defend their opinions using data to support their answers. Additionally, preparing these plans in advance can give you handy enrichment activities for early finishers.

Here are some ideas to get you started:

To create a relevant sub plan or mini-unit, select appropriate reading passages, preferably from both sides of the spectrum on opinion pieces, and add in some background information and data. It’s far better to curate the reading passages yourself rather than opening up the option to “Google it.” As useful as a tool as Google is, there’s a lot of misinformation out there also. (To wit, I once had a student do a report on amethyst and told me that it could cure headaches.) Then, generate some relevant analysis questions.

The trick to great sub plans is to make them relevant but not necessarily curricular so that they can fit anywhere in the year when you may need them. Building scientific literacy and using informational text to analyze information is always a skill that’s high on my priority list.

I’ve assembled 8 sub plans in a bundle and am offering it for 30% off right now. I’d love your feedback!

Pinterest Classrooms

I love Back to School time! I love buying new lesson plan books and hanging new bulletin boards. I love setting up my desk with the pics of my kids and my pencil holder.

But this year is different.

My school is currently expected to start with a hybrid September – some students in person and some working synchronously from home with another cohort (as yet unrevealed percentage of students) who are completely remote. I still can’t get my head around how to plan for this and my 32nd year in the classroom is just as wrought with anxiety, even more so, than my first year.

The whole process of planning, creating, and hanging a new bulletin board is normally something I love doing. I love choosing a new theme every year, saving ideas from Pinterest, and WOWing myself and my students with some dramatic bulletin board. Last year’s theme was a tropical rainforest. The year before was superheroes. The year before that was underwater. This year, I was thinking aliens.

As I watch the news about schools opening around the country and then quarantining the next day due to kids or staff testing positive doesn’t make me feel optimistic about remaining in my classroom for a long time. Who’s going to spend 10+ hours creating a spectacular bulletin board that students may never see? How much time and money am I willing to invest knowing that schools are shutting down as quickly as they’re opening up? Not to mention the fact that a large part of my classroom has been turned in to social distancing barriers, sanitizer stations, and plexiglass dividers.

Maybe this is the year I don’t bother with the Pinterest classroom. And maybe, it will be just fine.

Home Office Comfort

Looks like there will be some more time in my “home office” (read: kitchen counter) this September. If you’re like me, you spend a lot of time in the spring trying to make a comfortable place for you to work. My husband and I worked out a relatively comfortable coexistance during quarantine and I’ll need to set up a home office for those days when I’m teaching remotely in the fall again.

But I’m not going to make the same mistakes twice. Now that I have time to plan, here are some things I’ve learned from the pros about making working from home more comfortable:

Choose a chair where my feet hit the floor (no more cross legged on the couch or perched on the kitchen stool).

Sit in a place where my wrists bend when I type or use the mouse. I can prop up my laptop with books if I need to. Additionally, the screen of my laptop needs to be at eye level.

Lumbar support is critical. Rolled up towel would be fine if I can’t find a pillow I love.

When I’m in the classroom, I walk around constantly, but in my home office, I’m basically glued to my chair. Short frequent stretch breaks are going to be built in to my day from now on. In the spring, I would often look up from my laptop and realize the entire day had flown by without a break. No more, mister. I’m all about 5 minute breaks every 20 minutes. Additionally, I’m going to continue alternating sitting at the table with standing at the counter.

Since I’m working on a laptop, I’m buying an external mouse for comfort reasons. If remote learning goes on for much longer, I’m also considering an external keyboard.

File:Computer Workstation Variables cleanup.png

What are you doing to keep your home office comfortable and safe?

Image:  Creative Commons CC0 1.0 Universal Public Domain Dedication

Top 3 Science Teacher TED Talks

In 15 minutes or less, a TED talk can inspire, inform, and invigorate you. Here are my top 3 for science teachers:

Hey science teachers – make it fun

We’ve all assigned something we thought was fascinating and students don’t react in the way we thought they would. Tyler DeWitt makes a compelling argument that scientific vocabulary makes interesting topics inaccessible for the average student, and aren’t we all more interested in having students understand rather than memorize?

Teach teachers how to create magic

Teacher training programs aren’t engaging. How can we expect them to create engaging teachers? Yet we have educators who can engage and teach their audience. Where did they come from? They learned the skills of motivational story telling from places other than teacher preparation programs. They learned the magic of great teaching by engaging in the community with powerful and motivational speakers.

This virtual lab will revolutionize science class

Just like pilots are trained in simulated airplanes, students should be exposed to simulated experiments to be engaged in science. Experiments that are dangerous or expensive can be accessible to students using virtual environments, turning science into an experience more like a video game.

The best part about TED talks is that they can inspire you to think outside the box. The worst thing about TED talks is that thinking outside the box isn’t something we’re often allowed to do. Go on. Take a step out. You’ll be glad you did 🙂

Using Task Cards in Science

Task cards are versatile opportunities to practice skills in short increments of time. Here are my favorite 10 ways to use task cards in my middle school science classroom:

  1. Bellringer/Do now – If I project a task card or set of task cards on the screen, studentscells task cards complete them as a bellringer. Alternately, I can hand students one or two (or seven or eight) task cards to get them started at the beginning of the period. In a virtual, hybrid, or remote environment, this provides an opportunity to review and formatively assess where students are in their learning.
  2. Stations. Centers or station activities are common in primary and elementary classrooms but I used to steer away from them in middle grades. I think part of the reason I was hesitant to use stations was I was afraid of “down time” when students weren’t on task – switching stations or chitchatting – and there is a lot of content to cover in middle school that I don’t like to give up that time. Now I’m of a different mind – “down time” is rarely that. Studentsd=rt task cards transitioning and chitchatting are building skills that are an integral part of the middle school experience and I think better teachers provide for that opportunity. I’ve also revisited my stance on content – if I lectured nonstop for 10 months, I could “cover” all of the content I want students to be exposed to, but my real goal is more than exposure. I want students to engage with content, understand content, manipulate content, and make it their own. Stations can support that far better than any lecture I’ve ever given.weather task cards
  3. Games. Once you have the task cards created, use them in a review game. Students can move the football one floor square closer to their goal every time they get finish a task card correctly, for example, or they get a game piece to add to the grid in Connect 4. Task cards can be used instead of dice – if a student gets the card correct, they move ahead one place on a board game, but they lose a turn if they get the card wrong.
  4. Exit Tickets. Task cards make excellent tickets out the door. Students must hand you amoon task cards completed task card before they leave. In a virtual or hybrid environment, this can be a Google Form or an interactive Google Slide.
  5. Scoot. Lay the task cards around the room or hang them on the walls. Students travel from one card to another, recording their answers to each task card on a recording sheet. Sometimes I let students move to the next card at their own pace. Other times, I play music and they move when the music stops. I also might set a timer to let them know when to move.
  6. Early finishers and Enrichment. I have keychains of task cards of various ability levels ready to hand students when they finish. I canrelative dating task cards make an immediate decision on the level I want the student to work on, or students can move up to a harder level if they finish 4 task cards correctly.
  7. Whole class practice. If you project the task card, it can serve as guidance for I do, We do, You do practice.simple machines task cards
  8. Quiz, Quiz, Trade. Give each student a task card and have them solve it. Then, pair students up. Partners read the cards to each other and help each other solve them. After they both get the other card correctly, have them exchange cards and find a new partner.
  9. Spiraling curriculum. Bring out the task cards from September when you have five spare minutes in December for a quick review and reinforcement.
  10. Subs. When you’re absent, leave a few sets of task cards out for students to use either independently or in pairs if they finish the assignment early. Your subs will thank you!

I’d love to hear your favorite ways to use task cards in your middle school science classroom!

counting atoms

balancing equations task cards

 

 

 

 

 

Photo by Startup Stock Photos from Pexels

Game Template Freebie

I’ve just posted a new freebie in my TpT store and I know you’re going to want to download it ASAP to get ready for all the ways you can use it this year!

I have, who has. This fantastic game is great for a 5 minute whole class review. It takes a little bit of time to set up, but you can laminate the cards and use them forever. Each card says “I have” and then a vocabulary word. Underneath that, each card says “Who has” and a definition. Or, vice versa. I usually keep one card to myself and hand out the others – great if you have a few extras to give 2 or 3 to fidgeters to keep them engaged. I start by reading my “Who has,” and then the student with the “I have” that matches it shouts out “I have” and then the word. Then, that student reads his or her “Who has” and so on. Download my free template here.

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I hate wearing a mask

I’m sure you do, too.

My glasses fog. I feel claustrophobic and sometimes that leads to anxiety. My ears hurt. My face breaks out. I feel like I have to yell if someone is more than a few feet away from me. I can’t always tell what people are saying if they’re wearing a mask and mumbling.

But 2% of the population of my state has tested positive for coronavirus (don’t even get me started on how many people have been positive and never tested) and 8.5% of them have died.

So I wear a mask. Just in case I’ve been exposed and don’t know it yet.

I hope you do too.

Marilyn Monroe Mask Poster

Creating a Choice Board

You want your students to demonstrate mastery of a concept of skill. However, it’s not so important how they demonstrate it. That’s a perfect opportunity to differentiate and give students some choice.

One opportunity for student choice is a choice board. In a choice board, students are given a range of options to demonstrate their mastery. The best choice boards have options for all learning styles. Here’s a template I like to use (Click Choice Board Template to download):

choice board template

A few things to note:

  • The choices vary in amount and type of creativity required, but choice D is the basic regurgitate something you learned in a poster option. Perhaps a student will draw the nitrogen cycle after learning about the nitrogen cycle, or s/he will draw a cell after learning about the cell. No creativity required and no research required.
  • Choices A and H require writing. A is a creative writing piece and H is an expository writing piece – requiring different skills and addressing different types of students.
  • Choices B, C, E, F and H all require research into some aspect of the topic. After completing a unit on the nitrogen cycle, for example, students choose one aspect of the cycle to independently research. Then, they can share their research as: B. a slide show; C. a graph, perhaps comparing the percentages of gases in the atmosphere over time; E. a poster of molecular structures of nitrates and nitrogen; F. a flowchart on the production of urea in mammals; H. an essay on the evolution of nitrogen fixing bacteria.
  • Choices A, G, and I require creativity not normally demonstrated in science class and fulfiling them is not always going to be apparent to students. For choice A, a student might write a fictional story about a planet where decomposition doesn’t take place or a “day in the life” of a nitrogen atom. For choice G, a student might prepare a menu including foods from one specific food chain only. For choice I, students would need to find, or write their own, songs about the atmosphere (Breathe by Faith Hill? Walking on Air by Katy Pery?)

When I create a choice board, I use this basic format but then preselect which research ideas I’m going to suggest be presented as slideshows, essays, posters, or flowcharts.

In middle school, many students need gentle guidance rather than a direction to “Go research something!” However, as your students mature and your relationship with them grows, you might consider replacing one of the choices with a “Student’s Choice” option, allowing students to come up with their own option. Very often, students who choose this option will hold themselves to a much higher standard than you would have predicted.

Try it. Let me know what happens!

Desert Choice Board

Back To School Activities

The first few days of school are special. You’re meeting strangers who are going to quickly become some of the most important people in your life. Students from many years ago still tell me that they remember what I was wearing or what joke I told on the first day of school. Make your first impression a good one.

One activity that I enjoy doing is the “What Matters To Me?” activity. It ties science nicely into to getting to know the students. I give each student a clip art picture of a flask and ask them to fill it in with what matters to them. Sometimes I ask them leading questions – what are your favorite things about school, what do you hope this school year is like – and other times I just leave it blank and have students decide for themselves what it should be about.

Since it’s the first assignment of the year, students often go all out – they cut pictures out of magazines and decorate their flasks with their favorite football team colors. We hang them around the room and leave them up for most of the year to admire. You can download your own copy of “What Matters to Me” on my TpT store.

Every year, I try to do at least a few of these Getting to Know you activities. Kids love “minute to win it” activities and I mix it up – some whole class activities and some team activities. At the end of the year, my students always comment on how much fun their first days of school were because of these minute to win it games. 

Another activity I enjoy is the #20YearsFromNow. In this activity, I give students two frames to draw pictures of themselves in. One picture is themselves today, and they label the picture with hashtags that describe themselves. The second picture is 20 years in the future and they label that picture with hashtags to describe what they hope/want their futures to be like.

This is a fun way to get to know who they are and who they want to be. You can download your own copy of #20YearsFromNow at my TpT store.

 

What are your Back-To-School activities?