Reports Cards and Innovation!

There is so much to talk about since the last post. Although I have switched to bi-weekly posts due to time constraints, I am still being very regular about doing 15 minutes of PD each weekday evening and doing 30 minutes of reading per week. I always felt so overwhelmed by February in the past, but I have found being connected to other educators online to be very energizing. I NEVER thought I would be able to find time to do so much professional development complete my report cards and teach every day. Angela Watson's 40 Hour teacher work week club has really helped me be more efficient. I am glad to be able to use the extra time for being in touch with invigorating innovative teachers in an online community!

Twitter - I found a Connected Learning Self-Assessment that I need to use to help me add more new things to my classroom. I have started working on adding more voice and choice, as well as developing problem solvers and critical thinkers, but I would like to include more time for reflection and opportunities for innovation. One of the resources to help with this will be the PBL toolkit, and another is to investigate how far I am allowed to take the use of social media in the classroom. For Valentine's Day, I discovered 5 apps/websites that educators love and I was able to pass it on to other teachers in my building who are not on Twitter. I continue to be inspired by George Couros a recent blog of his that I liked was about Focusing more on innovation than edtech. I am really trying to embrace the "constant pursuit of getting better" that George talked about, too. My big excitement of the last two weeks was signing up for #IMMOOC4. Which leads to my reading segment . . .

Reading -  I continued with my reading of Tracy Johnson-Zager's book Becoming the Math Teacher You Wish You'd Had. I highly recommend this book. Every time I sit down and read a bit of it I find a few interesting strategies to try or anecdotes to reinforce things I already do. This time it was buddy checks that I used during my graphing practice to help students see if they could find all of the info on each other's work. Estimating, my favorite no, and whole class critiques were some of the other strategies I read about.
My other reading was starting Katie Martin's new book Learner-Centered Innovation that I chose for #IMMOOC 4. As George Couros recommended in the foreword I was looking to identify What challenged me, what has been reaffirmed, and what I will do moving forward. So far I have found most things have been reaffirmed. I like the analogy of traditional school to Kodak. I was also challenged by the idea that students have a hard time navigating the wide spectrum of expectations from all of their teachers which makes me feel challenged to figure out where to go from here. I can't wait to read more in the upcoming week!

Pluggin' Along

Podcasts - My usual fare of Truth for Teachers and Science Friday. Helpful and enlightening as always. China's policies on Renewable Energy seem so much more advanced than ours. Hopefully, we can get on board soon!

Twitter - Awesome insights this week on the difference between Engaging students and Empowering them. I also read a tweet by George Couros about 10 easy ways to create an amazing classroom culture. This will come in handy when we move to our new building at the end of the month and I am establishing new norms. Thanks, George!

10 Ways To Create an Amazing Classroom Culture

AJJuliani had posts about How to take criticism and about the Global Day of Design. (GDD18) I am excited to try one of his challenges with my science classes. I am also excited to see the new book by Katie Martin about Professional Learning that inspires student centered learning. #40CF has six questions to ask yourself everyday. Angela Watson had some great tips for writing report card comments in the #40HTWW club and I have already started using them! Jo Boaler put up a new poster on youcubed.org and a link to an article in Education Week about Educational Strategies Teachers might be missing out on. Jo's section was very informative and I am intrigued to read more about a strategy called QFT - Question Formulation Technique. Here is a link to the article: http://blogs.edweek.org/teachers/classroom_qa_with_larry_ferlazzo/2018/01/response_instructional_strategies_that_teachers_might_be_missing.html

Reading - I read two articles about productive struggle. I really liked the concepts in the one about scaffolding. (Scaffolding for Access to Productive Struggle from Mathematics Teaching in the Middle School Vol. 23 No. 4 January/February 2018) I am going to try the Cartoon Corner activities from the same issue next week because that is the exact topic I am working on right now!

February is here

This is a two-week reflection because I didn't have time to get to a computer on Friday of last week.

Podcasts: Truth for Teachers is back and I am really enjoying listening to Angela again while I am doing #40HTWW. I have implemented her concepts of chunking similar tasks, and I am using her list making system for work and home. I find I feel more relaxed when I go to bed because my list is finished every day. I feel better organized at school, too. So far so good! On Friday I finally caught up on the Science Friday podcasts. As always I find them interesting and inspiring. They have provided interesting facts for me to add to my science classes and my Young Surgeons elective. I am planning to start listening to School's In with Denise Pope and Dan Schwartz this week. 

Twitter: I have been pretty consistent with doing at least 15 minutes of Twitter each night thanks to the 40-hour teacher work week. I looked into some book titles like Teach Like Pirate, The Wild Card, Culturize, QuickDraw, Kids Deserve It, and 4 o'clock Faculty. I definitely have a long reading list! I read articles about a post-mortem for test-driven reforms, "genius" hour vs. Mastery hour, and empowered vs. engaged vs. unintentional teaching. I followed some new educators and my son's fourth-grade class. I watched some Ss instructional videos, read about how to be internet awesome. Hopefully, I will be able to tap into some of the live chats I have been reading about, but so far I haven't been able to make the times work with my schedule.

Reading: I am reading some articles about a productive struggle for all in math that I got from my math department chair. I will wait to comment until I have finished reading all four of them. I also read about how to be more efficient with grading writing assignments, so I hope to apply that to my science class assignments.

Happy 2018!

The new year started off almost as busy as I felt before the break, but the family time, as well as rest, made me much better equipped to handle it. This is a two-week reflection because there was a hockey tournament over MLK weekend.

Podcasts:
I took a real break and intentionally didn't do any professional development over break, so I have lots of old Science Friday episodes to get caught up on. I had some tech difficulties with playing podcasts in my car, but I think I have worked that all out now. I listened to one episode about the big Physics questions and the annual Christmas Bird Count. Both were interesting. The other episode I listened to had the year in review about the top science stories of 2017, an interview with the Secret Life of Flies author Erica McAlister, and the bourbon quiz. The Secret Life of Flies sounds fascinating, so I'd love to read it. I was able to gross out my Young Surgeon's students by telling them about how sterile maggots are being used to clean up gangrenous wounds. So cool!
There was a special episode of Angela Watson's Truth for Teachers that talked about optimizing time and how to plan for more productive times of the day to do certain tasks. It also talked about blocking similar tasks like making copies. So I have now started to do all my copies at the beginning of the day on Mondays. Such a simple idea, but it saves so much time and it forces me to plan further ahead. 

Twitter - I followed two new innovators and authors and #6thchat gave me some great suggestions for book ideas. The teacher challenge for 2018 looks interesting, but I have lots to do already with the 40 hour work week club. I spent most of my evening PD time working on the 40-hour work week club materials.
40-hour Work Week Club - I love lists, so I was super excited to hear Angela Watson's bonus material for the club about making prioritized lists. I am excited to try out her system and apply it to my practice.
Reading - I have been having trouble getting to this on Wednesday mornings for 30 minutes, so I am going to try splitting it up into two 15 minute sessions. One on Thursday morning and one on Friday morning. 
Clearly, I need to work on blogger more often because I can't figure out how to fix my line spacing!

So close I can almost taste it!

The pace is getting into a frenzy this week. The break is coming! 

Podcasts:
Truth for Teachers will not cast again until the new year, and I didn't get to Day 4 and 5 of the challenge, yet. Maybe next week!

Narwals, jellyfish, and microbes, Oh My! Science Friday was full of exciting bio-related stories this week. They also had a segment on The Best Science Books of 2017. The segment about Holiday light Safety and California's wildfires were both very timely, and I was sad to hear about the destruction of the Ventura Botanical Gardens. Voyager 1's thrusters and coastal restoration in Louisiana rounded out the program this week. 

Again, I ran out of podcasts to listen to before the week was over. Does anyone know any good podcasts that are not on break right now? I like Revisionist History, Truth for Teachers, and Mindshift, but they are all on breaks right now! Suggestions?

Twitter - I discovered AJ Juliani last week, and I read another one of his posts this week. It was called Project Based Activity That can work in any Classroom. http://ajjuliani.com/project-based-learning-activity-can-work-classroom/ I also signed up for his notifications and I am curious to know how this works if students or their parents do not want them to be broadcasting online. 

I read three George Couros posts this week and they were very timely for the chaos of life! They were 4 ways to not let others dim your light, 3 Ideas for taking care of yourself before the break, and 4 hints on being that "jolt" you need for yourself. As always George has a way of making me think about things differently or reminds me of truths that I easily forget. Thanks for keeping me focused George!

#inquirybasedlearning had a list of 6 strategies for creating an inquiry-driven classroom and the one that I think is hardest for many people (Myself included.) is STOP being the expert.

#mashupmath seems like a good source for some fun problem ideas.

Reading - I finally got to read some of NSTA's Science Scope and I found an interesting resource for my archaeology unit. It is askananthropologist.asu.edu. I also read about some ideas for better using formative assessments and a 5E model for teaching about fire safety and wildfires. I would love to add that to my energy unit in the spring.

Keeping track

This week I was really motivated to get lots of Twitter time, and I decided to keep better track of the interesting things I was learning by writing it down in a notebook rather than on random notes that I left everywhere. It has made this reflection much easier! 

Podcasts:
Truth for Teachers was not cast this week, but I listened to the 3rd challenge of the 5 day challenge. I have been able to to do pretty well with the first three days, but I haven't listened to the last two challenges, yet. It is hard to try new things this close to winter break. I feel like I am just in survival mode. Looking forward to listening to these challenge days this week. I missed your podcast this week, Angela!
Here is the link to her podcast if anyone is interested: https://thecornerstoneforteachers.com/truth-for-teachers-podcast/goodbye-teacher-tired/

Here are the titles of the first three days of the challenge:

1) Get real about how much you can accomplish each day, and eliminate the unnecessary.

2) Schedule your day to get the most important things done, instead of doing as much as possible.

3) Minimize decision-making by automating tasks and creating routines that simplify your life.

Science Friday covered the Net Neutrality issue and the house plan for taxing Grad students. A story that surprised me was about the HIV/AIDS eidpemic that is happening in the southern USA. All of which worry me for the future of our country. I also heard stories about Proton trapping, Muscle speed, Switching attention in Macacs, and research on Yeti DNA that turned out to really be bear DNA. The two stories I talked most about was the strength of neolithic women (During my archaeology unit) and robots modeled after oragami. (During a STEAM class.) I ran out of podcasts to listen to beofre the week was over. Does anyone know any good podcasts that are not on break right now? I like Revisionist History, Truth for Teachers, and Mindshift, but they are all on breaks right now! Suggestions?

Twitter - I followed a new math teacher and through her tweets I got linked to a way to use Desmos and One Note together. http://continuousformation.blogspot.com/2017/11/desmos-onenote-replay.html

George Corous lead me to an article by Katie Martin that was inspiring, and old quote of his from 2011 that talked about the difference between classroom management vs. classroom leadership. He also tweeted about an article by Marcel Schwantes that gave the 6 steps to get what you want from your manager.
I also really enjoyed AJ Juliani's post about getting students to do the talking. I plan to try some of his strategies in my science classes. https://medium.com/@ajjuliani/the-three-step-system-for-getting-students-to-do-the-talking-f1802cac8648 @ajjuliani

Tara Martin shared about students in her district who were sharing their learning portfolios.

Then I clicked on a link that took me to three articles about how CRISPR/CaS 9 works. They were fascinating, and I can't wait to hear more research about these gene editing tools. That ended up being my reading for the week. 

Learning Never Ends even if I don't blog about it

It has been awhile since my last post because I took time off from blogging for Thanksgiving, and then my son was home sick on Friday and the laundry took over. I was great about my podcasts for the last two weeks, my twitter activity was pretty low and I don't do as much reading as I would have liked, but I got to connect with a former colleague and talk about mindfulness in math. She also shared some exciting new resources that I can't wait to look over and connected me with a new resource for science in Boulder. All great stuff. Read on for details . . .

Podcasts:
Truth for Teachers was cast the Monday before Thanksgiving and I learned that it was the last episode of the season. However, in the episode, she started a 5-day Challenge to saying goodbye to teacher tired. I signed up for the challenge, and I am still working on it, but I liked lots of her ideas. Some of them I have kind of discovered on my own, but anything I can do to be more efficient, even in little ways is great. I have been working on these things on my own for awhile, but I appreciate the challenge and materials that go along with it because then I don't have to re-invent the wheel. Thanks, Angela!
Here is the link to her podcast: https://thecornerstoneforteachers.com/truth-for-teachers-podcast/goodbye-teacher-tired/

Here are the titles of her 5 days of the challenge:

1) Get real about how much you can accomplish each day, and eliminate the unnecessary.

2) Schedule your day to get the most important things done, instead of doing as much as possible.

3) Minimize decision-making by automating tasks and creating routines that simplify your life.

4) Maximize your energy and focus by batching tasks and building in buffer time.

5) Prioritize rest as the catalyst for productivity, and schedule time for things you love.

Science Friday had a special airing of the Ig Nobel awards ceremonies as a Thanksgiving treat. It was pretty entertaining to hear about the research that is going on out there. There were also segments on bat studies, some caves in Kentucky, potential ideas for mission to Uranus and Neptune to study the diamond rain, and mining coal for clues to ancient environments. I love listening to all these stories because I can then share with colleagues and students! 

Twitter

I didn't do much on Twitter for the last two weeks, but I am already working on it for this week, and I missed so much. Looking forward to spending the next few days catching up and getting ideas. So exciting and invigorating!
Reading
I didn't get to read because I had extra meetings scheduled during my normal reading times. I did get the chance to talk to someone on the Scheduling Committee about the new schedule we will be adopting in the 2019-2020 school year. 
This reflecting is a great reminder of what I have learned and it motivates me to keep going on this journey. Since I am approaching the mid-year mark it will also be a good chance to reflect on my goals and how I am doing with them. 

Catching up and on time (sort of)

Podcasts
As has become my custom I listened to Truth for Teachers. This week was Episode 114: 7 ways teachers can push past imposter syndrome  that had some useful tips for anyone who sometimes gets nervous or anxious about teaching. 
Science Friday  this week was really great because one of the segments was about mathematicians. I played a part of it for my classes because they talked about how you don't need to be a child prodigy in math to appreciate its beauty. They also mentioned growth mindset, and I was happy for my students to hear that message from someone other than me. As usual, I found all of the segments interesting. I am thankful for Science Friday and I plan to contribute to their campaign because I have already learned so much from them.

Social Media
I was able to spend some time on Twitter and Facebook this week. There aren't as many posts about education as there were at the beginning of the school year. I think other teachers are just as busy as me. On the youcubed facebook page, I came across an Open Letter to Jo Boaler to stop picking on Gifted Kids. It was an interesting read and presented both sides of the argument well. The good news was that many people expressed the opinion that a classroom like the ones Jo Boaler and the youcubians strive for would serve all kinds of learners, including "gifted" ones.
Reading
This week I was able to find time to return to Becoming the Math Teacher You Wish You'd Had by Tracy Johnson Yager and it was great to see some more concrete examples of how to apply Mathematical Mindsets to classrooms. From there I found a couple of videos on YouTube by a math teacher who was featured in the book. He took some puzzles designed for toddlers that had countless numbers of configurations. He didn't believe they were countless, so he decided to have his middle school math classes tackle the problem. It was a great example of how math can be found everywhere and the problems are deep and engaging. The students really embraced the challenge and had fun making the video, too.
#IMMOOC
George and Katie had Kayla Delzer as their guest speaker for the last Episode of #IMMOOC. It was so crazy because we are choosing the furniture for the new Middle School building that is in the process of being built so it was very timely to hear about voice and choice for seating. It was great to hear about trusting your own experience as a teacher and not to just rely on research. To value the expertise within yourself. They also talked about how Twitter can be helpful for teachers on the journey, but it doesn't mean teachers who aren't on Twitter are bad. Everyone is on their own journey and it is about doing what is best for students and teachers.
Feeling thankful for all the resources and ideas I have gleaned so far. Happy Thanksgiving everyone!

Stanford

This was by far my most exciting professional development week!
A colleague and I got to go to Stanford for a Mathematics Mindset conference. It was great to meet teachers from other schools who are in various stages of implementing Jo Boaler's ideas of what math classrooms should be. Here is a link to a poster I am going to put up in my classroom. I made some great connections and heard about exciting results out of San Francisco Unified School District. I am excited to keep evolving as a math teacher! The math camp materials provided lots of activities to use in my classes, and it would be a great curriculum to use at Breakthrough Kent Denver to try to give some DPS students a different math experience in the summer. I was looking for resources to try to help parents see why math education needs to evolve. Jo Boaler recommends that parents take the "How to learn math for Students." which is a free online course. There are also lots of resources for parents on the youcubed.org website. I was also able to get all of the names of the researchers whose work has been used to prove why we need to revolutionize math education. All of the various psychological studies and math metrics argue that removing labels and timed tests will help all students have a better relationship with math and earn higher scores on standardized tests. One of my favorite resources was the film we saw called, "Rethinking Giftedness." The changes I plan to implement immediately come from the idea of Mathematical Freedom. I am starting by changing the way students will record the work we do in class, and giving them access to more resources to solve problems. I get to continue to use online resources from the facebook page associated with this conference. As well as following Jo Boaler and the rest of the community of like-minded educators on Twitter.
Podcasts
I just finished listening to the Science Friday podcast this morning because of being away last week I didn't spend as much time in the car. I liked the idea of promoting science literacy in all classes to teach students how to be critical readers of information. The science news was interesting because scientists have recently identified a new species of Orangutan! I also liked hearing about the microbes as well as snails that could potentially be used for cancer research. Can you tell I was a Biology major?
This week the Truth for Teachers podcast really spoke to me. I often have stress over not doing enough and how to balance work with home life. I need to look into the toolkit, Angela Watson and Dan Tricarico have developed. Dan has a website called the Zen Teacher. It makes me want to re-introduce yoga into my weekly routine. I have now registered to get the email when they start the new group for the 40-hour work week club.
#IMMOOC
This recording of the YouTube live discussion with George Couros, Katie Martin, and Dwight_Carter was about Part 3 of the Innovator's Mindset book that I read this summer for the science department. Dwight_Carter is an administrator and author. Their conversation centered around many of the challenges faced by administrators who work in varying environments that change frequently. From standards to variety of teachers in their buildings. It was a good exercise in empathy for me to listen!

Podcasts are sustainable!

Week of 10/30 to 11/03
When I get super busy at least I can still listen to podcasts. I spent my dedicated reflection time last weekend getting ready to go to a conference. I will share about that in my next post. It was awesome! Here was my PD week:

Podcasts
Truth for Teachers this week was part two of strategies for working with students in high poverty. Again, this didn't really apply to my teaching situation, but it was helpful to listen and take what wisdom I could. I also followed the two teachers from this podcast on Twitter.
I keep hearing Angela Watson mentioning the 40 hour work week club, so I finally looked it up. Here is the link: https://40htw.com/join/
I am going to see if I can get this to count as professional development that the school will pay for. Even if I can't, it seems like it could save lots of time and make me more productive so I will see if I can fit it into the personal budget.

Science Friday this week had so many fascinating segments. I especially liked learning more about spiders, and CRISPR. The discussion about how different cultures deal with death was interesting, too. I have read the book Stiff and it reminded me of that. Which is particularly timely given my book club is reading Stiff right now.

MindShift
I finished the last episode about restorative justice they are working on in KIPP schools. It was the last episode of the season, so I wasn't able to listen to more. I enjoyed thinking about the implications of punitive justice and how it can be modified to better fit with growth mindset messages. I was pleased that most of the ideas in the podcast are already being adapted for our school.

Readings
I didn't get to do any readings this week because we had a special 6th-grade Seniors event on Wednesday morning, but I will get to it this week during PLC time Wednesday morning.

Late again!

This week my excuse for being late is the MS Halloween Dance, other Halloween activities, and student conference preparation.
My PD for the week of October 23rd Reflections:
Podcasts
Truth for Teachers this week was the first part of an interview with Sarah Plumitallo and Tamara Russell. The focus was about strategies they use in their classrooms that help them connect with students living in poverty. Although I do not teach high poverty students some of the strategies still apply to any teacher because they are all about building relationships with students in an authentic way. I also have scholarship students who do not live in poverty, but they are in a significantly lower income bracket than their classmates. This podcast help reinforce the importance of not judging and helping all students get the services or support they need.
Science Friday This week's episode talked about Leonardo DaVinci's life of art and science, the quest for a method of testing for impairment due to pot consumption, how to patch the latest wi-fi security bug, the findings of a recent stellar explosion, the health risks associated with wildfires, and some of the developments from Blade Runner 2049 that are no longer merely science fiction. My favorite piece was about Leonardo because he dissected living things and examined human anatomy in such minute detail to learn how to draw and paint faces more accurately. The Mona Lisa is a perfect example of how subtle muscle movements can make her smile look different from different locations.
MindShift This was a new blog that was recommended by a co-worker. It was interested because this episode touched on restorative justice and how it is being implemented at KIPP academies in California to replace a more traditional discipline model. Interesting stuff and I found it linked to math because the relationships have to come first and it also should involve voice and choice if it is going to be successful.
Videos
#IMMOOC Episodes 3 and 4
Tara Martin was the guest speaker for Episode 3. She is the one who suggested making blogs easier to read by putting headings throughout like I have done on this one. I also realized that Tara indirectly taught me how to use Tweetdeck and I appreciated the love she gave to me as a new Twitter user. That is the kind of support she talked about getting from the Twitter community and how those ideas lead her to be innovative and come up with her #Booksnaps idea. I really enjoyed hearing about how she has used the Twitter community to expand her horizons. She also talked about tweeting with an image and tagging people so your blog gets more notice. She believes in blogging because even if you don't get many people following you that you are still growing as a person and as a teacher by writing the blogs.
Patrick M. Martin was the Episode 4 guest and I really enjoyed hearing about his experience with being an innovative administrator. It was great that he included students when they were deciding to go to 1 to 1 Chromebooks with his students. I loved that they took the time to ask students for their feedback on technology and how they would use it. It was interesting that they saved so much money by the students telling them they wouldn't use computer cases. I wonder how this might apply to moving into the new building.
Reading
Becoming the Math Teacher You Wish You'd Had the thirty minutes of reading I did for this book was some case studies following things successful math teachers do to encourage deeper thinking and understanding in math classes. I like how closely related this book is to the concepts that Jo Boaler talked about in the "How to Learn Math for Teachers" class I took this summer.
Local Contacts
Networking with a 6th-grade science teacher at a local independent school. We have been emailing back and forth and haven't gotten around to meeting up yet, but we try to do that at least once a school year to share resources and ideas for teaching.

Fall three day weekend

I was able to do some PD reading this week. I read NSTA express and found out about a food computer and citizen scientist programs that I may share with some students to help them with our independent projects. Data gathering sources may help students who are struggling.
Science Friday was about how to create sci-fi worlds and how they relate to our world today. It was interesting, but not really applicable to my situation. I loved the piece where Jane Goodall was interviewed, and I would love to go see the new documentary about her. I think it is only playing in a theater that is an hour away. I will have to wait until it is more widely available. The final piece was about baby talk and how the timber is important. I liked hearing all the updates about science in the news. The story that I found most fascinating was about the amount of soot on birds in museums. Researchers have found our environmental protections have been working because air quality is so much better than it used to be.
Truth for Teachers was 6 ways to stop worrying about problems before they happen. This was great for me because I am a worrier and it helped me realize how far I have come on my personal journey. I already used many of the strategies already. This was a great positive message to hear as I was going into another busy week.
We had a long weekend, so I tried to not do any school work until tonight. It was great to refresh a bit with some family time.
Fingers crossed that I will get a chance to do a full amount of PD reading and Twitter. I am so behind on #IMMOOC!

Report Cards Done!

This was by far the week with the least Professional Development since school started. Why? Report Card comments! I tried to get a head start so I wouldn't be overwhelmed by them, but all of the other things like grading, coaching, being a wife, and a parent all demanded my attention, too. I made it though ~ maybe I will go to bed before 11 pm tonight. As a result of all the extra hours spent on report card comments and grading, all I did was a tiny bit of Twitter and listening to my weekly dose of podcasts.
Truth for Teachers was particularly timely because it talked about how to reduce work hours by streamlining parent communication without looking like a slacker. The tip that stood out most to me was making standard email responses and then customizing them instead of spending hours crafting individual emails. Now if I can only find the time to sit down and type out the responses! I think I will go back through my sent email to copy and paste some I have already written.
Science Friday, as always, had a myriad of topics this week. I learned the most from the piece about how bitcoin currency works. I had no idea it was so complicated and that it required "mining." Another cool story was about the return of the whales to NYC. They talked about how the Clean Water Act and the Environmental Protection Act had allowed the manhaden to return. Once the manhaden returned as a food source the whales followed. So cool! I also learned about how large the wild mustang population is in the West and the insane amount of money that is being spent to "control" the population. It seems like there should be a more efficient and natural way of controlling these populations without the huge cost or animal cruelty. Flooding in Louisana, Chronic fatigue patients trying to get accurate diagnoses for themselves, and Neanderthal DNA were some of the other topics this week. I also found out about the #neatrock activity they have going where you take a picture of a cool rock and post it on social media. They will then have geologists check them out and tell you what kind of rock you have. I am going to do this with my children, just for fun!
On #IMMOOC I am behind and hope to watch 2 episodes this week. Seriously looking forward to my chair massage tomorrow!

Yep, definitely October!

This is still Friday, right? I am doing my weekly reflection right on time then! LOL! The process of writing comments for my report cards has begun, so there is very little time for anything else right now. I did jot some notes on a sticky note though, so hopefully, this will still be pretty thorough.
I must have spent more time in the car last week because I listened to four Truth for Teachers and two Science Friday podcasts. In Episode 108 Angela Watson shared 4 things that drained her energy as a teacher and shared some ways to avoid being drained. Who can't use more energy, right? I also went back and listened to some of the old episodes that Angela made. Episodes 5, 4, and 3 were from 2015 but still had some applicable advice. Not letting negative coworkers get you down, how to shift ownership to your students and how to gain energy from your students are all really helpful tips. I really enjoyed Science Friday this week because they talked about Charles Darwin and some of the experiments he did in all areas of science, even psychology. There was also a story about how smartphones are robbing us of cognitive resources and how to take a healthy break from tech. With the news round up there was a story about how to help Puerto Rico in the aftermath of two hurricanes as well as a story about how nuclear bombs cause so much destruction from the initial blast to the after-effects of radiation.
I watched the second episode of #IMMOOC for Innovator's Mindset that I read this past summer. The guest speaker was Alice Keeler. She was super full of energy and had great info about using the 5E model for teaching. I also read an article from NSTA's Science Scope and it talked specifically how to use the 5E model to teach a unit on waves. I am teaching waves for the first time, and I really like the idea of using the 5E model, unfortunately, my team teachers do not feel the same way. Any suggestions for convincing them? I may just try to branch out on my own next year and hope they follow my example. I am finding it hard to keep up with all the assignments for #IMMOOC, but I figure everything I am doing is more than I have ever done before, so as long as I am learning and growing it is a success ~ especially during October!!
On Twitter, I read a cool article about Otzi the Iceman and how they have linked a newly discovered copper ax to the one Otzi carried upon his death. We study Otzi in my science class, so I am excited to share this new finding with my students. I also watched some Veritasium (Which I keep mispronouncing because of Harry Potter's veritaserum!) videos which I was happy to be reintroduced to. I am using some of them for my unit on waves to help with breaking some misconceptions.
On to comments! (I have all weekend because it is still Friday right? ;o )

It must be almost October

I definitely did not get to my reflections in a timely manner this week! Calling all of my homeroom families is taking lots of time, so other business got pushed to the back burner a bit.
Twitter was the most affected. I did read an article from NSTA express instead. It was about the visiting scientist program and how teachers have integrated these visitors into their curriculum. I definitely want to try to get something like this going, but the topics covered are not in my curriculum, so I am going to try to find a scientist that can be an expert in something I am already covering.
I also listened to a live streaming class called #IMMOOC on YouTube that I referenced in my last reflection. It happened last Monday night, and it had Jo Boaler as a guest speaker about why innovative mindsets are important. I had heard most of Jo's topics before because I took one of her classes this summer, but it was great to hear her talk about the importance of being open to new challenges in any class. She shared a personal story about how people tried to discredit her research, and she talked about if you are not making some people upset you are probably not challenging the status quo enough. We are still using math curriculum that was developed in the late 1800's and it is time to teach students to be problem solvers, not computers. We have really powerful computers so we need to have a HUGE paradigm shift to teach students not to give up when things get difficult. This is especially applicable to my school which is fairly traditional college prep curriculum.  I have homework to do before the second episode of #IMMOOC, so that will be part of my PD time this week.
I still listened to two Science Friday Podcasts and I learned about research studying wildfires and how management strategies for these public lands have changed over time. I learned about Malaria testing and how it is changing treatment in areas that are plagued by that disease. There were some interesting facts about studying glow worms (That aren't actually worms.) in New Zealand caves. I learned about memory manipulation, research on jellyfish sleep, and how dinosaur research can help us now or even in the future.
Truth for Teachers was pretty short this week and it was about infusing growth mindset into your teaching all year. I really wanted to re-listen to this podcast, but I was having technical issues and ended up listening to some of the earliest episodes about positive self-talk and classroom management strategies. These were both informative and a helpful reminder for me about how far I have come as a teacher. I am going to try to figure out how to re-listen to last week's TfT and I am eager to hear more of Angela Watson's insights from previous podcasts if I have time.
I got a new Science Scope magazine, so I want to focus on reading that this week, so Twitter may suffer a bit again.

PD Week 3

I am actually doing my reflection on Friday during the time I planned!
Podcasts continue to go well and I found time to get through two Science Friday broadcasts and one Truth for Teachers. This week I learned about a book I'd like to read that comes from a suggestion on TfT, and it is called, The Miseducation of the Negro. This book was described as a must read to help relate with non-white students. Science Friday had lots of interesting details about the end of the Cassini Mission. They also did a special about Kansas and how it was once all underwater. I learned interesting facts about carrion and dung beetles, too.
My reading is not going as well because now that my grading is in full swing I am finding it hard to carve out the time and still get a decent amount of sleep. I read about 15 minutes of Becoming the math teacher you wish you had, and I trolled Twitter for about 45 minutes. Twitter gave me a great idea about using sheet protectors with a piece of paper inside so students can write on it and then wipe it off and try again. I used them today in class for a game from youcubed.org called Prime Time. I found that washable Crayola markers stay on well and then wipe off easily with a wet paper towel. The regular Crayola markers do not stay on. High-lighters work too, but I didn't try them with dry erase markers, yet. Twitter also gave me the opportunity to sign up for a MOOC involving the book I read this summer called, Innovator's Mindset. (Which inspired me to try Twitter and start blogging!) This will take place starting next Monday. Even though my reading was short I managed to use part of it in class today. I read them a story about Poincare accidentally discovering chaos theory. They seemed to like hearing about a big mistake and how common mistakes are.
So pumped that I am gleaning nuggets every week!

My PD journey week two

Week two was quite hectic, but I did manage to spend daily time on Twitter and listening to podcasts.

On Twitter, I saw lots of information about the rover Cassini and its imminent demise. I found a few other interesting posts about science. One was about the fact that fatigue can be contagious. Just hearing others say they are tired could make you feel more tired than you actually are. I also saw a two-headed snake that would fight itself for food. I'm not sure why though because the food would all go to the same place! The education posts were more fruitful this week. There was a post by George Couros about performance orientation vs. learning orientation that I found fascinating. Quotes like, "How long does this assignment need to be?" vs. ""How can I make this assignment better?" It is definitely a good way to illustrate a paradigm shift. I also signed up for a book discussion of Innovators Mindset called #IMMOOC that will take place on YouTubeLive as well as Twitter chats. I am excited to hear from some of the guest speakers like Jo Boaler and Katie Martin. I am also interested to read a book called, Turn this Ship Around. 

The podcasts were interesting as always. Science Friday gave some fun scientific info. My favorite was hearing about all the muscles in the tongue, but it was also fascinating to hear about how they take apart aircraft to help them see the signs of aging in both metal and composite frames at the University of Wichita. Truth for Teachers talked about some interesting ideas for how to be more efficient with lesson planning.

My reading was shortened this week so I only got to read for 15 minutes. I started to read about a math teacher in Falmouth, ME. I am looking forward to finishing reading his case study about how to promote mathematical thinking in his students.

This week I am going to incorporate reading my NSTA publications, too. I am more excited by PD with every activity I do. Very inspiring!

PD Week 1 Reflection

This year I decided to embark on more in depth PD on my own because I was so inspired by the How to Learn Math for Teachers course I took this summer. My weekly plan is to listen to a podcast every day for at least 15 minutes on the way to work, read from either a math or science teaching book on Wednesday mornings, view Twitter posts related to science and math nightly. I plan to blog about my week every Friday. As you can see I am already behind on those plans, but better late than never!
Here is my summary of the week:
I listened to Truth for Teachers on Tuesday on the way to and from work, and the topic this week was about how to adapt to new teaching expectations or to exit gracefully. I found this to be an inspiring podcast because it helped renew my self-confidence in my abilities as a teacher and it also helped me to realize I am not alone, and all teachers are a work in progress because nobody is perfect.
I listened to two Science Friday podcasts. They were interesting and thought-provoking. Learning styles not existing was pretty fascinating. I like to hear the details of new pieces of science and I learned a new way to use the Science Friday website as an educator. Ira's voice is so fantastic, too!
On Wednesday I read a chapter out of a book I started this summer called, Becoming the Math Teacher you wish you'd had. Chapter 3 is called Mathematicians take Risks, and it was about making students feel comfortable enough to try new strategies that might be way different than the way they have worked in the past. This chapter was a great reinforcement of the concepts Jo Boaler talked about in the class I took this summer. It has helped inform my lesson planning and it has given me some practical ideas I can use in my class. (Individualized comment writing is one that I hope to be able to try.)
The Twitter posts were not as fruitful because I find it hard to filter through all of them. I am hoping to meet with a colleague this week to learn about Tweet Deck to make my feed better catered to the kind of things I want to read. That being said, I did use George Couros' suggestions for 5 questions to ask students at the beginning of the year, but I haven't had a chance to read their responses, yet.
My end of the week sickness thwarted my plans to reflect on Friday afternoon, yet I am inspired to continue my ambitious plans for PD next week. I can't wait to hear Truth for Teachers tomorrow.