Random Acts of Kindness Bulletin Ideas

Spring break is almost over, and I do feel fairly refreshed and rejuvenated (my hour long massage I just got doesn't hurt that either!), and whenever I get ready to head back to school after a break, I'm always so excited to bust out some new ideas. Anyone else get that way? If it's the middle of Feb. and I'm knee-deep in papers to grade, I'm not feeling very inspired, but when I have time to unwind and enjoy life a little, I'm always brainstorming ways to improve my class and classroom.

One idea I've been mulling over for awhile is a Random Acts of Kindness bulletin board in my room. Disclaimer: I suck at bulletin boards. Or anything creative or artsy, really. Good thing I'm not an elementary teacher. I can't imagine having to make all those cute bulletin boards on the regular!

In my room I have a really large bulletin board that I use for "class news" and keep a school calendar there, my list of study hall rules, all the schedules for different bell schedules/dismissals, the sports calendar for school, and a few motivational posters. But I have a small bulletin board at the front of my room that right now just houses a "Sound Smart, Quote Shakespeare" poster. I love my Shakespeare poster, but want to do something a little more creative.

So I thought about it and would like a way to showcase or honor some kids who may not always get acknowledged otherwise at school. I know a few teachers in my school have a bulletin to spotlight the highest scores on a test or what not. I don't like that idea for me personally because 1) many times that ends up being the same 2 or 3 kids, and 2) even if the score is good, I don't feel it's my place to broadcast a kid's score or give them possibly unwanted attention. In high school, some kids are really funny about that.

So my next thought was a bulletin board with something like "Caught in the Act" at the top and then I would put up a student's name and the random act of kindness (RAOK) I caught them doing during the week. I thought I could also let other students put one up (with my permission) for a peer that they caught doing something kind. It could be lending an absent student the day's notes to get caught up, or stopping in the hall to pick up a calculator someone dropped (you have no idea how often calculators get dropped and everyone just steps around it and keeps going!) I was hoping this would spotlight some students that may not otherwise get recognized for academics.

So, knowing nothing about being creative with bulletin boards, I took to the Interwebs to try and get some ideas. I didn't want it looking juvenile, since I mainly teach seniors, and they may think this idea is oh so childish anyways. This is my frontrunner so far:

Source: counselingcorner-allison.blogspot.com

I think the play on the song is funny and the kids would be amused by it. The only downside to this one is this quote is rather long and my bulletin board is quite small. I would still need room to showcase kids' names and RAOK. I haven't ruled this one out but need to find a way to make it fit on my bulletin board without being squished.

Another option is to make my small bulletin board my class news bulletin and take down the posters--just have calendar, schedules, and study hall rules posted. Then I could use my big bulletin board for this and maybe put up a few posters.

I also thought I could hang something like this on this bulletin board:

Source: kindseeds.blogspot.com

 I thought this was cute and who knows? Maybe a kid having a really rough day would find comfort in something like this. Or maybe they'd all roll their eyes and find it cheesy lol.

So over the next week, I think I'm going to brainstorm and see what I want to do. I just hate hearing so many negative things come out of students' mouths and want some more positivity. I also thought about saying that, at the end of each month, everyone who got a RAOK on my bulletin board got entered in the drawing for a prize. Maybe a king sized candy bar (they go NUTS over candy, seriously).

So what I'd love from all of you is feedback. What do you think of doing this with upper HS students? Anyone tried a bulletin board like this? Love it/hate it? Ideas for designing it in my room?

Let's Get Acquainted

Today I thought I'd join in the Let's Get Acquainted Link Up and tell you a few fun things about me.

Favorites Survey

Favorite Place to Shop

 

 Favorite TV Show

 Favorite Sweet Treat

chocolate cake!

 Favorite Food

pasta-any kind

 Favorite Restaurant

Frascati in San Francisco. My husband and I ate here on our first wedding anniversary while on vacation last year. Their stone fruit bruschetta was TO DIE FOR, and my husband described his duck as "life changing."

 So there you have it. It was hard to pick a favorite show because we like lots of TV shows, but these are probably our favorite two. Both come back this summer for their FINAL season ::tear:: I am excited to see how they both wrap up.

Today I hope to finally get some grading accomplished and maybe doing a little shopping at Target. Feel free to link up as well!

Advice for First Year Teachers (or anyone)

I wanted to do something a little different today. Rather than blog about something I've tried in my classroom recently, I wanted to get down some things I've been thinking about recently in regards to teaching. I'm sitting here at the bookstore, drinking coffee, with a tote full of papers to grade over break that have gone untouched today. And it got me thinking about some things I've learned over these 5 years in the classroom that I wish my first-year teacher self would have known. So here goes.

Mrs. L's Unsolicited Advice for First Year Teachers or Any Teacher Going Crazy Right Now

1. Know that everyone struggles and it's OK

I spent the majority of my first year teaching looking and feeling like this:

You feel unsure where to begin, pulled in 1000 different directions, you're stressed, overtired, and can never keep up with the lesson planning and grading.

I looked to veteran teachers who never seemed to have a care in the world, and I now realize two things. 1) They may have been struggling and I just had no idea because they hid it better than me. 2) They knew when to just let go and go with the flow instead of getting overly stressed.

They had also done this a lot longer than me. But now, as a more experienced teacher, I still struggle to keep up with the paperwork, the data, the testing, the kids, the extra stuff I volunteer for, etc. It is a lot. Know that everyone has been in your shoes and the vast majority of people are willing to help you out. Which brings me to #2.

2. Teaching is about beg, borrow, steal

DO NOT try to reinvent the wheel! There are way too many good resources out there to do that for every single lesson.  Whether that means taking to the Internet, teacher blogs, or other teachers in your school, USE the resources you are given. If you haven't been given any, ASK!

Do not be ashamed to go to the teacher next door and say, "Hey, do you have any activities that you use to teach Romeo and Juliet?" Chances are they do and they will share. If they refuse to share, kick them in the shin. (kidding)

I can honestly say I have never asked and been denied help by anyone in my building. Take their resources, tweak them, and make them work for your classroom. I also have found a wealth of information on the Web. Sometimes I just simply Google something like "lesson plans for The Old Man and the Sea" and you'd be surprised how many sites come up. I sift through to find things that look interesting to me and make them my own (if the sites I find are fine with taking and sharing). 

Yes, I still make up many handouts, tests, quizzes and projects myself. But I often take an idea I hear elsewhere and use that as a starting point. On the flip side, I am always super happy to share my ideas and handouts with other teachers in my building or on here. Sharing is caring :)

3. Realize dealing with parents is tough and you'll get through it

I won't lie. My first year of teaching was HARD. Really really hard and a big part of that was learning how to handle upset parents. We all have them and for a variety of reasons. If you have supportive administration like I do/did, it makes it easier but you're still on your own for a lot of it.

Find your preferred method of communication and try to use that. I prefer e-mail because it allows me to think about what I want to say before saying it, re-read, re-word, etc. I can also mull over what someone says to me before responding. It's also just logistically easier because I can send off an e-mail real quickly on lunch or during study hall supervision, etc. 

Remain calm even if the parent is upset and realize they (most likely) just want the best for their kid, which is what you want. If a parent gets heated on the phone, in an email, or in person, I always go back to that common ground: I remind them we both have the same person's interest at heart and want the same thing. If a parent screams at you, remain calm and don't scream back. I have seen this used so many times and it WORKS. People feel silly yelling at you while you sit there calmly and talk in a soft voice. It immediately diffuses the situation.

If the student is present, I always bring it back to them. Mom or Dad is angry because of a grade on a paper? I have the paper with me and, looking at the student, ask him or her why he or she did XYZ on the paper when they knew that wasn't the instruction. Or why they turned it in late when they knew that would mean half credit. I put it on them and the vast majority of the time, they admit blame and voila. Mom and Dad now realize they should be talking to their kid about responsibility and consequences, not yelling at me.

If all else fails, sometimes you need to get your dept. chair or principal involved to help mediate the situation and don't feel badly about doing so.

4. Prioritize paper grading so you don't look like this

Especially as an English teacher,  I felt like the mound of papers I had to grade never ended. I would either stay late at school or end up hauling a load of papers home with me virtually every night and every single weekend, on top of lesson planning. This is part of the teaching game, yes, and I have never found a way to NEVER take ANY papers home, despite conferences I've attended that say this is possible. But I HAVE found ways to make this much more manageable so I don't want to rip my eyes out.

First, set realistic expectations for yourself and let your students know these. Meaning, if you assign a 4 page essay and 50 students are turning in that essay on the same day, don't think you'll have these done in two days. That's not realistic unless every waking spare hour is spent grading.

Here is what I tell all my students on the first day of class in terms of returning essays:

"Depending on the length of essay and how many sections are completing this essay, expect at least a week's turnaround time, but no more than two. Sometimes I'll be able to get them done faster; sometimes it will take me the whole time. Just as you have multiple classes you are taking, I have multiple classes I am grading. I do not want to rush through grading these essays that you have spent so many hours working on and making them the best you can. They deserve my full, undivided attention. When I grade an essay, I read through it at least twice, if not three times. I take time in writing thoughtful comments and completing the rubric. Your essay and you deserve that. It would not be possible nor practical to give the papers the time I want to and return them in one or two days."

I have had a very positive reaction to this, and even though I occasionally get that kid that asks me 7th hour if the papers they turned in 3rd hour got graded yet, that is few and far between.

5. Be creative with due dates

One way to manage your paper load is to not have everything come in on the same day. I know this is sometimes not possible. Last fall, I had five preps, meaning 5 totally separate classes. Sometimes, it happened that three classes each had a big project due the same day or within one day of each other. But I try to not let this happen.

If you are teaching the same section multiple times per day, stagger the due dates of each major essay/project. 

So 1st hour may be due on Tues., while 3rd hour is due on Thurs. Then you have two days to get ahead on 1st hour's essays. The next time you have an essay due, reverse the due dates, so it's fair.

I also sometimes offer an extra point or two (not enough to make a HUGE difference) to students turning their papers in early. Many teachers deduct points for late essays, so I figure, why not add a point or two for an early essay? This encourages students to submit before the due date, and I try really hard to get early essays graded before the rest of the pack comes in. 

I also don't collect every single thing the students work on and grade it individually. Many times for homework, I walk around the room and use my Facebook "like" stamp to stamp complete papers, then record that on my roster. In my classes, homework is practice, so while it's important students do it and do it completely, I rarely grade for accuracy on homework. That's what I use tests, quizzes, projects, and essays to assess. I very rarely take home homework papers to grade individually. If a student doesn't have it done or it's incomplete, they don't get the credit for it or get partial credit. They're still accountable for completing homework, but I want it to be risk-free so they aren't afraid of messing up at that stage in the learning process.

6. Find another teacher you trust to serve as a mentor

I was fortunate to begin my teaching career at the school where I student taught. I was also fortunate that our district has a two-year mentoring program for all new teachers where you are paired up with a veteran teacher (I am actually serving as a mentor now for a new teacher in our dept. How the tables have turned!) My mentor was my student teaching cooperating teacher who I LOVED and miss every day (she has since retired).

If you don't have this, ask your principal for a recommendation for a teacher who would be good to go to with basic questions, either about the school or your subject matter. This should be a teacher you bond with, can trust, and can be open with. It's nice to just have someone to bounce an idea off of or even ask basic questions like, "What's the procedure for Homecoming week?", things veteran teachers forget might be confusing to a new person in the school.

I don't think I could have survived my first year without the support of my mentor teacher, quite honestly. She was a godsend. It is such a relief to have a fellow teacher you can talk to, cry to, complain to, or rejoice with who truly understands what you are going through. I am lucky that my husband is a teacher also because he "gets me" too. 

7. This is the most important: Don't give up your life!

Teaching is a lifestyle and is a career that doesn't end when you go home. We know that when we sign up. But you canNOT lose you.

My first year, I would go home and think about school all night and all weekend. If I had a bad day at school, it followed me home and hung over me like a dark cloud. I know it's easier said than done, but over the years, I have gotten a lot better and separating work from home life. Your spouses, kids, pets, and friends will thank you for this too.

You can't be a good teacher if you don't take care of yourself. If you don't get enough sleep, take time to de-stress and take time away from the job, you won't be effective in the classroom. You will be tired, cranky, impatient, and more likely to snap at students. You won't be fun to be around for the adults, either.

Find something you like that relaxes you. For me, it's reading, going for walks, playing with my dog or watching TV shows with my husband. Find time to do that thing EVERY NIGHT. I'm serious. Every night and every weekend take time away from the grading, planning, and answering e-mails. If you bring papers home to grade one night that don't get done, do not beat yourself up. You can do them tomorrow and they will still get done and the world will continue turning. I promise. Realize that your health and well-being must come first.

I hope you find some of these things helpful; I wish I would have realized all this sooner and not beaten myself up so much as a beginning teacher. If you have any advice to add, leave a comment!

April currently

This is my first time joining in on one of these "Currently's" so let's see if I did it right. Originally started here it looks like.

Currently listening: Fun. is one of my favorite bands. I liked the lead singer's former band, The Format, and followed him to Fun. We saw them last year in concert and they were awesome! Their first album is good as well. I have this currently playing on my laptop while I grade papers.
Currently loving: It's my spring break this week yippee! Oh how I needed some time off, even if I have work to do. I also love that this weekend had temps near the 60s, though today is quite a bit cooler.
Currently thinking: Lots of grading to do over break. I just want to get all caught up so I can start fresh when I return Monday.
Currently wanting: I need a real vacation so badly and we probably won't be taking one this year. Well we might escape to the Smoky Mountains for a few days if my parents can watch the dog.
Currently needing: My FIL goes in for brain surgery next Tuesday, so all the prayers and good vibes you can send his way would be much appreciated!
Advice: I went to Old Navy on Friday and I KNOW I have a gift card that still has money on it, but I could not find it anywhere in my purse/wallet. That was frustrating. So I decided from now on, when I get gift cards, I am putting them in a little plastic sandwich bag and tape the receipts to them, so I know how much money is still left on each one when I use them. That way they are all in one spot and I can easily find them.

Today was spent at Barnes & Noble doing some grading, surfing the Web, drinking some coffee and just relaxing. Tonight we have to get my husband fitted for a tux for a wedding he is in coming up, and we have loads and loads of laundry to do, as well as lots of cleaning. Fun fun! Have a good one! Happy April :) 

P.S. If you are stopping by the first time, I am a relatively new teacher blogger and love "meeting" new teachers and visiting new blogs. I'd love to interact with all of you! Feel free to follow my blog on the right hand side and leave a link to yours for me to check out.

Common Core Vocabulary

I am officially on Spring Break. Holla! We have today off and all of next week, not going back until April 8. Even though I brought home a tote full of papers to grade next week, I would much rather grade during daylight hours at Starbucks or Barnes & Noble than at home at night or trying to squeeze it in during prep. So I won't complain too much.

Today also actually FELT like spring with sun and temps nearing 60. I got a pedicure this morning and now my tootsies are a pretty shade of pink. I also did some spring shopping with my birthday gift cards and played with Roxie outside. A pretty good first day off.

We did find out this week that my father-in-law will have to have brain surgery on April 9 to remove two masses on his brain and are currently trying to figure out how we will go up to be with him (4 hours away) on surgery day with our super hyper, anxious dog that doesn't like car rides or strangers (she'd have to stay with my parents). So send good thoughts to us and our family if you could, please, for all of this!

Anyways, Common Core is on my mind because on our SIP day yesterday, the CC committee that I'm on met and we spent most of our time discussing vocabulary. I thought I would briefly explain the CC vocabulary stuff, post some resources or ideas I have found through this committee, and then see if anyone else has some good ideas to share!

Basically, there are three tiers of vocabulary in Common Core.

Tier 1 are words that show up in common conversation and vocabulary, like dog or bike or run. These don't really need much instruction (at the HS level, I have to do zero with tier 1 words).

Tier 2 words are high-frequency words that mature language users need to know. At a workshop I attended, the speaker described these as being "cross-curricular" words. English teachers should NOT be the only ones teaching tier 2 words. They may take on different meanings in different subject areas, so individual teachers should teach the meaning that relates to their subject area.
For example: "equality" means one thing in a history classroom and a different thing in a math class. That is a fairly simple example and they get more complex as the grade level goes up, but you get the idea.

Tier 3 words are content-specific vocab. So as an English teacher, I only teach those words that pertain to my subject area.
Examples: tragic hero, alliteration, hyperbole, etc.
I have heard numerous times that we should just give these definitions to students when we are teaching them. Each teacher would be responsible for teaching words just pertaining to their area.

I found a really good website (well it's really a blog) called Reading Sage  that has an excellent list of sample tier 2 words, definitions of each of the tiers, and a bunch of vocab. activities you can do with different tiered words for varying educational levels. If you scroll down the page, there are even links to other CCSS websites. This is probably the best vocab. resource I have found thus far in my Internet searching.

Basically, vocab. should not just be taught out of a vocab. workbook series anymore. We are getting rid of ours starting next year. It isn't effective to have students memorize 12 words for the quiz and then promptly forget them.

The workshop I attended also said students can only learn 3-4 new vocab. words (and learn them meaning understand them enough to incorporate them in their own vocabulary) per week, and that includes ALL the new words they are learning from ALL subjects, not just English. Yikes! No wonder they have a hard time on vocab. quizzes. After a new word is learned, it was suggested you build a word wall in your classroom so those words are always visible and accessible to students. I like this idea and will probably try it out next year.

The best way to combat the CC vocab. is to take it on as a whole school, at least in my very humble opinion. Our principal wanted us to focus on school-wide vocab. even this year, so we have tried something that works out pretty well if anyone wants to suggest it at their school. The English Dept. kind of spear-headed this and everyone else jumped on board.

My principal printed up a list of 100 words HS students should know (I think she got it through the SAT page). You could obviously adapt this to lower grade levels too (next year, we will probably do this with tier 2 CC words).

Every Friday is Vocab. Fun Friday. There is a list of all 100 words plus definitions in the mail room and every Friday morning, each teacher gets a sticky name tag in his/her mailbox. Each week you choose a new word and write either just the word or the word + definition on your name tag and wear it all day.

The idea is to get kids asking and thinking about the words. I know I have done, as well as some other teachers, an extra credit opportunity where I let students get 10 words from 10 teachers that day, write down the definition and make up a sentence using that word and they get a couple extra points. I know some teachers (and I have tried this too, though none of my students did it) tell their students they will get an extra point if they correctly use one of those vocab. words in another class and have the teacher sign-off that they used it correctly.

Our principal also had a huge spinning wheel made up with a bunch of the vocab. words on it. At lunch, she will occasionally (maybe once every other week) stand in the hall with the big wheel and let students spin it at lunch. If they can provide the definition of the word it lands on, they get a prize (typically a huge candy bar). She then asks the which teacher taught them that word and the teacher ALSO gets a prize (I think their prize is a gift card to a local shop). It has worked well so far! 

Just a couple ideas to get you thinking about the CC vocab. coming down the chute. Through all my work with CC thus far, I have found that it isn't drastically different from what we do now. We are teaching pretty much the same stuff, but the WAY in which we teach it might change slightly. I know I am already doing a lot of things CC has us do, like writing argumentatively, doing close readings, providing textual evidence, etc. So it isn't as scary as it might initially seem.

Taking your school newspaper online

Well look at that! We got a snow day today. We probably got about 7" total yesterday, but not all of it stuck to the ground. However, all the rural districts canceled today, which I am thankful for because driving country roads in those conditions is Not. Fun.

As much as I loved the surprise day off, this is NOT what spring should look like:

view from my front window

So while I am sitting at home today, I thought I would write a post I have wanted to tackle for awhile, which is about bringing our school newspaper into the 21st century and taking it online. Below I'll outline how I chose our host site, tips and tricks for bringing your school newspaper online, and how to combat possible issues with doing so.

You can also read my first post about organizing a journalism class here.

How I chose our host site:
There are different websites out there that will host a school paper. One common site that is free is hsj.org, which is a high school journalism organization. I have nothing against this organization and think it is great, but their options for bringing your paper online were limited. We didn't have as much freedom, as many layouts to choose from, and it overall didn't look as professional.

After literally just Googling "high school online newspapers," I found School Newspapers Online  
This website hosts newspapers from elementary schools through colleges and even some professional organization newspapers. I browsed through their clients list and looked at some local papers that used this host website and loved what I saw. 

SNO lets you choose from about 6 different possible layouts, you can add a plethora of widgets for free including a calendar, sports score scroll, polls, videos, photo slideshows, etc. You really can customize this website exactly how you like it, and it is so user-friendly.

The cost is $600/year for the first year and $300 after that. You can choose your own URL (ours is is our school paper name.org). You tell them what tabs you want at the top of the page, what colors you want to use, etc., and they have it set up for you within a couple days. Any time I have questions or issues, I get a response within an hour or two from their tech help team.

In order to publish an article, you just copy and paste the body into a text box, click a button to upload a pic with it, type in author's name and hit "publish." It is that simple, and it's exactly what I was looking for.

*P.S. I am in no way, shape, or form getting paid by SNO, nor do I work for them. Just wanted to share a site that worked for us.

Tips and Tricks for online Journalism

1. Survey students, teachers, community members, etc. to get a feel for interest.
We had normally put out one paper copy of the newspaper per month and it got circulated during homeroom. We knew kids read it because many times, teachers would use this as their homeroom activity for the week and distribute the papers for kids to read. I was concerned that we would lose readership by taking the paper completely online, when kids would have to choose to go to that site in their free time or during study hall.

After researching a possible host site, I brought it up with my staff. They all loved the idea. Then we surveyed some random students in study halls, and I talked it over with our principal. The response was overwhelmingly positive. This made me feel more confident about moving forward with this endeavor.

2. Promote, promote, promote!

We had to get the word out about our new site. I waited until we had had it for about two weeks and had a couple weeks' worth of articles uploaded, so there was content to read. Then I ran a school announcement in the morning announcements for three days, highlighting what types of articles we were running, what students might be interested in, etc.

I made colorful flyers with our new address on it and posted 20 copies around the school, including in the teacher's lounge and mail room, so staff got interested too.

We sent out a Skylert email to parents of students in the district (automated e-mail through Skyward) with the new address and highlighting interesting content. I get a Google analytics e-mailed to me each Monday showing the hits to our site every week. The day that e-mail was sent out, we had over 100 hits. It went out on a Friday and that entire weekend we were getting over 50 hits per day. On a normal day, we may have 15-20 hits.

Every time we have a new feature on our site or a particularly interesting article, I will run it in the morning announcements so students don't forget about checking it out.

3. Have a schedule for uploading content.

I went through this in more detail in my previous post about building a journalism class.  But basically, I have 2-3 students assigned to each day of the week for deadlines on articles. That means we publish at least two new articles each day. My editors are in charge of physically publishing these articles.

I also have to keep up the calendar, polls, sports scores, breaking news ticker, etc. My sports writer is in charge of maintaining the sports scores daily. He also often writes breaking news tickers/articles.

An administrator (me) is the only one who can upload polls. I try to publish a new poll every week and have it tie in with an article we recently wrote. The two most recent polls are displayed at all times on our front page sidebar. I also sit down every month and add new events to our calendar taken straight from our school calendar.

Combating possible issues

1. I'm sure many people are leery of letting students have access to publishing things online. I am too, which is why I only let my two editors and my sports writer have accounts. None of my other students have a log-in to our website. They write articles and find pics, but after I approve them, it goes to an editor to publish. I am also on our site during class time and double check everything that gets uploaded. In the future, I may (depending on the class) let other students have limited accounts (some accounts let them publish their own articles and some accounts let them write on our site but not actually publish).

2. Inappropriate comments.
This was a concern to me, too, but I wanted the option of comments so it could be interactive. This is why I chose a site that allows comment moderation beforehand.

In order to post a comment on our site, you must give a first and last name, plus a valid e-mail address. We do not allow anonymous comments. You must enter a captcha to try and combat spam (although I do get a fair share of spam comments), and then it gets e-mailed to me to moderate. I can post it, spam it, or trash it. This way students (or others) can interact with our articles and comment, but it is controlled, since it's still a school site.

3. Monetary concerns
We get sponsorships from local businesses to offset the costs of running a paper (this has honestly SAVED us so much money! We were paying close to $1600/year to get our paper copies printed).

At the beginning of each school year, we brainstorm a list of local businesses that may sponsor us. From that list, I cross off any that have been rude to us or not sponsored in the past and probably won't or that don't want to be bothered. I assign 3-4 businesses to each group of students (they usually travel in pairs).

The staff goes out to these businesses and we work on how they will approach asking for a sponsorship. We charge $15/month for a business to be located on our "sponsors" page with their company logo and a link to their website. We typically get 10-12 sponsors per school year, which is more than enough to cover our website expenses. In the future, I am also looking into selling advertisements for a little more money, which would be a larger ad that runs on our front page.

 So there you have it. Some tips and advice for transitioning your paper online. Another way to do this a little slower is to have a hybrid paper: publish online but keep paper copies as well. For us, it was more cost-efficient to just go completely online, plus it was eco-friendly. The kids are enjoying it, and I am loving it too. I can't believe how professional it looks! We have gotten nothing but positive comments about it, and I feel like the quality of articles students write have gone up since the move online.

Just as a side note, I wanted to mention a teaching documentary I watched this morning on my snow day that I highly recommend. I have Netflix streaming and am always looking for interesting things to watch.

Today I watched a docu called The American Teacher.

 

It chronicles four teachers through a school year and really gives a true glimpse into the trials and tribulations of being a public school teacher. I loved that it praised teachers, rather than criticized them. It shows the financial difficulties and strain it can put on teachers' families, the time commitment necessary, etc. As a public school teacher myself, I loved it and thought it was spot-on. So if anyone else is enjoying a snow day today, you might check it out!

Today's Technology Tidbit: Using Documentary in the Classroom

 This lesson is also included on Tried It Tuesday

Sorry it has been a whole week since I last posted. I really try to post at least thrice weekly. It has been a long, busy, and stressful week.

First we had my father-in-law's health issues going on and some nerve-wracking days with that. Then it was my birthday Friday (yay!) so my parents came down for a couple days and met our super high-anxiety dog (have I told you my dog hates people coming in the house, especially men? Yeah). Thankfully it actually went really well. Now today, we're getting 6" of snow! This does not sit well with me. It's spring for crying out loud!

So all of that led to my lack of posting, but I hope to get back on it this week, starting with a technology tidbit today.

I like to use film in the classroom when it's relevant. I look for high interest pieces that serve a purpose, and often times, show clips and not even the whole thing.

Today I want to talk a little about how I use documentaries in my classroom. I have Netflix streaming, and they actually have a TON of great documentaries on there that you can watch instantly. Of course, the one I wanted to use this week that I'm about to discuss is one that is NOT on there. Grr.

I am teaching the process of argument for my College English course. We discussed the parts of a successful argument (claim, support, assumption), different appeals of argument (ethos, pathos, logos--we did a Wikispace assignment where each student was assigned one appeal and had to post an example of it from modern-day media), counterargument and refute or concession, as well as discussed logical fallacies that we need to watch out for in argument.

Though they will be writing their argumentative essays, I wanted to show them a non-print example, so I decided to show clips of the Michael Moore documentary Sicko.

  

Many of the Michael Moore documentaries would work also. If you have never seen his documentaries, he is extremely liberal and is blatantly so. I emphasize to my students that I am not promoting his ideas on things and that that isn't what they should focus on; rather, they should focus on the process of the argument he makes, and they should watch to analyze and evaluate his actual argument.

We started watching this Friday. I gave them a sheet of questions to answer as they watched. Some of the questions were:

• What is his main claim?
• What different appeals does he use and what are examples of each?
• What type of support does he use for his argument?
• What assumptions does he make based on this support?
• Does he address the counterargument? If so, how? Does he refute or concede it?
• How successful is his argument overall?

On Monday we will wrap up watching part of it and discuss their findings. There are parts of his argument that are done very well and are strong and parts that are weaker. We'll point these out and apply his strategy of making an argument to their own topics and essays. I also like that it's a current hot button issue (universal healthcare) so it's relevant to the larger context of the course (writing in the context of current social issues in our society).

We do look at some written examples of argument too, but I like to get out of the textbook and bring in non-print sources whenever I can. For their next and final essay of the year, they are going to be writing an analysis of advertisements in social media, for example. They can still learn the process of writing an argument but apply it to something non-print. It holds their interest and makes it more relevant.

If you'd like more titles of great, school-appropriate documentaries, just let me know. I have watched many (or parts of many of them) on Netflix.

*There is a small amount of strong language in Sicko, so I wouldn't use it with kids younger than high school, and I'd probably use it for upper high school at that. I am much more lax with what I show my college-level seniors since it is a college course and I know they can handle it maturely. Honestly I think there may be a "bitch" and "ass" in the film, but nothing more than that.