"You can't do it all, but where can a teacher really cut corners?"

"You can't do it all, but where can a teacher really cut corners?"

This is the title of a podcast by National Board Certified Teacher Angela Watson, a transcription of which I came across on her blog The Cornerstone: Practical ideas that make teaching more effective, efficient, & enjoyable. This podcast/blog-post was in response to the following question from a teacher:

•  “Everyone knows that a first year teacher is not going to perform at the same level as a 30 year veteran. I would like to be intentional about where I am cutting corners so that my inexperience has the least impact on my students. What areas do you think are most important for first year teachers to focus on? How do I ask for guidance about where I can cut back without sounding like I’m incapable of doing my job?”

As a teacher in training on the verge of beginning his student teaching before graduation from college, I found myself very much encouraged by this article. It gave the following advice to beginning teachers.

1. Refuse to internalize the pressure to be as good as a veteran teacher;
2. Focus on cutting corners in areas that have the least impact on students;
3. Don't try to do all your lesson plans alone or create everything from scratch;
4. Reach out to other teachers unabashedly;
5. Cut the cutesy and let go of perfectionism;
6. Reflect on what works/what doesn't so you can learn to trust your own judgment.

This article spoke to my fears of struggling through the inevitable failures of being a beginning teacher. To address this fear, I found Watson's use of the business metaphor of an MVP (Minimum Viable Product) to be particularly helpful. As a beginning teacher, I am a minimum viable product that will be upgraded to the desired specifications with years of practice, reflection, and personal growth. 

If anyone reading this post is experiencing similar anxiety about being a beginner in any field, I'd highly recommend getting Watson's full post either by blog or by podcast by following the links above.

Student Login Activities - STAR Testing

With the increasing use of computers in elementary school classrooms, it has become commonplace for students to have to login to an online resource in order to complete class assignments. For instance, the students in the first grade classroom use STAR Testing, an online assessment resource produced by Renaissance.  To access this resource, students must login to the site and then select the area in which they will be tested (math, reading, etc.).  They login by using their lunch number as their username and the letters "we" (acronym for the school name) as the password.  STAR testing is used for a variety of things on the administrative level. For more information about it, please consult Renaissance. However, a teacher's primary concern with it is to determine what students know and how they as educators should best proceed in order to help students get where they need to be academically. 

Student Creativity with Technology

Without a doubt, the main thing that draws teachers to the profession is the joy of watching young minds "spread their wings" as they discover the world around them in unique ways of their own. Now with the increasing availability of and student access to digital technology, students now have new ways to new avenues to express their creativity.

Sadly, I have yet to witness an occasion when students had the opportunity to demonstrate their creativity due to the lack of technology available to students in the classrooms I have visited. However, one instance in which this has occurred is Armstrong Elementary third-graders incorporate 21st-century skills in classroom projects.

The idea here is simple yet profound: have third-grade students use technology to video record a presentation about their science project. 

This results in the participating students taking initiative to:

1. gather information within a content area (e.g. science), 
2. present the information to an audience,
3. record the presentation using digital technology.

By structuring the assignment in this fashion, the lesson designer(s) have essentially made student creativity a requisite to completion. Furthermore, students are not just learning about a component of scientific knowledge, but they are also practicing public speaking and working with digital technology--both essential "college and career readiness skills," as Common Core so often puts it. 

Digital Citizenship for Kids

"Pause & Think Online" - A Kids Video by Common Sense Media

It had been another long day at a local elementary school, working as an teaching assistant in an first grade classroom. I trudged into my room, plopped my book-bag on the floor, and collapsed into my rickety little leather desk chair. With a sigh, I pulled out my smartphone to take a brain-break and check my Facebook. As I scrolled down my news-feed, an edited photo of a female bow-hunter caught my attention (pun notwithstanding). I'm sure that the young blonde kneeling with her bow next to her prize (an eight-point buck, if memory serves) was attractive enough, but of course I couldn't tell with that big red 'X' pasted over her face, emoticons of an explosion and a revolver tacked up to either side of her head. In the comment of the original post was yet another rant against hunters who go out and kill poor innocent animals who are not harming anybody.  

Now, I am not a hunter, nor am I even an outdoors man. I'm far too accustomed to my climate-controlled, mosquito-free indoors! However, when I saw this post by an adult who was behaving like one of the six-year-olds that I had to deal with today who would belittle his classmate for correcting him, I was reminded of just how important the concept of Digital Citizenship is for kids to learn in the Digital Age.

"Pause & Think Online" - A Kids Video by Common Sense Media

Digital Citizenship, as highlighted in the video at the other end of the link above, is the concept that being a responsible, respectful, and safe citizen is just as important online through digital media as it is in public through face-to-face encounters. What I like about this video is that it communicates this message in a simple, entertaining, and easy to remember way that is entirely kid-friendly. If I ever have the privilege of running my own classroom, I intend to show this or a similar video to my students and have a class discussion about it with the aim of promoting desirable Digital Citizenship. I would be sure to stress the fact that if it is okay to do something to the classmate sitting next to them, then it is definitely not okay to do it to some stranger on Facebook. More importantly, I would highlight the importance of privacy protection online, especially with the rise in identity theft and online stalking and I am pleased to see this highlighted in the video.

So, to recap, Digital Citizenship is an important concept for people to grasp in the 21st century because, whether we act like it or not, we are still the same people in cyberspace as we are in the physical realm where we live, work, and play.

Kindles in a 5th Grade Classroom

*Disclaimer: For those of you out there in cyberspace who are not members of Eastern Oregon University's Technology for Educators class, that last post and the one you are about to read might sound a little random. Well, hang in there because there is going to be more where that came from thanks to that class requiring me to write posts about using various forms of technology in the classroom, among other things. Now that you've been forewarned, please continue...*

Kindles in a 5th Grade Classroom

All was surprisingly quiet in that 5th Grade Classroom. Lazy afternoon sunlight wormed its way around the blinds and into the cozy if disorganized learning environment. All that could be heard was the soft murmuring of students reading quietly to themselves during the class period known as Lit Block. I walked around the room, watching for signs of students struggling in their reading or being distracted while the teacher sat at his desk in the corner and Dibble-tested a student. I was happy to note that everyone seemed to be on task and making good progress--these were smart, well behaved kids--they had an intelligent and kind-yet-firm teacher.

I was lamenting my lack of a good book to read and the time to read it when I noticed some of the students were not using books, not in the traditional sense, at least. Instead they were reading off of Amazon Kindles. I was intrigued. The closest thing that I had to that growing up was when Dad bought a set of old adventure books (e.g. the original Jungle Book and Robinson Crusoe) on CD so that we could read them on our computers. I'm sorry to say that never caught on with the Clark kids because we didn't want to take the time to fire up a computer (which took forever to load back then!) and go searching in a file index for a book when we could just walk over to the shelf and pick one out and start reading. 

But this was different. It was a similar concept, to be sure, but now that technology had progressed, and with the millennial generation growing up more computer literate, these digital books were now much more accessible to students. Indeed, the students who had them all seemed to be fully engaged as they starred intently at those grey screens, murmuring the words under their breath as they read. As this post attests, I had decided in that moment to file away the observation for future reference. Perhaps I'll use such technology in my own classroom someday.

Until next time...

Jared D. Clark

I remember when...

I remember when school work, at least for me, used to be devoid of any sort of technology beyond the sophistication of a calculator. Even then, my parents rarely allowed me to use one because they thought that it would make my brain lazy. The nerve! So I had to settle for pencil and paper, not that doing so was a bad thing! To this day I find something comforting and even pleasurable in taking pen in hand and imprinting my thoughts on a sheet of paper. 

Now that I'm in college, I spend quite a bit of time doing just that as I take notes during lectures. Things have changed, though. Assignments aren't handed in hard-copy anymore, but are submitted electronically via email or some other means. Even to write this post I must forsake the pen and take up the keyboard. I have mixed feelings about this; as fun as it is trying to see just how many keys I can strike in the correct order in the least amount of time and as cool as I find the sound of that relentless tapping to be, I still miss my chicken scratch. However, I see that technological fluency is a necessary thing now so I've tried to adapt. 

I'm the kind of person who likes to consolidate resources, so if I have to do some things on a computer, I'll try to do complete as many necessary tasks on the computer. To this end, I've tried taking notes on a computer on a number of occasions. But the habit never seems to stick--the typing feeling tedious and forced--and before you know it I've got my notebook and pen back out and have resumed my chicken scrawling renewed vigor. My situation appeared hopeless. Will I ever acclimate to the digital age? Am I cursed to forever prefer outmoded means of communication?

But then earlier this month my Dad introduced me to a new-to-me Samsung Galaxy Note 3 smartphone. I'd had a smartphone before; I was quite happy with my iPhone 5S -- it did what I needed and that was that. But the larger screen and the stylus intrigued me and the promise of handwriting digital notes intrigued me. 

I admittedly skeptical at first because of bad experiences I'd had trying to do the same thing on my iPad. That didn't work out because I could never get a stylus that actually behaved like a pen. I would try to write in my own comfortable style (which is cursive, by the way, please don't hate me!) and that clumsy, squishy rubber tip would constantly skip lines, curves and curls and I'd always have to rewrite my notes -- something that I detest because it is tedious and I don't have the time for it when I'm trying to keep up with a lecture and the guy refuses to pause his slides long enough to get all the information down and --arrgghhh-- the frustration! But I digress.

So last Friday I had to attend an in-service meeting at a local elementary school. In a nutshell, I took notes on the Note (I know, aptly named, right?) and I loved it! It actually worked and I didn't have to carry anything around with me between meetings. It was awesome! I know, having to carry a notebook and a pen isn't exactly asking much, but hey, talk about streamlined! So we'll see how long this habit sticks around.

Until next time,
Jared D. Clark