So You've Lost Your Voice and You're A Teacher... Now What?

Hey guys! I don't know about you, but recently I have been watching Hack My Life on TruTV. If you weren't aware I am a major nerd and love education/informational TV. (Not to mention my Doctor Who and Sherlock obsession!) On Hack My Life they do a segment called "Now What" where they give different scenarios of hacks. So today I ask you.. So you've lost your voice and you're a teacher, NOW WHAT?

When your a teacher, your voice is one of the most important tools. When it's gone, it can be very difficult to instruct, question, and to maintain good behavior management. I know I can't just take 5 days off to "rest my voice" like my doctor always seems to recommend. Adapting is the name of the game and here are a few things I do differently when I've lost my voice.


Getting Their Attention:
On a normal day I love a call and response attention getter such as the famous "Class, Class..Yes,Yes". When I've lost my voice this seems nearly impossible! In this case, I love to use a service bell. I ding my bell twice as a replacement of my normal "class, class". This works well because it's loud enough that they can hear it.

You could also use preemptive measures by not using a call and response attention getter. You could implement the clap call and response, where the teacher claps and the students echo the clapping pattern. If this was already in place, the teacher wouldn't need to change anything. I personally just prefer a vocal call and response!

We try to make quick transitions between one activity to another. Our goal is to be at our new destination and ready in 7 counts, but we have to 10 counts before we get in trouble. (See The Essential 55 by Ron Clark) I usually count out loud the numbers, but I have been known to just count using my hand. I use American Sign Language to count to 10 because it only requires 1 hand. The kids love it, and I don't have to strain my voice to count!

Behavior Management:
Class Dojo is a great behavior management tool that works whether you have a voice or not! Some things I love particularly when I don't have a voice are;
                           It gives a noise when you give or take away a point which reminds the kids about 
                           their behavior.
                      
                           I can display it on the ActivBoard so students can monitor how they are doing.
                      
                           I can give or take points on my ipad and it shows up on the active board.
                      
                           One thing I love, whether I have a voice or not, is that when I'm teaching, Class 
                           Dojo is not up on my board, but will still make a noise when I give or take points
                           Students  have no idea who I am giving or taking points from, but they automatically
                           begin self monitoring their behavior!


Teaching:
When you don't have a voice it's a great time to use peer tutors. I love using peer tutors often anyway, but it comes in handy to let them help me "teach" their neighbor the concepts!


These are just a few ways that might be able to help you! Don't forget to drink lots of hot tea! Do you have any hacks that help you get through a few days with no voice?

Idea for Pulling Sticks

Hey guys! Today I want to share with you something new I am going to try this year. In years past, I have used popsicle sticks to randomly call on students to answer questions. I use them a lot when I am doing review, specifically in Science and Social Studies. I love pulling sticks because the students never know who I'm going to call on, which causes them to pay closer attention. The only downfall I have is that I don't want to continually pull the same stick and have the same student answer multiple answer, or miss a stick and a student not have a turn. So I started laying the stick to the side once a student got an answer correct. This lead to another problem... Once the student answered a question correctly they quit paying attention because they knew I wouldn't be pulling their stick again. Sigh... This ruins the whole purpose of the review in the first place! However, I believe I have found the solution!

I have added colored dots on both ends of the popsicle stick using a sharpie: one blue, one red. (I choose these colors because it's the color scheme of my room. I'm a bit OCD about matchy matchy!) I'll begin by having all sticks having the same color sticking out. Once a student answers a question correctly I will turn their stick over so that the second color is showing. This way I know who has answered a question and who has not. It also causes students to continue paying attention after they have answered a question, since their stick is still in the cup and could still be pulled.

Here is my "sticks cup." I have two cups because I have two classes since we departmentalize. My homeroom has McDonald on the cup and the other class has their homeroom teacher's name on the cup. 

This is one of the sticks. I just used a blue and red sharpie for the dots. Easy and cheaper than buying actual dots to stick on it. 

I have seen an idea where a toilet paper role has been used hidden inside the cup. Once a student answers a question the stick goes into the toilet paper role, which keeps the pulled sticks and unpulled sticks separate.

If you use a different strategy for pulling sticks, I would love to hear about them in the comments!

I hope you enjoyed!

5 Things I Want to Try in My Classroom This Year!

Hey guys! Today I want to share with you the 5 things I want to try in my classroom this year.  Last year we went full common core in math and reading. After a year of getting my feet wet, I'm now ready to dive in and see how it goes. Here are the 5 things I'm wanting to try during my "diving in" process! 

Number 1: Number Talks 

During a recent math conference this book was brought to my attention as a great way to work on fluency and math strategies with students. This book has common core connections and is for grades K-5.  I have talked my school into purchasing the book and am waiting very impatiently to get my hands on it! 

Number 2: A Carpet 

This one may seem strange but hear me out! In my school only K-3 grades have a carpet in their classrooms. It was always thought to be "too young" for 4-5 grade. To better implement number talks from above I need a "meeting place". Thus I would really like to get a carpet this year. I have read many blogs about intermediate grades using carpets successfully. Of course when I go searching for them again, I can't find them. ::sigh:: Once I have implemented the carpet and number talks I promise to come back and report how it is working! 

Number 3: Desk Organization 

I found a blog that had a really neat idea on how to keep desks organized when students switch classrooms. I am really hoping to try this this year to help keep the desks from becoming black holes. This idea can be found here: http://www.ashleigh-educationjourney.com

Number 4: Fractions 

During a recent math conference, this book was recommended to me for teaching fractions. In 4th grade CCSS fractions are a major focus. I really want to make sure I am teaching it in a way that my students will understand and comprehend, not just know how to find an answer. 

Number 5: I Can... Bulletin Board 

I am really wanting to turn my small bulletin board into an I Can.. CCSS Bulletin Board. I have been posting my standards on my white board, but now that summer is here, I am ready to tackle the bulletin boards. There are MANY cute ideas on how to decorate or organize an I Can bulletin Board. I'm juggling ideas around in my mind and have decided that I will decided on July 1 (when I am allowed to go to the teacher store and purchase items for the new school year) what route I want to go. 

What are some ideas that you are hoping to try this school year?

I hope you enjoyed!

Teaching Complete Metamorphosis

Hey guys! Today I want to talk about one of the activities I did when I was teaching complete metamorphosis this year! In fourth grade, students need to know the difference between complete and incomplete metamorphosis. They also need to be able to visually identify which metamorphosis an insect goes through. For this activity I had students compare and contrast the life cycle of a butterfly and a ladybug. I have a real specimen of a butterfly life cycle and a plastic specimen of the ladybug.

First, I had the students draw the different stages of both insects.

Second, they had to answer question comparing and contrasting the butterfly life cycle with the lady bug life cycle. 

Here is a picture of my students examining the ladybug and butterfly life cycle specimen. 

Mathematical Practices Common Core Posters

Hey guys! This summer I have been doing lots of work to prepare for the upcoming Common Core implementation for our county. I found these cute mathematical practices posters that correlate with the 8 mathematical practices of common core. There are posters for K-1, 2-3, and 4-5 that are written in kid-friendly terms. I've included the links below so you can check them out! These would be great to help explain to the students what test graders are looking for on their constructed response assessments!

K-1 Posters Click Here

2-3 Posters Click Here

4-5 Posters Click Here

Introducing Equivalent Fractions

Hey guys! Last week I began introducing fractions to my 4th graders. I wanted to share with you how I introduce equivalent fractions to my students. When I first began teaching, I felt that I did not have enough time in the day to deal with using manipulatives in math. There were too many standards and it just took too long to deal with getting them out. I have come to realize that this was a grave mistake! Although using manipulatives does take extra time, it is worth it. Once the students can understand the concrete version of an idea, they tend to grasp the abstract version a little quicker. Saying that, I try to use manipulatives whenever I can.

Whenever I introduce equivalent fractions to my students I pull out the fraction bars. The fraction bar sets I have go from 1 whole to a denominator of 12. I have my fraction bars  in individual baggies, so that I can give each group a bag of fraction bars. (I try to pull these out the day before and have them sitting out ready to be used. This saves time during the lesson.) First, I pass out the bags of fraction bars and ask the students to sort them by color. Next, I  begin with the 1/2 fraction bar and model with the students how to find an equivalent fraction. I then let them use trial and error to find the remaining fractions. After this, I write all the fractions we found on the board. Next, I repeat this process with 1/3 & 1/4 bars. Many times the student will realize that there is a pattern happening. I will then talk about the pattern with the class and then announce that we are going to learn how to find equivalent fractions using math.

This process only takes about 15-25 minutes from passing out the bars to picking the bars back up. I hope that if you don't already use manipulatives in your classroom, that you will pull them out and try them. In my classroom, the reward outweighs the "trouble" of getting them out!

Behavior Chart

Hey guys! I just wanted to share with you my behavior chart. I made it basing it on the example from Harry Wong. The students begin on "Good" everyday. During the day the students can move up or down depending on their behavior. I also allow those students who may have moved down the opportunity to move back up if their behavior improves. I do this because one of the many saying in my classroom (especially for math) is that it's okay to make a mistake as long as you learn from it. I also believe that those students who struggle with behavior have an incentive to move back up where as if they can only move down then they really don't have much of a reason to want to improve their behavior. For a student to move to excellent they have to exhibit behavior that is above and beyond the norm. I especially like to use this when the students shouldn't be talking, but they are and there is that one child sitting there doing exactly what they are suppose to. I call them out for their excellent behavior and they get to move their clip up. The other students then look to that student and mimic what they are doing in hopes of being excellent too. This is so much better than constantly fussing at all of the students for talking. 

To make- I used card stock with and glued the printed words to them. I then laminated it and now I can use this chart for a couple years. I use clothes pins to write students name on them. 

I hope you enjoy! 

Teacher Tips!

Teach 123 is having a great linky party asking everyone to give a few teacher tips for new teachers. Being a first year teacher can be stressful. I truly believe teaching is a calling. It takes a special kind of person to teach others and have the patience and energy to do it. Check out my teaching tips and then go visit Teach 123 to see what advice fellow teachers have to say!