8th Grade - the Capstone Year

Ever wonder what learning looks like as students progress through their last year at TMS?  Here's a peak at what 8th grade is doing today.

In Science, students are synthesizing their understanding of Plate Tectonics...

The pictures here show the various ways students can demonstrate their knowledge of forces that shape the earth, landforms at plate boundaries, mountain building, and continent building.  And, students can even use Minecraft, a highly complex and relevant app!  Below is an outline of their expectations and assessment.

And here, a student explains his group's learning...



In math, students thinking is extended by taking "obscure" information and processing it into an equation - having students think backwards about these problems solidifies their understanding.  I'm just nerdy enough to want to do these problems myself.

In math, quick check-ins with students give perspective on which students are following through with their work and which skills need reteaching.

In social studies, the MAP word of the day is integrated into daily content.  In this case students are modifying the answer to make it correct.

In English, students are writing thesis sentences to begin argumentative writing: Is Edgar Allen Poe mentally ill?

Writing with a Purpose

Here's a great example of authentic learning:  ELL students wrote stories, published them, and then did author's readings with elementary ELL students.

Here're the completed books - such professionalism!

Students practiced their language skills and integrated knowledge about plot, characterization, etc.

Students connected with elementary ELL students through Facetime.

Students read their books to their elementary buddies.

6th Grade - the Foundation of Middle School Learning

Instruction in 6th grade is ever-important, and like all of us, 6th grade teachers continue to try new things to improve the rigor and relevance of learning at TMS.  Check out these examples; they definitely point to the vertical and horizontal alignment at TMS...

Color-marking in English - this sets students up for success as they continue to color mark in 7th and 8th grade.  Great vertical alignment!

Collaborative teaching with students - A student who was absent the day before worked with a partner who caught her up on learning.  Both students benefit:  one solidifies their knowledge while teaching the other and the other gets a summary of missed work.

Science notebooking - NO!  This is math notebooking!

Students tracking their own notes helps them develop responsibility and gives them resources for future reference.

Learning is fun (and tactile!) - Here's an example of geometric principles in action.

Best Practices - Essential questions, RAP reminders and Scoring Rubrics.

The Art of Thinking

I once heard this great analogy:

"In the US, when we see people on the phone, talking to others, etc., we don't bother them because they're busy.  In China, when they see people sitting quietly thinking, they don't bother them because they're busy."

I think about this quote a lot (I'll confess that I don't know if it's an accurate cultural statement) as I realize that we fail to allow ourselves, and possibly our students, enough time to just think, to figure it out...

How do you get your students thinking?  Do you require them to think on a regular basis?  It's the reason I push for engagement and authenticity so heavily...if we get students engaged in relevant enriching learning, we get them thinking!

An interdisciplinary thinking exercise:  students in social studies are calculating pyramids, determining work force and designing buildings.

Peer Conferencing/Evaluation -  Here, students are evaluating (one of the most sophisticated forms of thinking) other students' work.  What's noteworthy is that each student will evaluate 4 other student's writing.  

Here's an example of the peer evaluation sheet.  Not only are students evaluating multiple pieces of writing, but they area also evaluating a different skill set each time.

Look at that!  I can see him thinking! Plus, there's the benefit that the students being evaluated may use the feedback to strengthen their writing!


We often think about peer conferencing/evaluation as a benefit to the student getting the feedback, but in reality, the learning benefit is to both the student being evaluated and those doing the evaluation.

Balance Beam

I often talk about the balance we must find in education, the balance between reading and writing, between student accountability and student support, between basic skills and critical thinking skills, between right brain and left brain.  It often feels like we are walking a tight rope, trying to find ways to reach the perfect balance, to keep it all from falling apart.  And we are, BUT we are also great acrobats!!!!

Check out how we keep our balance...

We have a little fun with our geometry puns!  If you can't read them here, stop into Megan Scott's room for a little funny math.

We balance our expectations and let students know what they are so they have a purpose for learning too!

We connect our basic math to relevant information.  After all, don't all students want to understand fractions so they can divide that Halloween candy evenly?

We hold kids accountable for doing the essential work of class.  These students have been pulled out to complete their work - sometimes, getting it done is not good enough.  We require kids to get it done correctly!

When teaching RAP, we put things in kid-friendly language, but we still hold them accountable for demonstrating skills. 

We balance the skills of writing with the higher level skills of evaluation when kids score different RAP examples.  In this lesson, students scored writing by using the four corners of the room.  One corner was a 1, one was a 2, etc. where students had great discussions about high quality writing.

We have kids practice their listening and notetaking skills while documenting book talks...after all, there may be some good books that they want to read in the future.

We have fun on 'er day with a student as the teachER.

While kids may prefer 5 As, we need to focus on 5 Cs

In our digital world, there are 5 Cs that guide us.  No matter what tools we use, the focus on Citizenship, Collaboration, Creativity, Communication and Content should be cornerstones of learning.  Technology gives us the tools to do these "5 Cs" better.  I've seen some great examples of these 5 Cs:  Collaboration with Google Apps and Edmodo Book Talks, Communication with Remind 101 and Google Apps, and so much more...

Here are a some specific 5 Cs around TMS from the last few days.

Creativity and Content -- Using an online program, students integrate their understanding of music and notes to compose original songs.

Communication -- Using resources like OneNote helps students refer to their previous learning...plus check out those links to the teacher's website and student grades!

Collaboration and Content -- Students worked together to design a Google form to quiz their peers on newly acquired science content.

Content and Collaboration -- students are having fun demonstrating their knowledge of those science concepts.  Plus, as students developed the quizzes for one another, they had to expand their own understanding of the content. 

Collaboration, Content, and Creativity -- Students work together to research a chosen aspect of Egyptian history and create a project to share with others.

Creativity and Content-- Students are building a pyramid, integrating research, writing, and mathematics into their process.

Creativity and Content -- Here the students are doing the research and design for their pyramid project.

Communication -- Why not play a little Eygptian music to communicate the mood of the time period?

Citizenship will be a huge focus in the month of November, so be prepared to have some rich conversations about what that looks like for students.

How am I ever going to use this?

Making learning relevant for students, making it authentic, means that we make an obvious connection between the learning and how we use it in real life.  Sometimes, it takes just a little different spin to make an activity authentic.  Here's an example of how you can do it.

Objective:  Students will identify how they use reading strategies in non-fiction text.  (I choose this because non-fiction text is in every content area)

Typical assessment example:  Students present their strategies and summarize which ones they used, why they used them, and where they used them in the text.

Authentic assessment example:  Students are textbook publishers selling their non-fiction material to a school district.  They will present to the school administrators why the text is a good fit for teaching non-fiction reading strategies.

In both examples, students have to identify non-fiction reading strategies to build their content-area comprehension.  The typical assessment requires they practice and share.  The authentic assessment requires that they practice and share, but they also have to evaluate the best strategies in order to sell their audience.

Consider your assessments...

Beyond assessments, check out these examples of real-life applications in learning...

Listening to a historian about how the History Museum incorporates students' work into their exhibits.

Practical map-making skills from a cartographer.

Seeing what those maps really do for our world today.

A skit in Spanish where students are acting out a conversation they would have when traveling to another country.

Peek-a-boo Part II

Today, I got the chance to stop into 6th grade and some main floor classes.  Take a look at some of the best practices I witnessed as I peeked...

Conferencing with students...This is a strategy that I think has HUGE growth potential for increasing student learning.  When students are working independently, conference with them.  Here are some examples across multiple contents of how this can be used....

1)  During silent reading, check in with individual students to reinforce their application of learning outcomes.  For example, if you are focusing on plot, ask students to share the setting, conflict, climax, etc. of the book they are reading...it's a good opportunity to require them to think.

2)  During writing time, have students show you their examples to prove their thesis.  This will work if they are writing using the RAP strategies, writing DBQ essays or finalizing conclusions from a inquiry-based lab.

3)  During stations, make yourself one of the stations.  You can group students by specific skills to provide remediation and/or enrichment.

The trick is to not stress yourself out...you don't need to get to every student everyday, but make sure you are eventually getting to all of them.

Co-Teaching...What's noteworthy are the roles of each of the teachers.  This is a true team-teaching model where the special education teacher is serving as the primary with the general ed. teacher providing tips and supplementary ideas.  Great collaboration, ladies!

Holding kids accountable...In this class, students are required to read outside of class, demonstrating their comprehension on a quick quiz.  Building their homework stamina over time helps to prepare students for the next year's expecations.  

More Reflection...Here, students have identified what they learned this week.

Authentic Learning...In the first two pictures, a student has designed a tutorial for others to use on Google Drive applications.  She has provided detailed directions and screenshots of how to change the color of folders...I need this skill.  The final picture is of student problem-solving projects...How do you make a catapult that will actually shot objects across the room?  Now, I think every teacher would enjoy that! :)

  

More Authentic Learning...Students are studying mean, median, and mode.  And, what more relevant way in this post-season climate than with Cardinal baseball salaries?  I was also impressed with the use of wireless and one-note on the tablet to help facilitate that learning.

Differentiating for talent...Art students are not limited in their expression.  Instead, they have loose deadlines so that they can work at their pace and the degree of difficulty they prefer.  All students are held to basic principles, but those who want to expand are encouraged to do so.  Others, who finish sooner, move on to the next essential learning task.  This is the same concept of Writer's Workshop, just a different genre.

Teaching Organization...Kids don't come to us prepared to be well-organized.  Okay...some do, but we have to explicitly teach most how to be responsible middle school students.  In this class, students were required to write their assignment in the agenda book (or, use their devices if they had another tool).  The trick is to reinforce the expectation.  I used to go around and thank kids who completed their agenda books - it's amazing how much kids crave that positive reinforcement.  Even those who didn't want to record assignments, did record them.

Preparing for Student-Led Conferences...Check out this modeling in action.