What Does Teacher Leadership Mean to Me?

     When I first started teaching, I looked to all of the teachers on my grade level and on my hall way for assistance. I borrowed ideas, asked for help and shared ideas that I had as well. My grade level was crucial to my development as an educator. I can still look back and named all of the people that daily challenged me to always do what was best for my students and encouraged me to do more and more. 

     The past few years I've unknowingly worked myself into a leadership role for my school. If you would have seen me as a first year teacher, you would've never guessed it. My willingness to share awesome things that I'd discovered, led me into this role. I soon became a leader in my school and partnered with my love for technology. I was encouraged from by my administrator to join the Pinnacle group. 

     This year, I'm at a new school. My principal continues to push me to lead on my grade level and in the school. Thankfully, I've been welcomed with open arms and I continue to encourage other teachers to focus on students and do the best for them every day. 

     If it wasn't for teacher leaders in my schools that I've worked in, I wouldn't be where I am today. I probably would be completely burnt out. Don't get me wrong, I still get burnt out, but my fellow teachers continue to encourage me and challenge me to always find new ways and focus on the best for students.

    Teacher Leadership is a very important part of education. If we don't have teacher leaders, who will we follow? Who will challenge us? Who will encourage us? Where will we end up? Where will our students end up?

Math Practice

Basic math facts are so important for students. I noticed that many of my students lacked the memorization of basic math facts. I was introduced to xtramath.com from my children's teachers. They started working on xtramath as a part of their homework.

I introduced my students to the program, it is a free website to help practice the basic facts with students. It tracks their progress and shows them what they need to work on. Students earn a certification for completing all of their addition fact, then a different one for subtraction, multiplication and division.

I've already seen a lot of progress in my students with their mental math by knowing their basic math facts. It only takes 3-5 minutes each day for the students to practice their facts. The website can be accessed on a laptop, desktop, chrome book or an iPad. My students use our iPads and desktops in our classroom.

I hope you can use it to help your students improve on their basic math facts.   :)

Google Classroom

I absolutely love having Google classroom for my students. At first, it took a little time setting things up because I hadn't created a contact group for my students, but I didn't let that slow me down.

One of my favorite uses for classroom.google.com is for my students to turn in assignments. When I create a writing assignment, students can add their writing to the assignment and I can collaborate with them (this was very helpful with our Ecosystems projects) a lot quicker than it would be to meet with every group in person. I can add comments and look at their writing from my couch or at planning time. They can look at the comments and suggestions. We only have to discuss any information that still isn't clear. This frees up so much of my time. I can also quickly see who hasn't turned the assignment in, and remind them of the due date. 

I also love using the announcement portion to quickly and easily share websites that they can refer back to later. I've used this for math games to play to reinforce a specific skill. We have also used this to give links for coding sites and the order I would like them to try them in. 

Ever since I've gotten my hands on it, I've had hundreds of ideas of how it could be used in the classroom. I need to make a list of things that I want to do differently next year. 

My absolutely favorite part of the site is how easy it makes sharing documents with my students. Instead of my incoming files/email blowing up, it puts them neatly in a "classroom" folder in my documents, it is then inside a folder with the name of the assignment on the folder. I LOVE it. 

Ecosystems

My fifth graders have been studying ecosystems this month. They divided into different groups and created a diorama and a 2 page paper reporting what they learned. The projects took us a few weeks for the students to do the research, write the paper and to create the diorama. Students then presented the information to the class.

A few of my groups used an iPad and took pictures of their diorama. They used Balloon Stickies Plus or Skitch to annotate their picture. From there they brought their pictures into Show Me and recorded their presentation.

This helped many of my students that were not comfortable with getting up in front of the class to present. They were ok with watching their presentation, and the rest of the class was very supportive of them.

Here are a few of the presentations.

Saltwater

Taiga

Coniferous Forest

Enjoy!

40 Book Challenge

I decided to do the 40 book challenge with my students this year. Almost every student is on their way to achieve the goal of 40 books by the end of the year. I have a few that are struggling through it, but I'm very proud of them for giving their best effort.

Not only are the students reading books on their level, but I'm reading 40 books right along with them. It's my goal to be able to do a better job of recommending books to my students. I want to be able to discuss the books with them and not just by going off of what others have said about a particular book. I'm also trying a variety of genres as well.

I picked this idea up when I started a book study a few years ago on "The Book Whisperer" by Donalyn Miller. I absolutely loved the book. I also follow her on goodreads and I'm in the middle of her second book. She speaks from teaching 6th grade language arts, but it is very easy to relate to as an upper elementary teacher. 

I want to instil a love and passion for reading. I want to introduce students to genres that they haven't tried before. I want them to have a hard time putting a book down. 

So far, so good

At recess 

Yes, 5 of my students were reading instead of playing. They realize that books can take you to far off places. A few of then noticed that I had my phone out taking pictures. ;) 

Honored

This is my first year Teaching at Hawks Nest. The past 7 years, I've spent with 4th graders. This is my first year in 5th grade and I LOVE IT!!! I work with a wonderful team of teachers, support staff and administrator. I was surprised and honored when I was chosen as Teacher of the Year for the 2014-2015 school year.

I have an interview with our county coming up on December 1st. Our county will take the top 5 from the county and ask them for a portfolio and observe them teaching in their classroom. I will post an update when I find out how I've done with my interview. I'm nervous and anxious about the interview, I'll be glad when it is over with.

Water Cycle

     My first year in 5th grade is off to a great start. The past few weeks we have been studying the Water Cycle. Students have had a lot of fun doing experiments, investigations and reading selections all about the Water Cycle.
      For our culminating activity, I asked my students to create a presentation about the information they have learned. We checked out our school's brand new Chrome Book cart, and I gave each child their login information. That was confusing and an adventure all in itself (each child had to remember to put a period between their first name and last name, they accidentally put spaces in and couldn't remember the long k12.nc.us part, or got it mixed up). The student had this information on an index card, but still struggled putting it in correctly. ;) (really there were only 2-3 students and easy mistakes). It was neat seeing them help each other find mistakes.
    Students grouped themselves into groups of 2 or 3. I helped them create a blank presentation and showed them how to collaborate. One of the teachers on my grade level created a rubric for them to use and they were off. Off to create, share and work together. The students did amazing with this project and I'm so thankful we were able to start out this year with a fun dose of technology.