An Afternoon w/Kathleen Tolan #tcrwp

I'll be with Kathleen Tolan the next three days and the first hour of our afternoon together is full of Tweetable moments, some thoughts below. 

Social Studies curriculum is usually two years ahead of the grade level where it's being taught. Wow, that's a bold statement, how will we achieve this.

- must give kids a forum to practice towards mastery 
- social studies text need to be readable 
- work towards moving away from social studies text books
- see it, hear it, use it….academic vocabulary 
- echo reading with kids, read a paragraph and re-read behind teacher or stronger reader
- text complexity is covered in many of the ideas above
- give kids an area in the room to read and discuss, must have more text evidence in the talk.
- shared reading - put something on document camera and read together.
- mini-lecture - be clear and to the point
- debate (My idea, record or podcast these to share with parents!)
- you can't get deep in a center when the buzzer goes off, we want kids to return to the center/work, must be deep and not just surface
- have kids name the strategy they're using - close reading and close looking - do this at center time!
- teach kids to have a plan
- have task cards for students to use, this makes the teacher available to support 

To summarize in my own words - 

Mini-lessons are the KEY to this work, we must give kids these tools so they can go to their 'tool-box' and use the appropriate strategy when needed. Guide the students in the work and call on them while guiding when it's time for independent work. 

Coaching is also so KEY, wearing my Principal hat and thinking about transferring my work here with my teachers back in California. Our staff meeting time or having a Workshop Wednesday time where I can teach ideas/concepts that will transfer to class and mini-lessons. 

Getting More Connected - Twitter Challenge #tcrwp

I know, I'm on a roll with blogging today with my 5th post of the day. It's funny, I've been Tweeting with @themchugh all morning and then finally met 'in real life' during the small section time this morning. He commented on all my posts from this morning and how he's been wanting/trying to start a blog of his own. We should strive to model for our teachers what we want them and our students to do. As I wrote this morning, all 3rd-5th graders at my school have their own blog, their own digital writing space.....that's so powerful! I'm excited for Jeff to start his blog this week, my #educhallenge to him!

So, getting more connected, my Twitter challenge. I have 20+ new followers in the last 24 hours and I've followed about the same amount, all educators attending #tcrwp this week. During the small section time this morning with @AlexisCzeterko I asked my group what their handles were. One of the three (thanks @lucysalazar) were on Twitter, and the other two said they 'knew' they should be on. My brain starts rolling and I'm thinking about 'how' I can get these educators connected, when they aren't connected and can't see all that they're missing. It's complicated I know.......there is so much conversation going on 'behind' the scenes that everyone can benefit from.

Thanks to the power of Twitter and @alicekeeler for sharing a great 'getting started' document. And her question.....

http://www.alicekeeler.com/teachertech/2013/10/28/twitter-for-educators-a-document/

Open to ideas and motivation, Tweet them out!

Small Group Section - Center Work w/ @AlexisCzeterko #tcrwp

A totally PACKED room with Alexis Czeterko this morning for our first small group section of the week!

Some initial thoughts/ideas........

It's all about the mini-lesson.....start with a picture, ask questions, take notes.

- "What specifically do you see going on, look for those details?"
- "What jumps out at you right away?"
- "What do you notice about the kids in this picture."
- "Do you recognize anyone in the artifact?"
- "Get a gist of the picture, look closer at the details and record together!"
- "Take a second and third look at the picture, REALLY get a look at the details!"

Now for our first assignment, 'Paired Texts Center'

Read similar text sets, compare and contrast, non-fiction is huge, have a mid-workshop lesson and go for different note taking types! The mid-workshop lesson is really a great time/chance to infuse ideas while the kids are deep in the learning, push their thinking, such great coachable moments.

Love sports analogies and it's like your coach being with you on the course, helping/pushing/teaching while you're in the game!

Note taking ideas.....

- sketch notes
- boxes and bullets
- timeline
- 2-column chart
- flowchart

More to come!

Harvey 'Smokey' Daniels - Opening Keynote Reflection/Thoughts #tcrwp

What a fun opening keynote from Smokey Daniels, so many Tweetable moments/comments from this morning. 

Giving us a pictorial tour of his travels throughout the US in working with schools. Harvey says so much is missing from the Common Core…..creativity, engagement, curiosity, choice and responsibility. Telling stories is so powerful, they engage the audience, get people excited, inspire, laugh, think about our personal interactions and make us want to write!

With the writing standards he’s concerned they’re too low. Kids need to be writing way more says Harvey, kids should write ’think pieces’ 5, 7, 20 times a day….what does that look like.  Showing us MANY examples of written notes from kids, so many teachable moments, editing, fun memories and ideas to implement at school. Share with kids, get them excited, engage them, all level of students can write these!

I think about my school (jseroadrunners.com , @jseroadrunners) and that each of our 3rd-5th graders have their own blog on KidBlog.org. In two years I’ve seen kids write more and more each year. Having conversations with each other, learning, writing, and publishing their work for everyone to read….that’s powerful! I’m not saying paper/pencil doesn’t have a place at all, but digitizing our writing is so powerful for kids to engage in, give it a shot!

More thoughts to come later…..

Also, anyone want to co-blog a post with me this week, Tweet me if you do! @awelcome 

First Morning Thoughts - February Institute #tcrwp

First day of the TCRWP February Institute in New York and already seeing people I know from California, meeting new people and those that I ‘know’ through Twitter. I walked into the opening keynote this morning and @teachkate is welcoming participants along with @amandalah! Having been in elementary education my entire career (teacher, Assistant Principal and now Principal) I’ve always/usually been the only male in the room, so it’s really great to see @rscalateach in the crowd and hopefully we’ll connect in person this week as well.

Some initial thoughts this morning……

- it’s so inspiring to be surrounded by fellow educators who want to learn and extend their thinking.
- people coming together from all over the country, to become better teachers/leaders, all for the best interest of kids!
- some are TCRWP veterans and others their first time here.
- it’s cold and snowy outside but people are smiling, laughing and excited to be here.

Just a short post this morning with opening thoughts…..I’m hoping to convince @amandalah to do a co-blog post this week, I know @wordcrazy is already on board for this!

#standby #keeplearning 

TCRWP - Here I Come! #tcrwp #savmp

It's 4:30am in California and it's fully normal for me to be up at this time, my 'normal' routine is a 4:00 or 4:15am wake-up each day. Today though is not normal because a Town Car is coming to pick-me up for SFO and my much anticipated trip to NY and TCRWP!

Eleven years ago was my first introduction to Writers Workshop from none other than my current Administrative coach, Robert Alpert. (Note - I'm working on Robert and getting him on Twitter!) I can vividly remember the training and him 'telling' stories throughout the week long seminar at Montair Elementary in Danville, it changed my teaching and had a lasting impact!

Now, I'm an Elementary Principal and we've launched Writers Workshop at John Swett Elementary and bringing my school to the next level with Workshop is why I'm going! Can't wait to connect with educators I already know and meet so many more.

My wife and I are a parenting team, and this is the longest period of time I'll be away from her and our two children. She's slightly nervous for the busyness that is G and T our two children, but I know she'll be fine and have fun while I'm gone.

As I told some students last Friday when talking about my trip....."I'm going to NY to become a better Principal!" #enoughsaid #teamkid

Watch this blog and twitter ( @awelcome ) and follow the #tcrwp hashtag throughout the week!

An Amazing Addition #savmp #juno

It can sometimes be challenging to 'look' ahead and have a 'vision' of next steps for a classroom or school. 

- How can we take our teaching/learning to the next level?

- What's it going to take for that to happen?

- Who/what needs to be involved?

Sometimes this happens inadvertently......

- You meet other educators who have great energy/ideas and it all starts to flow!

or.....

- You get hooked up with two Danish guys, one is an app developer with the #1 app in Denmark (that's a separate blog post and YES we're piloting the app at JSE) and the other is President of FrontRow and they come to your school and give you a demo!

Jens setting up the Juno!

Jens contacted me about coming to JSE for a demo of their Juno system, I fished around with a couple teachers about 'piloting' in their rooms and @JenniferDeWeerd jumped right in! This system has been such an amazing addition to our school and Jenn's classroom so far, in so many ways!

- Voice enhancement in class

- Screen/voice capture with lessons on the SMART board and wireless document camera!

This is where the REAL power of the Juno comes into play. Jennifer can record/capture EVERYTHING she teaches the students from the SMART board and/or document camera whenever she wants. 

- Math lesson 

- Student presentations

- The list is looooong

The most amazing part is, we have it all set up so ALL the screen/voice recordings get automatically synced with Google Drive so Jenn's entire class has access to them whenever they want, and I do as well. If a student is at home and can't remember the steps for long division, they go to their Google Drive. Student does a 'how-to' in class for a presentation, automatically in Google Drive.

#eduawesome

Contact Jens to demo a system in your classroom, you WON'T be disappointed, you'll be INSPIRED!

Jenn sporting some educational jewelry with the teacher microphone, it works on voice commands as well!

21st Century Teacher set-up, MacBook Air, wireless document camera and Juno system, ready to record!

All Juno recordings are automatically shared with my Google Drive as well, I can see what's going on in class from my iPhone! #wiredprincipal

Jenn's had the Juno in class for only ten days and the Google Drive folder is already filling up, keep them coming, love to learn!

#teamkid