Letter To Myself

So, I was watching a bunch of sappy, feel good videos about teachers and education, and I came across one that really stuck out to me. It was a video of teachers writing to themselves before they started their very first day ever! It was really interesting to see what they would say, and I thought it would be a cool thing for me to do. I’m only a year and half removed from my first day ever, but there’s a whole lot that I wish I could tell myself back then. Here goes nothing…

Dear 1st year Mr. Mouton, Mr. Moomaw, Mr. MooMoo, Mr. Crouton, Mouton, Mr. Crazy Socks, Mr. Minion (you have many names)

This is your future self. You are about to embark on the most exciting chapter of your life. You may think you know what lies ahead of you, but I’m happy to say you don’t. You have no idea what you’re getting yourself into. I’m proud to say that it’s going to be better than you could have ever imagined. You’re going to spend countless hours up at that school on Sunday. Your team is incredible, and the relationships that develop with them are priceless. You’re going to wear a Minion pajama suit and skirt. You’re going to buy this thing called a POP that’s going to lead to slight obsession. You’re going to experience some of the best times of your life, but you’re also going to experience one of the worst. It’s all apart of this crazy thing you do everyday with your life. It’s called being a teacher, and you’re going to love it. Now, let me just give you some advice.

First off, you can’t be afraid to ask for help. You’re a first year teacher, the only math teacher in 4th grade, and you’re starting out from scratch with nothing. The three ladies you work with are incredible, and they are all smarter than you. It is better to just admit it now. They are three of the best teachers, and they will give you so much advice throughout your first year. So, don’t be stubborn and get off your high horse. There is no shame in asking for help. That was one thing we struggle with this year. We can let our ego get in the way, and this only causes more stress for us. No one is perfect, and we all need help from time to time. You’re just fortunate to have some of the best team members around. So, use them! :)

Secondly, you’re first year is going to a roller coaster of success and failures. Just like with most things, you’re going to have your ups and downs. All of the notes and lessons you make at the beginning of the year… Yeah, it’s all garbage. Don’t worry though, you’ll redo them all next year. Let me just save you a headache now. You need to use PowerPoint to make your stuff. Miss A will tell you to use PowerPoint, but you’re so stubborn you’ll use Word. Don’t do that. Word is so much harder to use. When it comes to long division, you need to have patience. The first two days of it the kiddos are going to look at you like you’re speaking Chinese. Then through a miracle, you’ll change how you’re teaching it and they’ll all become masters at it. Like seriously, long division ends up being one of the best skills we learn this year. They’re like little Jedi division masters afterwards, so be patient. Now fractions, I’m sorry to say, we’ll just be a struggle the whole time. We’re going to have to revamp it in your second year. The important thing, though, is to not let the struggles keep you down. You’re going to do some amazing things this year, and some things that are going to bomb. All that matters is how you handle the things that tank. You can either let them keep you down, or you can assess the situation and come back to work the next day prepared to be better. It’s all about your attitude. Like seriously, you will do some amazing things. For example: fantasy football, math olympics, geometry town, long division (crazy I know), the menu project, trashketball, and many other things. So, you need to keep the mindset that you’re going to give it everything you got everyday!

But teaching isn’t all about the content. It’s so much more than that. The most important thing to us (you) is the kids. You’re going to have an incredible group of kiddos, and that first group of homeroom kids will steal your heart. The relationships that you make this coming year will change your life forever, and I’m so excited for you to experience it. You’ll love it and not to toot our own horn, but the kiddos will love you too. One of your favorite things to do will be to play soccer at recess. You will have a big group of kiddos out there playing with you, and some of the kiddos that play will surprise you. You’re also going to love seeing the Kindergartners. We’ll eat lunch with them, and they’ll quickly learn who you are. They’re just so dang adorable. Embrace all of it. That’s what makes this job so special, and I know that’s the reason you decided to be a teacher. Well, I’m here to tell you that you made the right choice. I know what you’re thinking… Do our old kiddos still come talk to us? You bet they do. You make a lasting impression.

I want to talk about the hardest thing you’ll face in your first year. You’re going to have a great year, and your team will nominate you for 1st year teacher of the year because they’re awesome in that way. Like seriously, they have to do so much to fill that out and get it turned it. They’re incredible for doing it, and we’ll be forever grateful. And, I gotta say you deserve to be nominated. I’m your biggest fan, so I know how hard you’re going to work and how much you will care about those kiddos. You do. You deserve it. You’re going to write the best paper you have ever written (with the help of Miss A) persuading people to make you a finalist. You’re going to think you’re a lock for a finalist, and there’s no way they can’t pick you. Then it happens. You’re going to get the email, look for your name, and see three other names as the finalists. You’re not chosen as a finalist, and it is one of the most soul crushing moments you’ll ever have. To make matters worse, you read the email standing in front of the class, and we’re not very good at hiding our emotions. Try to read it not in front of the kids. I’m not going to sugar coat it, it honestly is one of the most defeating things you’ll experience. You’re going to want it so bad, and to know they don’t pick you is hard. I know that it’s your goal to not only be a finalist, but to when 1st year TOY for the district. It’s going to feel like you failed. BUT, I’m here to tell you forget about it because it doesn’t matter. The people that you want thinking you’re a great teacher, they do. They think you deserve it, and that’s all that matters. You will make a difference, and you are an incredible teacher. Are you perfect? Absolutely not. But, teaching is what you’re meant to do, and you make a difference! You rock your first year of teaching, and you don’t need that award to validate it for you. Through the relationships you build with the kids and the experiences you have along the way, those will validate your first year as a success. I need you to remember that.

Your first year is going to be successful. I’m not saying everyday will be rainbows and butterflies because it won’t be. There will be hard days. There’s going to be days where you don’t want to go. There will be days you will think that you’re not making a difference, and no would even care if you were there. You’re wrong. That school is EXACTLY where you’re supposed to be, and you’re doing exactly what you’re supposed to be doing. Impacting kids’ lives is what you’re meant to do. So when the going gets tough, suck it up because it will get better. Keep going to work everyday with the mindset that you’re going to make a difference because you are. Because, Mr. Mouton, you love the heck out of your job and those kids.

Sincerely,

Your older self.

P.S. If I had to sum up your first year and a half in two pictures, these would be it. Enjoy every moment!

1 Down 3 To Go

It’s been a good chunk of time since my last blog post. To me, however, it doesn’t feel that long, but it’s been over 9 weeks. 9 weeks… How has the first 9 weeks of school already come and gone? It seems like yesterday that it was the first day of school, and I was getting nervous to start the year. The days are just flying by!

The reason I haven’t really been blogging is I didn’t really know what I wanted to talk about. I’ve said that before, but if you know me, you know I’m not a huge writer. So, great ideas don’t just come to me to write about. I figured with the 9 weeks ending, I could kind of recap the couple of months of school.

My biggest takeaway from the beginning of school is… I was not a very good teacher the first few weeks of school. I remember coming into this year thinking I’m set because I’ve got all this stuff that I made from last year. I won’t really have to make anything! Boy, I was naïve. Everything that I made at the beginning of the year last year was just terrible. I remember looking through it thinking oh wow there’s no way I used this. Trust me, it was bad. I was a rookie. I didn’t have anything, and I was just starting out. I am glad to say the rest of the year was way better. So, the thought that I wasn’t going to have to make much stuff ended very quickly.

I think it’s a good thing, though. As a teacher, you don’t want to become complacent and do the same thing over and over again. I feel that I should always strive to become a better teacher. Is there going to be things that I do multiple times? Yes. But, there’s also going to be things that I’m constantly changing for the better. I’ve always heard that self-reflection is huge. I need to really to do that after each unit. I need to think about what worked and what didn’t. If something worked, I should do it again. If something bombed, I should definitely try something else. Regardless, I think it’s important to look over everything you did, and see if there is any way to improve. It’s important to keep the mindset that, as a teacher, I never stop learning. I’m still a student just as much as my kiddos are. I learn new things every day.

My second big takeaway is that each group of kiddos is different and unique. The group of kids that we have now is completely different from the kids we had last year. There’s a whole new realm of strengths, weaknesses, and challenges, but I love this new group. I’ve really enjoyed getting to know all of them these past 9 weeks. Has it always been rainbows and butterflies? No, but overall it’s been great. Don’t get me wrong; I totally miss my old kiddos too. I’m very fortunate that they are just down the hall. It’s an awesome feeling when they’re still so excited to see you and want to say hi to me in the hallway. I love those kids. They will always hold a special place in my heart with them being my first group. I’m just glad that they still want to talk to me ;)

One really cool thing that we did this first 9 weeks was the Menu Project. I did this project last year, and I loved it. More importantly, the kiddos loved it. So, I decided to do it again. Of course, I went through it and made some necessary changes to make it better. In a nutshell, the kids are in groups and they are challenged with creating a menu for a restaurant that they create. They can pick any theme that they want, and they come up with the food choices for their restaurants. They make menus, and at the end we have our “dinner” session where the groups “dine” at other restaurants. Each group has to calculate the total bill and change for each customer. It’s just away to kind of have a real life application of adding and subtracting decimals. The kids loved it, and it was so cool to see the amazing things that they came up with. They were excited to come to class everyday, and their menus they made were incredible. We were also fortunate to be chosen for showcasing for the whole district. McA was the school of the month, and the district chose the Menu Project as something they wanted to highlight. Of course I thought it was awesome they picked it, but I was really more excited for my kiddos worked to be seen all over the district. They’re the reason I do what I do, and for their work to be shown off really meant a lot to them. I was so proud of all their hard work. If you would like to read the article here is a link to it: http://tinyurl.com/hk4mhdu

It’s been an eventful start to the school year. It’s a cliché, but it’s had its up and downs for sure. I love what I do, and that hasn’t changed. I’m looking forward to the rest of the year, and I can’t wait to further the relationships with this group of kiddos. It’s a lot of hard work, but I’m up for it. There’s nothing else I’d rather do.

If you’re still reading this, you rock. Thank you for the support. :)

Back At The Starting Line

I'm sitting at home on the couch watching the Olympics. First of all, how addicting is watching the Olympics? Michael Phelps & Katie Ledecky have to have been dolphins in past life. Anyways. It's been an interesting day. My family and I attended a funeral today for my uncle's dad. Funerals always make you think about everything! There's a ton of things on my mind, but there are a few that really stick out to me.

My uncle spoke at the funeral, and it was a very emotional, heartfelt speech. What I loved about it was his final thought. He challenged each one of us listening to reach out to our loved ones and let them know how much we care about them. We don't when we won't be able to talk to our loved ones. Don't we all have someone that we could reach out to, but we always find a reason not to. There's a person in my head right now that I need to reach out to. I'm definitely going to accept that challenge, and I would like to extend that challenge to anybody reading this.

One of the other things pressing on my mind is the upcoming school year. How could it not be? The first official day back for teachers is in less than 48 hours. This is my last non school night of the summer! To be honest, I'm SO excited to get back to work. I'm ready, and I've really been ready for a couple of weeks now. I'm looking forward to this upcoming week. I get to be back with my team and working with them, and also with all the other wonderful ladies (& Coach Baker) that I work with. Then I also get to meet my knew group of kiddos. I was looking online at the kids that I got and they are all adorable. They're all adorable in the beginning though ;) I can't wait to meet them. I think that they have found out who their teacher will be, and I hope that they are excited to have me. I know that I'm excited to have them! I can't wait to get working with my homeroom kiddos and the whole 4th grade group.

Which brings me to my last thought. I'm thinking about my kids from last year. I miss them (they better come say hi to me on Tuesday!!) On Facebook, there's a group of all the parents for the class of 2024 which is the group of kids that I just had. I'm in the group, and I got a notification today of two 5th grade teachers requesting to join the group. The first thought that crossed my mind was, "I'm not their teacher anymore." I was like woah. As great as that first year was, it's on to the next one. Everybody is talking about who their kids teacher is, and I'm so excited for all of them to be 5th graders this year. It's such a great group of kids, and I was very blessed to have them as my first group of kids. What I really took away, though, was that I will NEVER forget that group of kids. They were my first group, and I've got a really good memory ;) They have left a lasting impact, and I will never forget them. I have our class picture framed on my book shelf at my apartment. I'm a bit of a nostalgic kinda guy. I love those kids. All of them not just my homeroom. I can only hope that I left a positive lasting impression. But you know what the best part is? I'm about to get a whole new group of kids to make an impact on. That excites me! That first group will always hold a special place in my heart, but I'm so lucky that I'm going to continue getting new kiddos each year to work with.

Summer is over, but that doesn't mean the fun times have to stop. I can't wait to get working, and I can't wait to make an impact on this next group of kiddos!

Strive For Greatness

It’s the fourth week of my first summer vacation as a teacher, and I have learned two things.

1. I definitely needed a break. Teachers deserve a break, and I am thoroughly enjoying the chance to sit back and relax a little.
2. I already miss it. I miss my kiddos, my team, my co-workers. I miss all of it.

I miss waking up at 6:04 everyday to get ready. I miss the Chick-fil-la drive thru to get my Dr. Pepper that helps get me ready for the day. I miss kiddos walking in and and saying hello. I miss working with the students and my team members. I miss it all. I’m crazy right? It hasn’t even been four weeks yet. How can I miss it so much? It’s simple really. I love what I do.

I haven’t posted in awhile, and I didn’t really know what I wanted to talk about. If you are choosing to read this post, I greatly appreciate it. There’s a good amount weighing on my mind, and I just want to talk about a little bit of it.

The thing that I miss the most are my students. Were they starting to drive me a little crazy there at the end? Yes. Was I starting to drive my students a little crazy at the end? Probably. It’s been a little over three weeks, and I haven’t seen any of them. To say I miss them is an understatement. They’re the reason I get up everyday and go to work. They’re the reason that I and teachers everywhere work so hard for! Our job is to shape young minds and help them grow and mature. In the summer, there’s no kids. I wake up everyday, and there’s nothing to do. Don’t get me wrong. I’m enjoying the break, but I feel like I’m lacking a sense of purpose. During the school year, I had 80+ kiddos depending on me, and in the summer, I don’t. It’s a weird feeling. I think about my students all the time, and I miss them. I only hope that some of them miss me too. That’s the impact we want to leave behind isn’t it?

An extremely close second on the list of things I miss: my team. I don’t know if you know, but I had a phenomenal team. We rocked. I may be biased, but you have to be your biggest fan. I couldn’t have asked for a better team for my first year of teaching. We worked so great together, and I loved everyday I got to spend with them. I just miss being at school with them and collaborating together. Those three ladies are incredible teachers, and they’re some of the best in the district. I would argue that with anybody!

Our team for next school year is going to look a little different. AB retired, and I hope that she is taking full advantage of being retired and enjoying every single day. She definitely deserves it, but it’s safe to say she will be severely missed. But.. I am incredibly excited for our new team member. I haven’t had too many interactions with her, but from I have had, she seems incredible too. I’m excited about what next year will bring for our team, and I can’t wait to start working with her. I’ve already heard so many great ideas from her, and she’s pretty hilarious as well. I think she’s going to be awesome!

I was asked a few days ago, “What is your favorite part of your job?” I thought about it for a second. I feel like a lot of people would say teaching the kids and watching them grasp that super hard concept, or watching them grow in the classroom and become better students. Not me. Now I love watching my students understand a new math concept (like long division). But, my favorite part of the job is what I like to call the “Mr. Trevor” part of my job. I LOVE all of the informal time that I get to spend with the kids. That could be a ton of things. It could be talking with the students in the hallway in between classes, when I grab the microphone at lunch, and they would all yell for me to start singing, interacting with them at recess, or seeing them at the talent show or Chili Cook Off. Any chance that I got to spend with my kiddos outside of the classroom that’s what I love. I love building relationships with all of my Ss. All of those opportunities are when the students can be themselves, and I just love getting to spend time with them. I still love helping my Ss become better learners, and I love teaching them math. But I love interacting with them when the pressures of learning standards aren’t at the forefront of their minds.

I just finished up a book study for the book Teach Like A Pirate. It’s all about ways that you can improve your classroom, and make it exciting for you, your students, and colleagues. I found the book to be very useful. One of the things that really stuck with me was to always strive for greatness in the classroom. Teaching requires a great passion and enthusiasm for working with kids in order to be successful, but it also takes an incredible amount of hard work. I can’t just wake up and wing it. I have to work at it, and I’ll always have to work at it. Last year when I started, I had nothing. I had no 4th grade math lessons, worksheets, or projects. You name it, and I didn’t have it. I had to come up with everything as the year went on. It was a lot of work. Now going into my second year, I have all of that stuff that I used last year. I could do the same thing I did last year, and it might be successful. But I’m already licking my chops to improve on what I did last year. I want to make it all better and more successful. I want to be a great teacher. I know I’m not the only one. I doubt any teacher does anything the same way year in and year out. But, I’m so excited and ready to get back to work to improve on what I did last year. There were things that I did last year that rocked, but there were also things that kind of bombed (stupid fractions…). I can’t wait to make it all better, but I can’t do it alone and without a little bit of hard work.

I’m excited at the prospect of what my second year of teaching will bring. I’m ready for a new group of kiddos to work with, and I hope they’re excited to work with me. My old kiddos better come back to visit because you know I’m going to be bugging them and their big bad 5th grade selves. I’m excited to work with a new team and to see everyone that I work with. We should all strive for greatness, and it’s okay to be a little crazy in the process.

If you’re still reading, you’re a trooper. I’m curious as to who reads this far, so if you are still reading… Tell me who your favorite superhero is in the comments. (If you want lol)

Mine is the Hulk.

Quickly Winding Down

Can you believe it? It went that fast? Where did it all go? It's Memorial Day, and I'm sitting here enjoying the day off. All of a sudden, it hits me. There are only two and half days left of my first year of teaching. 2 & 1/2. That's unbelievable to me. I can remember going to my first week of inservice like it was yesterday. I was so nervous and anxious to get started. Before I knew it, our first activity was to dress up like clowns because you know, we are the Greatest Show on Earth. All I'm thinking about at this point was the daunting task that is your first year of teaching. People always say that it's going to be the most stressful year, and that you're going to be so busy. I was worried about it, but I was ready to take it head on.

I'm sitting here now, and that daunting task called your first year of teaching is pretty much over. Ten months came and went like a flash. I'm seriously at a lost for words. Probably not the best for writing a blog post ;)

I just wanted to kind of quickly reflect on the year as a whole. I won't go into details right now because that sappy post is coming later after this week is over (I can be nostalgic). 

One of the things we always hear about in college is how busy your first year of teaching will be. I heard that it's going to be so stressful, you're barely have time for anything else, & it's going to be hard, etc. I don't really remember anyone telling me that it's going to be awesome. That being a first year teacher is great! I didn't hear that. I feel like the mindset going in is to "survive". I didn't want to just survive. I wanted to enjoy my first year, and I wanted to make an impact on kids! I think I've done that. 

I'm very fortunate and blessed with my situation. I work at an incredible school. I have outstanding team made up of 3 of the best teachers I'ver ever met. Seriously, I would put our 4th grade team up against 4th grade team in the district as being one of the best. That's in large part to the incredible ladies that I work with. I also have an amazing supporting cast: my team, principal, family, and my students. I got lucky. I really did. All the more reason to work my butt off to be the best teacher I could be. 

With all that being said, it's not like I didn't have stressful times this year. Of course I did. I was still a first year teacher. Not to sound cocky, but I don't think I was as stressed out and worried about everything as much as most first year teachers are. My mindset throughout the whole year was that I was going to put forth my best effort in everything that I did, and that I wasn't going to dwell on everything that went wrong. There's no sense in worrying about something that is out of your control. That was huge to me. 

It takes a lot of work to be a teacher. Way more than anyone can imagine. If you've never taught before, you really can't fully understand all of the stuff that we have to do. It's way more than just teaching kids math. That's not even half of it. Teaching is such an incredibly important profession. Everyone of us has teachers that have impacted his or her life. My first year of teaching is wrapping up quickly. All I can is that I'm so excited for what's to come! I hope that I made a lasting (positive) impact on these first group of kiddos. Bring on the next group! Well... bring them on after summer ;) 

Math Olympics: STAAR Review

This past week was my last opportunity to prepare my kiddos before they take the math STAAR. The week before was spent doing review packets and discussing topics that we had covered all year. It wasn't the most exciting week ever for the kiddos or myself. I love doing exciting things, and that review week wasn't that fun. So, I was determined to make this last week exciting while still being meaningful. There was no time to waste, and I wanted to take every opportunity I could to give my students a better chance at being successful on the test. After talking with my team and looking up some ideas, I decided that I was going to do Math Olympics. 

If I was going to do this, I was going to go all out. I was going to make this week as awesome as possible. I started by thinking of how I could make this into an awesome competition for the students to do. The students were put into teams of 4 or 5 at random using Flippity for each rotation. These were the teams that they were going to have all week. Each day there was going to be a different "event" for the teams to participate in. There would be a winner for each event, but also 2nd, 3rd, 4th, etc. They would be assigned a number of points depending on what place they achieved in each event. The goal was to keep track of each team's point total throughout the week. At the end of the week, the team with the most points would be the champions. I even went out and bought some cheap little plastic trophies at party city for like $10 to give to the champions.

The next step was to figure out what events there would be. I came up with 4 events.

1. Group Quizizz

2. Relay Race

3. Kahoot Trashketball

4. Tic Tac Toe

Of course there is still math involved in all of these events. I just had to figure out what I wanted to do with them. Some of you may notice that there's only 4 events, and 5 days in a week. Well, I thought that one day during the week should be dedicated to building my students test taking stamina. I'll get into how I did that later. I'm going to go into detail of how I did each event, and what I used to make the events happen. It may be long, but I promise it'll be worth the read. 

Monday:

The first thing I did was introduce the concept of the Math Olympics to each rotation. Immediately, I had their attention. The first job was to reveal their teams, and they had to come up with their team names. It's always funny to see what kind of names they come up with. My personal favorites were: Pink Fluffy Hulks (Hulk is my favorite super hero), Jamaican Turtles, Elite Denominators, & Math Minions (take a look at my classroom and you'll understand this one). All of the team names were unique. With their team, they would also design and create a flag to represent their teams. I started to notice that some of the team members who may not have been the most artistic were being left out. I adjusted on the fly, and decided to have them create a PicCollage on their iPad to represent their teams as well. They would submit the PicCollage, and I would create a QR code that linked to their PicCollage to put on their flag. This way the whole team was engaged, and everyone had a job. 

I gave them about 30 minutes to work on this before I started the first event. The first event of the week was a Group Quizizz. If you don't what Quizizz is, it's this online review game that is very similar to a Kahoot, but it's a self-paced review. It shows questions and answer choices, and it gives the players a certain amount of time to answer question. The quicker you answer and get it right the more points you get. My kiddos love Quizizz, and they were excited to do it together in their teams. I decided that the topics I wanted in the Quizizz were 2 Digit Multiplication, Long Division, and Conversions. The great thing about Quizizz is the creator has the ability to take questions from previously made ones, and insert them into his/her own. I did this, and I quickly had a 25 question review game made in minutes. 

The teams would use one iPad and work together to answer all of the questions. The teams were allowed to move anywhere they wanted. A lot of them moved into the hallway, corner of the room, or over to the rolly chairs. Basically anywhere they could hide the answers from another team. Once they began, they were required to pass the iPad after each question. This way each team member had the opportunity to answer a question. Of course, the team members could help each other with the questions. Overall, the teams did incredible. As the teacher it shows you the number of questions answered correct/incorrect. I have 4 class rotations, and each rotation, as a whole, answered above 90% of the questions correctly. Quizizz keeps score, and the results are shown at the end. There's really no extra work for the teacher when it comes to keeping score. The kids loved it! They were engaged, and this was only the beginning. 

Tuesday:

The kiddos came back the next day super anxious to find out what the next event was. Tuesday's event was... a Math Relay Race. I took the teams outside and we were going to have a relay race. Well, we didn't just go outside and run around. I decided that I was going to incorporate STAAR questions from the test two years ago that still aligned with our TEKS. This was a great way to let the kids get exposure to the type of questions they would see on the test. 

This is how the relay race worked. The teams lined up on one side of the parking lot. On the opposite side, there was a chair with a packet of the old STAAR questions. I would say go and the first person would take and run towards the chair. There job was to answer the question as fast as they could. Once they answered the question, they would run back and the next person would would run and do the same thing to the next question. The team that finished first earned 5 points. I emphasized, however, the importance of getting the questions correct. They just wanted to get the questions done with no regard for accuracy. I made the importance of getting the questions correct by saying that for each question right you earned 2 points. So, if a team finished first by missed over half the questions, they probably won't win the event. Once each team was finished, we went back inside and graded the packets. There's a little work when it comes to determining the winner for this event, but it wasn't too hard. 

I think this may have been one of my favorite events. They loved it, and it was great practice for them! Overall, they did very well on the questions. The teams loved going outside. I even added the aspect of having to do 5 jumping jacks before you could answer a question. It was a very healthy competition ;)

Wednesday:

This was the day that I decided to have my kiddos work on their test taking stamina. The state released only half of the STAAR from last year, and I decided that I would have my students work these questions in class. I preached the importance of using their test taking strategies. You know, the ones that apply to all tests for all subjects not just reading or math. They need to make those thinking tracks, prove answers right or wrong, read the questions more than once, etc. They're only 10 years old, and they've only taken one year of testing. They still need practice taking tests, and this was a great way to do it. There were only 23 questions, but I wanted them to get familiar with what the questions would look like. We took three benchmarks during the year made by our district, and the questions on that were incredibly wordy and very difficult. After taking the benchmarks and to much of their surprise, the kiddos were shocked to see that the STAAR questions were a little easier to tackle than the benchmark questions earlier in the year. 

I was incredibly impressed with the results of these practice questions. They did great! I scored each student's packet, so that they could see how they did. Like I said, I was very impressed and relieved to see these great results. I even had one student only miss three questions, and this was a kid who was in tutoring at the beginning of the year. I was so proud of him, and I emailed his mom to let her know what an amazing job he did on it.

Thursday:

This day was by far my favorite event of the week! It was awesome. We played Kahoot Trashketball. Even the name, to me, is exciting. I believe that most of us are familiar with Kahoot and how it works. Short version... It's an online review game where the question is projected on the screen and the kiddos have a certain amount of time to answer the question on their iPads or computers. Usually, they answer the questions and they are assigned points based on how fast they got it right. I decided to ignore the points in the Kahoot. I was going to use the Kahoot only as a means of projecting the question and getting quick responses. It also allows for me to see immediately who got the question right or wrong. The way the teams were going to earn points was through Trashketball. Trashketball is exactly what it sounds like. It's just like basketball, but the kids are shooting into a trash can instead. If the teams got the questions right, they earned the right to shoot for points. I used task cards, and uploaded them into the Kahoot and used them as the questions. The topics spanned the whole year's worth of information. 

I lined up the trash can in the front of the room, and I moved the desks out of the way to make a shooting lane. I used pieces of tape to mark on the ground the different ranges for points. For example, if the kiddo shot from behind the 3 point line and made it, he earned three points for his team. They could make up to 4 points on one basket. It was pretty far shot to make 4 points. Of course, they all tried to shoot from back there in the beginning, but after realizing they weren't scoring any points, they wisely moved up closer. 

It was awesome. They were so focused on answering the questions right because they wanted the chance to shoot the ball. The majority of the shots taken were from the 1 point range, but even then it was still hard to make the basket. It was so suspenseful each time a new person came up to shoot. Each shot was followed either by a groan or an extremely loud cheer. I'm sure my class was a little obnoxious this day. I had two roation winners that came down to the final shot. I had never seen one of my kiddos so focused and determined as he was taking that last shot. He nailed it by the way. The biggest cheer was when someone finally made the 4 point shot. He threw up the shot, it hit off the trash can, hit the whiteboard behind it, and bounced back into the trash can. The whole class erupted in cheers! It was hilariously awesome. The kids loved this game! I was very pleased with how this game went. 

Friday:

To finish off the week, I decided to do an outdoor Tic Tac Toe game. This was an interesting game to plan for. I used chalk and Lego pieces. The chalk was to make the tic tac toe board on the concrete, and the lego pieces were used as the "Xs and Os". The math aspect was word problems from our Envision books. There's an end of 4th grade assessment that I used from the book, and it had word problems that covered all of the topics from the year. 

The game worked like this. Each team had a packet of questions. Each page represented the questions for a single game. The first page was for game one. The objective is to answer the question in the packet. If they get the question right, a person from the team runs to the tic tac toe board drawn on the ground and lays down the Lego piece in the spot they choose. They run back, and the next person on the team does the next question. They do this until they get three in a row just like in normal tic tac toe. 

This game required "jobs". 

Writer: The team member is answering the question

Runner: Team member who runs and puts the Lego piece down

Checker: The team member who checks to see if the answer is right or wrong

Strategist: Team member who is figuring out where to put the Lego pieces to win the game. 

After each question, the team members are rotating the jobs between the team. The writer becomes the runner, the runner becomes the strategist, the strategist becomes the checker, and the checker becomes writer. The keep rotating until the game is won. 

The packet was designed for seven games. I would have two separate games going at one time. I would keep track of how many games each team had won. It was pretty intense to see them sprinting to play tic tac toe. There were a lot of upset teams when the opposite team would block them. It was fun, and I think the kiddos really enjoyed this game as well. 

This video is when one of the teams won their particular tic tac toe game. 

After this event was over, we went back into the classroom and I calculated who the overall champion would be. Each rotation was so anxious and excited to see who won. The winning teams earned tickets, ice cream passes, and a little plastic trophy. You would have thought that I gave them gold. It was cool to see how excited they got when they winning teams found out they won. I will also say get ready for some sad kiddos of the teams who don't win. We're all a little competitive on the inside. ;)

Overall, this was an incredible week. I loved it, and I really think that the kiddos loved it too. There is nothing more important than fostering a love of math in my students. Math is probably not the most loved subject in school. I love math, and my hope is that my love of math is rubbing off on them. When they finally leave my classroom for the last time, I hope they like math more than when they first came entered the room way back in august. Half of the battle, to me, is not giving up with math and having someone who can make you enjoy doing it. That's my job, and I love it. 

The STAAR test is here. It's happening, and there is nothing else that I can do to prepare them for it. They're ready. They may not think they are, but they are. I'm in their heads, and they'll hear me while they're taking their test with different strategies and tips that we have practiced with. They know all that they need to know, but now it's a matter of them doing what they're supposed to do. I'm sure that I'll be a nervous wreck tomorrow, but I know they'll be fine. I want them to do well and succeed more than anybody. All I can ask is that they do their best. I'm still going to love each of them once the day is over. This test doesn't define them or the year they had in my class. I know who they really are, and I know how far all of them have come. 

This is my first group of kiddos, and I have loved every minute of being their teacher. We have worked our butts off to learn and grow together. I have learned so much from working with them. I can't wait to see the results because I know they'll all rock it!

Go For Gold

Five more days of school. That's it. That's all we have. Except it's not...

There are five more school days until my kiddos take the STAAR test. The STAAR test is necessary, but it's not the only thing that we should be working towards. The thought just hit me that we have way more than five days of school left. The year doesn't end after the STAAR. The kids will still come back the next day, and we will get back to work until the real last day of school. There's so much emphasis (maybe not so much at our school) on STAAR that it can feel like all were working towards is the STAAR. What happens after that? We just sit around and play with our thumbs? No. We have to go back to work because there's unfinished business. 

The school year doesn't end after the STAAR test. Don't forget that. 

The real reason I wanted to blog today was because I'm so excited for what this upcoming week holds. There is five more days to review and prepare for the test. This past week the kiddos worked like crazy people. They worked so hard, and I'm very proud of them. Each day they got a new review packet over a different topic. I'm sure I wasn't there favorite person last week. Well this week will make it better. 

I wanted to have a less stressful week before the actual thing. I got the idea from a fellow teacher on my team because they're doing something very similar this week for ELA. She kind of rocks as a teacher. I don't have much of a following, but y'all should really check her out. With Love From Texas.

This week we are doing STAAR Olympics. I'm so excited for it. There's not much more that I love than competition, and this week is packed full of it. For each rotation, I'm putting the kids into teams of four. They're going to come up with their own team or country name. It can be anything that they want, and they will create a flag to represent their team. This will hopefully give them a sense of pride and excitement towards the objective. Each day they will be competing in a different event. I'll go into more details of the events on a different post. After each event, though, the teams will be rewarded points based on their place in each event. For example, first place will get 10 points. I'll keep track of all the points for the week's events, and I'll have a first place winner for each rotation. I even bought cheap little trophies to hand out to each winning group!

I'm pumped about this. We have events that utilize technology, going out side and running around, and even trash can basketball. I'm doing every thing I can to get them excited about math this week. However, we're still going to be reviewing the material. It's just going to be trapped inside a vortex of fun! I'm picking the topics that they still may need a little work on and encompassing them in different events. I think (and hope) that it's going to be awesome. If there's one thing I've learned this year, you have to adjust on the fly if something isn't working out, and this week will be no exception. I'm ready for the week to start, and I'm ready for the competition to begin. 

Frequency Tables: What's Your Favorite?

So, I know that I posted yesterday, but I really had an itch to post about what we did today in class. At first thought, I didn't want to post because it was a quick turnaround from the last one, but I got over that ;)

These past two days in class we have been discussing Frequency Tables. This is a topic that isn't exactly the toughest, but still important. Yesterday, we talked about what they were and we practiced making and reading some of them. The kiddos seemed to have a pretty good grasp on it. I didn't want to just spend one class period on it because I felt it deserved a little more importance. So, I came up with this idea.

If you have ever worked with kids, you know that truly care about what interests them. They get excited about things that they like, and if I ever incorporate some of their interests in class, then I've got them on the hook. I thought with teaching frequency tables, this would be a great opportunity to have the students utilize topics that were important to them. This may seem like an obvious idea, but I did it anyways :)

I started planning out a Create Your Own Frequency Table. Just off the title... boring. When you dig deeper, the kiddos' task is to come up with some sort of poll question. It can be any question that they wanted. The example that I gave all day was... Who is your favorite Avenger? (I love superhero stuff) Just fyi... mine is the Hulk!

The idea is for the kids to come up with their own question about something that interests them. I got the typical questions. What is your favorite pet? What is your favorite sport? What is your favorite subject? Some of my personal favorite questions: What is your favorite planet? Gemstone? DC hero? (superheroes rock). The kids also had to come up with five different answer choices for their classmates to choose from. This was to limit the range of answers they got. 

I know frequency tables are usually meant for determining the frequency of numbers and fractions, but I felt that they could be used in this way. We were still calculating the frequency, just using non-numerical things. The students would go around and get the answer to their poll question from each of their classmates. They would take the results that they got and determine the frequency. They had to fill out a frequency table. The table had 3 parts:
1. Answer Choices
2. Tally - to tally up the amount for each answer choice.
3. Frequency - the frequency that each answer got. 

So in reality, the kiddos were still calculating frequency, but they were so much more invested because it was something relevant to them. You should have seen how excited they got to go around and ask their question to everyone. Of course, I walked around and made sure they were asking the questions and filling out their tables correctly. 

They were, and I decided to take this one step further. I'm always hearing how important it is to write in math class. Right WA & AB? ;) Our kids all have blogs similar to this one, so I had them write a blog post. They had to answer these 5 questions:
1. What is your poll question and answer choices?
2. What was the most common response?
3. What was the least common response?
4. What was the difference between the most and least common response?
5. Personal thoughts. Were you surprised by anything? What did you think about this?


Of course, they had to write in complete sentences. I had one kid come up and show me his blog post, and it was riddled full of run on sentences. I asked him, "Would you turn this into Mrs. Burton?" He smirked, and replied, "No..." Good try ;) But the majority really got into to writing their blog posts. They wanted to add pictures of their choices, and highlight the most popular response. 

I thought the day went extremely well, and I left school feeling very positive about the day. The kiddos were excited and invested, and they just thought they were doing polls and asking their friends questions. But in reality, they were determining the frequency of the responses they just didn't know it. Math without being overwhelmed. I love it.