I just got home from the QA Auction. What a night. I know that people often talk about the quality of a school being linked to leadership and teachers, and that's true to some extent. But tonight I saw a whole lot of amazing people come together to support and sustain what we do at QAE. A few of us were teachers, but the vast majority were parents, families, and friends. We couldn't even begin to do what we do without those people. They certainly contribute financially. But more importantly, they care, they're involved, and they show their kids that a school is worth investing time and effort. They create the environment that predicates success. Thank you to those incredible parents.

I am excellent because I am happy most of the time. I think a lot of things are interesting and fun. Also, I am excellent because my days are filled with amazing, funny, intelligent kids.

In this note:

1. Veterans Day

2. Picture retake

3. Conferences

4. iPod Touches

5. Coebotics event

6. Gardening this weekend

1. Veteran’s Day: This Friday is Veterans Day and school is closed for the day. We will have an afternoon assembly on Thursday to honor our Veterans. Tonight, the kids will bring home paper stars on which they will write the names of family members who are veterans. Bring the stars back by Thursday, and they’ll be mounted on a bulletin board in the cafeteria.

2. Picture retake: Picture retake (for kids who were absent or for those who need to have a do-over) will be Friday, November 18.

3. Conferences: If you have not signed up for a conference, or if you need to change your conference time, you can find a conference link on the front page of my website. Just find an open conference time and sign up. If you are changing a conference time, please be sure to take your name off your original spot to free it up for other parents.

A note about conferences: I would like the student to be present when we have our conference. Ultimately, our conversation will center around the student’s work and progress in class, and I think it’s important that he or she take part in that conversation. If you have issues you’d like to talk about in private without your child, please let me know before hand. We’ll be able to restructure the conference to accommodate your request.

Conferences are great (I’d rather have conferences every term than report cards), but they go very fast. We have only 20 minutes in which to cover everything, and the time really flies by.  In some instances, I may need to cut a conversation short at our scheduled end time to be ready for the next conference. 

4. iPod Touches: As many of you know, due to the generosity of our parent community we now have a full classroom set of iPod touches. I’m working with Matt Johnson (network analyst) and Gary Cranston (instructional technologist) to get them set up and ready for student use. We are not going to turn them over to kids until we are comfortable with our systems – permissions, syncing/charging protocol, expectations and guidelines for kid use, etc. This may happen by the end of this week, but it’s likely to be next week before the kids get them in hand. 

One thing I need to be emphasize: these are school tools, just like their student reference books, library books, the Flip Cameras, or the computers in the lab. We’ll have some clear guidelines in place for their use. There’s a bit of a hierarchy of use, with creation, communication, and information acquisition at the top. Games, especially those we deem as having little or no academic value, are very low priority.

There will be a point at which the iPods will be able to come home with the kids, but there will almost always be a specific task assigned for their use. Also, I won’t send them home until I have an iPod guideline form from each student, signed by the student and parent. 

Finally, I’m interested to hear what you think. If you have any ideas about projects, questions about use, or input about handheld technology in the classroom, please share your thoughts. (This e-mail will be posted on my blog, so you’re welcome to comment below.)  The use of handheld devices is on a rapid rise in elementary education. Many people rave about them, while others rage. At this point, hard evidence about their effect in the classroom is negligible. I’m interested in documenting their use and effect, both anecdotally and statistically. If anyone is generating research on the use of handheld technology in the elementary classroom, it should be Queen Anne Elementary.

5. Coebotics: Coe School is presenting a very cool event this coming weekend. The Coe Robotics Festival will be held on Saturday, November 12, from 9AM until 2:30. See the attached flier for details.

6. On Sunday (Nov. 13), I’ll be working in our school garden – I’d love to have some help from students. We have a section set aside for 5th grade use that we’ll be planting in the spring. On Sunday, I’ll be weeding the plot and planting a cover crop for the winter.  How long it takes will depend on how much help I have, but I’ll start the work at 10:30AM.  Let me know if you or your kids are interested in joining me.

That’s all for now –

Cheers,

Joe

Wow. I don't even know where to begin. I asked the kids to create projects around Explorer Stories, and they exceeded my highest expectations.  They worked hard all week, staying on task (for the most part) despite being scattered throughout two widely separated buildings. They worked well together (for the most part) to develop and present collaborative projects. They had the confidence to put them on display in front of our school and community. And their confidence is well-founded. Their projects are fantastic. You can see and hear them on our "projects" page, here.

(I'll post video of the theatrical performance by Laila, Kiah, Cosimo, Elena, Michael, and Bethanne after they perform the full piece at Islandwood next week.)

Your comments are welcome...

Charlie Chaplin? X-Minus One? It's all about Explorer narratives. In class, we've been discussing Explorers, mostly in the area of literature. Our first immersive project will be to take what we've learned about explorers and turn them into our own narratives. But there's a catch... the narrative has to take a form that I dictate, and we have only one week to finish. 

The Setup: In class, we talked about what happens in each stage of an Explorer story, and kids recognized that there are some common patterns to narrative development. In the beginning, we meet characters, learn about the setting, and something happens to launch the story. In the middle, the characters take their journey, meet with conflict, meet companions, and begin to fulfill their exploration. In the end, conflicts are resolved, the exploration comes to a close, and the characters reflect on what they've seen, done, and learned.  


The Action: Over the course of one week, the kids will work in pairs, small groups, or solo to write an Explorer Story. This has to have a beginning (The Set-Up), a middle (The Action), and an end (The Payoff). As they develop their stories, the kids need to consider what we've already learned about explorer characters and stories and work those elements into their narratives. 

Creating the story is just one step. The bulk of our week will be spent creating the story in one of several ways. One group will create a silent movie. Another will produce a radio show.  Other options are: illustrated blog/journal, play/musical, two-minute movie, still-photo-only movie, monologue, or children's book, or stop-motion animation. 

The Payoff: At the end of the week, we should have 5 - 9 different projects, all which reflect different ways to tell a story. We will be able to share these online through this website, and will look for opportunities to share with our school, our families, and our community.

Today in math, my students signed in to Khan Academy for the first time. Khan Academy (khanacademy.org) is an online collection of educational videos about a broad array of subjects. Each video is a short (usually around 10 minutes) lesson on a single topic, like photosynthesis, or how treasuries work, or "valence electrons" (which I know nothing about... Maybe I'll watch the video), etc. If you've never seen the site, I encourage you to poke around on it a bit. It's fascinating, and the brief lessons are very well done and informative.

The bulk of the material on the site, and the reason we're using it, is about math. Salman Khan (the founder and lecturer for all the videos) delivers math mini-lessons on everything from basic addition and number lines to college calculus.

The videos alone are a goldmine of information. And to make it even better, a student can log in and "practice" a broad array of mathematical concepts. The practice is self-directed (in keeping with one of Queen Anne Elementary's Five Pillars: We are self-directed learners). They can attempt any concept, but the goal is to focus on their own needs, without being distracted by too simple or too complex topics. 

The practice sessions are displayed as a part of a "knowledge map" that shows a branching system of connected and supporting topics.  The student logs in, finds the topic on the map that she wants to practice, and clicks it. She then is offered a series of problems. If she answers 10 questions in a row correctly, she is considered "proficient" in that topic. 

As she is working, she has the option to watch a video explaining the process she's working on. Watching a video doesn't reset her "streak count" (the number of correct answers in a row), but can provide excellent insight into how to approach the problems. She can also click a "hint" button. This button reveals a hint that is directly related to the problem she's working on. She can take further hints if she chooses. Taking a hint does reset the streak count back to zero. Students earn "energy points" for practicing, and can earn various medals for different achievements.

Furthermore, I can track each student's progress, and the data that I see can be very specific. I can see what time she practices, what topic she practiced, how long it took her to answer all of the questions, how long it took to answer each individual questions, what videos she watched and when, what incorrect answers she's given, and more. 

Using this information, I can tailor a minilesson for a student or group of students, I can see where a student is struggling or excelling, I can assign specific topics or videos to watch, and I can give kids the proper recognition for medals earned.


Here are a couple of recent articles on Khan Academy:
Wired Magazine, August 2011: How Khan Academy is Changing the Rules of Education
CNN Money, August 2010: Bill Gates' Favorite Teacher
And here's a TED talk by Salman Khan from March, 2011: Let's Use Video to Reinvent Education

Instructions for logging in to Khan Academy:

site: www.khanacademy.org

Login: go to the "Google" login.

Student login names are their first name and last initial, followed by "@queenanneelementary.org." So someone named Tony Iommi would be "tonyi@queenanneelementary.org."

Except for 3-letter names, Passwords are "12" followed by the student's first name only, then "34." So Tony's password would be "12tony34."

For 3-letter names, add "345" after the name. So someone named Eve would have the password "12eve345."


I'm excited to see where this will take us. I want it to be a valuable supplement to our math curriculum, not a replacement.  I'm happy to hear your feedback about it, positive or negative. 


Cheers,
Joe Bailey-Fogarty
Queen Anne Elementary
5th Grade Teacher
cell: 206-856-6469
Room 305 phone: 252-2508

I just wanted to post a couple of articles I've found interesting recently.  Most of the articles I tend to get interested in have to do with technology in education, re-examinations of standard practice, and articles about cognitive processing apropos of learning.

This first one is a brief one from British blog. It's about the importance of teaching computer programming to younger kids (roughly 5th graders). Programming reinforces logical and "algorithmic" thinking. It also gives some resources for kid-friendly programming languages. One of these is "Scratch," a program developed at M.I.T. which I've used with kids at school and in my summer program. I wonder if I should increase the kids' exposure to things like Scratch? Given the amount of time I have to deliver all the other subjects, it's hard to see where I'd put it. But I'd find it very rewarding, and I think the kids would too.

Here's the article: Teach Our Kids to Code

The second one is from the New York Times this past Saturday. It's an opinion piece that looks at homework, and the difference between "quantity" homework and "quality" homework. It also has some interesting things to say about "spaced repetition" and a learning technique called "retrieval practice."  The Trouble with Homework.

Finally, another NY Times piece, this one from about a week ago. In a Classroom of the Future, Stagnant Scores examines the achievement scores of a school that has adopted a heavy technology integration model. It's a longer article, but worth the read. It brings up some very interesting questions that ra

    I quite enjoyed today. Not only did we discuss possible furniture arrangements, finish a math pre-assessment, and take some time to sing a collective song on the playground about the various strange animals each student would bring to the class, we also had a great discussion about "explorers." In small groups, then as a whole class, we brainstormed ideas to fit these starters:

Explorers are...
An explorer is...
An explorer does..
... is an explorer.

While these groups were working, one group assembled a list of things that an explorer can explore.  When we came back together, this group stood up and read their list to the class like some strange poem. It was wonderful. Here's what they came up with (imagine this being spoken one word at a time by one child after another, standing in a line at the front of the room):

"An explorer can explore video games, people, the internet, being born, a big shoe, America, the top of a mountain, Switzerland, earwax, a computer, an ice cave, Finn, electricity, Zev's tongue, bearcat-dog-lion, sheet of music, anything, fruit, shampoo, the woods, schools/buildings, television, ideas, a termite, animals, a cup, music, a keyboard, plastic."

Some ideas the other groups came up with ("an explorer is..." or "...is an explorer"):

Inventors are explorers.
Mathematicians are explorers.
Amerigo Vespucci was an explorer.
An explorer is someone who discovers new places and new things.
Louis Armstrong and Columbus were explorers.
Babies are explorers.
An astronaut is an explorer.
Daniel Boone was an explorer.
Ants are explorers.
An explorer is someone who explores things.
An explorer is someone who discovers.
Clark was an explorer.
A coroner is someone who explores dead bodies.
Animals are explorers.
Indiana Jones is an explorer.
Explorers can be anything.
An Explorer is anyone.


We then discussed how we all might be explorers, how you can explore musically, you can explore experiences, you can explore ideas. We decided an explorer is someone who doesn't know something, but who wants to know it. An explorer can explore something that is new to him or her, even if someone else has already been there. (In fact, that's quite useful if you have someone who knows something about where you're going - sometimes we need a guide.)

As you might guess, we're moving into a thematic unit around the idea of "explorers." We'll look at explorers in books, in history, in science, and in our own classroom. Laying this groundwork today was a blast.

I'm looking forward to the exploration....

Cheers,
Joe

Hello all,

The first day went swimmingly well, thank you to all who worked hard to get the kids here, helped them throughout the day, and got them home safely.


In this e-mail:
1. Deskless room
2. Islandwood
3. Morning schedule (starting tomorrow!)

1. Deskless room.
As I'm sure you've heard already - we're currently without desks. This is in part due to circumstances, and a larger part due to experimenting with different classroom models. In short - As we were planning for furniture, the SPS surplus warehouse was fairly well picked over. We were offered some surplus furniture that would not have been a good fit for our class nor how I teach. Single desks with connected chairs are not ideal. So we thought about our options, and we decided to try starting the year without desks.

Part of the thought process was that we wanted to put the question to the kids.  What does it take to make a comfortable, desirable classroom that still allows us to do all the work we need to do?  These kids have been in school for many years. They know what it takes to do school work, read, write, work in groups, etc. Is it possible that they might have some good ideas about how to set up a room - either with or without furniture?

We're going to go through a period of excitement in which the discomfort might be overshadowed. We don't have long before the shortcomings of a furnitureless classroom become apparent. But tomorrow we begin the process in earnest of discussing what we need in this room to make it an effective classroom. We may end up coming down on the side of tables and chairs, or desks, or easy chairs and hammocks, or a couple of sofas and bean bag chairs...who knows? In our discussions and planning, I will emphasize that any idea they come up with must be followed by a reasonable examination of its merits. We're not going to hang a rope swing in the class just because someone wants to try it out. 

Once we decide what we need, we have to figure out how to get it. We will use every resource at our disposal, from district, PTSA, or building funding, to grant writing, asking for donations, or building it ourselves. We will likely ask some of you for input on this (how are your sofa building skills?..), or we will ask you to use connections you have outside of school to help us outfit our classroom in an innovative, effective, student-centered, teacher guided, comfortable way.

2. Islandwood
Our class is scheduled to attend Islandwood (www.islandwood.org) from October 3 through October 6. That is practically tomorrow. I need to connect with whatever parent offered to head up (or pitch in on) Islandwood planning and fundraising. We need to meet very soon - perhaps even tomorrow immediately after school or Friday.

One thing I would like to have is a list of parents who are interested in chaperoning this multi-day, very active field trip.  Please respond to me if you are interested in joining us for the whole trip, including riding the bus to and from Islandwood. We will make a list of chaperones and alternates. Please be aware that we have a small fifth-grade cohort, and will likely not be able to include everyone who volunteers.

3. Morning schedule - starting tomorrow.
In the mornings, I will be here by 8:30AM. You are welcome to bring your kids early, but they have to be up in my room, working or reading quietly. I'll be very busy with meetings, planning, grading, filing, etc., and won't be able to ask more than once if a student is being distracting or out of line. If that does happen more than once, I'll have to ask that student not to come in early. 

Playground supervision begins at 9:00, so you are welcome to drop your child off any time after that.

We will be starting every day with P.E. Tomorrow, I'll gather students on the front porch of the Treehouse and walk them over to the gym.  Starting Friday, they will need to go directly to the gym at the start of the day.

Cheers,
Joe Bailey-Fogarty