I'm going to FAIL this year!

The cliche goal setting post is upon me. You know the one, where we all become optimistic, SMART goal setting educators. Come June we look back and realize that we probably dropped the ball some time in October and then reset our goals around New Years' and dropped the ball again around February break and then said eh, there's always next year. Since I'm a whopping 7 days until school begins, let's take a look at my goals from last year as I remember them now and see how I did.

1. Flip my Civics course and have it ready (all lesson/all units) to go by day 1.

• Well, I flipped. Flipped out is more like it. There were times I felt I couldn't get it done, but I did. While I'm not sure you'd call what I do truly flipping (well, I suppose there is no "definition), I love how I'm teaching the course, I love the changes I'm making, and I love the feedback I get from the students.
• For this year I'd like to continue on this path, continue listening to the students, and add in more personal reflection (see #4 below). I think where I'm moving too is a place of problem and project based learning with writing infused into the course. I like it. 

2. Take 4 graduate courses (2 in the fall and 2 in the spring).

• Why do I always do this to myself? I took 2 in the fall. Stopped going to the second (I had already taken the course topic twice before) class after the midterm. Spring I only took one.
• This year I'm again attempting 4, but with a better plan. Since I'm doing my practicum in the fall, I'm only "teaching" 3 classes (instead of 6) and then Guidance 9 on Tuesdays and Thursdays so fall won't be trying, but there's always the spring!

3. Replan as I go my Honors World History course to include more discussion, more groups, more projects, and try a flipped lesson/unit in the spring.

• Ummm what was I thinking? With teaching 6 classes, taking 4 graduate courses, and already replanning a course, what made me think I could replan a second course? Seriously, optimism in the summer is more like delusion!

4. Continue blogging throughout the year.

• See #3 above! Although I wish I had kept blogging. I think it would have helped to flesh out ideas I had and implement new ones. But most of all just served as a sounding board for myself, even if I never actually posted it!

5. Stay engaged with like minded individuals online.

• Like #4 above, it would have helped with the "self-care" aspect I always forget about!

I'm sure there were more, but this is what I can think of and BOY DID I FAIL! My umbrella goal for this year is simple I want to FAIL. Yes I am setting out to intentionally FAIL. I know sounds negative and quite the opposite of what I should be doing, but hear me out!

Step 1 in FAIL is FOCUSING. 

• I need to focus on what is important. I need to take time and assess what needs to be done now, what can wait to be done, and what can just plain never be done!

Step 2 in FAIL is APPRECIATE 

• I need to learn to appreciate what I have. That means my support systems around me, my family, my colleagues, my friends, my students, and my PLN!

Step 3 in FAIL is INTERESTS

• I can no longer afford to say yes to everything that everyone asks me to do. I must learn to cull my interests to those that truly excite me and that I have a passion for. Rather than wanting to be helpful to everyone in every situation, I can be most useful to people when my skill set and interests match up.

Step 4 in FAIL is LAUGHTER

• Laughter is the best medicine of all. I want to laugh more, I want to laugher harder, and I want to laugh wholeheartedly this year. I want to enjoy life, after all you're only 29.1 once right!

So who else wants to FAIL with me this year?

So Flippin' Excited!

I was nervous, well still am nervous. Monday night I couldn't sleep, Tuesday I felt like I had a caffeine drip in my veins, Flip Class was getting the best of me - I couldn't wait to show off my baby. Boy have I learned a few things in just two days. Here are my reflections!

1. This generation of kids, and I'll have you know I am NOT that far removed from them, while they have been around technology all their lives are NOT technologically intelligent by default. I realized that while it was safe to assume a few things, most things would have to be taught. Yes they know what YouTube is, yes they know what Google is, yes they can access our LMS. Have they ever really used any of these things (other than the LMS) for educational purposes, no. So to teach them how to use them along these lines was quite the task. In two days, I hope I have scratched the service.

2. Over the summer I lovingly referred to my new Civics class (the syllabus, the flipped model, the ideas, thoughts etc.) as my baby. So I thought it no big deal to do this in my class. The conversation went something like this.

• Ms. P: So this class is my baby, I have spent many hours nurturing it, and I love it. You don't have to love it back, but you certainly cannot call it ugly! And I'd love whatever feedback, positive and negative, you can give me.
• Student: YOU HAD A BABY, but you weren't fat in June?
• CLASS STARTS THE BIGGEST BELLY LAUGH EVER - INCLUDING MYSELF
• Ms. P: No, student, I did not have a baby over the summer. I was making a comparison between a parent raising a baby and me creating this class. Where I have created it and am now setting it free into the world to see how others will interact and react to it.
• Student: Oh, that does make more sense.

Let me tell you - if a rumor got out that I did have a baby (AND I DIDN'T!) there would be some interesting conversations between me and the powers that be!

3. Students are very willing to give feedback and are great at it all you have to do is ask. I'm curious as to why they haven't before. Perhaps it's because of the typical student teacher relationship and there is some sort of boundary, or if they just never thought to - but I intend to do it much more often this year!

4. Their first flipped assignment is due by tomorrow at 7am - and as of right now I have 40/68 responses - with 3 emails asking for help and those 3 submitted. So tomorrow we'll recap with what to do. I spent today going back over what we did yesterday in terms of homework expectations and how to do it. I pretended I was again a 15 year old doing this homework and had them guide me through it - so I took wrong turns (clicks) and became side tracked. To them it was amusing but got the point across. Again it goes back to this idea of asking for feedback - a student suggested that I have them walk me through the process to see if they could remember. Sometimes my students are so smart!

Overall, I'm excited to see what the rest of the week brings - how have your first weeks been going?

First Unit

I get frustrated a lot when planning - and last week I hit a wall! I was attempting to redesign and realign my syllabus using UBD (Understanding by Design) - that was a mistake! Not the theory, but how I was trying to do it. I took the weekend off of everything Flipped, UBD, school etc., and boy did that make the difference!

Monday afternoon after watching my mindless TV (DOOL if you were curious!) I had the stroke of genius. I wasn't looking to redesign the nuts and bolts of my units, so let me redesign the assessments for the units coming from a PBL (Project Based Learning) viewpoint. From there I can flesh out the standards which will lead me to the EUs (Enduring Understandings) and EQs (Essential Questions). As soon as I rephrased my problem, it made total sense and I was IN THE ZONE!

I have since planned out the first unit that allows students to choose their assessment, depending if they want to work individually or in a group setting. Next on the agenda is writing the scripts for the videos, and writing out the projects in details, creating the rubrics, and some daily discussion points for guidance. After this unit is done I think I'm going to feel like I'm in a better place.

Next on the docket - intro videos for parents/students to Flipping/technology etc., and start reading my new World History text. I thought it was a good idea to change my Honors text for this coming year while creating pretty much a brand new Civics class. What am I thinking?

Coming Out

For the past 6 months or so I've been toying with the idea of flipping. Trolling the internet for articles, how-to's, and blogs of those who have gone before. Shamelessly asking questions such as "just how do you make the video, no like step by step." I'm not kidding, I asked someone this (if it was you, I'm sorry!). I think I've come a long way since then! 

In the last quarter of the year I successfully flipped a unit, although it was more Flipped 001 than Flipped 101. I've shared my thoughts, successes, and failures with a few trusted colleagues who will back me up no matter what and give me the encouragement and kick in the rear when needed but I hadn't shared it with my sister, a fellow teacher...until today!

I have been extremely nervous to tell her what I was planning on doing. You see, I am the younger sister and have followed her wherever I go, since, well birth! I was nervous that she might not "get it", understand why I was doing it, or think that I had finally jumped into the deep end. I'm sure my family has a pool going for when this actually does happen!

Thankfully she was fully supportive and was truly interested in knowing just what I was going to do and how I was going to do it. When I started to speak aloud about my ideas they came flooding out and I realized I am further along in my planning than I thought - what a relief! I also realized just how much this is backed up by theory to make the "big guys" happy.

Having the short conversation with her this afternoon gave me renewed hope that this will work, the kids will enjoy it, and the outcomes will be there. My hard work will pay off and I'm going to have a lot of fun doing it! So thanks for the encouragement!

This is the most recent photo I could find of us (without my niece)! Taken April 2008 when we went to San Diego together - before she had my niece and during my first year of teaching!

What's in a name?

It took me a while to create a title for this blog. For one, I don't consider myself creative and once I get it in my head that I'm not creative I get a block - hence it taking me an hour (yes, an hour) to come up with the title of my blog. Other titles in the running:

• Technological Diffusion
• Bursting through the Dark Ages (hey I'm a Social Studies teacher and LOVE the Middle Ages!)
• Crazed Flipper 

You get the idea right? I was running on E! 

A bit about me - I'm a 28 year old Social Studies teacher (Civics and Ancient World history) teaching in a private school in CT. 2012-2013 will be my 6th year teaching and I love every crazy, exciting, hair pulling, tear jerking, ah-ha, drama filled moment of it! I am currently enrolled in a program for School Counseling and will (hopefully) be done with that in December of 2014.

This year I received a grant from the Stanton Foundation in NYC to increase technology in my  Civics classroom and so I have set about to completely reform and revamp my Civics curriculum. I am flipping my classroom (read about flipping here) as well as implementing Project Based Learning. I tried it out with my absolute last unit in Civics last year (I know I know silly me) and surprisingly it went over well!

I am very excited to continue this into the new school year and am working on it feverishly this summer. It's been fun and amazing to start connecting with other educators and create my PLN on Twitter, now I'm starting to branch out on the Blogosphere! So please bear with me as I figure out how this works!