So Sweet

Today I introduced the Malcolm X remix assignment that I designed after doing the Mozilla Webmaker training at NWPs Annual Meeting last week. I was nervous about it because I kept it open ended so my students will have buy in to make it a relevant project for themselves. 

At the end of class a girl walked up to me and said, "did you think of this?" I told her I did. She winked at me and said,"Well, you did a good job on hit his one." 

It made my day! Thanks Mozilla and Laura Hilliger

Sunday Blues

Today is my first day back at work since attending the National Writing Project Annual Meeting and NCTE in Boston. I had so much energy and excitement about the people I was surrounded with and who I met and talked with about the things that really matter in our profession of teaching kids how to read and write. I have felt energized and excited since attending.

That is why I could not figure out last night why I had the Sunday blues so badly. It felt like a heavy load was held over me, the thought of work made me feel tired - like I just couldn't move on. I went to the grocery store and couldn't even motivate for what to cook for the week.

On my drive home the orange-red sunset over the mountains near my house shook me loose. I began to think to myself, "Self, you love your job. You love what you do. This is what you have chosen. This is your place. What's your problem?" And I was right, I do love what I do. I love to see my students learn and ponder and read and write. It's a fun job.

Last week Kathy Collins asked what is coming between me and my students when I confer. Well...now I am asking what is coming between me and my students enjoying the creation of learning. Why does it have to feel like drudgery? Why can't we put the fun back in learning? Who says it has to be a slog?

#nerdlution

Yes, I'm in. I want to commit to doing something for the next 50 days, including while I'm on my trip to Europe. I will commit to writing/posting SOMETHING on my blog every day. Now, I must use a caveat here though. While I'm in Europe, I may not have access to wifi each day, but I will post my writings when I can.

I'm excited for this because although I don't do it like I should, writing helps keep me grounded. I plan to write mostly about the new remix project my students are about to embark on. I've never done anything like this. Can't wait to jump in...

Hack, Remix, and Play

Hacking to most people conjures images of people like Andrew Snowden, people working behind closed doors and in secret to find out secrets, or worse yet, to destroy something another has made. And while this is one notion of hacking, there is another that I learned about last week.

This other notion of hacking involves the idea that we can take anything that has been already formulated and change it in order to remix it into something else, either more useful or simply more artistic. There is a whole culture forming softeware and encouraging people to hack, to remix, and to play. 

What's exciting about this maker movement is how energizing it can be to take something that's already wonderful and change it to make it useful for a different user or for a different purpose. 

I was introduced to the Mozilla maker apps this week and I had a blast! What was so fun for me is that I not only got to remix a web site, but I got to glimpse inside some wsites to see just How they are made. Using Mozilla's X Ray Goggles allowed me to glimpse at the blocks that piece websites together, while allowing capabilities to change the site so it doesn't ruin the site. Popcorn Maker allowed me to hack into a site and remix it, teaching me to change it using the same coding language website writers use. It was exhilarating.

It felt like true writing and creativity. It helped me take a look at the website design for how it is put together both technically, but also from an author's craft standpoint. This is the piece that feels exciting for my classroom. It seems a great way to use these tools that allow a glimpse at the coding of pages while also crafting a mode of writing to pull boys into the craft. 

I have struggled to bring boys wh oh I game especially into the craft of writing. I am hoping to take this new knowledge to leverage it for those boys in particular. I am going to hack and remix and play to breathe new life into my school year.

Malcolm X and Questlove Memes

I made these using Webmaker Thimble

Life in my Writing Classrom: A Visual

Stop yelling...will you?

It always ends the same. "Mom, it's hard for me to listen to you when you're squawking and yelling at me." Every argument I have with my daughter is the same: I ask her to do something, sometimes there's an eyeroll, I get annoyed because I don't feel like she's taking whatever I ask her to do seriously, then I begin with the lecture. It usually starts something like, "I'm feeling frustrated..." and then we progress from there. I end the argument with, "I'm not yelling; I am talking to you with hopes that something will change."

"But, mom, you ARE yelling."

And...this is the point where we agree to disagree.

But the truth is that I never see myself as yelling. I see myself as lecturing, yes, but yelling? Not so much.

I teach students who struggle with writing and every Friday I go to another teacher's room to do team building. We play games and then we talk about what happened during the game. Man, was I schooled last week.

One of the students pointed out that his team was successful because no one was yelling, people were giving directions, but not yelling. So I asked him the difference. This began a discussion about the way kids view yelling.

Apparently, and I did not know this, yelling is not necessarily just a raising of the voice any more. You see, when I was growing up, yelling was simply raising one's voice. This is no longer the case. Yelling now seems to be telling a person to do something where the person being told does not play a part in the decision-making process. They are simply told to do whatever it is.

Whereas, giving directions implies all of the stakeholders are involved in the decision-making process...or, at least, they feel like they are involved in the process.

This realization I made with this group of students last week has opened my eyes. It has helped me understand my daughter. It has helped me think of her words very differently. All because I took the time to listen.