Improving Instructional Practices

50 + Instructional Strategies

Danielson’s Domain 1e Designing coherent instruction, 3c Engaging students in learning

Some days it can be difficult to think of teaching strategies that will excite and engage your students in learning.  Below is a graphic organizer of more than fifty strategies that you can print out and keep handy when planning lessons.  

Want to access the site and learn more?  Just click the link below

http://www.teachthought.com/teaching/50-teaching-strategies-to-jumpstart-your-teacher-brain/

PMS News & Notes 4/26/15

As we finish the last full week of April, it's hard to believe we are here.  As we approach June, the value that we place on consistent, focused instruction remains a key piece to a successful 4th Quarter. Below are some notes and dates for our school...

Badger Exam Testing
7th Grade finished up testing this week, and at the time of this writing are almost complete.  This week went even smoother than last, and we look for a solid week of 6th grade testing next week to finish up this year's state testing.  Thank you to each of you in your flexibility and willingness for this to be a success.

Spring is Here...
As the weather gets nicer, I appreciate the continued commitment and focus on our goals. Very soon, we will be gathering our student data, analyzing growth toward both our SLO and our Vision 2020 goals. Our focus must remain constant using our "capital" (classroom minutes), getting the most out of each minute right up till the end of the year.

Next Year Schedule Information
There will be a couple of changes to next year's schedule and course offerings.  The Curriculum Committee approved the changes, and the Board will review them at Monday's meeting.  Some of the schedule process can be difficult to figure out without an explanation, so I hesitate to write about it, but I will make an attempt.  If you have any questions, please let me know.

-All Core classes in all grades will meet for roughly 90 minutes blocks
-We will offer 4 sections of each Core class in Grades 6 and 7 (we will be hiring another MS teacher to be able to do this)
-Science and Social Studies will meet every day for a semester, instead of every day for a year
-We will offer a Coding course taught by Mr. Jennings in the 6th grade rotation instead of I-Tech, as we are increasing our Tech offerings at the HS
-We will offer a STEM 8th grade elective

PUMA Pride Committee
Our Puma Pride Committee met this past Thursday and we added a couple of members.  Thank you to Mr. Kallungi and Ms. Deans for joining the crew.  Committee members will be seeking your input about the Puma Pride rubric, as we look to make this an even more useful tool.  We also are looking at the culture of our building, and determining areas for growth. The next meeting will be on Thursday, May 21st.

Student of the Month Breakfast
The next Student of the Month Breakfast will be on Thursday, May 14. This will be the final breakfast of the year.

Next Staff Meeting
Our next staff meeting will be on Wednesday, 5/6/15 starting at 2:50 in Room 201.  We will continue our conversation from the last staff meeting.  Click HERE to review the work from the "Behavior Activity". I am planning a "Staff Share" session again.  Please let me know if there is a practice, activity or lesson that you know is very effective at getting students to achieve at high levels.

Twitter Find of the Week

Dan Rockwell ‏@Leadershipfreak  20m20 minutes ago

I'd rather fail in pursuit of extraordinary than succeed pursuing average. #leadership

Duty Next Week

Morning - Rogness, Vian

Bus - Anderson

Data

Number of "Needs Improvement" scores on Puma Pride Report Cards

8th Grade

1st Quarter - 47

2nd Quarter - 36

3rd Quarter - 22

7th Grade

1st Quarter - 9

2nd Quarter - 5

3rd Quarter - 18

6th Grade

1st Quarter - 2

2nd Quarter - 9

3rd Quarter - 3

PMS News & Notes 4/17/15

Beautiful weather was the highlight of the week, and Week 1 of Badger Exam testing is in the books as well! Check out below for some news from the past week, and things to come.

Badger Exam
The 8th Graders kicked off Badger Exam testing this week.  The testing process was pretty smooth, and we look forward to utilizing a couple of minor lessons learned to run an even more efficient testing session for our 7th and 6th graders. We will start 7th grade testing on Tuesday, 4/21.  Our testing session will run from 7:35 to about 9:05.  6th graders will start on Tuesday, 4/28.

Tornado Drill
After the Tornado Drill on Thursday afternoon, I'm confident that we are ready if the need arises.  All classes were able to get to their locations in a very efficient manner.  Thank you for guiding our students.

Student of the Month Breakfast
The next Student of the Month Breakfast will be on Thursday, May 14. It would be helpful to have the names of the students recommended to the office by Friday, May 1.  This will be the final breakfast of the year.

Next Staff Meeting
Our next staff meeting will be on Wednesday, 5/6/15 starting at 2:50 in Room 201.  We will continue our conversation from the last staff meeting.  Click HERE to review the work from the "Behavior Activity". I am planning a "Staff Share" session again.  Please let me know if there is a practice, activity or lesson that you know is very effective at getting students to achieve at high levels.

Field Trip Reminder
If you are planning a field trip, and are planning for parent volunteers to chaperone, they need to complete the volunteer/background check process through our district office.  Please plan ahead for this, as they need about two weeks notice to get the chaperones on our approved volunteer list.  If a chaperone is already on our volunteer list, please confirm that with me.

Twitter Find of the Week

edutopia ‏@edutopia  Mar 24

6 characteristics at the heart of great teaching: http://edut.to/18VjKxk .

Duty Next Week

Morning - Lendobeja, O'Connor

Bus - Barnett

Data

Attendance Rate (Through Mid-April)

14-15 - 95.48%

13-14 - 95.24%

12-13 - 95.57%

PMS News & Notes 4/10/15

The first week back from Spring Break is in the books!  The weather is getting nicer, and we look ahead to maximizing the days and minutes remaining in the school year.  A few notes from the week ahead and the weeks to come below.

Badger Exam
Our Badger Exam practice sessions are complete, and I think it was a good opportunity to iron out a few kinks before the actual testing kicks off next week.  The testing schedule and groups are HERE. If there were any issues (grouping. logistics, connectivity, etc), please let me know asap.  The 8th grade is set to kick off their testing next Tuesday.  Thanks to all for your flexibility, feedback, and willingness to make this go as smooth as possible.

Student of the Month Breakfast
We had another successful breakfast this morning, with one of the biggest crowds of the year.  Thank you to all for your willingness to come in early, and do all of the little extra things that this event requires. It was another positive atmosphere, and getting families in here is a very good thing. The next Student of the Month Breakfast will be on Thursday, May 14. It would be helpful to have the names of the students recommended to the office by Friday, May 1.  This will be the final breakfast of the year.

Staff Meeting Recap
I want to thank all of you for your participation in our staff meeting on Wednesday.  Special thanks to Mr. Frehner, Mrs. Hendrickson, and Mr. Jorgensen for offering to share a glimpse of some great things that are happening in our classrooms. There will be another time for a staff share during the May meeting. If you are interested in sharing a practice that has been successful at getting students to achieve higher levels, let me know and we'll set it up.  Also, I am working on a document that will have the feedback about norming our behavior system that will be shared soon, and we'll continue the conversation at our next staff meeting on May 6.

April Safety Drill
We will be conducting another tornado drill this month.  This drill will be held at the same time as the statewide tornado drill on Thursday, April 16.  The Tornado Warning will begin at 1:45.

Culture
At the assembly before break, I shared with our students a vision for Poynette schools and students to have an expectation of excellence, and pride in all that we do. Much of our culture is in the day to day interactions of both students and staff members. As we look to build excellence into all that our students do, having high expectations for each of our students in both their behavior and work is key. Students often will rise to the expectations that are set forth for them by the adults in their lives.

Sub-Caller
On Friday, 4/17 morning, I will be the sub caller. 608 692 2088

Twitter Find of the Week
A good read on questioning in the classroom...

Ben Gilpin ‏@benjamingilpin  35m35 minutes ago

A Quick Guide To Questioning In The Classroom http://goo.gl/vJ6ceA  via @TeachThought

Duty Next Week (Morning is Outside!!)

Morning - Jorgensen, Kallungi

Bus - Deans

Data

I've attached the HS WKCE data trends in Reading and Math. The WKCE was taken in October of the Sophomore year, and these results are a result of MS efforts.

PHS Reading Data

PHS Math Data

Badger Exam Practice Sessions

Hello,
This week starting on Wednesday (8th Grade), we will be conducting dry-runs for the Badger Exam. Students will meet in their actual testing groups during their actual testing time and we will utilize the actual chrome books that we will use during testing. Below is the schedule, and what our students should do during this time. It is really important that things run as smooth as possible right from the get go...This dry run is necessary to troubleshoot any issues before the actual testing window begins. I appreciate your flexibility during this time.

When: (should take about 90 minutes)
8th Grade - Wednesday, 4/8/15 @ 9:05am
7th Grade - Thursday, 4/9/15 @ 7:35am
6th Grade - Friday, 4/10/15 @ 7:35 am

Where:
Students will meet in their testing groups (if any teacher has feedback on testing groups, we can certainly make changes after or before the dry run).  You can view the groups HERE.

What:
Please utilize the following schedule with your testing group.  I will share this document with all students.  They can open the document and follow the links.

Other:
Please share as much information with students to get them ready for what the schedule will look like, and how students should make every attempt to be here on testing days.

Things to Report to Mr. Pritzl:
-# of Headphones needed in your testing group
-Did anyone request the use of a mouse?
-If there are any student questions that you did not know the answer
-Any issues that arose that we need to think about

Improving Instructional Practices

5 Fantastic, Fast, Formative Assessment Tools

Domain 3: Instruction: 3d: Using Assessment in Instruction

“I thought I could read my students' body language. I was wrong. As an experiment, I used Socrative when I taught binary numbers. What I learned forever changed my views on being a better teacher”.-Vicki Davis

Here's what happened in my classroom. I was teaching my hardest topic of the year -- binary numbers, where students learn to add ones and zeros like a computer. It looks harder than it is, and many of my students will shut down and not even want to try. So I taught how to count in binary numbers, and we worked some examples together. After a few minutes, two students piped up.

"We've got this, it's easy," they said. "Can we move on?" I looked at the other students and asked, "Do you have this?" They nodded their heads furiously up and down in a "yes."

So I wrote a problem on the board. Students were already logged into Socrative, and a box opened up on their screens. Each student typed in his or her answer to the problem. They clicked enter, and all of their answers appeared on my screen beside the name of each student. I was floored. Guess how many knew the right answer? Two! Just the two students who had spoken up and no one else!

Good teachers in every subject will adjust their teaching based upon what students know at each point. Good formative assessment removes the embarrassment of public hand raising and gives teachers feedback that impacts how they're teaching at that moment.

Instant Feedback. We can do this now. Here's how.

1. Socrative: Socrative can be used for quick quizzes and also on the fly. Here's another feature. Before class,  create quizzes that we can play as a game called Space Race. The website automatically divides the class into teams. Kids know what color team they're on and can look at the rockets racing one another on the board.

2. Kahoot (shared with you last blog post) Kahoot lets us build fun quizzes. Students use computers, cell phones, or other devices to join in the game. You can create flashcards for review. You can also embed videos and use Kahoot as part of the teaching process, or students can create review games to share

3. Zaption: Just as we know that it's better to ask questions throughout the text rather than only at the end of the chapter, you should also ask questions after a topic is covered in the video and not wait until the end. Zaption lets you embed questions within the video. Students can't move forward in the video until they can correctly answer the question. Whether you’re flipping your classroom or in-flipping, this is a powerful tool.

4. Backchannel Chat Tools: Backchannel chat -- a live chat that accompanies class discussion -- is a great way to do exit ticket activities. While these chat tools aren't anonymous, Chatzy, Today’s Meet, or Ning can be powerful. Students can take notes as you teach together, and you can check for understanding by having them type answers to questions. Another riff on this would be group note taking in Google Docs. (If you need to have anonymous chat, you could set something up in Google Forms.)

5. No BYOD? But what if you have no computers, no cell phones, no nothing? Do you have a smartphone or tablet? If so, you've got two simple answers.

For verbal questions: Log into Plickers and create a page for each student. This tool will code in the student's name and answers. Hand each student their plicker card and ask a question. The student will hold the card up in the direction of their answer. Looking at the class through the camera on your smartphone inside the Plicker app, you’ll see the name of each student and whether he or she got the answer right to the question you just asked! BAM! (Hat tip to Richard Byrne for teaching me about Plickers in a recent interview.)

For quick quizzes: QuickKey is one mobile scanning app for the iPhone. There are several others, such as ZipGrade and GradeCam. The disadvantage of this method is that your questions must be multiple choice. You print out the short form and students bubble it in. Use your smartphone to immediately know what students know with a snap of a picture.  Read the full article here.

PMS News & Notes 3/27/15

Spring break is here!  It is time to recharge the batteries and get ready for a very important stretch run. We have all worked extremely hard.  Thank you for your part in the positive work, effort, and attitude it takes to run successful programs which lead to student success.  Some quick news and notes before break...

Monday 4/6 PD Day
You can check out the schedule for the PD Day HERE.  We will start Badger Exam Proctor Training at 1:00pm, and that training should take no longer than 2 hours. I will have an updated list of the test proctors and activity schedule for those not involved in proctoring the exam on Monday.

Badger Exam
There was a recent update delaying the ELA portion of the exam for 2 weeks.  This does not affect our testing schedule.  Beginning with 8th grade on Wednesday 4/8, we will run a Badger Exam dry run, including having the students watch the video tutorial on their own, and taking time to go through the practice test. I will have details on Monday as well.  7th grade will do a dry run on Thursday 4/9, and 6th grade on Friday 4/10. Testing groups will be shared on Monday as well.

Field Trip Reminder
As we get deeper into spring, we have more field trips in our lesson plans and schedules.  If you are planning a field trip, and are having parent volunteers to chaperone, they need to complete the volunteer/background check process through our district office.  Please plan ahead for this, as they need about two weeks notice to get the chaperones on our approved volunteer list.  If a chaperone is already on our volunteer list, please confirm that with me.

Student of the Month Breakfast
Our next Student of the Month Breakfast will be on Friday, 4/10.  We almost have all of our candidates selected.  Thanks for your support of this great event for our students and families.

Twitter Find of the Week
The author poses a great question, and the conversation in the comments is the valuable part...feel free to add to it!  The link is HERE too...

Steven W. Anderson ‏@web20classroom  18m18 minutes ago

What Do We Do When What We Do Is Still Not Enough? http://goo.gl/P7YRXc  via @pernilleripp

Duty Next Week
Morning - Hazard, Hendrickson - After spring break, we will be outside only again :)
Bus - Fraser

Data
3rd Quarter Behavior Referrals
14-15 - 53 Events 37 Students
13-14 - 141 Events 59 Students
12-13 - 99 Events 54 Students

Have a Great Spring Break!!!

PMS News & Notes 3/20/15

Spring is here!  This is the time of the year where the relationships we have worked hard to establish with our students continue to pay off. These relationships help to keep the focus of the kids in the classroom, when it becomes continually more difficult as we all look outside and see the nice weather.  Thank you for your contribution to making this a great place to be!  Some news and notes below...

End of Quarter 3
The last day of the 3rd Quarter is next Friday, 3/27.  Spring Break will push back the due date for 3rd Quarter grades. We will plan to get report cards out in the mail on Thursday, 4/9. Please aim to get grades posted by Wednesday 4/8 at noon.  As a reminder, you will need to overwrite mid-term grades, and if you did not assess a standard, please leave it blank. Also, individual comments should be next to a standard.  If you have any questions about how the report card looks for your class, please see me, and I'll show you what the report card looks like.

Spring Time
As the year nears the end, the focus remains the same.  The capital that we have at our disposal to maximize student achievement is instructional minutes. I appreciate the way our staff utilizes these minutes to get our students to achieve at the highest levels of our expectations.

Carol Dweck's Message
I would like to keep Carol Dweck's message about the importance of praising effort (in lieu of intelligence), and how that builds motivation in our students. At the beginning of the year, I wanted to be sure to keep this message in the forefront of our thinking, so that is why I included it in another post.

Tornado Drill
Next week we will be conducting a tornado drill.  The drill will be held on Wednesday, 3/25 at 1:30pm.  Please review the tornado drill procedures with your students prior to the drill.

Puma Pride Committee
The Puma Pride Committee met this past Thursday and had another good meeting, talking about our Puma Pride rubric and the culture of our school.  An update will be provided at our next staff meeting.  The next meeting is Thursday, April 23 from 3:00 - 3:30 in Mrs. Hendrickson's room.  Feel free to join the group.

Badger Exam
The time for the Badger Exam is quickly approaching. You can find the schedule in last week's blog, and information about room assignments and testing groups is coming soon.  I will be at a training on Friday (3/20) afternoon to prep further for a successful implementation.

Student of the Month Reminder
Please collaborate on your nominees by next Wednesday (3/25).  The next breakfast is Friday, 4/10.

Twitter Find of the Week

 ASCD retweeted

Alina Davis ‏@alinadavis  27m27 minutes ago

I want to be a student in her class! Dean MS @CyFairISD #ascd15

Duty Next Week
Morning - Greer, Harms
Bus - Hazard

Data
Attendance Rates 14-15 School Year
September - 95.97%
October - 95.96%
November - 94.48%
December - 96.82%
January - 95.20%
February - 93.88%
March - 95.96%

Improving Instructional Practices

Formative Assessments ~ Kahoot

Danielson’s Domains:  1f Designing Students Assessments, 3d Using Assessment in Instruction

Want a quick and engaging way to formatively assess student learning?  Give Kahoot a try!

This website lets students respond to polls that teachers can create on a computer, phone, or tablet.  Kahoot students to answer on their device and gives you a quick graph of results as to what students know, and any misconceptions they still may have that you can address right away.  

Try it out at gethakoot.com

PMS News & Notes 3/12/15

I don't know about you, but this is my favorite time of the year...especially when the weather is so nice, so quick, and the snow is nearly gone.  There is nothing like the excitement and energy of March Madness, especially with the Pumas playing for the right to go to state tomorrow.  With all of that being said, our focus remains the same.  The end of Quarter 3 is almost upon us, and routines and expectations are well established.  It is so important to maintain high expectations and continue to nudge our students towards higher level work...Thank you for all you do for our kids.  Check out below for some important updates.

Badger Exam Update
Earlier this week, the DPI released some significant news about the Badger Exam.  The ELA Performance Task portion of the test has been cancelled.  This new information means that we will have a less daunting and time consuming Badger Exam schedule.  The projected schedule at this time is:

4/14 - 4/17 - 8th Grade - 9:05 - 10:45 each day.  ELA on Tuesday, followed by the Math portion.
4/21 - 4/24 - 7th Grade - 7:35 - 9:15 each day.  ELA on Tuesday, followed by the Math portion.
4/28 - 5/1 - 6th Grade - 7:35 - 9:15 each day.  ELA on Tuesday, followed by the Math portion.

We will need about 3 of the newer chrome carts for each grade level, and we ask that we look at not overloading the network with traffic during testing times.  We will also be using Homeroom time on 3/27 for Badger Exam Prep.  Also, the week after spring break, we will schedule a dry run for each grade level on different days starting Wednesday with 8th Grade, Thursday with 7th Grade, and Friday with 6th Grade.  Testing groups and assignment information will be out soon.

Homeroom on Friday 3/27
Like I mentioned above, on Friday, 3/27, we will have a Homeroom lesson plan for Badger Exam prep.  All students should report to their normal Homeroom groups on this day.

End of 3rd Quarter Celebration
On Friday, 3/27 we will be having an assembly for all Middle School students at 2:00 pm in the 1-8 Gym.  For 6th grade Applied Academics, this means that your last day with them will be Thursday, 3/26.  We will need all teaching staff in the gym for the assembly.

Budget for This Year
At this time, spending for the 14-15 school year is complete.  The only thing that can be purchased are any consumable purchases that normally occur each year for certain classes.  If you have questions, please let me know.

Also, a reminder to get your requisitions and summary sheets (by department) to me by end of day today.

Excellence In Our Building
There are so many great things happening in our building, and we need to share and recognize these things. At our next staff meeting, we will be taking time for a staff share/collaboration/celebration.  Please communicate with me if you have a shining activity/practice/method that you would like to share. Also, it is important that we share our story with the community.  I am looking for people to help me lead this charge.  I hope to foster and grow a culture of teachers that are innovators and proud of the effective, hard work that we do.  Don't hesitate to send an email or talk to me about the special things that we do for our students.

Student of the Month Breakfast
Thanks to Mr. Jorgensen, Ms. Fraser, and Mr. Lendobeja for their participation on Thursday morning. This is truly a great event.  The next breakfast will be on Friday, April 10.  With spring break in the mix, we'll need nominees by Wednesday, 3/25.  Please start thinking and communicating about this soon.

Twitter Find of the Week


Duty Next Week
Morning - Frehner, Graeve
Bus - Graeve

Data
Behavior Referrals through 7 weeks in 3rd Quarter
14-15 - 39 Events 39 Students
13-14 - 107 Events 51 Students
12-13 - 83 Events 48 Students
11-12 - 184 Events 73 Students

PMS News & Notes 3/6/15

What a week!  With a couple nights of conferences, and a jam packed school schedule, it's time for everyone to enjoy a much deserved weekend.  Despite the longer hours this week, the focus on student achievement and effort remained constant. See below for some more information...

Monday Sub-Caller

If you are not feeling well on Monday morning or late Sunday evening, I will be the sub-caller for the Middle School.  Please call 608 692 2088 if necessary, and the earlier, the better.

Parent-Teacher Conference Wrap-Up

The second round of PT Conferences are in the rear-view mirror.  During both nights, I observed many parents seated at a cafeteria with their child rummaging through materials from a locker trying to get organized.  Thank you for your willingness to connect with parents, and work with them as partners in their child's education.

Staff Meeting Wrap-Up

Most of our staff meeting focused on building upon the culture of literacy in our school.  The very next day, during a mini-observation, I observed a teacher utilizing reading comprehension strategies with a text reading from their content area, and it went very well.  As a reminder, to accelerate our movement, we should show an interest in what our students are reading, read with them during silent reading days during IE time, and be enthusiastic about becoming better in all areas of literacy.  I appreciate your attention and efforts towards making each day a little better than the previous one in this area.

Budget

This is a reminder to schedule a time to get together with me to talk budget sometime this next week if you have not already.

Student of the Month Breakfast

This Thursday, 3/12/15, will be our next Student of the Month Breakfast.  Thank you to all who acted quickly to get our nomination in.  Also, thank you to Ms. Fraser, Mr. Jorgensen, and Mr. Lendobeja for presenting this month.  Our next SOM Breakfast will be on Friday, April 10.  Please be thinking about possible candidates for next month...it'll be here before you know it.

Twitter Find of the Week

Jerry Pritzl‏@jerrypritzl

http://www.justintarte.com/2014/12/10-things-students-want-all-educators.html?m=1 …

0 replies0 retweets0 favorites

Duty Next Week

Morning - Deans, Fraser

Bus - Greer

Data

Attendance rate - 95.3%

Behavior Referrals in 3rd Quarter so far...37 Events, 32 Students

PMS News & Notes 2/27/15

We are officially past the mid-point of the 3rd Quarter, and I noticed some 30's in the long term forecast...perhaps spring and warm weather is right around the corner?  I think we are all ready for that!  Check out some news from the week that was and the weeks and months to come...

Parent-Teacher Conferences
I appreciate the hard work that everyone has spent contacting parents to set up a time to meet for our 2nd round of parent-teacher conferences.  This is a great communication opportunity for us. Conferences will be on Monday from 4:00 to 7:30 and Thursday from 4:30 to 8:00.

Student of the Month Breakfast
This is a reminder to everyone, except the 6th grade team :), to get me your nominations for February Student of the Month ASAP.  The breakfast will be on Thursday, March 12 starting at 7:00 am.

Badger Exam Schedule
We have tentatively set the dates and times for the Badger Exam.  This testing process will be much different than the traditional WKCE.  More details will follow in the next couple of weeks in terms of groups and formal preparation.  The testing schedule will be:

6th and 7th Grade
ELA - 4/14 - 4/17 - 7:35 - 9:05 am
Math - 4/21 - 4/24 - 7:35 - 9:05 am

8th Grade
ELA - 4/14 - 4/17 - 9:05 - 10:35 am
Math - 4/28 - 5/1 - 9:05 - 10:35 am

Upcoming Staff Meeting
This is a reminder that we will have a staff meeting on Wednesday of the week, 3/4 in Room 201.

Budget

Another reminder to be working on budget for next year.  You can click HERE for a template for a requisition.  As a reminder, please have materials turned in to me by March 13.

Twitter Post of the Week

 Todd retweeted

Beth Whitaker ‏@BethWhitaker2  1h1 hour ago

Five Trends That Are Transforming Education http://zite.to/1E1CzMH 

Duty This Week
Morning - Anderson, Barnett
Bus - Harms

Data
Attendance Rate - 95.45% (Goal: 96%)

Behavior Referrals in 3rd Quarter through 5 weeks
14-15 - 29 Events 26 Students
13-14 - 74 Events 42 Students
12-13 - 76 Events 51 Students