 Explore.org is the world's leading philanthropic live nature cam network. For free, anyone can drop into different habitats around the world and observe an amazing number of different animals - from rescued cats to Bald Eagles, Brown Bears to goats, and Puffins to Beluga Whales. All Live Cams are available in high definition and most are live 24 hours a day. Below each cam is a map showing where the stream is coming from and some information about the animals that are featured.
Use these Live Cams to give students an opportunity to actually observe and take notes on the animals they are writing reports about. Starting a new science unit on underwater ecosystems and can't make it to an aquarium? Spend a few minutes each day observing the shark, whale, and fish channels. Or, just put up a different stream when you aren't using your projector. Think of it as a screensaver that reminds kids that, outside of your classroom, there is a big world out there filled with all kinds of ecosystems and animals. Check out all of Explore.org's Live Cams for free at: explore.org/livecams  The Chrome Music Lab Song Maker puts the ability to create music at the fingertips of students. To make a song, click boxes on the grid, set the tempo, and press play. The track automatically loops and can be changed in real time. When they are happy with their song, students can share their track with the world by clicking the save button and getting a link. Notice the math connections hidden within tempo and timing of notes. Talk about the patterns of notes that make their music sounds like songs. Have student create songs that accompany their writing - that add to the tone of their stories. Watch smiles develop as they are able to create real music in just a few minutes. Want a simple example? Check out the simple jam I made in about five minutes: https://goo.gl/c8v14q Chrome Music Lab Song Maker is available at: https://musiclab.chromeexperiments.com/Song-Maker/ For younger learners, check out the Melody Maker, a simplified version with the same general design. Available at: https://musiclab.chromeexperiments.com/Melody-Maker/  One afternoon, during the last trimester of my first year of teaching, my principal grabbed my attention during lunch and asked me to come see him as soon as school was over. He mentioned that he had received a letter from a parent of one of my students and he wanted to get my take on it.
On the outside, I responded confidently. “Sure, not a problem,” I said. On the inside, it was a different story. I started thinking if there was anything that had happened in my class over the last few days that could have warranted a parent letter sent directly to the principal. Needless to say, I sweated bullets for the ensuing hours. My first year of teaching had been at times bumpy (see Evidence Exhibit A: my first evaluation observation). I wondered if this would be the straw that broke the camel’s back. Or, in this case, the letter that broke the teaching career of a young, well-intentioned educator  As a third grade teacher, the coming of spring meant Charlotte’s Web. It was a rite of passage for third graders - to meet Fern Arable, to enter that barn, to experience the ultimate sacrifice that Charlotte, the motherly spider, makes for Wilbur. Despite being a story about talking farm animals, it is a powerful text and, for many students, it is the first time the idea of death is introduced in a class read aloud. The conversations I would have with those third graders, they were heavy. Tears were shed. Suddenly, school got real. Death was a thing. Read about and talked about.
And so, to celebrate the completion of the book and the serious, mature, third grade conversations that we had, we would make large, pink paper maché pigs complete with ridiculous looking googley eyes. I always got a kick out of the contrast between the seriousness of the end of the book and the silliness of those googley eyes.
Bonus Points! presents inspiring educators with a list of 10 questions on varying educational topics and lets them choose which they want to respond to. Through this process, we uncover and demystify some of the hidden realities that happen in all classrooms and gain some wisdom from some really amazing and inspiring educators.
 What is something about your classroom that makes it a special space where you and your students want to spend time?
Students call my classroom library “The Garden. In the garden, we have a futon, a HUGE memory foam bean bag chair, this wacky egg chair, and a bunch of throw pillows. What I love most about this area of my room is that it has been created and molded each year by the families of my students. We have created this inviting and comforting space that makes my students feel so comfortable in my room that they beg to stay in (especially during recess). My students and I love this area. It feels like a hybrid between a treehouse and the inside of an incredible fort. Surrounding the garden is our classroom library books with our “Student Recommended Reads” bin and my personal favorite fourth grade books. As a class, we discuss how special a classroom library is because of all that we can learn from books and how there’s an adventure in every book. That’s why we call it “The Garden”, because it’s where great readers and leaders grow. This area is also where I do a lot of my instruction and we have some of our deepest and most vulnerable conversations and moments as a class there. My students associate this part of our room as a welcoming and comforting place where all are accepted to be who they are and everyone is invited to be vulnerable and to ask tough questions.  At the elementary school that I used to teach at, the kids created a version of four square that they called “Skill.” It was a lot like the traditional game of Four Square that we played in my youth, but there were slight, esoteric rule changes and new vocabulary that made it nearly incomprehensible to adults. The game inevitably led to uncountable playground disagreements. The whistle at the end of recess would mark the moment when emotions would boil over and tearful students would enter the classroom, unable to learn, needing to get their Skill frustrations out into the open.
Needless to say, I did not hold Skill in high esteem. In fact, I’ll say it... I pretty much hated Skill. It was the silly creation that was more trouble than it was worth. In my expert opinion, it was a lesser form of the nearly perfect game of Four Square. It was an “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it” situation. In an attempt to quell the end of recess dramatics, we brainstormed solutions. We wrote down all the rules on a poster. We trained students to be Skill Referees. We used peer mediators to help with disagreements. The Skill Drama. It continued. I made threats. Skill would be banned from the playground. Individual students wouldn’t be allowed to play for weeks at a time. Calls would be made home to parents. Yes, I'll admit it. I might have gone as far as to say that I was going to pop the red bouncy balls used for the game of Skill. Bonus Points! presents inspiring educators with a list of 10 questions on varying educational topics and lets them choose which they want to respond to. Through this process, we uncover and demystify some of the hidden realities that happen in all classrooms and gain some wisdom from some really amazing and inspiring educators.  Anelyse George is a fifth grade teacher in Danville, California. She has a human centered classroom - one where both kids and adults can thrive and produce amazing work. She believes that classroom community is more important than anything else. She is, in short, an amazing educator. You can follow Anelyse and her classroom adventures on Twitter at @AnelyseGeorge.  Where is your go-to place on the internet as an educator? Where do you go for inspiration or for resources or to gain perspective on your work?
Cultofpedagogy.com where, as they say, “Teacher nerds, unite!” This is by far my favorite place to glean inspiration, improve my practice, and learn about what’s going on in education. The blog post about finding your marigold is what got me hooked to this site and coming back for more. The article is aimed at new teachers, however, I find it to be a good read every school year. Jennifer Gonzalez advice new teachers to find their marigolds. Marigolds are planted near other plants because they help surrounding plants grow, they’re known as companion plants. This beautiful metaphor is a one that we can carry through any part of our life but is especially useful when you’re trying to keep the joy in your teaching practice. You need to find people, other teachers and colleagues, that make you grow, that are positive, that can be planted alongside you through this tough work and help you thrive. The teaching world is full of “walnut trees” notorious for inhibiting growth, or in our educator world, people who are just plain 'ole negative. Finding your marigolds will help you maintain your love for teaching, believe the work is worth it, and have the support that is so needed in this tough job. I read this article a few times a year and make sure I keep my connections with my marigolds at my own school site and the marigolds i’ve found throughout my school district.
This is a true story. It is not exaggerated. This really happened to me.
I began teaching third grade at the age of 23 years old. It was my first “real” job and, despite my teacher preparation coursework, I found myself in the middle of October unsure if I could make it all the way to the end of the year. I found myself counting the days until Thanksgiving break. I found myself counting the hours until my next prep period. The students were rebelling. Simple tasks that came so easily in the first weeks, like lining up quietly for recess, became laborious chores requiring my raised voice spouting empty threats of missed recess minutes. Getting through a Writer’s Workshop lesson on crafting the perfect hook for your personal narrative? Forget about it. The more I doubled down, becoming stricter and stricter, the more the students pushed back. Things were not going well. And this was the moment when I received a note from my principal informing me that it was time to schedule my first evaluation - a thirty minute observation followed by a fifteen minute debriefing meeting. On the morning of my principal’s visit, I gathered my students around my rocking chair and, in a final act of desperation, I attempted to reason with them. I leaned in and, with a whisper, asked, “How do you kids feel about a little extra recess?” |
