The Flip Side with Jon Bergmann

This summer I had the honor of being interviewed by Jon Bergmann! Jon Bergmann is one of the pioneers of flipped learning, so of course he wanted me to share my perspective on flipping a first grad classroom. John has his own online podcast, The Flip Side, on the Bam Radio Network. I was a little nervous, but it ended up being such a great experience.

The Flip Side with Jon Bergmann

On another note... there are so many wonderful podcasts dedicated to the world of #edtech and #elemedu. I could listen to hours of creative ideas and thoughts about the world of education.  Below are the podcasts I have been listening as I am driving around town the past few weeks. There are so many more awesome podcasts out there and over the summer I get into a few at a time.

EduAllStars

#EdChat Radio

NPR: TED Radio Hour

ECEC Radio- The Early Care and Education Consortium

Top 10 2012-2013 Moments

10. Falloween!

The handwriting fairy (a frequent visitor in my classroom).

and a witch from Ronald Dahl's book The Witches.

9. My 30th Birthday

My students showered me with love. It made my big 3.0 much better than expected.

My family and friends did too, but I was not expecting so many sweet gestures from the kiddos!

8. Designing and creating our school yearbook!

 

I personally think the yearbook turned out great (I am not biased or anything).

Let's just say that after the 60-70 hours spent on planning, designing, creating, photographing, editing and advertising I can confidently say I know how to create a elementary school yearbook!

7. The Author's Tea

See: An Author's Tea

6. Submitting my Take One Entry!

See: Take One Complete

5. Receiving a Governing Board Award!

See: Governing Board Award- Flipped Sisters

4. 1:1 iPads & the Flipped Model

I feel so lucky to have been given the tools and training to use this model!

3. Meeting my very dear friend Jen

I think Cookie Monster could use some grammar instruction. :)
God must have had a hand in placing us together in first grade this year. I adore her to pieces!

2. My students completing their (and my) first Challenge Based Learning Project

I was blown away by their creativity and work ethic!
(More to come on this soon!)

1. Receiving the Arcadia News Teacher of the Month Award. One of the nominations melted my heart. I did not expect this award. I love my students and I am the lucky to have such a special job!

Quick E-Mail

Digital fluency is a huge part of incorporating iPads into a first grade literacy classroom. Learning anything takes time and practice, practice, practice.  I value  time spent on students exploring and playing around with the presentation apps. I consider it to be unstructured inquiry at its finest.  With that said, I am always trying to find creative ways to access content based learning through 1:1 technology (this has always been my ultimate goal with having the iPads). Today's activity is a great example of using them within a content based lesson.  I had students send me a simple e-mail! It allows for me to check for understanding of the comprehension lesson, provides typing fluency practice, and spirals back to what they have already learned about sending an e-mail.  Even better is I can access these documents from anywhere.  You can generally find me sifting through these e-mails via my phone the night before the next lesson.  These give me immediate feedback on where I need to take my students next.  Below are some sample e-mails from my sweet students.

Oh Dear

 So much has happened this year.  I have had so many blessing, as well as challenges. They have all made me stronger in not only teaching, but also in life in general.
Updates from my classroom:

Sarah & I with my iPad cart

1. I am officially a flipped classroom teacher.  In short that means I video tape lessons for my students to watch at home.  They then show their understanding of the content by completing a short check for understanding assignment.  I am then able to use class time for re-teach, enrichment, project based learning, or simply moving on quicker with content. I could be wrong, but my guess is I am one of a few first grade teachers attempting this in the nation.  Most flipped classrooms start in upper elementary through high school.

2. I have 1:1 ipads for one group of my students.  They watch the teaching videos on the iPads and use the iPads for learning throughout their time in the classroom. AMAZING! To the left is a sample PDF of my assessments collected from Thursday's activity in class.  Each student read and e-mailed me the main idea and two details of the informational text they read. No big deal WOW! Talk about 21st century skills beginning to emerge.

3. I am working on my  National Board Certification in the area of literacy.  In the teacher field, that means that the next year is going to be tough, focused, and possibly my most challenging year career wise.  I believe the end result will make me a stronger and more reflective practitioner.  Right now I am taking part in a program called Take One.  This provides me the opportunity to begin my boards by completing one of the four portfolio entries required. This is due April 15th.  Oh my gooooooodnesss!  More to come as it is beginning to take up my weekends.

4. I took on our school yearbook this year.  In December, I was panicked, scared, and frustrated that I committed to taking on the task back in early August.  30+ hours of work later and I am actually enjoying putting it all together together.  The teachers I work with have been great.  I would say I am about half done and the end in sight.  I do think it will be a proud moment when I open up a final copy.  My one desire is for our school community to love it!  It is their memories and simply doing in putting it together.

I am ready for my first graders to arrive. Early August 2012

To leave you with some fun, here are some highlights of my class this year:

Always trying to grow my classroom library!

What can you infer about Ms. S by going through her trash?

The beginning work from our descriptive writing unit.

My sweet first graders loving books!

Summer School: Teaching the different verb tenses!