19 for 2019

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Last year inspired by the podcast Happier with Gretchen Rubin, I made an 18 for 2018 list and loved it! For some reason this stuck way more for me than New Year’s resolutions, even though it is pretty much the same thing. I accomplished 14 of the items on my list, including flossing every single day, going on a date with my husband at least once every month, hosting a dinner party, and learning a new song on the guitar. It was a fun and practical way to get things done I had been wanting to do. And I’ve still flossed every day since January 1, 2018!

So, this year I knew I wanted to make a 19 for 2019 list and loved hearing on the podcast that many other people were inspired to do so as well. As I brainstormed, I knew I wanted to keep a couple things on my list from last year like going on a date night each month and going camping. However, most of my list is new.

After some brainstorming, I wrote out my list in my new Erin Condon planner. (Aside, thanks to Sarah Hart-Unger and her podcast Better than Before, I found this awesome planner to use for the year from Erin Condren!) Here is my list for 2019!

A few to highlight

  • Run 365 miles: Last year on my list I had to run a half marathon. I trained for the summer and was planning to do one with a colleague in September. But then a few weeks before my knee was hurting so badly I could barely make it two miles. I ended up not running the race, which was the right call for me. This year I thought I would add a running goal again, but one that I could track in a whole different way!
  • Organize a playdate with Owen’s friends: Sometimes I am aware of how much of a second child Owen is. We do playdates for my older kiddo and her friends, but I haven’t organized one for him…yet.
  • Meditate regularly: I like Dan Harris‘ idea of daily-ish in meditation. I signed up for the Calm app for free through their educator program. It has timers, body scans, guided meditations, and master classes on various topics. My daughter loves their meditative sleep stories too!
  • Go to Canada: We live so close to Canada it’s fun to take advantage of heading to a different country for the weekend. This was on my list last year and we never went, so I’m determined to make it happen this year!

I’m excited to work my way through this list and see what comes in 2019!!

Trying out Microsoft Font Maker

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I recently heard about the app Microsoft Font Maker and immediately downloaded it to try it out! This app allows you to turn your handwriting into a font to use on the computer. Using a stylus on my Surface Pro 4, I began trying it out. The first step was to write out the letters and symbols. Here is my first font part way through.

After writing out the letters and symbols I wrote out three sentences. (I noticed the sentences changed when I did this process a second time.)

After adjusting the spacing of the words and letters, my font was all set. I saved it to my computer, installed it (super easy!), and tried it out in Microsoft Word.

The whole process took me less than 5 minutes. So I tried again, writing a little slower this time. Here are my sentences with both fonts.

Apparently my hand writing is pretty consistent. I can barely tell the difference between the two versions I created.

As I mentioned above in my font, I think it could also be fun to make bubble letters or a fun kind of font as well. I’ve always loved creating fonts on paper and drawing fun letters–now I can do it on the computer! As I begin 2019, I’m curious if I will find ways to use this in the classroom, in addition to having fun with it.

Have you used this app, or another handwriting-to-font app? What would you use an app like this for?

Can you teach students to be less distracted on computers? We tried! And it worked!

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I teach at a one-to-one school. When you look around my classroom you will see various laptops–Surfaces, MacBooks, Dells, and many others. I love that my students have computers! And, they present a whole new level of distraction into the classroom. Email, iMessage, and Buzzfeed fill the screens, sometimes it seems just as often as OneNote, where we have our course information. So this year, my teaching team and I tried out a new way to teach about technology distractions in class.

Distracted on Purpose

At the beginning of the lesson, I handed out a slip of paper to each student and told them to follow the directions for the next 10 minutes. After a few students asked if I really wanted them to follow these directions, the lesson continued as normal. There was some direct instruction then time to look over a page in the textbook and answer questions that were posted on the SmartBoard. During this time, students followed their card.

Half of the cards said: “Pay attention and take notes in the next 10 minutes. There will be a quiz at the end of this activity on the following four terms…” and listed out the specific terms.

The other half of the cards had various directions that would force them to be off task. I had brainstormed and chosen things I know my students do in class at times. Some examples were:

  • Send three emails to classmates in this class telling them a funny joke you find online. Don’t let your teacher see you do this.
  • Find two lists on Buzzfeed about celebrities. In your notes, write who is #4 in each of these lists and what the list is about. Don’t let your teacher see you do this.
  • Send three texts from your phone. Don’t let your teacher see you using your phone.
  • Work on homework or classwork for another class for a few minutes during this activity. This can be in OneNote. Don’t let your teacher see you do this.
  • In the next few minutes go to the bathroom on another floor of the building then come back to class. No hurry.

The Quiz

After 10 minutes, I told all my students to close their computers and to take out a pen for a quiz. Immediately, the room was quiet. I reassured them the quiz would not count for a grade, but we would score it to see how everyone did. I told students to answer the questions on the quiz then turn over the quiz and answer “How did the directions on your slip help or hurt how you did on this quiz?”

As they began, the students who knew the quiz was coming answered the questions quickly and correctly. The students with the other directions, were predictably, not as confident. Many could not answer any of the four questions.

Reflections

The students totally got it. Their reflections after this short activity were clear. When they were distracted on their devices or phones they did not pay as close attention to the lesson. Knowing what will be on a quiz helps, so maybe it is worth it to look at the study guides we provide. In each class, the person who had gone to the bathroom shared they “had no idea what was going on” once they returned.

I was reminded at how impactful a short, engaging activity can be for students. I could tell them that technology distracts them from being present to the learning in class, which I do, and it would likely not sink in. This activity helped them to get to the same point on their own, in 10 minutes. It was definitely worth the time! I was also amazed at how much I did not see–selfies, Buzzfeed, emails, phones–for the most part they did a great job hiding it all from me.

An unexpected reflection came a few weeks later at a technology committee meeting. An English teacher who had heard about our lesson shared that she noticed a difference in her sophomore classes after we did this activity in Religion. The French teacher asked when we had done it, because she, too, had noticed a change.

This short activity led to big gains for my students. I know the teaching on distractions and devices is not complete, but it was a memorable and impactful start!

Fun and Tiring: Reflection on the First Three Weeks

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It’s hard to believe there have been three weeks of teaching already! It both feels like we just started and that we have been back for months. On the first day of school I saw a colleague in the hall and we both commented that it feels so great to be back in the classroom. As my students would say, teaching is my jam. It felt great to be back! The two words that come to mind about the first three weeks are: fun and tiring.

This year I am teaching a course I haven’t taught in 5 years. In that time, there was a significant revision of the scope and sequence. Teaching a new course is absolutely a combination of fun and tiring. It is great to be back with sophomores and it’s fun to look at lesson plans and assessments with a fresh perspective. I’m not as efficient at the grading or lesson planning as I learn the layout of the new curriculum. It has taken me much longer to have my lessons ready to go than it did last year. I also find myself having many more questions for the teachers on my team. Thankfully they are wonderful and very willing to help–even when I texted on the weekend to make sure I had the right answers on a reading quiz!

Last week I led our sophomore retreat, which too was fun and tiring. It is outside for most of the day. The week leading up to the retreat it said rain and possibly thunderstorms. We have never had to create such specific back up plans in case of rain. People joke that in Seattle it rains all the time, but in the 12 years I’ve been at the school we have never had rain on this retreat! It took a lot of extra planning, more coordinating with other adults, and lots of flexibility from people all around the school. The day of the retreat, my boss and I talked at 6:00 am to make the call–we had the retreat outside because the forecast kept pushing the rain back later in the afternoon. The retreat was one of the best we’ve had and the weather was great!! We even got hot chocolate for the kids in the morning which was a big hit! The whole day, and days leading up to it, were so fun, and tiring!

It is definitely nice to feel like I’m getting into more of a grove. And falling asleep at 8:30 pm on Friday night felt great too! Ahhhhh, back to teacher life!

First Week Flipgrid

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My selfie (with stickers) I posted at the end of my video. Students loved adding stickers to theirs

The first week back with students was so fun and so tiring! It’s amazing that even as I start year 14 of teaching, I still forget just how tiring that first week back is until I’m in the thick of it. Then I remember, very quickly.

One highlight of the week was the first assignment my students completed. Each student recorded a video introducing themselves on Flipgrid. Flipgrid is a website that students log into and submit a video of themselves answering a question or sharing insights. Earlier this year Microsoft purchased Flipgrid and made it free for all educators! The questions I had my students answer were: (1) What is your first and last name and what do you like to be called in class? (2) What is one thing you love? and (3) What are three words you would use to describe yourself? I was blown away by how awesome this assignment turned out!

A few highlights

  • The biggest benefit was that in these 15-30
    second videos, I got to know my students more than I have ever been able to do in the first days of school. Their personalities shined through both in their answers and how they recorded the video. There were lots of cameos by pets, siblings, and friends, which were so fun. The words my students chose to describe themselves gave me a lot of insight into their personality and interests. Watching the videos was so fun, and it was evident my students had fun making them! Also, many students watched their classmates’ videos (which was not a requirement) and in doing so were also getting to know each other more.
  • It was so helpful to hear students saying their own name. Now that these videos are done, I can use them to help me learn names this week and I can go back to them later in the year when I need a reminder on the pronunciation of a last name.
  • The videos were easy to make for students. The code to access the assignment made it easy for students to find it. Students can log in with a Microsoft or Google account, or with an email address, which means I could make my assignments only visible if you had the code and logged in with an account from my school.

I am excited to use Flipgrid again for other assignments! It’s a powerful tool to bring student voice into assessments and reflections, especially for those students who may not always want to share out loud in class. I also think it could be a good tool to use with teachers, possibly sharing insights gained from a professional development opportunity.

What are ways you could use Flipgrid with students or teachers?

3 Lessons from Deep Work

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Yesterday I finished reading Cal Newport’s book Deep Work: Rules for Focused Success in a Distracted World. Newport is a computer science professor at Georgetown University.
This book has been quoted in tons of other books and articles I have read, so I was excited to read it for myself. (My preferred reading genre is what I like to call “inspirational non-fiction” and this definitely fits right in!)

The book is broken up into two main parts: explaining why “deep work” is valuable and his suggestions about how to make space in your life to do the deep work. He defines deep work as: “Professional activities performed in a state of distraction-free concentration that push your cognitive capabilities to their limit. These efforts create new value, improve your skill, and are hard to replicate” (p. 3).

His explanation of why deep work is valuable is well-researched, thorough, and convincing. He has employed methods of deep work over the past decade and has a crazy amount of academic publications, a few books, and tenure at Georgetown to show for it. (He’s also a dad of two small kids and doesn’t work after 5:30 pm.) Newport recognizes that we cannot live our entire lives in the state of completing deep work. We can, however, organize our lives such that deep work can be done regularly. Here are three key lessons I took after reading this book.

3 lessons learned 

Look at your schedule and figure out when deep work can be done

Newport explains many different approaches, such as bimodal philosophy (dividing your time clearly for some stretches for deep work and other stretches for everything else), a rhythmic philosophy (create a simple yet regular habit of deep work), or a journalist approach (fit deep work wherever you can in your schedule). There is not one right way; there is just a right way for you. But you must make the space for this deep work to happen, or our days and weeks will be filled with other, not so deep, work. The benefits of deep work are not going to magically appear as you answer email. You must create the space to push your cognitive abilities forward.

Cut back on shallow work

Newport explains shallow work as the tasks that are noncognitive demanding tasks, that can be performed while distracted, and are easily replicated. Every job will have shallow work but the goal here is to cut back on how much of it you do. He suggests creating time for your shallow work, just as you do for deep work. Then you can batch the tasks and be intentional about completing what’s needed, without getting lost in only shallow work. He also suggests saying no to shallow work more often–I could definitely be better at that. This relates to another key point Newport makes in the book, in which he suggests it may be worth quitting social media. This may be a big jump for many people, but he makes many interesting points about how easy it is use social media as a distraction to deep work.

Put more thought into your leisure time

This phrase came from Arnold Bennett, an English writer born near the turn of the twentieth century. Newport explains that it is very easy to spend evenings with whatever grabs our attention first, for example scrolling through Instagram or mindlessly watching TV. The issue is that the activities that catch our attention right away are not always the activities that would lead to the feeling of being relaxed and rejuvenated. For example, for my husband it is much more relaxing to spend 20 minutes playing guitar as opposed to reading the news on Twitter for 20 minutes, or for me I feel much more relaxed if I’ve read a good book for 20 minutes rather than check out Facebook. If we are not intentional about our leisure time, the hours can go by unnoticed, leaving us often just more tired.

 

These lessons learned have definitely given me ideas for reflecting on my schedule for the upcoming school year. I am already brainstorming about how I can create the time and space for more deep work, and what that deep work will be.

And, although I am not quitting all social media, I did leave my phone inside as I write this blog post outside on my computer that is in airplane mode. The shallow work of social media, checking email, or unloading the dishwasher will be there later. Right now is time for reflecting, writing, creating, synthesizing–you know, deep work.

Productivity Pro Tip: Set a Timer

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I love learning about productivity and time management, through books, podcasts, blogs, conversations, whatever it may be. One time management tip that comes up a lot is to set a timer. This tip can be used in so many situations to help teachers. Here are some examples from my life:

  • When I am having a hard time starting to grade, I set a timer. Maybe for 30 minutes, then be done. Or even for just 15 minutes and then I can decide if I want to continue or switch tasks.
  • When I’m planning a new lesson I’ll often set a timer so I don’t get lost planning and spend 3 hours planning for a 45 minute lesson.
  • If I want to challenge myself to be super productive, I’ll set a 5 minute timer and see how many emails I can respond to in that short amount of time.
  • During lessons I often set timers (or have a student set a timer) for group time or individual work time. It’s amazing how off I can be if I just guess how long it’s been for an activity 🙂

Ideas for timers

I generally use my phone for a timer so I can set it and just leave it across the room or on a corner of my desk. If you like websites, two easy ones are:

e.ggtimer.com/

Egg Timer has a simple look to it that is clearly visible either on the page or in the title bar.

onlinestopwatch.com

More research

If you want to read more about the benefits of setting a timer, here are a couple blogs with great ideas:

Life Hacker: Use A Timer

Time Management Ninja: Set A Timer

Life Hack’s summary of a Pomodoro Timer

As you consider this productivity pro tip, when would setting a timer help you to be more productive? Have you tried this? Did it work for you?

Who ever is doing the talking is doing the learning

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When talking with a third-year teacher a while back, we were talking about the difference between a student-centered class and a teacher-centered class. I made the comment that I think whoever is doing the talking is doing the learning. She sat back and thought for a minute, then said, “my first year teaching I did so much talking, and I learned so much!” She wasn’t so sure the same was true for her students.

This idea of considering who is doing the most talking has helped me many times over the years. It is even a line in my Manifesto on Teaching.

It is easy to talk a lot as teachers. We have a built in audience. We (hopefully) have interesting things to share. We have objectives to teach.

And it can happen to all of us. In our first years we are working so hard to get by, that it can be easy to default to teacher-centered practices such as a lecture with a PowerPoint. As experienced teachers, we can fall behind and want to “get through” material that we may opt for the efficiency of teacher-centered practices.

However, if we are always the one doing the talking what does that mean for our students?

Ya, but…

You’re probably there are many ways to be an active learner besides talking. And we all know that just because someone is talking does not necessarily mean they are learning.

But I do think that if we step back and consider who is doing the talking in our classes it can give us insight about who is learning and what they are learning. It can help us to see if students are at the center of the learning. It can help us to consider how we are making space for students to share their knowledge, experience, and learning. It can remind us to step back and listen a bit more.

In your class, who does most of the talking? What does this mean for the learning and the environment?

Productivity Pro Tip: Plan Your Planning Period

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A reoccurring topic on this blog will be productivity. I love talking about productivity, efficiency, organizing, and using technology to help with all three. It is a favorite topic of mine to read about or listen to podcasts on! Today’s productivity pro tip is to plan your planning periods. Planning your planning period means to literally sit down and make a plan for your time that is your own. This also can include time before or after school (when you are not in meetings…).

To consider how to plan your planning period, two suggestions:

1.       Take time to think about what the most important tasks are for you to complete. Spending a couple minutes at the beginning of your day or planning period to focus on what is most important, can help you get more done in the end. Not only will this help you be productive, it will help you to prioritize and focus on what is most helpful and important. I make a list, separate from my to do list, of the 2-3 tasks that are most important for me to complete in my planning period.

two of my planning period priority lists from today

2.       Group together like tasks. If you have a couple different times in the day that are open for you to work, group together tasks that make sense to go together. For example, if you have to grade a few homework assignments, grade them during the same planning period so you can get into a rhythm. If you need to deliver various paperwork to others in your building, gather it all together and deliver it to various offices all on the same trip around the building. Ultimately this can help you to get more time back in your day.

Your job is more than email

When we don’t plan out our planning time, we can get sucked into email. We may just want to decompress, so we open our computer not knowing what we will do and end up lost in email. We may not know exactly what tasks need to be done, so we refer to our inbox as a to do list. The issue is that often our inbox does not list out the most important tasks for us to complete. It has the tasks (sometimes important, sometimes not) other people are asking of us.

Rather than checking my email at the beginning of my planning period, I tend to check it in the last 5 minutes or so. This gives me enough time to respond to quick emails and to make notes on my to do list if there is something I need to return to.

Do you plan your planning period? How does this help you to be more intentional about how you spend your time?

 

Connect Before You Correct

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The second line in my teaching manifesto says “Connect before I correct.” I learned this phrase from a colleague who learned it in a parenting class. As a teacher and a mom I tend to notice things. I notice when the door is left unlocked as we are leaving for school. I notice when we need more milk. I notice a new toy in the preschool classroom as I drop off my daughter.

I notice which students are hanging out together before school. I notice which students are breaking dress code. I notice which students are shopping online during class. I notice the student who seems to be off today.

The idea of connecting before I correct is to show that I notice the positive things before I show I noticed something to correct. For example, I could ask a student about how the volleyball match went last night, then later in class ask her about her missing assignment. I could take the time to find out what interests a student most before having a conversation with her about being off task on her device. It could even be a simple “hi, how’s it going?” to a student before asking him to report to the dean for being out of dress code.

Sometimes when we are in teacher-mode we are so quick to point out what needs to change or be done differently. We are quick to correct, hopefully out of a desire to help our students. But we can slow down. We can take the minute, or day, or week to connect first.

As we continue in September and this start of the new school year, I am reminded each day the power of connecting with my students. Having a one-on-one conversation can be hard in a high school when I have so many students in one day. Even still, it is absolutely worth it. With each day of the school year I am able to connect more and more helping my students to feel welcomed and valued.

This is not to let students off the hook. Rather, it is to remember they are people. There is more to them than just want needs to be corrected. When could you take more time to connect before you correct?