Thinking outside the box

Good morning colleagues!

My class is currently one week deep into a cross-curricular American Civil War project with Language Arts. The students have done some overarching research on important historical figures during the war, found the characteristic that this person best exemplifies, and have started designing their "improvement hour" project.

Yesterday I had the students fill out a Google Form about how they are doing on their project, and any stumbles that they had. I used the data results to guide the students needing to be spoken with immediately, which students I could meet with that day, and which students I could meet with the next day. It allowed me to prioritize my conference order.

One student had this answer, and it made me pause.

Important #middleschool words: "It was just hard to think about things like most of the time your teachers make ideas then you have to 1/2

— Rachel Jeffrey (@historicalipad) April 14, 2017

whatever they say but this time you are making ideas with your brain,well I don't know it is just hard to think like this I guess." 2/2

— Rachel Jeffrey (@historicalipad) April 14, 2017

Though what she said is both encouraging and discouraging, I am happy for a few things. I am glad that I saved a project like this for the fourth quarter. Though my classroom style is not typical, my school is quite traditional. It took a lot of breaking down walls and barriers this year to get my kids ready. A project like this would have bombed in the first quarter. I am happy that I am doing this project at all. Those that read my blog often know that I am not having the best year. I refused to let myself get in the way of me having my students do something that benefits their present and future. I am glad that I am giving my students something with many choices. They are getting to decide what they do and how they do it. I had a quick spark of inspiration last week and also added that the students combine their project with something they are passionate about. I have seen more "buy-in" as the project as gone on.

Love how this turned out! #edchat #classroom #middleschool pic.twitter.com/ZGFUbbnJdZ

— Rachel Jeffrey (@historicalipad) August 1, 2016

I am happy that I have this on my wall. I never pointed it out to students, but I've been pointing it out a lot this past week (especially the "this is too hard"). I said to one student, "I know you never look at it." He said, "Actually, I've looked at it a lot." Boom! I consider that a win :)

I think where I'm going with all of this is that this project has been reassuring. I am glad that I decided to elevate the Civil War unit. It is a challenge, but it is pushing my students outside the box and is forcing them to think in ways that they might not have thought before. This is authentic 21st-century learning that demonstrates the relevance of history while preparing them for the future. This has been the most creative, innovative unit that I've created, and I am proud of my students, my teammate, and myself.

Thanks for reading. I'll see you next week :)

- Rachel

@historicalipad

My Teacherspayteachers website

Designing an Interactive Google Map

Good morning colleagues! I was not planning on blogging today, but I wanted to share about my awesome Spring break while ALSO demonstrating how to create an interactive Google Map!

In Drive, create a new map

Title your map, then add a layer and title

In your locations layer, click the pin, search for your location, and add to map

You can change the color and icon of your location.

In locations, add a second location. You can add an image and text description of your location.

Click on the "directions" icon. This will add a new layer where you can search from point A to B.

Change your map sharing directions so that everyone can see it!

And of course, here is my map of my break. Enjoy!

I hope that you could see a way to use these maps in your classroom, and I hope this was helpful in walking you through how to create one. Thanks for reading. I'll see you next week :)

- Rachel

@historicalipad

My Teacherspayteachers website

Elevate.

Hello, colleagues!

I'm going to share an idea that I had this week that I'm pretty excited about. Every spring, eighth grade American history teachers partner with their Language Arts teammate to do a Civil War research paper. We've done this for the past eight years that I have taught here, and it's a unit that just doesn't excite me. I don't hate the project, but I am not a fan of the content or the fact that the students create a research paper. Civil War technology is not compelling; I cannot get excited about it in any capacity (and it includes photography, and I LOVE photography). I also don't want to grade 110 research essays after I've already had the students write three analytical essays throughout the year.

Every year I want to elevate the project. I'm not trying to make it better, but am more focused on creating something that works for my students and for myself. The lightbulb went off this week when I was thinking about my Google Innovator project. I decided that I wanted to do a "trial run" with this unit. If I do or do not become a Google Innovator, I believe in character education and want to continue to elevate my content.

So my plan is to have the students research a person from the American Civil War.

They will investigate the person and find a characteristic best demonstrated by this individual.

I then want the students to take this personality feature and try to emulate it in some sort of genius hour project. My thought is that it will lead to community building, whether in the classroom, in the school, or in the community of Colorado Springs. For example, say they choose Clara Barton who was a nurse. They pick the characteristic of selflessness. They emulate Clara Barton's selflessness by performing random acts of kindness for a stranger for a week. I'm still thinking this all through, but I want them to address my unit essential question: How can we emulate the best of the past? I'm also thinking about finding primary documents for them to access through Actively Learn, and they will continue with flipped learning.

This would only, however, take up my portion of the unit. So for my Language Arts counterpart, I was inspired by a colleague who sent me a Pinterest pin about a wax museum project. I asked my colleague if she would be interested in having the students research these people (together; we have a shared wall) then present their wax figure in her class. She just ate it up!

I tried to create an eclectic bunch of people to study because I'm hoping through this project that the students emulate the best of the past and also see themselves in history. I'm not sure if I could ask for anything more.

Thanks for reading. I'll see you next week :)

- Rachel

@historicalipad

My Teacherspayteachers website