Finding a love of reading

Hello, colleagues! I recently digitally subscribed to the New York Times (they were running a promotion for $1 a week). I've been reading the news quite a bit in the last four or so years, so it only made sense to pay for a digital subscription for not only news, but opinion articles, recipes, and even a mini daily crossword.

I was reading last week when I came across an opinion article called "Why Are We Still Teaching Reading the Wrong Way?" As a teacher, I knew I had to read it. The article talks about how teaching phonics is the best way to teach students how to read, and because it's so intensive, most teachers ignore the best approach. Of course, there was a response article today in which readers wrote about how they learned to read with some responses supporting the original opinion article, and other responses refuting it.

Reading the original and response articles made me think about my own love of reading. I enjoy reading as much as almost anything. I don't remember learning to read, but my mother says that I picked up reading before I went to school. I know that she was a stay-at-home mom that read with me. I know we didn't have cable until first or second grade, so I the tv I watched was mostly PBS educational kid shows (Sesame Street, Mr. Rogers' Neighborhood, Reading Rainbow). Other than watching tv and playing outside, I remember reading... a lot! I grew up in a small town of 600 people with not a lot to do. My godmother (really my grandmother) was the librarian of our small town library that was two blocks from my house. I spent all of my free time there reading. I was reading well above my age since I eventually ran out of books to read that were "appropriate" for my age (e.g. reading John Grisham at age 12).  I fell in love with books at an early age, so I still love reading.

That is not, however, the case for most of our students. Why is that the case? I believe that part of it is due to students not knowing how to read, some of it is students not being able to read what they want, partly due to students being busy all of the time, and of course due to students being distracted by other things in their lives (e.g. social media, their cell phone, etc.).

So how can we get kids to enjoy reading again?

• Create a bedtime routine where you read every night. This is one of the biggest changes I made in my life within the last few years. I made the conscious decision to go to bed an hour before I wanted to fall asleep so that I could devote 30-45 minutes of time to reading. By reading this much each night, I read approximately one book a week. That is why, on my Goodreads reading challenge, I've challenged myself to read 52 books in a year. I've already read 48 books this year. 
• Let kids read what they want to read. I read what I want. I enjoy reading trashy beach novels and suspenseful thrillers. I don't always enjoy reading about history... I need a break from what I teach! My husband doesn't enjoy reading very much, but when his monthly Wired magazine arrives, he reads it cover to cover... sometimes more than once. I feel that should be the same for students. They should be able to read magazines, or story books, or a John Grisham novel that is well beyond their age. 
• Be a good example and read yourself in front of them. Part of the reason why I read so much as a child is because my parents read quite a bit when I was young. My dad would often sit in "his chair" and read at night. My mom would lay on the couch and read during the day. When my parents read, the TV was off. There was nothing else for me to do but read alongside them. 
• Limit technology. It was different when I was a child than what it is like for my students today, but as I said in the previous paragraph, the TV was off when my parents were reading. Now, if I read, I will turn off the TV and will silence my cell phone. Before bedtime, I will read and then post on Instagram right before falling asleep. It's become a habit over the past year. 
• Swap music for an audiobook. Install Audible on your child's phone so they can "read" while on the bus, or, if you drive them to school, turn on an audiobook instead of the radio. I'm not the biggest fan of audiobooks because I get distracted, but my husband loves podcasts and audiobooks much more than reading.
• Help bring books to life. I've always tried to read the book before watching the movie because a) I love spoilers and knowing what happens and b) I want to see how it comes alive. My sister and I recently saw Harry Potter and the Cursed Child on Broadway. I hadn't read the screenplay yet, so I read it on the plane. I was so disappointed when I read it and was worried that seeing the play live wouldn't live up to my expectations. Boy was I WRONG. It was one of the most amazing things I've ever seen. Now I want to reread the screenplay AND go see the show again! 
• Stash books all over. Growing up, we had a huge bookshelf in the hallway that had a lot of books on it. Now, on my Kindle, I try to find free books to download (currently have 21 classics and 33 random books). It's all about having options and variety. That keeps me interested in my current novel because I want to finish it and start a new one!
• Conquer the log. This probably looks a little different for students, but I love logging my books on Goodreads. Because Goodreads is "Facebook for readers," I can see what my friends are reading. This has helped me find so many interesting books that I never would have found otherwise. Goodreads also recommends books based on what I've read, so the more I read, the better the recommendations!

I hope, through this list, that your students (or you, or your kids) will start to enjoy reading more. I want everyone to have the same love for reading that I do! 

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

- Rachel

@historicalipad
My Teacherspayteachers website

Helping Students Research

Good morning colleagues! This week researching in class came up two different times. The first time research came up was when my former teammate needed some advice to help students analyze Civil War historical figures. The second time research was in a conversation was talking about some students that are ineligible for track because of failing a research assessment in math.

It is very evident that students struggle with researching a topic. I think the main reason is that students are overwhelmed with information as they investigate, because they expect instant results (instant gratification), and because learners have never been taught HOW and WHY they should research a topic.

This is not a blog post where I wag my finger at other people and their inadequate teaching of research in their class. I am less than a year out from being a Social Studies teacher myself, and I will own that I did a poor job teaching my students. This post is, instead, about how I think we can get students to research thoroughly.

I believe that this problem can be resolved through teaching students advanced Google searching skills. If a student is studying Abraham Lincoln, there are 10,500,000 results. TEN MILLION RESULTS! What if the information that they need is hiding on page 36 of the results?! I've long been a proponent of teaching students advanced Google searching skills. I haven't always been the best at explaining it to the kids, but it's essential to help students dig through the waste of the internet to find the diamond. I even put together an infographic of my (personally) most used Google search terms when I research. If a student is analyzing Abraham Lincoln's Gettysburg Address on Google, there are 646,000 results. "Abraham Lincoln" "Gettysburg Address" site:.edu has 8,650 results. "Abraham Lincoln" "Gettysburg Address" site:.gov has 7,550 results. Both of those searches have many results to wade through, but it's approximately 98% fewer results than the original search AND all results come from an educational or government website. "Abraham Lincoln" "Gettysburg Address" site:nytimes.com has only 343 results. We have to help students "dig" to find the information that they need. If you have your students doing general research, I would encourage you to force students to find information from .edu and .gov pages, and maybe even ask them to use a reputable news source.

If you want students to slow down as they work, SLOW THEM DOWN and give them time. I would encourage you to do a class research project at the beginning of the year. Work together as a class using the same search queries and search results. Have students look at the author to identify bias and to evaluate the source. Have students discuss what makes a result better than another. Force students to find a wide variety of sources as they research. Then, as students get better at slowing down, start giving them more of a challenge. Give them questions that cannot be "Googled," i.e., have them form an opinion about the subject and find evidence to support their answer. It makes it much more difficult to plagiarize, AND if they're passionate about the topic (or their opinion), they will invest and want to find the answers.

Why should we make our students investigate a variety of topics? I think the better question is, do we want our students to be self-sufficient, well-rounded, life-long learners? I feel like every teacher would answer yes to that question. But not every student is going to be an academic for the rest of their lives. Some kids may end up as a mechanic, a doctor, or a secretary. No matter what occupation someone has in the future, they will likely have to do some research. We seek more efficient methods for doing our job, and in an ever-changing technological world, how we do our jobs changes. We have to be able to adapt to those changes through making and understanding that evolution. So after we conquer the "why" with our students, we have to teach them the HOW. Students need to learn how to use advanced skills with Google searching, they need to understand what a good source looks like, they need time management skills through assigning small chunks of work at a time, and they need to cite the sources that they use to avoid plagiarizing someone else's work. In the end, if you want students to be excellent researchers, you have to teach them to be thorough and thoughtful researchers. Never expect that the teacher they had the previous year showed them anything about research. Take ownership of the students that you have, right now, in your class.

As I wrote out my blog, I realized there was an extra problem - meeting the needs of ALL of our students. This problem was always my most challenging. I did a decent job at differentiating and accommodating my assignments, except for research. You have to scaffold inquiry for students, whether that's finding and vetting websites for them, creating research cloze notes, or even putting students into homogeneous groups for a research project. I would also think about doing small mini-lessons for research or even severely chunking a student's time in your class as they research. It is hard for kids to stay focused past 20 minutes. How can you use that to your advantage? Can you make 20-minute research blocks available for your students so that they're not doing the same thing for 60 minutes?




Hopefully, this gives you some food for thought as you are thinking about an upcoming research project (or how you can improve a previous activity)! Thanks for reading... I'll see you next week :)

- Rachel

@historicalipad

My Teacherspayteachers website

Vetting Apps

Good morning colleagues! I'm back! I was going to post last week... I had this great plan of reading The Innovator's Mindset and doing a book review blog post. But then Spring Break happened, i.e., I sat around and did NOTHING and enjoyed my time off. So then I was going to finish it this week, but we started track practice, and having two and a half hours less each day really cramps my time! SO...  I have a completely different blog post this week!

While reading The Innovator's Mindset, I saw a great quotation from George Couros, "My belief is not that teachers don't want to change, but they sometimes lack clear guidance and support to make the desired change." This bit of information has stuck with me this whole week as I've thought about supporting teachers in my position, but also as I've read more on the news about Cambridge Analytica. If you don't follow the news, Cambridge Analytica is a political consulting firm that mines and analyzes data. Why this story is huge is because they accessed private information from between 50-80 million Facebook users to influence and target American voters in the 2016 Presidential election. Cambridge Analytica is mostly funded by two people: Robert Mercer and Steve Bannon.

So why am I bringing up this breach on my educational blog? Because I, along with a group of three other teachers, have embarked on an ambitious program to "vet" apps for our school district. Traditionally, large school districts have an "edtech" team that does this, but because our district is still designing (hopefully) this team, some of the responsibilities have fallen on everyday teachers.
What is app vetting and why do we do it? In simple terms, we are auditing/reviewing apps to ensure that they meet student data privacy laws such as FERPA and COPPA. The Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA) is a Federal law that protects the privacy of student education records. One aspect of this is that schools must have written permission from the parent to release any information from a student's education record which includes their name, location, student ID, etc. The Children's Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA) is a law created to protect the privacy of children under 13. COPPA imposes specific requirements on operators of websites or online services directed to children under 13 years of age, and on operators of other websites or online services that have actual knowledge that they are collecting personal information online from a child under 13 years of age.

Right now, D49 is not meeting the requirements of these two federal laws. After the Cambridge Analytica scandal, it is even more imperative to be in compliance ASAP! We have to ensure that our students' data is not being accessed, let alone mined, for nefarious purposes!

So why did I bring up the George Couros quotation? Because it has been briefly mentioned to my 1:1 colleagues that there will be changes next year and some apps will not be able to be used. Some teachers were quite frustrated and wanted to know why this change was happening. I even mentioned FERPA and COPPA, but the teachers didn't know what those laws were and wondered if they were new. After looking at, reading, and thinking about the quotation,  I've realized that the frustration stems from teachers lacking the guidance and support for the change.
So I'm going to lay out how we vet apps (what we're looking for) and how we will make changes for the next school year.

• We look at the applications that teachers want to use and determine if they will be used for educational purposes. 
• We access the iOS application's App Store page so that we can quickly find the developer website and privacy policy. 
• Once on the privacy policy, we scour for a few things. What types of information are being shared?  Is there any information shared that could be considered sensitive?  Are students sharing personally identifiable information? How does the application gather data? Does it share or sell the data? Does it retain the data after the account is deleted? Does the application have ads? Are students under 13 allowed to use the application? Does the app require parental consent before use? Are students generating content? Is that content shared publicly? What happens if there's a breach of data?
• After finding answers to all of the questions that we have, we put the application on a spreadsheet. The app will fall under one of four categories: 1) approved with no limitations, 2) approved with limitations, banned completely, approved for a teacher account only. 
• By the end of the year, all 1:1 teachers need to make a list of applications that they want to use in the classroom. We will compile the list and vet apps over the summer. At the beginning of year registration, parents will sign off on all applications to be used. 
• If a teacher wants a new application through the next school year, at SMS I will vet the app. Once approved, the teacher will have to send home a parent permission form, receive all forms back, then I will add the application to the 1:1 device. 

This is all a work in progress, and it is very slow moving as there are only four of us teachers vetting applications. I hope, through this process, that teachers understand the importance of vetting apps to keep our students safe in the 21st century.

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

- Rachel

@historicalipad

My Teacherspayteachers website

Inspiration

Good afternoon colleagues!

Yesterday was STRESSFUL. Long story short, I had 10 (TEN) colleagues in my room taking the Google level 1 or 2 certification. Because they were logged in with their Google exam account (instead of their district account), YouTube and Google Sites were blocked by our district web filter. We figured out a solution, but it was a nerve-wracking three hours for all involved. We probably won't test under district wifi again!

But in the end, most teachers passed their exam! What stood out to me was their growth mindset and desire to push their teaching philosophy forward. It was a fabulous end, to a long week, that was full of inspiration! One day last week a tweet popped up in my feed with a TED video. I'd never seen the video before, and when I opened it, it was from February 2006 (as I am student teaching and preparing for college graduation). I found this video to be efficacious and inspirational.

Wow! There's a LOT here. What spoke to me was...

1. Creativity is as important as literacy. Yes, we want our students to be well-spoken and well-read. But we can't scare them away from what they are passionate about. What they are excited about has meaning and has a purpose. If we do not allow our students to be creative and take chances, we will never come up with anything new and original. I liken this to Snapchat. Who knew, eight years ago, that people would use a messaging platform that sent pictures. And these pictures would disappear after a period of time. You could add filters and text to become a storyteller. Or professional snowboarding. Five years ago, you could win a competition with back to back 720s. Then it was back to back 1080s. Now back to back 1440s. As more snowboarders take chances (and fall in the process), the sport will continue to change and evolve, and push the limits of a human body. But if you tell a kid that taking pictures, or snowboarding, is not as important as doing math, these results will never happen. 
2. Degrees are no longer worth anything. A degree used to ensure a job after graduation. Now, it doesn't. Now you need an MA or Ph.D. to get the same position. Instead of "preparing" every student for college, prepare them for what they want to do! Some jobs require on-the-job training or maybe a two-year degree from community college. We have to stop telling EVERY student to go to college. Instead, we need to listen more and help guide and facilitate them to their goal. 
3. Intelligence is diverse, dynamic, and distinct. I am a great example of this. I was a good student in school, but I was always the "dumb" of the smart kids. I could play the game of school, but I wasn't learning anything. I knew I wanted to teach history because I wanted to SEE students learn (not lecture them to death). The longer I taught, the more strategies I learned and the more creative I became. The more creative I became, the more my students learned. I started to find my passion and creativity with technology and found what I am really good at. I am more creative (and intelligent) now than I ever was as a student, or even when I first started teaching. It just took me awhile to find who I was as a teacher, to educate my whole being. 

After watching this video, I ended up down a rabbit hole of further inspiring videos.

1. Human beings are different and diverse. That means our curriculum ALSO needs to be varied and diverse. Students should not sit, hour after hour, doing low-grade clerical work. Students should be up and be moving while they are learning. I feel like this idea connects to Teach Like a Pirate with all of the "hook" options. How can we hook our different and diverse students?
2. If there is no learning going on... there's no education going on. You must discuss LEARNING when you talk about teaching! What are the outcomes? What do you want the students to KNOW? How will you know that they know? 
3. Students are creative. We've beat creativity over time. It is challenging to get eighth-grade students to be creative when they haven't had to be creative in nine years. How do we do that? How can we engage, provoke, and stimulate our students? Find their passion. Right now, their focus may be their cell phone. What is it about their phone that is engaging and exciting? Is there any way that you can bring those ideas into your curriculum? And it doesn't have to be about gamifying the classroom! How can you get students to create, design, modify, and improve? 

1. If you are going to lead, lead. Be visible to the students, whether that's in the hallway or the classroom or at events. The students should know who you are if you are a leader. Students don't have to necessarily like you, but they do need to respect you. They should see you as someone they want to be in the future. If you are transparent in your interactions and challenge students to be who they are meant to be, they will see you as a leader. As a leader, surround yourself with people that think like you and support students like you, but also challenge your ideas. With your fellow leaders, figure out the fundamental "stuff" and what the students require.
2. So what. Now what? No more excuses. Teachers say that they never have enough time. It is unfortunate to admit that there are only 24 hours in a day, so there will never be more time. What are you spending your time doing? Could your time be better spent elsewhere? No more excuses. Be solution-oriented and then ASK for change.
3. If nobody told you that they loved you today, you remember I do, and I always will. Love your kids. Love who they are now so that you can admire them in the future. Believe in them and believe in their possibilities. Only look at what they can become and let that drive your love for your students. Students want to feel special. You can do that by listening to them and allowing that support to guide your curriculum, your interactions, and your mindset. 

Find a way to be inspired these last few weeks before spring break! Thanks for reading! Be on the lookout (in a few weeks) for my next blog!

- Rachel

@historicalipad

My Teacherspayteachers website

Mind. Blown.

Happy Sunday, colleagues! This past week I was scrolling through Twitter when I came across a post from Jennifer Gonzales. Of course, the title got my attention, but the article, itself, was even better.

Buzzword Bling: Putting Substance Behind Our Big Words
Guest post by Typhani Harris, Ph.Dhttps://t.co/dZBcykUCmv#teaching #studentchoice #studentengagement #teachingstrategies #wholechild

— Jennifer Gonzalez (@cultofpedagogy) January 23, 2018

This blog post is 2 1/2 years old but is still very much relevant. A lot of what is spoken in the blog post directly relates to my classroom and my education philosophy: 21st-century learning, real-world projects, and engagement. The part that blew my mind was the piece about how real-world knowledge is when it is real for students, but not necessarily real for teachers.

When I taught Social Studies, and I heard about making curriculum real-world, I struggled. I was frustrated with trying to explain what I considered "modern day" topics while teaching about what happened in the US 300 years ago. The closest I ever felt I got was the very last unit I developed last year when I had the students study a modern event dealing with racism and connect its lineage back to Reconstruction and Jim Crow laws. I felt so successful, and it was the last US history topic I taught over nine years.

After reading this blog post, I realized that I was unintentionally teaching real-world concepts for the last five years! I was doing so by connecting to their real-world NOW. I knew it was a best teaching practice to provide students opportunities to interact and communicate with each other. For some reason, I never thought about how beneficial it was to produce situations (or simulations) that were similar to their lives right now. Those situations/simulations are real-world for THEM (even if they're not real world for us).

What are some ways to design real-world lessons, projects, or units for our students?

• Even though students can't vote, they are interested in today's politics. If you teach Social Studies, compare and contrast political actions in 1789 with the government today. Compare the Presidents and their agendas. How is the Supreme Court different? How is Congress different? As you continue to teach your curriculum (into the 19th and 20th centuries), discuss where the changes happened. Focus on, How did we get here today? 
• Let students write a blog. Sometimes you can give them prompts, but sometimes, let them free write. Let them blog about what they're reading or have them blog about a recent personal Instagram post. If you want students to comment on each others' posts, have them look at vocabulary. Are there any words that might sound better than what they posted? It's a sneaky activity that expands their vocabulary!
• Students are obsessed with Netflix! Do you want them to write a story? Have the students "pitch" their plotline to Netflix executives. Want to make the lesson even more real world? Have a panel (teachers, students, maybe even local filmmakers?!) that discuss their storylines with them, in person, in front of the class. 
• I'm speaking here as a non-math person, but is it possible for students to study algorithms? Is it possible for them to look at how Facebook's news feed has changed (based on the algorithm)? Could they do a scientific study of how (or how often) they see a person on their Instagram feed now that it is no longer based on time of posting?

My challenge to you, this week, is to find a way to make your content more relevant to students TODAY, whether you update a lesson, add technology, or just listen to what students care about today. Thanks for reading. I'll see you next week :)

- Rachel

@historicalipad

My Teacherspayteachers website

End of unit reflections

Hello, teachers! Sorry for the missing blog last week! I came down with a cold last Friday but felt the need to go photograph some beautiful frost in town that same day. I'm pretty sure I made myself sicker, so my mind was not ready for blogging last week :(

This morning I am reflecting on a unit that my classes completed on Friday. It was a four week unit over what I call the pre-Civil War era (1820s - 1859). For the first two weeks, students were put into large groups in which they "presented" a whole class lesson on a decade (purely giving content). For the last two weeks of the unit, the students worked individually in which they picked three events in one decade to dive "deeper" into. They used a tic-tac-toe board to pick the products that they wanted to create while also choosing the proficiency level that they wanted to demonstrate.

What worked: Most students enjoyed "teaching" for a whole class period (in a large group). They were nervous overall, but they shined in front of the class. This set them up for success in presenting in front of the whole class. I could tell that some students accessed their group presentation rubric as most students improved upon their eye contact and projection for their second presentation. I also liked that when students presented individually that they weren't required to show memorized content, but instead talked about what they created and how their events caused change (the essential question for the unit). This helped with their confidence and talking to their colleagues instead of just reading from the screen. I heard many students say that they enjoyed having a choice in their topic and product creation, and I felt having the tic-tac-toe board at this point in the year ensured the success as they were comfortable with choice (as opposed to the beginning of the year).

What didn't work: I liked the students taking on the class lesson piece, but I do not feel like I set up the students for success in their content presentations. This unit, more than any prior, made me realize how weak my students' research skills are. This could be a whole other blog topic - teaching students how to investigate on the internet. I don't feel like I train them well in this aspect, and to some extent, expect the students to come to eighth grade prepared with research skills. I know that this is wrong, and I know that my students don't know how to analyze and dive deeper online. Do I know how to teach the students to research on the internet? I'm not sure, but I feel like I need to scaffold their research better. Unfortunately, this means created focused research handouts for each topic. That is something I need to create over the summer if I want to do this unit again (and I know for sure that I do).

I need to, somehow, clean up my directions. I'm not clear if this was all on me, but my students were missing what they were supposed to DO for the second half of the unit. The students just wanted to regurgitate information, when I kept telling them to be persuasive; that they are trying to persuade someone to move to the historical location to ensure that the historical event happens (because, you know, they are time travelers). I know that when I go through their products that most of them will miss that mark.

One struggle (that I've dealt with in the past) is that the students want to make sure that they are doing the assignment "right," so they keep asking me how their product looks, they are checking in with me, and they are asking me questions. This prevented me from checking in with all of my students. I was also trying to get through their research handouts as they were working, but I could never find time. The missing feedback from me did not help the previous issue of my students repeating content instead of being persuasive.

And the BIGGEST problem with this unit is a student problem: time management. Even though I had checkpoints and due dates in place, they were not enough. The students put off their project until the last minute and then scrambled the night before presentations started. I told all of the students to be prepared to present on the first day, but in one class I had to go ask 19 students to present before I could find five students ready to go. I believe that next time I will have more stringent due dates and clearer time management strategies to ensure that their time management is on point. I heard many complaints that I gave too much homework, but it was evident that putting it off until the last minute meant that they had a lot of homework in one night! I wrote on the board how much time they had which effectively ended this complaint.

I had a frustrating week when it came to presentations, but in the end, I know that this was a solid first start to a new design for a unit. I am happy with what I created and am excited to "fix it" for next year!

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

- Rachel

@historicalipad

My Teacherspayteachers website

Historical Wanderings

Hello, colleagues! I have returned from my East Coast trip and am still processing my vacation! I was lucky enough to have one of my sisters move to Eastern Pennsylvania. She is close to Philadelphia and Washington DC, two cities I have never visited. It is rather embarrassing to admit this as I am an American history teacher! Our district has a modified year-round schedule (nine weeks on, two weeks off), so we get a two-week break in the middle of October. It is the most fantastic break in the schedule! Flights tend to be relatively cheap, so my husband and I were able to fly directly to Philadelphia round trip for less than $300. Trust me; this is a steal.

We spent a day in Philadelphia, two days in Washington DC, and a day at Gettysburg. It was an amazing experience! I appreciated these places more as an adult because I could provide context for myself - I knew the magnitude of these places and felt honored to be there.

A photo posted by Rachel Jeffrey (@rbailsjeffreyphoto) on Oct 16, 2016 at 4:31am PDT

As I walked around, I asked myself (and talked about it out loud to my husband and family) if I could imagine bringing my students to PA and DC. One of my colleagues takes students to different locations around the world - taking them to the East Coast would be easier, right? It can't be that hard, right?!

While we toured, I saw many school groups out and about. The common thread through each set of students: they were loud and were running around like chickens with their heads cut off. The teacher in me (and my husband) wanted to yell at them for their disrespect. I also wanted to talk to their leader and ask what on earth they were doing. But as I thought about it, I wondered if I could do any better with my students. Could I get my students to care about these places? If so, how? What does it take to get students to connect to the past?

A photo posted by Rachel Jeffrey (@rbailsjeffreyphoto) on Oct 21, 2016 at 7:07am PDT

What stood out to me was:
1. The teacher had thirty or more students with them at any given time. Often, it was more than fifty.
2. The teacher had the students move at their individual pace
3. The teacher often stood to the side away from the students

I decided that if I took students out east, it would be a select group of students (preferably twenty or less). I would not attempt to take all kids because one person cannot adequately monitor nor connect with a large group of students. Secondly, I would not just watch my students; I would guide them through the exhibits and locations and would guide them with a purpose. I'm not sure I would give them a handout, but I would have tasks for them and activities that help them connect. Students relate to others through feelings and emotions, so they have to have some context to understand the magnitude of why they were there. Third, I would pick select locations based on what my students study in the classroom. For example, I would skip the Vietnam Memorial as we only study early American history. That is a memorial that the tour groups seemed to struggle with the most - they ran around, talked loudly, and Snapchatted while I watched a woman leave a gift for her deceased father while sobbing. There was no connection between those kids and what was happening around them.

In the end, I had a fantastic trip. I was able to see some incredible locations, learned some new things about history, and get some great photos. I am incredibly grateful for my journey out east. I am also thankful that I was able to see those tour groups so that I will think carefully about classroom field trips in the future.

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

- Rachel
@historicalipad
My Teacherspayteachers website

Interested in purchasing my photography? Check out my store on Redbubble.

A photo posted by Rachel Jeffrey (@rbailsjeffreyphoto) on Oct 17, 2016 at 7:16am PDT