Shaping the unknowns

How to start the year off is always a question I struggle with each year?  This year is no different.  I am jumping into flipping my class.  However, I am leaning towards starting the beginning of the year traditionally especially in Spanish 1, and staring the flipped version in chapter 1.

I have been running the set up through my mind almost all summer and I am trying to get things fine tuned and set the way I want them.  I am getting a lot support from my PLN and get wonderful new ideas from them as well.  I just found out that a teacher in other high school in my district will be flipping, so we are going to collaborate as the year goes.  This will be a great support.

I am excited about what this year can be with the new changes in my class.  It will be a learning experience and I want the students to know that I am trying this and it may or may not work, but I ultimately want the students to learn that not knowing if you are going to be successful is not a reason for not trying something new.  I want my students to realize that anything is possible and not be worried if the idea works.  This idea works multiple facets in Spanish and with my use of technology.  

The beginning of the school year has many unknowns.  This year will be no different.  One large unknown for me, but exciting and interesting, will be the addition of two new administrators.  My principal and assistant principal are both new this year.  This will be an exciting, and I cannot wait to share with them my plans for flipping and incorporating technology with some PBL and SBG.  Add to that four Spanish 1 classes and there will be plenty of unknowns.  

To me, unknowns are clean slates that we are able to create what we want to make them.  Everything I do will shape how these unknowns pan out.  Having an open mind and being willing to be flexible, will  allow these unknowns to be positive ones.  LIke all journeys in life, you start somewhere with a clean slate and the start of this school year no exception.  

Have a Great Year Everyone!

The Journey Continues

At the end of last school year, I did some dabbling into flipping my classes.  I really like the premise behind flipping and feel that it is a good fit for me and my Spanish classroom.  I want to focus more of my face to face (f2f) time on meaningful activities that build the students interpersonal, interpretive and presentational skills in reading, speaking. listening and writing.  With that said, I believe that by flipping I can take the grammar instruction out of the f2f time and use videos to present them.  This will allow me work with the students communication skills.

To help prepare myself for flipping, I watched Heather Witten's webinar via Sophia on Flipped for Fluency.     She gave some great examples and had some fantastic questions on how she went about flipping her class.  This webinar gave me a focused look on how I want to go about setting up my class.

My focus is set.  I am started with what I want the students to know by the end of the year.  I then am breaking down my grammar points to use at various points in the year.  I am grouping this based on themes so that the units are focused and I can tie those into cultural related topics.  I will be giving 2 check in assessments to see how students are progressing before students create a unit proficiency assessment.  This assessment will have a focus, but students will get to choose their own way to present their proficiency.

Along with flipping, I am wanting to try some PBL and as much tech use as possible.  I even think that students will be blogging in Spanish this year to improve their writing.  For speaking formative assessments, I am going to be using google voice for students to call and leave a message that will show their comprehension of the questions and their speaking abilities.

I am excited about this journey with flipping this year and cannot wait to get started.  I know that the students will need to change their thought process for my class, but once they see how effective taking control of their own learning will be they will buy into it!

I will keep you all updated on how the journey is going once I start getting units planned and the school year begins.

The process continues

After looking at various different ways to flip the classroom, I still am in the process of finding out what a flipped classroom means to me. I have ideas in my head. I want the students to work towards mastery, not just doing things by a time frame and moving on. If that was the case, what's the point of changing things up.

I have spent time looking into different activities that will meaningful and technologically driven. I have scoured Twitter and different groups getting nuggets of information. I am looking at tech groups, educator groups, foreign language groups, flipped class groups and so on. I was lucky enough to be pointed towards @SraWitten and @karacjacobs. Their blogs and advice have been greatly helpful.

I have watched webinars on flipping and have even received my "Flipped" Certificate from @sophia (www.sophia.org) I am in the process of adding to and making new tutorials for my class. I am convinced that flipping the class will be successful.

With every new concept I have introduced this year, I have had to prod my Spanish II's through it. When things do not go real smooth, they want to give up and quit and go back to the old ways of doing things. I keep pushing. When we started with Schoology, now it is adding BYOT to the classroom and taking tests/quizzes using technology. I am sure when I introduce Google Voice in the next week or so, that will be received with open arms. (I somehow doubt that)

I want to model for students that just because we don't know what how things will turn out or that if things are difficult, we can't just stop and forget it. I want them to know that I don't know if this will work, but I am doing it anyway and I am jumping in with both feet.

My Spanish II's just took their first set of notes in the flipped model on Thursday night. I cannot wait to see how this goes.

On an exciting note, I was asked to take part in the second cohort of my district's technology integration pilot. I am honored to be asked and am looking forward to finding things to use and do with my classes.

Well, I will let you know how things are progressing.

Where to being?

After teaching for 11 years, one usually know just how they want to do their job day in and day out. After getting an iPad to use in class, I am now questioning that mantra. My district, like most, is facing financial concerns, and as a result PD is not normally approved, so I took to the social media airways to get some ideas. I joined twitter (@sadkinsump) and have started blogging.

My school uses Schoology as its LMS. I fiddled with it in the summer, but thought nothing about it. At our school PD day, we had a short presentation on Schoology, and I realized how that could be beneficial in the Foreign Language classroom. I started my Spanish II's using Schoology for discussion posts, so they could improve their writing and could see how others were doing too.

I have increased my use of Schoology and now have all my students in Spanish I and II using it. I have also started posting notes from class, worksheets, vocabulary lists and links to quizlet. I realize the more that students have access to things at home and on their own time the more beneficial it is to them.

Sorry for digressing. After getting my iPad, I have been looking at different ways to enhance my class. I have began using the educreations app and love it. I like the idea of posting the notes with my voice, so students can hear and see what the notes are. This offers so much more than just copying the notes from a friend.

After starting this, I found the #edchat group on Twitter and learned about this idea of flipping the classroom. I read some blog links from Daniel Edwards (@syded06) and I have been sold on the idea of flipping the classroom.

The chemistry teacher and I have talked off and on for a week or so about flipping the classroom and what that means. I really believe in the flipped mastery model, but I am now in the area of how to go about doing it all. I have a few students who normally do not do their homework, so I am trying to figure out how that will play out if they do not listen to the notes and then be ready for the days activities. I also question how to handle students who say they have no access to the computer at home, even though, they already have told me they do.

I think the benefits of the flipped classroom fits the Foreign Language classroom really well. The goal of the class is for students to communicate in the Target Language not just do the grammar concepts really well. The flipped classroom allows students to spend less time on the grammar and more time working on the communicating.

I am on information overload right now. I see so many new ideas and want to run with them all. I know I need to choose only a few and do those well and then implement the others after I get up and going.

I am open to any and all suggestions as well as encouragement in this process.

I will keep you all posted on how things start off.