Who loves Class Dojo!

I do, I have been a big fan of Class Dojo for about 3 years. It started with my toughest group! These second graders were a team trying to take me down. I left at the end of that school year and fell asleep for a week. They were struggling to read and some of them were very upset and had started to show signs of really angry violent behavior. I needed to get them to listen to me and I knew they would learn and grow.

Class Dojo was the only way I could get them to understand their behaviors and not blame adults and act out more. The started tracking their own behavior and saw the clear connections. The clips the cards, the names on the board nothing worked like the lovely little Class Dojo sound for a positive reward.

I also used other strategies from Whole Brain Teaching and Teach Like a Champion, Doug Lemov.  We instituted Class Yes.  The choral response was a great consistent tool.

We started to try to beat the clock or in my class because I likey the music we would beat the song . I selected " Everybody Wants to be loved" Ingrid Michaelson song.


I just loved seeing the boy labeled a bully sing this sweet tune as he packed up his Readers Notebook. Everytime I hear this song I still think of this group of kiddos.



Next, I used Phonevite paired with Class Dojo.

The kids set a daily goal. Yes, daily because that is what they needed. I would call every student every day using Phonevite, with a positive pre recorded message " Yay, you met your goal" or a different positive pre recorded message" Bummer, you did not meet your goal today. Make a plan with your family of how you will be able to meet the goal tomorrow." Then plans and parents flooded my classroom. They loved it and the kids knew everyday before we were dismissed I would check Class Dojo and set up the phone calls to be made in Phonevite. Everyone was getting a call either way. The parents were expecting it. They would begin to monitor and correct behaviors throughout the day if they knew the day was off to a bad start.

Things started to change and this was a class that I really enjoyed and was sad to see go by the end of the year. Some of the plans were, you will have a goal every 30 min to earn 0 negative dojo points and 1 positive dojo point. That's when the ipad and multiple alarms with different sounds came in handy. Each of the kids with the short term goals knew their sound and knew I would be checking in on them when that sound went off as well the rest of the class would check in with them and soon the other students were cheering them on. They were getting their MOJO. No they certainly were not the highest scoring class but they had grown in behaviors and academics some kids doubled their test scores from previous years, some tripled it. AMAZING group!

Well, Well, Well, the folks at Class Dojo are much smarter than me and they took this one step better and now Class Dojo can be linked to texts. What you talkin bout Willis?
You can do a few amazing things;
1. Send out text blasts ( similar to what I was doing with Phonevite )(I still love Phonevite but I do not need it for this anymore)
2. Send private text with parents and leave those open for parent responses.
3. Send out private texts to parents and just leave it so you know they read it. They are properly called; read receipts.
Their info graphic is much prettier than mine:

Oh YES! and do not forget it works for both the iphone (itunes store) people and the little green Robot folks as well (Android) I am new to iphone so I love both. Green robots! Hmmmm! MOJO is this maybe shall I quote the movie Star Wars; "I am your father MOJO."says Android. Maybe IDK, I see a resemblance.

Can you say Hollaaa! I can but I do not really like to because I think Holllar has seen it's day. I will say Goody Goody Gumdrops, or Winner Winner Chicken Dinner (classics).


I am in love with these new features. I am an Teacher on Assignment this year and I have been trying to find ways to use it for my new role. Sometimes I model lessons and sometimes I just release teachers. If you have any great ideas I would love to hear them.

P.S. MOJO is much cuter than Android.

Who won the Golden Ticket?

So, you ask are you, still talking about CUE. Well yes, I am Kinda Sorta. A few years ago I had the amazing opportunity to be a part of a fellowship. In this fellowship I was able to spend two years with a mentor working and reflecting on my teaching practice. I had a amazing experience and it helped me to spice things up a bit in my teaching or as Trisha would say " Take it up a Notch".

Long ole' story short, my partner selected math and I selected reading so we could collaborate and share together our fellowship learning. Smart move!We have never looked back.

Early in the fellowship we got a hold of a Trisha Callella video KINDERGARTEN math based on her learning in the fellowship as well.  Here is a little snippet of the video of several years ago. She was Common Core and More before most of us had even seen or heard of Common Core. She is the first one on the video the curly blonde. The thing that amazes me about Trisha, I am going to call her Trisha like I know her, is the things her kids can do. Yes, she is amazing but the things her students produce is powerful and the true meaning of learning.

Still in my long ole' story, anyway we watched her video about 20 times taking "crazy time" notes it is a 55 minute video. Then we were given a Golden Ticket opportunity to observe in her class. I said" Yes please ME ME ME ." Now, I know why my students do that. I went and I watched another impressive lesson then we got to ask her questions and debrief in the presence of a true master mind changes you and your work forever.

My fellowship ended and every now and then I would see Trisha at a fellowship conference, or hear about new fellows speaking about her with amazement. Then, I am at CUE conference and who is listed in the CUE Guide. Trisha Callella doing a session on App Matching.  My fellowship mentor told me and I just could not believe it until I saw it, I could not wait to see how she uses technology, how her students use technology.

Well, I am in the session and in walks in Sharon Sutton, aka former admin. at UCLA lab school, ( lab school is like a school of your dreams, amazing educators happy children beautiful streams and bridge going through the campus when you are there you hear musac, like harps and violins playing softly behind the children learning) Oh yeah! I know I am in the right sessions, she hangs with my mentor so they start talking and she says" I hear she is amazing!"

CONFIRMED! I am in the Right Session.

Trisha is presenting at a Computer Using Educators Conference and she opens with I am not a Techie. What? Why? some of the people in the session begin to look away start to pack up their conference totes. But then she starts talking and she starts talking fast (because when you are this smart you have to talk fast to get out all that is in your head). Next it sounded like this....




Silence, again last time I heard this kind of silence it was in my brain trying to come up with an idea for telligami. (No more head silence thank you Jo Ann Fox)

My fellowship partner turns to me and says" She is what you have been looking for." She is referring to my comment that I love techie educators, their risk taking sprit is awesome but when I go to TCRWP and CGI trainings from UCLA, super advanced level of analytical curriculum and teaching they are not that techie and they do not need to be they are amazing in a different way. "I wanted it all! to quote Veruca Salt (Willy Wonka).

My question was; Where is the deep analytical educator using technology in powerful ways to bring DOK and Blooms into play and the students are the producers in a very authentic way?

"We are the music makers... and we are the dreamers of dreams." - Willy Wonka

Continuing with my Willy Wonka quotes: I was dreaming for a unique kind of educational music maker.

Found her! Trisha Callella

Here is an example:

Full circle the student has become the teacher. LOVE it!

The biggest take away from her session was to dive deeper into my understanding and implementation of Driving/Essential questions!
For example Trisha asks questions like this to the students:

What is the best tool to share an interview?

Instead of we have imovie you are going to use imovie to share your interview. The students have lost the learning of what tools are important for what purpose. Of course this may require some frontloading but WOW! I am sold. I feel embarrassed that I am just posting my learning and not my students but I am on Spring Break I am working on a lesson right now for next week.   So, Who won the Golden Ticket I did once.  Is it possible to have another Golden Ticket Opportunity to shadow or observe Trisha again! I don't know for now I have so much in my head from her session.  I end with this thought as I prepare for next week in my classrooms!

So much time and so little to do. Wait a minute. Strike that. Reverse it. Thank you. Willa Wonka

What did I learn at CUE conference?

So, I have returned from the CUE conference and I have settled into my Spring Break schedule which consists of a lot of catch up. I am preparing to do my taxes, cleaning closets and watching movies I never get to watch. I also have the great fun of picking my kiddos up from school for a week. They love as much as I do. No, Spring Break trip this year. Just enjoying a slower pace of life.

Let's talk about CUE before I continue to ramble on. I had a great experience at CUE as usual. It keeps me in touch with the techies teachers and inspires my creativity every time.

1. So, a while back I watched this super cool video by Dan Meyer and I applied some of his strategies in a 2nd grade classroom and they worked.

Well, Hello!!! guess who is the opening keynote at CUE, Dan the High School Math Teacher. GREAT and inspiring again his original TED talk was called: Math class needs a Makeover. You can find it on my post  in October.

Dan has many great ideas, I love his new message of Perplexity and how we need to provide students with perplexity in the math classroom beyond adding their names to the word problem.
I have started following this guy on twitter because I need to be around amazing minds like this.  Here is the link to my previous post about Dan but I intend to try out an idea in one of my classrooms next week based on his new ideas about Perplexity that he shared with us at CUE.

2. Levar Burton aka Reading Rainbow guy aka Jordy. This is not the learning you would expect but I did learn about Levar Burton. So, I am working the registration booth at the CUE conference and a registrant runs (speed walks) in swishing their conference tote side to side clutching their ipad mini, and says"Which way to Jordy?" I just starred at her. (insert puzzled face) Then they lady next to me says"  That way down the hallway." I pretended that I knew what was going on and continued my job while thinking: Who the heck is Jordy?????
Then the group of registrant volunteers gathers and says did you see the tweet about " Jordy and Khan (Sal Khan of Khan academy closing keynote) together at CUE, then they belt out these belly jerking laughs, some of them threw their heads back and fist pumped each other. In my head I am thinking WHAT? One of the volunteers asks"Are you a Trekkie?" I shook my head "NO".  She explained that Jordy is the character Levar Burton played on Star Trek and Khan is an infamous bad guy from Star Trek as well ( not the Khan academy Khan).  WHO Knew Not Me?  But now I know! And here it is: THank YOu Willam Shatner! and my husband who upon me returning from CUE said" You do not need to be a Trekkie to know about this Khan moment, it is iconic." I have watched and I am now sharing this video in case you have not seen it or don't know about Khan, then you want have an awkward moment at a CUE conference like me ya know just trying to help out.


3. You know what a GOOGLE SLAM is? Well its always a good time. They don't even have to try GOOGLE SLAM is a good time. (In my head I hear the Carly Rae song "It's always a Good Time.")

Here were the SLAMMERS. Megan Ellis ,

JR Ginex-Orinion, Lisa Highfill,Karl Lindgren-Streicher,Diane Main,Joe Wood all worth following on Twitter. LOVE Twitter super fast quick PD. 

This is one of my favorite things that would make you look super cool as a teacher or doing PD try google speak to search for something but test out what you want to search for before hand because  similar to another friend on the iphone it is not always accurate. This would be a great tool for younger students to do searches without having to type and build language skills. I am thinking ask the students a driving question " What would we ask google to help us find information about Pandas? What words would best help google know what we want?
I would love to hear what they say. This could be a possible mini lesson on being concise and making your message clear.  WORD CHOICE writing lesson ;)

  Google SLAM session continued! So, the session was packed (with people and info) but it ended with this. Gotta love it! I would love to make one of these videos when I go back to work.

Well there they are 3Three things I learned at CUE but there are so many way too many for this one post. My head is full again and that is why I love going to CUE! Enjoy this video!!!

Is it Spring Break Yet?

Is it Spring Break Yet? and Who goes to a conference two days before spring Break? I go to a conference two days before Spring Break. So, I spent this week dreaming literally dreaming about the amazing PD I was going to attend the week before spring break. It is like a Smorgasborg of Great PD. I could barely focus on my day job. I mean it is the kind of PD that just makes you giddy. First of all it is the week before SPRINNNNNNNNNNNNNNNG BREAAAAAAAAAAAAK!I should have been counting days until I get to sleep in well sorta sleep in my babies are not on Spring Break with me so I will be at their school. NO not me I was counting down the days until Tuesday Night Wahooooo! So,Tuesday Afternoon, I meet with a cohort group of fellowship Alumnus and about 4 of them had just returned from, the amazing and overloading Teacher's College Reading and Writing Workshop at University of Columbia. They were such lucky ducks(not really they have been working at this for over 10 years,I observed at their school a couple of years ago and holy moly gucamole it was amazing) but they did get a really big grant and they flew out to NY and attended a 4 day training on Informational Reading and Writing integrated with Science and Social Studies. Say that three times. It is a mouthful but boy oh boy the juicy nuggets of goodness that they shared were amazing. I can not wait to begin experimenting with them. Thanks Ms. Tara from Louisiana. So, 7:00 pm sharing time finished 8:30 parking lot discussion with teacher buds I do not get to see everyday anymore ends. INSERT SAD WIMPER! :( Oh did I forget the assessments, the looks the stares the OH YEAH's the assessments are sooo cool. I will post about this soon. If you cannot wait check out the TCWRP website.

 Let's move on to Wednesday afternoon, where oh where am I going. That's right you guessed it more PD. This was not as delightful as Tuesday but equally as cool. It was EDCALIBUR. It is a online lesson plan, data management tool. I have not fully explored it but it has a great calendar tool for planning and sharing lessons online. As I am typing I am thinking this needs to be combined with a Confer App, Daily Pensieve, or Chronicles App (found out about Chronicles Tuesday Night) to really pull you lessons, conferring, strategy groups lessons, and data to drive instruction.

 And now Wednesday Night I am writing this blog, doing laundry,setting up my sched. for the CUE CONFERENCE. Yeah! for CUE. My Husband will be Dad and Mom for the next few days. (Please if you see my children with messy hair and/or mismatch clothes, do not make fun of them their dad did his best) My teacher friends who have never been to CUE are like oh you get to chill out and relax. No Way Jose you have to pack tennis shoe, jeans and cute tops for the evenings of networking. The day starts at 6:30am when we start walking to the Convention Center with all the other crazy teachers. Then we speed walking from one session to the next sometimes waiting in line for the Apple Sessions, sitting on concrete in hallways like we are kids again waiting for concert tix. Gotta leave it to Apple to make their sessions ticket only sessions. Then in between sessions  we are all trying to find outlets to charge your tech support systems, smartphone, tablet, laptop. I just found out one of the most amazing math teachers will be at the conference. So, Cha Cha Cha for that!

Well, I am super excited to learn a bunch at CUE and then if I make it through the Conference then I can enjoy SRPIINNNNNNG BREAAAAAAK! So, the question is:
Is It Spring Break Yet? No, but I don't care I am too busy and geeked out to care.

Where am I going to Sit

Well, I did not know before but now I do. A few months ago I was able to lay down some Sit Spots in a First Grade Classroom that was being over run with a Big Ole Rug of the United States. I don't know why or who thought the United States was a good idea for first graders, like as if, the first graders are going to sit 2 to a state maybe 3 for the larger states. Who knows what the logic was? But, you can see the BIG OLE US rug in the pic below. We just shoved it over to put down the SitSpots. So, months later and the Sit Spots are still in tact and going strong. I would take a new picture but it looks identical. No peeling, No messed up edges, No one spot was eaten by a vacum, No icky tape residue. Wow, a teacher's dream and a custodian's dream.

 Now, these first graders know where to sit and there is no sobbing, shoving, overlapping legs or unwanted touching.  Or my favorite the kid who knowingly sits in another kid's spot and then acts likes it is his spot. Dialogue: Teacher: "I don't think you are in a red square Juan?" Juan: "What? Red Square.", then stays in the red square that is not his motionless. Teacher: "Juan let me check my seating chart." but before you can check it 3 Know it all Nellie's chime in: "No, he does not that is Braxton's spot." 3 minutes of instructional time wasted and then you have to tell Juan directly" Juan please move that is not your spot you are not California you are Texas." then you have to point to and stand next to Juan's spot in Texas. Holy Moly gotta love first graders.

 On a more exciting and optimistic note today, I just collected more orders from teachers in my district who also want the Sit Spot magic: So Everyone Knows Where to Sit! More exciting a couple of weeks ago I went the Southern California Blogger Bash and POW! SHaZamm! Who was there? Sit Spots of course and all the great bloggers I stalk for my kindergarten and first grade teachers and guess what they also fell in love with Sit Spots. They are having a giveaway and sharing great ideas on their blogs on how they are using Sit Spots. Here are some of their buttons Check it out! There are 9 Cali gals doing this Giveaway I collected a few of their buttons below to show you how cool their ideas are. DON'T MISS THIS OPPORTUNITY TO WIN!!!

I really love The Teacher Idea Factory Ideas!

So, to answer the question Where do I sit? Well, sit on your Sit Spot and the students and teacher are happy even the visually OCD ones like me. And don't feel bad if you don't win these great bloggers/Caligals have a coupon code it is a  25% off code good until March 31, are you ready for it, can you deal with this, I am gonna drop the boom on you. Ready, Here is the code: CALIGALS14 

Happy Teaching and Good Luck!

Who goes to work on Saturdays!

Well, lots of people go to work on Saturdays I suppose but when you are a teacher that is suppose to be your day off.  Well some teachers like to relax, sleep in and/or enjoy a great sunny weather in California and some work. I was in the working group this weekend  I was helping put together an event for a CUE affillate we had a Bring your App's to the 4 C's. The 4 C's the ones every one wants to bring up at every staff meeting since Common Core hit the ground running. Communication, Collaboration, Creativity and Critical Thinking  wahoo! Click here if you want to learn more NEA has a pdf for your enjoyment.

So, this  CUE Coffee Break went off okay but started out as a big pile of FUN. It took awhile to get the network up and running but it did. Since, I did not have access to JoAnn's presentation the day before the event I had to make some guesses on what to test on the wifi I made some guesses and some were right and some were way wrong.  People, I was worried at 4:30pm the day before the event I was still worried 7:00 am the morning of the event still worried but the IT department pulled through for me and one tech guy really made everyone feel comfortable and ready to dig in and learn as well as donate his hotspot to our presenter. Yes, he too came on a Saturday and he was learning all kinds of  tech goodies as well.

If you have not heard of the presenter her name is Jo Ann Fox. Check out her website  Click Here!
She is very certified and friendly.  She was a trooper even though we did not have everything she needed in terms of internet she made it work.

Here we are working hard or at least looking like we are. See the sun streaming in the window no was is day dreaming out the window. Well maybe just me:(




This is the cool thing I am taking away from this event. I had telligami on my iphone/ipad for awhile and I did nothing with it. I did not have an idea nothing. It sounded like this in my brain.....................



That's right nothing. Until this Saturday and then while Jo Ann presented I started to create a telligami.


It is basically an avatar that you can change the background and have him or her talk by recording or typing in the text. I thought about how cool this would be for the introverts of the world who have been forced into doing oral presentations. I thought about tutorials students could make and possible link from Anchor charts with QR codes, what about if you wanted to flip your math class I think it is much cooler to look at this avatar than me.  Cool beans Right! Now, I my brain sounds like this,

dksldksjfkdjsa;lkjdksjfkdjskfjdsljfkldjslfjdsjfdklsjaflkdjskfjdksfjdsfjdklsjfdkjsfkjdsjfdkjsfjdnvmnxkhfioewmnnoewnfdsfbdsjkghjgjajgdkngjkdnsadklsffdksnafndsnafkndsanfkdnsfkldnsmnvdmnvkewjiaerhtpojtnmndsmfldsa.
Yep, not even words just super fast ideas that I can not keep up with. Well, now let's think about this question; Who goes to work on Saturdays? Well, I do along with a group of talented amazing teachers who want to learn and grow into even more talented and amazing teachers.


 As Telligami says Animate Your Life. I animated my life! Check me out!

https://tellagami.com/gami/NHDVH6/

Happy Monday!

What would you do if you were in the same room as your favorite Bloggers?

Last week, I braved the rainy streets of So Cal which is like a Super Snow Storm any where else. I was also super sick but I had already paid for this event and I knew it would be worth it.

What was the Event you ask?

Southern California Kindergarten Conference ( also for Pre K, TK and First Grade teachers)
When I taught Kindergarten I always wanted to go but to no avail. So, here was my chance for me and my kindergarten teacher friend to kinda go. We only bought tickets to the Blogger Bash which I would say was worth the money. Here is the super cute icon that was created by many of the awesome bloggers I stalk. I linked it the Teeny Tiny Teacher's blog if you want to check out her post on the Blogger Bash.

She is quite amazing.
So, did I forget to mention I was SICK so it was not quite the experience I wanted it to be, but still well worth it. Let's start with the negative and get that out of the way. I did not win a raffle prize and there were super cool prizes baskets, binders, beautifully laminated activities, and gift cards Oh My! What I did win was a big fat splinter running my hand under the table to see if I was the lucky winner of a $25 gift card.  No not a winner.
However, I did enjoy the chicken dinner. I also met some new friends that sat with me at my table they were a blast to cheer and hoot with even though I could only hear part of the convo. because my ear was clogged. I got a great little goodie bag with a CD full of fun cool resources, I will certainly be using in my travels from classroom to classroom. I also got a cool idea I have already stolen. That's right I  already ordered my googly eyes from amazon PRIME (pretend the capital letters mean that you sing the word PRIME in a fun voice similar to a chime on you icalendar) I digress. Anyway I don't know how I missed this the first time around but I did and now I am going to so use this.

Eye Like what I see! Click Here to check out Teacher to the Core blog post on it. I have been having these school to school contests for behavior points and it works fine but this, this would be a great way to visually reinforce the idea of participation and behavior management.  I plan to create my little jar this weekend and be up an running next week.  So, the rainy trip was worth it so worth it. I got so many other ideas but this was the first one I am going to begin to implement. LOVE it and Teacher to the Core is pretty darn sarcastic and funny. LOVE that too.

To answer the question:
What would you do if you were in the same room as your favorite bloggers? 
Well, when you sick pretty much just smile, drink tons of water and take it all in. If I were not sick probably run around taking pics on my iphone and asking questions and having small talk but not this time maybe at the next Blogger Bash. Thank you to all the bloggers who were there and put in countless hours preparing for this conference and bash. 

Happy Tuesday!