What Is Innovation Day and Why Should You Care?

On May 7th, I was lucky enough to witness almost seventy 5th grade students take full control of their learning, their time, their outcomes, and their work ethic.  How you may ask?  By having them all partake in Innovation Day, my second annual one.  For those who do not know Innovation Day is the school version of FedEx Day (although they want to rename it); a day where students get to choose what they want to learn about as long as they create something to deliver.  These creations are varied as can be seen by the different pictures in our video, but the one thing they all have in common is passion.

You see Innovation Day is all about passionate self-directed learning.  I do not dictate what the students have to do or what topic they study.  I do not give them output restrictions.  I do not grade it.  I do not guide them.  What I do though is help them find a way to create, I guide them through discussion and preparation before the day and then on the day I step aside, fully confident that they can indeed achieve without me.  And that is truly what is hardest about Innovation day; getting out of the way.  not offering your help, not showing students how to do something or research something, but trusting their abilities and talents to navigate through every obstacle.  Of course, I am there in the room with them, but I mainly film their progress and then stay in my own corner.  In fact, most students are so focused on what they are trying to create that they have little time or desire to speak to me.

So why should you take the Innovation day challenge, because it is a challenge indeed!  You should take it because the trust you hand over to your students is palpable.  Because students realize that they can direct their own learning.  Because students get excited about learning and see that many things can be accomplished at school.  Because students get to show off their interests and their skills in new ways.  Because this may just inspire you to do this more often, perhaps as a genius hour?  Because this allows students to prove to you that they can manage their own time, that they can get things done within a deadline, that they do have a great work ethic; all things we tend to use homework for.  Because my students voted Innovation Day their second most favorite thing of the whol e year and that says a lot.

So how do you get started?  Well, here is my planning sheet  I have students fill out a couple weeks prior.  Here is the first post I ever wrote about it.  Here is the post I wrote after my first one where I was totally blown away.  Here are Josh Stumpenhorsts' resources that I have used.  And finally here are two videos to show you the results.  One is of the day, the other is created on Innovation Day by Jacob who decided to do stop motion and by golly figured it out on his own.  And that truly is what it is all about.  So this year or next take the Innovation day challenge; give your students a whole day to direct their own learning and let them astound you.  You will not be disappointed.

Student Blogging Challenges - A List of Ideas

One of the things that my students love the most on our KidBlog are our weekly blog challenges.  And while these challenges are in sense homework, they always have the opportunity to do them at school, and get enough time to do it without being a hassle.  Over the past two years we have had quite a lot of fun with these, so why not share for all you blogging with your students.  Feel free to borrow or change to suit your kids.

I have broken these into categories for easier reading.

All About You

• Imagine you have been given $100 to donate to someone or something like a charity or even to start a charitable business.   The challenge is to make your money grow whether through product or some other form.  So you need to blog about what you will do with the money, how it will grow and how much you can make it grow even more.  Your money will have 3 months to grow.
• If you could go anywhere in time once round-trip, where would you go and why?  What would you see there?  What would you do?  Would you bring anything back or try to change the past?
• If you could go anywhere in time once round-trip, where would you go and why?  What would you see there?  What would you do?  Would you bring anything back or try to change the past? 
• If you could eat only one meal the next year, what would it be? 
• If you could do one good thing this Holiday season to make others happy, what would it be?
•  Tell me about the great traditions you have in your family. 
•  What makes you the happiest in your life and even better how do you show how thankful you are? 
• This week I would like to challenge you to write about about a place, from the past or the present, where you would like to live or go for a holiday or vacation.

Wacky Challenges

• How many ways can you use a paperclip?
• How many ways can you use a toothbrush?

All About School

• Which school rule you would change, how you would change it and why?
• How is the year going so far?  What are you excited about?  What works for you?  What doesn’t? How can we make 5th grade better?  What should I change?
• What would you change about school so that you would love being there?
• Tell me what was the best, the worst, the most fun, the most boring things of the trimester?  
• So, if you could decide what we had to learn about, what would it be?  What would our goals be? How would we learn about it? And how would we pass that learning on? 
• What does a principal do all day?  What qualities does a principal have and what do they do in the summer?
• You are the teacher; which class would you add to school curriculum that we don't already have?  When would the class meet, what would the students do?  What would it look like, feel like, sound like?  And what would the students produce to show their learning?

 
Your Thoughts on Education and School

• What is the true purpose of education?  Why do you go to school?  Why do you learn what you have to learn?
• Is teaching and learning the same thing or not?
• Should education be fun?
• Give me your thoughts on tests!  Do you think they help or hurt your learning?  What do you suggest to teachers about tests?

Academic Related and Story Writing

• You need to write to other teachers and tell them about the Global Read Aloud.
• I want you to tell the world about Innovation Day!
• Tell everyone about the simulation in social studies 
• Keep a science diary of our experiments and answer any questions people may leave in the comments.
• Write a book review of the book you are currently reading.
• Explain what the author study is, who you chose to study and why.
• Finish the story, “The crash came from around the corner…”
• Finish the sentences:  Being a good teacher means…. Being a good student means… 
• What do you love when teachers do in their classrooms?  What do you wish I did as a teacher? If you were a teacher how would you run your classroom?

All About Blogging

• Should we continue to blog or not, convince me!
• So how has blogging helped you as a writer?  What do you like about blogging?  What do you not like?  What would you change?  Would you continue blogging next year if you could?
• What are the rules for blogging, how do you stay safe?
•  Now that you have tried it, what would you tell other kids and teachers about blogging?  What should they know before they start?  What should they be careful with?  How can they get people to comment?  Any advice for people who want to blog but don’t know how?
• Pick one student from another blog and introduce yourself properly 

When Students Tell You They Are Bored Can We Blame the Students As Well?

I am in a conference trying to figure out why a child seems less engaged, less into it, and just not all that excited about school.  So far the conversation has been rather one-sided, meaning me speaking and being met with lsilence.  Finally I ask, "Are you bored?"  And the student looks up and says, "Yeah."

I think that has happened to most teachers, a bored student, but what may not have happened to many is for that student to have the guts to tell you.  I know I was incredibly bored throughout many classes in my school days but I never did tell a teacher since I figured nothing good would come of it.  And I may have been right because my gut reaction the moment I was told was to get frustrated.  How can you be bored in my room? We do so many exciting things!  And yet, I bite my tongue, nod, and go home with a head full of questions.

I have a classroom full of noise, ideas, and engagement. It is something I work incredibly hard for and I am very very proud of and yet, it can also be boring.  There are times when the base needs to be built for our further exploration and I have to talk.  I try to make it engaging, I try to make is student-centered, and yet sometimes I can't.  It gets better every year but still; but yes I can be boring.  So these thoughts follow me home and I ask my husband what I should he do since he acutely suffered from school boredom.

His thoughts stopped me; "Maybe it isn't you?  Maybe you do everything you can and that child needs to step up too.  Maybe boredom is a two way street and you can only make it so exciting but if the student is not ready or wanting to be engaged then it doesn't matter what you do."  I immediately started to defend the child and lament that it must be me until I realized he may be on to something; perhaps we as educators can only do so much.  Perhaps we can only engage and excite until a certain point and then the student has to invest as well.  Perhaps we cannot change every student's perception of school no matter how many things we pull out to do.  Perhaps, we are not the only ones with control in our classroom?

So I turn to you; what do we do when students are bored?  After we have changed the curriculum, the approach and the task?   What do we do when a student-centered learning environment is not enough?  Do we dare tell the student that they too have to invest?  That they have to make an effort to be interested or else school will be infinitely boring no matter what we do?  Do we dare put some of the responsibility for school engagement back on their shoulders?  Or is that taking the easy way out?

Is Teaching Killing Student Self-Reliance?

"But mommy, I can't!!!!"  Thea is struggling to put two pieces together for a game, I look at her patiently and urge her to try again, try again.  As parents we are slightly bewildered by the "I can'ts" we hear every day; little things such as getting socks on, or big things seem an insurmountable challenge for our 3 year old turn into cries for help and yet with diligence we urge her to move on, to try again, and to figure it out.  We are trying to raise a self-reliant little girl that faces challenges with relish rather than hide from them.  We want her to have faith in herself, in her abilities, and to also have courage.

I go to school and see the same thing; "I don't get this..."  "I can't do this..." can be heard on a regular basis and I know I am not alone. So I made one of my goals to teach self-reliance, to teach courage, to teach willingness to try and fail.  To urge these students patiently on, to identify the problem and figure out how to solve it. Sure it would be easier if I would just do it for them, but what does that teach?

So I ponder, what if we as teacher removed ourselves from the equation?  Set up a problem or challenge for the class and then stepped back to see what would happen?  Since the beginning of the year this has played out in my classroom; here is the challenge, you have the skills, now solve it. While some may claim I do not do my full job then, I would say that I am preparing students to be independent thinkers.  To trust in themselves and their own abilities, to be problem-solvers, intuitive thinkers, and to not ever be afraid of something not working.  The result?  Students who try first and then turn to tools, to each other to figure something out. Students ho discuss solutions and challenges with themselves and each other.  Students who know it is ok to pull out a piece of scrap aper, try something, throw it out and try something else.

When we over-prescribe and over-explain, we rob students of the pleasure of accomplishment. Sure they will still get from point A to point B, but the satisfaction of true learning will be diminished. When I tell my students that I have a challenge for them, and yes that it may be difficult but not impossible, I get some trepidation, some wavering and then it turns to determination, to a "we can do this" moment.  That is what learning should look like.  My students have become more self-reliant, more courageous learners, more willing to take a risk and figure something out. Sure they still ask for my help, but it is with pointed questions and tried pathways.

So can you step back, can you let them try without giving out all of the steps?  Can you teach them overall skills on how to attack problems and then let them customize to each situation?  It takes guts and it takes courage, and it also takes an enormous belief in your students.  I think they deserve it.

Related articles

• Some Thoughts on Collaboration and Student Choice (mrspripp.blogspot.com)
• It Takes One (mrspripp.blogspot.com)
• 5 Steps to Letting Go and Learning More (mrspripp.blogspot.com)

I Must Apologize Beforehand - A Serial Apologizer Apologizes

Image from here

I have to start out by saying I am sorry for what I am about to post.  It may offend, it may irk you a little, so thus the apology beforehand.  See there now you are disarmed and perhaps it wont really be so bad, after all, the apology has already been given.

I am serial apologizer.  Not for my life really but for the way I teach.  I don't flash the way I work in my classroom, which sounds ludicrous since I blog about it, but if you catch me in conversation, I am not one to tell you that what my kids do is pretty spectacular.  That the kind of community I am part sometimes makes me deliriously happy.  That I am so proud of all the work my students do, of the risks we take, and the mountains we climb.  I don't flaunt it because that would be too offensive.

And yet, for every time I hide what I do.  For every time I don't stand by the choices I have made in case I may offend someone, I chip away at my own desire as a teacher to be a world changer.  My own world, the world of my students, and perhaps even the greater world outside of my room.  For every time I wrap my teaching philosophy in apologies a little bit of it gets duller, less fantastic, until I wonder what I will be left with.

So why is it I feel the need to apologize?  Because I am different?  Because I have opinions?  Because I vehemently believe that the focus has to be on the needs of the students and not that of the teacher?  Because I believe in honest communication and not veiled lingo?  Because I believe that you have to fight for change from within in any way you can and give your students that voice?  Because I believe that we have to get the students involved in their own education so we don't lose them, after all education should not be done to them but with them?

I am not sure, I am sorry, I really don't know  But it is making me think that I need to stop.  I am starting to think that I need to stand by what I do a little taller, a little prouder and not diminish the choices I have made.  The choice to be different in an otherwise cookie-cutter educational system because it is what I believe in.  The choice to throw away punishment, lecturing, homework and grades as much as I can and instead focus on knowledge, exploration and the need to fail over and over again.  The choice to change, the choice to not do it the way I was taught, and the choice to take risks.  After all, it is working, I am sorry, but it is true.

Related articles

• You Don't Have to Be A Technology Whiz But You Do Need to Be Fearless (mrspripp.blogspot.com)
• Teachers Do More Than Teach - Why Technology Can Never Replace Them (mrspripp.blogspot.com)
• Yes It Is All About the Children But It Also Has To Be About the Teachers (mrspripp.blogspot.com)
• Some Thoughts on Collaboration and Student Choice (mrspripp.blogspot.com)

A Couple of Ideas Before Break

Image from here

March in the US means spring break is fast approaching and so are the students yearning for vacation.  So what is a teacher to do when the learning cannot stop and neither can the teaching.  Well I created some projects that yes, cover the standards, and also keep my students on their toes.

• The Grand Canyon Challenge.  I have wanted to incorporate Google SKetch Up for along time in my classroom and now finally have a chance.  In this extension for a landforms science activity students have become structural engineers that have to get a large crate from one side of the Grand Canyon to the other every day of the year.  There are limitations of course, such as a no fly zone, and the students have to ultimately sketch their concept in Sketch Up.  I revealed this today and the kids were stumped and excited.  Final product:  3-D sketch to be judged by my husband and presented to the class.
• The Slavery Research Project Prezi.  Prezi is another tool I have wanted to show my 5th graders and this delving into slavery comes as integrated social studies and reading activity.  We have been reading "Jump Ship to Freedom" and the students asked, yes asked, whether they could do research on issues surrounding slavery.  So for the last 2 weeks the students have been very hard at work researching (nice way to discuss Sweetsearch and other internet searching tips) as well as creating their Prezi and their presentations.  Final product: students present their research and are videotaped so they can critique themselves.
• The Superheroes Writing Project.  Stumbled upon this brilliant idea from TES and then adapted it for my own use.  We have been discussing authors' tools and this exploration of superheroes through comic-books gives us a chance to really work on creating a character, creating a setting and a plot development.  I have never had students complain to me before about not having enough writing time, now they do.  Final product:  Superhero and villain dossier, detailed setting description as well as mini plot development with illustrations if they choose.
• Readers Theatre.  We have 1st grade buddies that we do a lot of fun projects with and this month we are working on readers theatre with them.  In the end students will film their productions and perform for each other, the filming is for their parents to see.  Natural way to practice fluency and expression at all reading abilities.
• Mini projects in general.  I am trying to come up with more movement in my classroom right now as well as mini challenges.  Students are currently bringing in spaghetti, marshmallows and toilet-paper tubes for some mini challenges we will be doing as well.  

We are finishing up several units before spring break affording us the ability to come back and get immersed in new stuff.  I do like to wrap it up a bit before break because after it the year just seems to disappear.

A couple of notes:

• I am sharing my superhero lesson plan but it is a work in progress and I am adding to it as I teach it.
• Prezi cannot be used without email addresses so I have students use my account for it, however, if they have emails you can give them individual accounts for free.
• Google Sketch Up does give out free educator licenses for their Pro version, which is awesome, so take advantage of that!
• Many of my ideas come from the people I am connected with; my inspirational husband and my PLN so thank you.

A Challenge to All

I was the new kid in town 4 times before I turned 14.  I hated being the new kid.  My sister, Christine, was a dazzler.  She made new friends simply because she arrived, she drew people to her, and she still does.  I was the awkward kid that kind of looked like a boy, had huge feet, and was way too serious for her age.  Not a great combination for dazzling new people.  So when I first joined Twitter, I felt the clammy hand of past embarrassment gain hold of me.  What if no one cared?  What if no one responded?  What if no one followed?  I want to say that I joined Twitter to learn, which I did, but I also joined the blogging and tweeting world to connect with people, and it is this connection that keeps me coming back every day.  It's the connection that urges me to get others to join, that makes me write my heart out on this blog, and that makes me push myself into new challenges.  But what if you just can't make that connection?

There were a couple of people who immidiately took me under their wing Lisa Dabbs @Teachingwthsoul, Edna Sackson @WhatEdSaid and Joan Young @Florishingkids.  If it hadn't been for them, I don't think I would still be tweeting.  So as I look at my own follower count and see it grow way beyond this shy girl's expectations, I wonder, who can I reach out to and how?  How can we make deeper connections, especially with those people that like me felt like the new kid in town?  How can we let people know that Twitter is all about connections and not to be afraid to reach out?

I think a movement has gained momentum lately spearheaded by Katie Hellerman who posted this incredible video: The Connection Challenge.  This then sparked an amazing post by Jabiz Raisdana called "Next Level" which urged us all to reach out and open up.  Cale Birks came up with the idea of the Ten Picture Tour of our schools, which you can follow on Twitter under #10PIXTR. And today Justin Tarte wrote a great post asking what can we do to keep the momentum going called "It's All about Sustainable Momentum.." 

So I have been wanting to open up, after all, I am way to honest on my blog anyway.  And the one world that we often keep hidden is our home, afterall, we can hide behind our computers. What if we did the 10 picture of our homes instead?  Wouldn't that also provide another layer to our connection?  If you see the mess I sit in every day when I blog, will it make you know me better?  So I offer up this challenge:

Do a 10 picture tour of your home.  Nothing fancy, I don't expect masterpieces.

Post it on your blog and tweet it out using the same hashtag #10PIXTR (I hope that's alright).

 Let's see if we can take this connection one step further.