Battling the Cue Blues

So, I'm starting this blog post during the 2nd day of CUE.  Who knows when I'll finish it.


Honestly, I'm a little disappointed so far this year.  I'll still come back next year because maybe it was a fluke.  I left many sessions early so far, and the planning of the rooms did not go well.  If you follow me on twitter, you knew how I felt about the Leslie Fisher debacle.

Since they were smart enough to put her in Oasis 4 on Thursday, I was able to see her Tools You Can Use Tomorrow session, which I saw at ISTE.  There was a ton of stuff that was new that I was learning about for the first time and lots of new additions to things I already knew.  One thing that I need to look into that she mentioned was Insert Learning.  Their webpage says:

 "InsertLearning is a Chrome extension that lets you turn websites into interactive lessons. Our toolbar is preloaded on this page so you can try it out without installing anything or signing up. Click on the buttons to transform this text."

I need to figure out what I can try this out with.  I'm thinking maybe something informational to prepare either my 11th graders for The Great Gatsby or my 10th graders to A Midsummer Night's Dream.  Any suggestions on good websites for either of those?

I skipped the Thursday keynote in order to (barely) get in and see a session by Brent Coley about Google Forms.  He didn't revolutionize my thinking about forms, but he definitely had me thinking of some pretty neat uses for them.  I use a Google sheet to keep track of parent contact.  He uses a gForm.  I didn't think about using that, which would give me a time stamp that I don't currently have.  So, I need to create a form or add the time to the date when I fill it out.  I think I'll also be turning the PLC minutes into a gForm so I have all the information throughout the year in a spreadsheet.  Oh, the joys of being the "boss" (read: the bullet-ridden messenger).

I enjoyed the Google Innovator's Slam that featured people like Alice Chen and JR Ginnex-Orinion.  I found out that EdTechTeam's CheckMark extension can now be customized; so, I might use it now.  I also got some neat little hacks to gSlides with videos that I might give a try (you can autoplay and shrink a video for music in the background of a presentation)....

It's the last day of CUE.  Took a break and am coming back while I wait for my first session.  Apparently, the "theme" of putting big-name presenters in smaller rooms has continued.  They have Alice Keeler is a smaller room already filled (pretty sure I won't be able to get into her next session, which I planned on going to) while other rooms have a sprinkling of people in it.  For those that don't know, Alice is a Google Classroom Guru.  If you use Classroom, you need to check her out.



I've already learned something about a tool I use that I didn't know and Kate Baker's presentation hasn't even started.  I had no idea that Actively Learn had a gDoc add-on.

So to reflect on yesterday (Friday), my morning sessions pretty much sucked.  It was a mess with not being able to get in for Leslie Fisher, too many people, and I left all the sessions I actually got into early for one reason or another.  I had an over-priced lunch in the Rocks Lounge at the Renaissance and then checked out Ann Kozma's Diamond Time session.   It was a great session.  Totally hit me in the feels, especially the #LAM (Life Altering Moments) section.  One of our students was shot at the Vegas massacre, so that hit home.  The rest of Friday was kind of a dud for me.

Yeah!  Got into the 2nd Alice Keeler, so I'll continue with this once I get back home from the Springs of Palms....

I lazed about the majority of the rest of the weekend.  My calves were certainly sore.  Saturday's sessions were much better, despite the issues I've already stated.  I really enjoyed the Kate Baker presentation.  I really need to find a way to incorporate and try out Formative.   I may try it with my colleagues the next time I need to do some PD instead of trying to fit it into what I'm doing in class. I also learned that with PDFs, I can also add graphic novels to Actively Learn.

Alice Keeler's session on Classroom tips was really good and that was a session that could have been a double session.  The biggest thing that resonated with me was the fact that she doesn't make copies of any of her gDocs, Slides, etc.   She names the versions and restores back to the "original".  I think I may give that a try with some of the things I do, especially the stuff I use every year and make copies and rename with the date to keep track.  That would certainly help illiminate (eventually) my "archives".

I go in for a morning presentation on the premium aspects of NoRedInk tomorrow, taking the rest of the day off for my CT scan, and then back for ILT meeting and then physical therapy.  I may have to take the next day off too.

The First Week Hangover

Screenshot of my Saturday
morning Facebook status

Well, the school year has begun.  Yeah?

My district made the wonderful (🤔😒😕) decision to start school about three weeks earlier than it normally would.  It also made the decision to start with a completely full week of school.  I really like getting eased back in with a half week.  When does your school year start?  Full week? Half week?

The week before, when I was planning out the first week, I was really grateful for my blog (someone has to be right?).  It was great to go back to this post and see what I had done and how it had worked the year before.

We had shorter class periods all week this week for Week of Welcome (WOW).  We had our now elusive seminar at the beginning of each day this week.  I'm having a hard time connecting with this group of kids.  I don't know if it's the "chemical" makeup of this particular group, the fact that I barely know them (I could maybe remember 3 of their names outside of the students that are also in my English classes - though I don't really know their name and faces yet either), or that I just had such a great relationship with my previous seminar that my gauge is off.

Anyways, since we had shorter class periods and an entire week, I broke things down a little differently this year.

On Monday, I passed out all the important first-day documents, and I read through portions of the syllabus with the kids, pointed out the late work policy, and that they needed to bring Chromebooks, but if they didn't I had them covered.  I then showed them the class set I accumulated in 2014.  I told them it would cost them a class participation point though if they used one of mine (by the end of the week, 2 of the classes all had theirs and in the remaining 3 only a few needed to borrow one).  Then, we did a Kahoot that was about me and the room.  It was the same one we did last year.  It worked really well and helped me begin crafting relationships with a few students who found that I liked to watch Game of Thrones because of it.

The day was interesting in the way that the energy between me and the students really had a drastic change between Periods 2 and 3 where I switch from CP to Honors.  The 10th-grade honors students just really gave back nearly the same amount of energy that I was giving to them.  Just really drove home that this group of kids is my niche.

The next day, I had them take a first-week survey.  There were some memorable responses to some of the questions.

For instance, I had a question that asked if there was another name—other than their name on the roll—they would like to be called.  One of the students said I could call him a stick of butter as long as I was consistent.  I'm going to like this kid.

This was an intriguing answer to what they liked most about the previous year.

Here is an unedited sampling of some of their favorite jokes they shared with me (you are welcome):

• What did the buffalo tell his son when he left to college? Bison
• I told my girlfriend she drew her eyebrows too high. She seemed surprised.
• Why did the quadrilateral get late to school? Because it was on the Rhombus
• Q: What did the DNA say to the other DNA? A: Do these genes make my butt look fat
• why did the duck go to rehab? because he was quack addict!
• what's forrest gump's password? 1Forrest1
• Teacher: "Kids, what does the chicken give you?" Student: "Meat!" Teacher: "Very good! Now what does the pig give you?" Student: "Bacon!" Teacher: "Great! And what does the fat cow give you?" Student: "Homework!"

Wasn't sure how to take that last one, but thought I would share it anyway.

This transitioned them into the updated BreakoutEdu from last year.  There were, of course, those that didn't like it because it was a challenge but when surveyed, the students mostly seemed to like that they were challenged and had to think critically.  Here are the some of the survey results from that activity:

Wednesday and Thursday, I got kids signed up for NoRedInk, Verso, and Actively Learn.  Thanks to the Breakout, they were already signed up for Google Classroom.  I had practice activities for Verso and Actively Learn and a planning diagnostic for NoRedInk.  The purchase order for Actively Learn hasn't come through yet, so I'm back to a free plan.  I'm anxious to get back to the Team Plan, especially since I have a cluster of ELs in my two 11th-grade classes and would like to set up some differentiation for them.  A lot of students, including many of those ELs, didn't complete the Actively Learn assignment (answer 2 questions and make one annotation shared with the class), so I sent out a comment on Google Classroom encouraging them to finish it this weekend and I'll look at them again on Monday.

Friday was spent getting student's blogs set up and showing them how to make a post.  I had planned on doing a reflection on Kid President's Guide to Being Awesome, but I think I'll have to find time to fit that in next week.  I might push back the narrative essay a day and have students do it Monday.

I've also realized, after a week of doing the exact same thing in all my classes, that I wouldn't want to teach the same prep all day.  I did it once about 6 years ago, but I need the change of pace more now I think.

How did your first week go?  I hope it was a good one.