Why I (heart) Evernote!

Ok, so I've been promising for several months now that I would write about how I use Evernote and why I'm now convinced I wouldn't be able to function without it.  (Thanks to those of you who have kept reminding me that you'd like to hear more about it.  Today is finally your day!) 

So, I love Evernote because...

Evernote helps me capture, organize, and save blog posts I find with ideas I want to try out!  (And it does so in a way that I can actually find them when I want to!)  This is probably the most important and frequent way I use Evernote.

the Firefox web clipper

• My favorite feature for this is the web clipper, which allows me to basically save a complete image (but more than an image, because it remains edit-able and interactive, with all links live) of the page or article I want.  Once installed for whatever browser you use (I use it in both Firefox and Chrome), it's just a little button on your toolbar that you can push when you find something you want to save!  You can even choose between saving the whole webpage, the article on the page, a selection you've highlighted, or just the url.   I love using the web clipper because then I can actually see the whole articles and pages I saved right inside Evernote, without having to open the page on a browser.  (But the web clipper saves the url with the clip, so if I want to open up the webpage, I can -- like if I want to link to it on a blog post!)

Looking in my "Lesson activities" folder at a note (on the right) created with the web clipper.

my folders!

• Folders (called "Notebooks" in Evernote) help me keep my ideas organized.  I use fairly broad folder categories to help myself browse through my notes -- "Lesson Activities", "Student Project Ideas", and "Student Resources" are my most-frequently used folders.  These are mostly useful if I just want to scroll through my notes to see what's there, not if I'm looking for something really specific.

some of my tags

• For me, the life-saving feature of Evernote when it comes to saving teaching ideas from blogs is tagging.  Whenever I add a new note, I put it in the appropriate folder, but I also I tag it with every attribute of the idea that I might possibly want to find later.  Depending on the browser you're using, you can even add the tags you want and choose which folder you want to save your new "note" in right from the web clipper!  Then when I'm planning and I think "ohhh, I read something about a web tool would be perfect for this project...", I just click on my "web tools" tag and I can find that note easily!  (There's also a search feature where I can search all my notes in case I didn't tag it like I thought, which happens only rarely.)

I can create other types of notes too!  Evernote has pretty much replaced my multitude of sticky notes, emails to myself, and little notebooks in my purses.  My life is now way easier because of:

• Travel plans: I have a "travel" folder with links to hotels, activities, restaurants, lists of things I want to do, and even reservation/purchase confirmations I've clipped with the web clipper.
• Lists:  I'm a list-maker, and now my lists can go anywhere.  I can keep and easily add to my lists of blog ideas, materials I need to buy for school, gift ideas for family members, and various random thoughts I need to remember.  Having them in Evernote is a bonus because it means I can include webpage links, pictures, etc. of the things in my list, or even attach files.   (Although for real to-do lists, I use the very-cool Orchestra iOS app and webpage instead.)
• Quotations: I LOVE collecting quotations.  I used to keep several Word documents of my favorite quotations, but I kept having to email them to myself to add to them or view them when I needed them.  Now I just save them in Evernote and I always have them!

I can access my notes from anywhere!  Obviously, this is what makes all the other features truly amazing.  I can edit and view all of those wonderful things I just discussed from my school laptop, my home computer, my iPod Touch, some random computer at a library or a friend's house... anywhere!

• Evernote has a pretty good iOS app that I use frequently on my iPod touch. I can view all my notes and create new notes.  Unfortunately, there's nothing like a web clipper to actually save whole articles or pages, so I always end up just copying & pasting the url of articles I read on my iPod.
• Evernote has great Mac and PC software that make it easy to use on any computer.  (Our district uses Macs but our home computer is a PC, and both versions are excellent and sync with each other perfectly.)  It doesn't matter where I made a note, it's always fine when I view it from any Evernote version!
• There's even a web version to use just by signing in to the Evernote website, in case I'm on a computer at the library or somewhere else that's not "mine" and doesn't have the software installed.

For more information about using Evernote, check out Richard Byrne's excellent post about to how use Evernote.  You can also find more information on the Evernote Blog.

(All these opinions are my own, and I didn't receive any compensation for writing about Evernote.)

Year-End Reflection (2011-12)

As I discussed earlier today, I'm finally ready to write my end-of-the-year reflection, using Ruth's prompts to focus my thinking.  2011-12 was a difficult school year: our levy failed, bringing my 6th and 7th grade programs to an end, we were involved in challenging professional development initiatives about student growth data, and controversial politics in our state hung like a dark cloud over educators. But there was plenty of sunshine too, including excitement about increasing student learning, collaboration with colleagues, ever-emerging new technology, and the simple joy of sharing something I love with wonderful students.  Anyway...

I learned:

• My ideas are worth sharing!
• Embracing the reader and writer within me makes me a better teacher.
• I CAN make time for reading (books, not just blogs!) and writing every day!
• I LOVE teaching. Period.  Teaching students AND teaching my colleagues.
• Building relationships and sharing ideas with colleagues in my building(s) is one of the most valuable ways I can spend my time.
• Support from colleagues matters.
• You can never take for granted what you think students know.
• Allowing students to see you in a different light (such as on the DC trip) can do wonders for how they respond to you. 
• Building relationships with parents reminds you that every STUDENT in your class is a lovable PERSON in a family.
• There are plenty of things that are bigger than school.
• My family is awesome!  (Well, I already knew this... but it's good to have reminders!)

I was stretched by:

• Having to go re-learn my "cart-ninja" skills after having my own room for the first two trimesters.
• Balancing my time to incorporate blogging.
• Being sent to Washington, DC with the 8th graders while having to leave my 6th & 7th grade classes behind.
• Figuring out how to draw out enthusiasm from reluctant students.
• Trying (and mostly failing) to start working out more often.
• Incorporating new web tools into my classroom (and deciding which ones I wanted to try!)
• Supporting my colleagues in their use of technology and teaching them how to use Moodle, their webpages, SMARTboards, and RSS readers.
• Jumping more deeply into ESL by co-teaching the Welcome Center class at School #3.
• Learning to document and track my students' growth in more concrete ways.
• Taking on a leadership role within the Alumni Band.

I'm excited about:

• Continuing to CONNECT with my colleagues and friends I've met through blogging!
• Sharing more of my ideas with colleagues in my district!
• My big leap into High School ELL!
• Sharing reading and writing with students, and helping them love it too!
• Diving back into math, science, and social studies as I help my ELLs with them.  (I always loved all subjects in school!)

I'm beginning to realize:

• There will NEVER be enough time to do everything I want to do.  I have to pick and choose and make time for the most important things.
• Sometimes, I have to choose the not-so-important things too.  Because they're also important, just in a different way.
• Reading and writing are part of who I am.  A big part.
• Never focus so hard on the STUDENT that you lose sight of the PERSON that a learner is.  Those personal connections mean everything, and every person is valuable in their own way.
• Teaching is NOT going to get any easier, ever.  I will always feel like I have so much to learn... but that's a good thing, because I never want to stop learning.

Objects in mirror are closer than they appear

at Two Writing Teachers!

During the last week of school, Ruth posted a wonderful end-of-year reflection with thoughtful guiding statements that encouraged the rest of us to do the same.  I read it.  I connected with so many of her thoughts.

Now, I'm typically extremely reflective (as I'm sure you can tell from my blog!), but it's more of an ongoing, informal, day-of-the-lesson reflection process.  A final, cumulative look back at the year sounded like a great idea, and something that might give me some new insights. I saved Ruth's post in Evernote (which, by the way, I PROMISE to write about someday!) with plans to create my own year-end reflection.

But there were grades to post, Jarritos to buy, lots of stuff to pack, a year-end outing to attend with teachers I might never see again, and lots to think about for next year!  Oh, and the Memorial Tournament was going on, a family tradition since I was little.  And did I mention I had to get ready for summer school?  The reflection idea completely slipped out of my mind.  (Which, after all, is why I use Evernote!)

In the coming weeks, I read some posts by slicers who wrote their reflections.  Linda even reflected on her reflection, which was really cool!  Oh yeah!  I wanted to write follow Ruth's sentence starters to write a reflection!  But I didn't really feel like it.  

There was summer school... 
and a big pile of books to read...
and TeachersWrite... 
plans to finalize for our vacation to Spain...
it was so sunny out...
I wanted to meet my husband for lunch...
so much to think about to get ready for next year...
all these Spanish lessons I'll never do again that I want to blog about...

It's funny how time just slips by, sometimes slinking quietly like a gentle stream and sometimes charging through like a rushing river after a flood.  Suddenly, it's the last week of summer school, when it seems that just a few days ago I was planning our Olympics unit!  And yet, on the other hand, the school year seems to have floated away, a tiny speck in the distance behind me.

It's just like looking in the rearview mirror: I can barely see what's right behind me, because it's sitting in my blind spot.  I can only see the closest things if I turn and look on purpose, and then my view is focused on that one thing.  This is the kind of reflection I do during the school year.

photo credit: gustaffo89 via photo pin cc

To really look back at the wide view, I have to be far enough away for it to show up in my mirror.  This is the real reason I couldn't write my reflection right when the year ended.  I was still in the midst of it all!  It was still in my blind spot!  Now that I can see it, I'm ready to write.  After all, it's not as far away as it seems.  Just far enough away that I can see it.  

"Are we gonna play that game?"

A few weeks ago, I posted about the Velcro grammar activity I made up for my 7th graders.  That actually came out of another hands-on grammar activity that I want to share today.

Adjective agreement is always a difficult concept for students since it's something completely unfamiliar.  While it helps that we learn it after they've developed a solid understanding of indefinite articles, adjective agreement is still tricky for many students since it's more complicated.  It really helps them to be able to physically move around the adjective endings (and review indefinite articles), especially if they have to argue their ending choice to a partner!

For both 6th and 7th graders, I created sets of cut-out words (indefinite articles, nouns, color words with no o's, and little o/a/os/as/s/es endings) that they use with a partner to create descriptions of objects (stuffed animals for 6th grade, clothing for 7th grade) on their tables.

learning in action!

 As the pairs created their descriptions, I was able to circulate through the room, checking their work, answering questions, and spending time with students who needed more help with the concept.  I loved hearing their conversations as they struggled together, explained concepts to each other, and deepened their understanding.

I expected lots of learning.  What I didn't expect was how much FUN the students would have!  We did this activity on the first day of learning adjective agreement, after a listening activity to expose the students to the structure and a mini-lesson on the SMARTboard where they guessed the rules.  The next day, we did it again as a warm-up (they got to choose different animals/clothing to describe) and my 6th graders reacted in a totally unexpected way:

         "OOOOH!"  Squeals of delight as they saw the bags of words and stuffed
          animals back on the table.
         "Are we going to play that game again?"
          "What game?"  We didn't play a game yesterday.  Games are Go Fish, Memory, 
           Bingo, Around the World...
          "With the animals and the words!"  Oh wow, they think this is a game!  I 
           thought it was a better version of a grammar worksheet!

Well, they are an enthusiastic class.  I grinned and brushed it off... until it happened again the next trimester... and the next trimester!  Invariably, across different classes and different schools, some kids would walk into class that second lesson and ask if we were "playing that game again".  Whoa.  Magic!  Throw in some stuffed animals, collaboration, and cut-up word cards, and grammar practice is a game! 

Words Matter

at Two Writing Teachers!

Today, as they have done in several other summers, our district ELL coordinators brought in some teachers who were participating in a PD session about ELLs.  (And today... surprise! The deputy superintendent showed up as well, as if a gaggle of teachers wasn't enough!)  This always makes me proud but nervous, since I know they are trying to show the teachers what good ELL teaching looks like.  It's a compliment and something-to-live-up-to at the same time!

I laminated it to keep on my desk!

A couple of years ago, they came in for the first time during only my second summer teaching summer school.  (Thus, only my second little experience teaching ELLs!)  The ELL coordinator had stopped by the previous day to bring supplies or something and caught me busy making faces, oohing and ahhing and pointing at the pictures in the book,with the kids huddled around me as we were captivated by Pete Seeger's audio performance of his retelling of the South African folk tale Abiyoyo. She ducked back out without talking to me, but when I went back to my desk, she had left two sticky notes. One said "You are a pleasure to watch teach." The other asked if the PD class could come observe me the next day.  Observe me?  I don't even know if I know what I'm doing! 

But they came, and they ooh'ed and aah'ed and pointed at the activities and decorations and materials I'd made for our thematic unit.  They watched my students learning, they took my extra copies of my handouts, they asked me questions, and they pointed out all the things I was doing that were "just like" what they were learning in their PD session.  Of course I knew all the theories I was putting into practice, and I knew my students were learning... but suddenly it was more real once it was validated by other people: I was a real ESL teacher, one worth watching and learning from!

This year, thanks mostly to budget cuts, we have a new format: 28 K-5 students in an elementary school library with me and the librarian for a two-hour, two-day-a-week "Summer Book Club" through the month of June.  (Previously, it was just me with about 10-15 students for about 2.5 hours every day for two and a half weeks.)  The jump back down to elementary from middle school (wooo, those K's are little and wiggly!) has taken some readjusting on my part, and the Tues/Thurs schedule is nice for making it feel like a real summer but makes it hard to get into a rhythm.  Since there are so many kids, we've been splitting them and doing stations, but that makes me feel even more discombobulated.  (What a fun word! I love words that feel like the idea they express!)

Besides, I didn't feel like we were doing anything super "great" today... the kids were using pictures that I took of them last week to write about the show and tell they did about a special object from their home countries, they were adding Olympics-related words to the word wall, the librarian was doing a read-aloud, and I was doing a content-knowledge-building activity about Olympic sports on the SMARTboard, where the kids would drag pictures of sports into "Winter Olympics", "Summer Olympics", or "Not in the Olympics" categories. Nothing spectacular.

So I was feeling just as unsure about being observed as I was that first summer... but my feelings were just as unfounded.  The teachers were fascinated, the ELL coordinators complimented me on the country activity and the SMARTboard activity, and one whispered in my ear that the deputy superintendent was "very impressed".  On top of all that, one of the coordinators texted me this afternoon, just to say "Great lesson!"

Really, I wish teachers had more chances to observe each other and be observed.  Having the chance to talk about my activities encourages reflection and helps me articulate what I believe about teaching and learning, and I would certainly learn so much more if I could watch other teachers and discuss their lessons with them more often!  Besides, there's nothing more powerful than words of praise and encouragement, especially from people you admire and respect.  Just as I've come to know through slicing, words mean so much.  They can push you, challenge you, lift you up, and keep you going.

You (yes, you, slicing friend!) are a pleasure to exchange words with.  While I can't possibly tape them all on my desk, I carry them in my heart.

Fun with Themes!

Year 4 (for me) of ELL Summer School is in full swing.  I love summer school because it's been my chance to play around with teaching ESL, to implement my teaching philosophies with no strings attached, to create finely crafted, meaningful language use opportunities in contextualized thematic units while engaging students with interesting academic content.

I've taken K-5 students into the ocean, complete with blue cellophane over the lights, windows, and tables, paper scuba masks, and a touch table with real shark teeth and seashells!

grab your snokel and dive in!  :-)

Middle school students went to South Africa during the 2010 World Cup, where they performed Reader's Theater skits of traditional South African folktales and followed the soccer action with daily game reports:

best of all, Spain won it all!  :-)

Last year, more middle schoolers braved the icy cold of Antarctica by making our own pemmican (just like the first explorers!), modeling topographic maps out of sugar cookie dough, and creating Antarctic adventure board games!

brrrrr!  :-)

This year, it's back to K-5 students, and toned down because of a new format.  Nonetheless, we're having a great time learning about the upcoming Summer Olympics!

¡Vamos de compras!

Since my 6th & 7th grade programs are eliminated and I won't even be teaching Spanish anymore, I'm going to try to share a whole bunch of my favorite activities from those programs over the summer.

A favorite activity that I've done with several different topics (food and school supplies, and I can also see it being done easily with clothing, although I never got around to it!) is shopping / the marketplace.  It's just what it sounds like -- our classroom becomes a live marketplace or store where the kids buy and sell plastic realia (and pictures of items when I don't have enough!).  For money, I invested in a lovely set of fake-but-authentic-looking euros and the kids LOVED using them!  In addition to authentic money, there are several opportunities to weave culture into this activity, such as markets / small shops, cultural icon stores like El Corte Inglés, how to say prices, and even exchange rates.

two 7th-graders interacting at a "school supply shop"

Some students volunteer to be "shop owners" -- responsible for setting up their "store", handing items to the "customers" when they ask for them (listening), telling customers the cost of their items (speaking), and making change (life skill!).  To create several stations, I categorized the items into several specialty "shops" (bakery, fresh fruits & vegetables, butcher shop, dessert shop, etc.), giving each "shop" a big bag with their items to sell, signs, and money to make change. (Small shops are a cultural element common in Spanish-speaking countries anyway, but you could make specialized areas of a large store, depending on your situation.) Many of "shop owners" get into their role so enthusiastically that they'll "advertise" for their store, yelling our items and prices in the TL to attract more "customers"!

The other students are "customers", who have to make a shopping list on a budget (writing & life skill!), ask for the items they want (speaking), and pay the correct amount of money when asked (listening).  If they're interested, I try to let the shop owners swap with a customer partway through, so they can experience both roles.

While this activity tends to be SO engaging that some kids will try to slip into English more than usual at first, it's awesome once everyone gets going in the TL (like always, close monitoring is the key!).  The best part is when those super-enthusiastic students dive thoroughly into their role and start telling the "English-sneaking" kids "I don't speak English"!

I love it because it creates a completely authentic way to use language, plus the chance to "experience" some of those cultural elements!  As for the kids, they rush around with sparkling eyes and always list it as one of their favorite activities.