3-2-1 and Week 1 Recap

One week down, only 40-something to go! That first week is always exhausting. I feel like I could have gone to sleep on Friday, not woken up until Tuesday, and still felt just as tired. There's just so much to do in the first week!

Monday was crazy, which was to be expected. Between kids not having their schedules, random interruptions, practicing hallway procedures, etc., I didn't get through as much as I had hoped. I had wanted to do the marshmallow challenge on Monday, but only one class actually got to do this. I like doing the sticky note activity as well, but I didn't have a chance to grab paper, and they won't stick to my whiteboard, so that was a flop this year. Oh well.

Tuesday we did mock stations to practice procedures in my room. I had a station with procedure task cards, a station where they had to complete a 7 Habits Puzzle, and a station with me to do "math about me." Unfortunately, only my second block actually got to do this. My first block was so scattered the first day, that I had to take Tuesday to go through my syllabus and procedures, and my third block had to spend half the period (literally) remembering how to come into a classroom the correct way. I'm going to have my hands full with that one.

In my TPT store :)

Wednesday we dove right in to reviewing integer operations. We completed a foldable and setup our notebooks. We then did some integer task cards, played Integer Insanity, and went on our way.

Thursday we covered fraction operations and did a set of fraction/decimal task cards.

Friday we went over PEMDAS and reviewed Wednesday's and Thursday's topics. The thing I love most about SBG is that it makes me reflect more when I'm looking at work. Even though I don't grade classwork SBG, I still look to see what is causing the issues. When we played Integer Insanity, I noticed that a lot of kids were forgetting the order of operations ALWAYS applies. On Friday, I gave them an assignment on PEMDAS that did not have any negatives, and I gave them a separate assignment on just integer rules. Separated, they can do it. Combine the two, and it's a disaster. We'll work on it.

We also are focusing on the 7 Habits in our "Patriot Period" which is half DEAR and half "advisory" for lack of a better word. We talked this week about "The Man in the Mirror," setting goals, paradigms and principles, and wrote letters to ourselves in the future. I'll give these letters to the kids when they graduate from 8th grade in June. They really liked this activity and put a lot of thought into their letters (I think). I didn't read them because I wanted them to be personal and I thought if they knew I was looking at them they may not be as honest with themselves.

Now for....

3 things that happened this week:

1. The kids started! I have an awesome advisory group, two awesome blocks, and one that is going to need some tough love, but I'm hopeful that they can evolve into another wonderful group :)

2. I tried stations. It didn't work. I'm giving up stations. Sigh.

3. I wore myself out. Big time. Staying at school until 6 then going to rehearsals until 10 is exhausting. 

2 things I'm looking forward to this week:

1. My first SBG test of the year will be on Friday! :)

2. Getting into more of a routine myself and with the kiddos 

1 thing that I need to work on

1. Getting everything together for my second unit, which is my first real unit of 8th grade curriculum. I was very proactive with my review unit and having everything done ahead of time. I want to keep up that work ethic all year :)

Check out my TPT store--I added lots of new products this morning :D

Math Workshop--A plea for help!

Just a quick post...

I wanted to implement workshop last year, but our periods got cut to 60 minutes and I just didn't see it possible.

This year I have 80, but I am having a hard time coming up with how to organize things. Here are the two options as I see them now:

Option 1:
* 10min to do warm-ups, check hwk, any announcements etc.
* 20min for a mini lesson--whole group. This is where we would do our INB/ISN right hand page.
* 50min of rotations--I have my class in 4 or 5 groups (one class only has 21 kids, the others are 24 and 28). I need to have 5 rotations because of this, but is 10 minutes enough time to do task cards? What if they don't get all of them done? If I did this, my math workshop board has the following rotations:

Math Journal--Complete the left hand page in their notebooks

At your seat--Partner work/task cards

Teacher's Choice--task cards/game/SMG on Thursdays

Help Desk--With me

Skills Practice--independent work

This leaves no time for recapping at the end of the block. I'm not sure how I feel about that.

Option 2:

*10min for hwk/warm-ups/announcements

*60min of rotations

*10min recap

The catch with this is rotations would either be 4 15min rotations or 3 20min rotations. I would do the lesson as the help desk. My problem with that is I will have to have two groups at a time (12 students instead of 6. Not as effective), and kids will have to be working on task cards for skills that I haven't taught unless they are in my first group.

So the question is...

If you use workshop or rotations as part of your daily routine in middle school math, how do you do it? What works, what doesn't? What do you recommend?

3-2-1 (A day late) and Day 1 Recap

In 2011 and 2012 I was hired to work for schools in towns I didn't teach in (in Pittsburgh after I had  just moved back to my parents 4 hours away LITERALLY only a week before in 2011, and in NC in 2012) the day before school started. I'm not kidding. It was Friday, school started Monday, and I went from sobbing about how I couldn't find a job to setting up a classroom in 2 hours. Insanity.

So how did I feel more prepared those years than this one? First day of school round 4 should have been the easiest yet! Sigh.

Between things being thrown on us last minute (typical), timing not going as planned (more typical), kids not having schedules and having to look them up (also typical), not being able to figure out how to work the built in locks in the lockers (UGHH! HEADACHE!), mixed in with all the other first day of school things, it was a mess.

Not to mention I forgot the adapter for my MacBook to use it with my projector AND my teacher binder at home. What. A. Day. Block 1, we didn't even get through all of the school paperwork let alone get to talk about my own class. Block 2 flew through the syllabus, but there wasn't enough time before or after lunch to do the activity that I wanted to do (Marshmallow Challenge from Sherri at Middle School Math Rules!), and Block 3 was "turned up" from lunch and never really got themselves in check. Of course that's my biggest class.

Didn't leave until 6 then straight to play practice until 9:45ish. I'm exhausted. 

Anyway, here's my 

 

3 things that happened this week:

1. I went to Pittsburgh to see my family :D My aunt retired from 30+ years in the school system this summer and my parents just moved my brother in at Pitt on Thursday, so we had a retirement celebration Friday night. I have only seen my aunt once since I moved two years ago, so that was nice :)
2. I got ALL of my copies and plans made for the first two weeks of school. WHAT!?
3. I started rehearsals for the next play I'm working on, and my high school best friend who also ended up down here in NC (same town, actually) was cast in it. Our first show together in 10 years. Yay!

2 things on my to-do list:

1. Sharpen my saw. Not a real saw. Talking 7 Habits here. I need some me time immediately
2. Get my apartment back in order. It's been kind of neglected. Oops

1 thing I'm looking forward to this week:

1. Friday. Kidding! Getting my classes into a routine and the schedule calming down. I like routine and there was just far too much chaos for me today. 

Back to School!

We started back for workdays this week, and I am worn out. I haven't gotten HOME before 9 any day this week, and today and yesterday were both after 10:30. Yoi.

I've been busy busy busy getting everything set up in my INB, in my classroom, and for SBG. I posted two new foldables in my TPT store tonight and finally got my data trackers updated there as well. I was also inspired by Ms. Rubin at Everybody is a Genius to create a more visually appealing syllabus. Here is the result:

Front--General Info

Back--SBG Info

I'm obsessed. I wish my teachers gave us fun looking syllabi like this!

My principal and the other two 8th grade math teachers are on board for piloting SBG in Math 8 this year full force, so I'm really excited about that. I will do a full post on that in more detail once things are up and running. Crossing my fingers all goes well on that front!

In the meantime, I finally got my class website up. Yay! 

More details to come when my brain starts functioning properly again.