Two years ago, my district went to 1:1 devices.  We got Acer Netbooks for every student!  The change that happened by going 1:1 was amazing, but what I noticed was that my students weren't collaborating as much as I wanted them to.  By the end of that school year, I knew I needed to change some things.  Over that summer, I started researching how classroom design influences student learning and achievement.  
While perusing Twitter, I came across a tweet from Erin Klein about her classroom and the changes she had made to her classroom design.  This is a link to her blog with lots of amazing pictures of her classroom.  

I noticed a HUGE improvement in how my students worked together.  I started off the first day of school with a fun activity where my students HAD to collaborate in order to complete the activity successfully.  Cooperation and collaboration are obviously VERY important to me so I do stress how important it is to work together; but this year my class just seemed to take working together as a matter of fact, much more so than ever before.   The kinds of things my third graders were able to accomplish this year amazed even me! There are truly too many collaborative projects to list, so go and check out my class blog to get an idea of the kinds of things my students did over the course of the school year. 

Every year we have a wonderful lady who comes in to our 3rd grade classes at my site.  She comes once a week and does "Scouts".  She does the whole bit...wears the uniform, teaches scout pledge, scout badges, folders, recycling activities, citizenship lessons and much more.  She is an awesome lady, but she is very strict and likes things a "certain" way (everyone in their seat, no talking, no getting up, no bathroom, etc).  When she first walked into my "new" classroom this year, she had a look on her face that said, "Oh no...this will never work!".  By the end of the year, she gave me the BEST compliment!  She started off by telling me that she didn't think my room design was going to work at all! But she went on to say that my students followed directions beautifully, were respectful, and in general was a very well-behaved class.  She came to appreciate the room arrangement and said that she really enjoyed working in my room.  

Now I want to point out...I did NOT get the "primo" class.  I had the usual number (30 to be exact) of energetic, antsy, goofy, loopy, needy, un-focused, challenging kids as I normally do.  Because "those" kids weren't forced to sit in a desk without the ability to get up and move around; they thrived!  During the Fall parent conferences, I had parents tell me that their child was excited to come to school, that they weren't having battles in the morning, they weren't having "homework" fights and that in general their child was happy.

I started off the school year by allowing my students to choose where they wanted to sit each day (and sometimes multiple times during the day)...complete freedom.  I did have to change that "freedom" a bit, however. I really fought with myself about that change for a long time.  I REALLY wanted my students to learn to be responsible learners and to have the freedom to move about the room as they saw fit.  Unfortunately, I found that third graders still need a bit more structure.  I did have to go to "assigning" seats; but having said that, the kids were still able to move around the room quite a bit over the course of a school day.  They sort of had a "home base" that they started off the day in, but then were able to move to the floor or corner or another "open" spot if they needed to at different times during the day.  I finally appeased myself with the realization that it wasn't really a "responsibility" issue, it was a "comfort" issue.  Eight-year-olds were just more comfortable knowing that their spot was THEIR spot and that they weren't going to loose that spot at any moment.  

I will NEVER, EVER go back to student desks!  NOT EVER! 

I am very lucky to have the support of my principal, my district's Tech Director, and our Superintendent.  

DO IT!  Jump in with both feet!  Research classroom design.  Draw pictures. Make plans.  Hit up anyone you know who might be looking to replace furniture.  Check out your local Craigslist.  Talk to teachers at your site or in your district.  Talk to your custodians...they may know of unused district furniture.  But by all means...change things!  I promise, you will not be sorry! 

Here are a few more resources for you:
Classroom Cribs - 4 Finalists
Alice Keeler - Rethinking Class Design
An Article about Innovative Classroom Design
Tim Bedley's Unusual Classroom 

This is a quick post about my Top 5 EASY things to do with Google Forms (ok, the #1 way is a bit more involved, but still crazy cool!).  I hope some of these will give you an idea or two to use in your classroom.  I'd love to hear about what you are doing with your students...please leave a comment down below!

Google forms has a very easy way to see the results of the voting.  By clicking "Responses" and then "Summary of Responses", you'll be able to see a graphic representation of the results.  This is also a super spiffy way to talk about data collection and how to represent data in more than one way (CCSS MD.3)

Voting for which book to read aloud next...

Sometimes teachers just need a quick 1 or 2 question assessment, using Google forms to make Entrance or Exit tickets to get a "picture" of how the class is doing on a specific skill.  I can quickly see the results the same way I mentioned above ( by clicking "Summary of Responses"), which helps with my planning.  

We learned to play a game from Kenya called Shisima and the kids recorded data while they were playing so we could analyze it afterwards.

After we looked at the data, we then talked about strategy for this particular game. I asked the kids, "Was it better to be the first person or not?  How do you know?"

I think this is the way I use Google forms the most with my 3rd graders.  I make some sort of google "quiz" for them almost weekly.  I make the majority of the questions Multiple Choice or Checkbox and use Flubaroo to grade them. (Flubaro is an awesome Add-On...see THIS post for more info) 

When we took the CAASPP this year, I noticed that my kids needed no help with navigating the test.  They all were comfortable with the split screens, scrolling up and down, clicking circles to choose their answers and typing in explanations.  Because of their comfort with navigating within the test, they were able to concentrate on the actual TASKS of the test.

Here is an awesome blog post by Alice Keeler about how to make a Google form. 

I hope I gave you a few ideas for using Google Forms in your classroom!

Now, let me scramble some eggs and I'm all over that!  Add a little cheese, some salt and pepper, maybe even sprinkle some chopped avocado or green onion on them and now THAT's something I can do!

I'm not entirely sure where the connection is between sucking at frying eggs and my teaching, but if you bare with me; I'm sure we will both come across the point soon!

I think the point is, I don't do ONE thing at a time hardly EVER!  I'm always doing at least a couple of things simultaneously.  Now, hold on!  I am NOT one of those super organized, centered, calm people that CAN do more than one thing at a time and not go insane.  That's absolutely NOT me, but what I am saying is where in life do we do JUST ONE THING at a time?  Anywhere? If there is, I haven't come across it yet.  It's the way our brain works.  Our brain is trying to take in all this information around us and it tries to figure out what to DO with the information and where to store it.  Our brains are hard-wired to observe, analyze, understand and organize a bajillion (yes, I know that's not a real number!) bits of information every minute of every day.

Just like I suck at frying eggs, I suck at teaching ONE standard at a time. I couldn't stand teaching synonyms this week and teaching antonyms next week and following with compound words the week after that.  Every year after weeks of teaching one thing isolation, and practicing that ONE thing and doing worksheet pages practicing that ONE thing; when it came to testing or looking at my students' writing, they would never show their understanding of that ONE thing!  They almost always got that question wrong on the test, or when given an opportunity to use that skill in their writing, wouldn't.  It drove me nuts!  "Why did they get this question wrong? I taught that skill!", I would scream!  

Now I know what you're going to say!  And no, I'm not crazy or going against my anti-homework opinions.  My 3rd graders have been chosen to pilot a "take-your-school-computer-home" program for the past 3 weeks.  And it as worked out really nicely for the most part, but I'll save that for another post. 
 
So for the past three weeks my students have been able to take their school computers home Monday through Thursday and then the computers stay locked up in the classroom for the weekends.  Well, my students have been pestering me to let them take their computers home over the weekends and I just haven't been able to get myself to say "yes" until yesterday.  I finally gave in, but I told them that if they took their computers home over the weekend, they will have to do something REALLY spiffy with them!
I made a very simple assignment in Google Classroom for them.  It took maybe 5 minutes for me to post, here it is:

It basically says; "here's a couple of videos about the Solar System. Watch them. Make something. Be creative. Have fun."  I told the kids that the assignment was optional, that they didn't HAVE to do it.

This afternoon (it's Saturday), I got an email notification that one of my students shared a Google Presentation with me.  The title of the presentation was "The Solar System by Dana and Vanessa".  I was curious, "...by Dana AND Vanessa" it said.  So I opened the presentation and was VERY pleasantly surprised!  It was indeed done by BOTH girls.  I know this because I checked to Revision History and it was clearly worked on by both girls at the same time! So, my next thought was, "ok, these girls are good friends, maybe one girl went to the other girl's house".  Nope, I know Dana's mom well enough that I texted her and asked about how the girls did their work.  She told me that they were both in their own houses and they worked on the presentation for most of the afternoon today! 

Let me point out a few things so you can fully appreciate the awesome cool-ness of this!

1. It's SATURDAY! These girls chose to work/learn on their own time! Seriously?  Remember, I told the kids that they did not HAVE to complete this assignment...it was just for fun.
2. They chose to collaborate on this presentation! They were in their own houses and decided to do this project together AT THE SAME TIME!. They communicated through the chat feature and they also FaceTimed each other while they were working.  Like I said earlier, they really did work on this together. By looking at the Revision History, I can see what TIME changes were made, WHAT changes were made and I can see WHO made those changes.  
   

Now, scroll back up to the presentation and check out the 2nd to the last slide; the girls cited the source where they found most of their information.  I didn't tell them they had to do that.  Yes, we've been working on that; but I didn't even mentioned it in this assignment. They just did it...all on their own! Don't forget, they are 3rd graders! The source where they found their information was NOT one of the links I included in the assignment.  So these girls searched for their own information!

Now, I also have to say that these two girls are my "middle-of-the-road" students.  They are good solid AVERAGE students, not my GATE students!  So needless to say, I am beyond impressed!  These two definitely did something SPIFFY with their computers this weekend! 


        Who says kids have to be in classrooms to learn? Not me!

My husband is a mechanic and if he wants to look up how to replace the evaporator on a 2003 Town & Country (my car), he doesn't look it up in a repair manual anymore.  Most of those manuals are obsolete as soon as they are printed these days!  Instead, he gets me to search YouTube for him (he's a total whiz when it comes to cars, but a complete dud when it comes to tech...he's still rockin' an old slide-up-to-text phone; which he hates.  If he had his choice, he'd still have his Motorola flip phone!)  

My point is...information is no longer stored in the head of some person called "teacher".  When was the last time you were talking to someone and you disagreed on whether Robert Downey Jr. was really in the 80s movie, Weird Science or not?  What did you do in that situation?  That's right...you whipped out your smart phone and Googled it!  (And, yes RDJr. really was in that movie!)

This is my son.  As you can see, he has a few devices going there.  As I was walking by him, my first reaction was..."Seriously? You need 4 devices right now?"  As he explained to me, he did in fact need all of those devices because each one served a different purpose.  He was playing a game on his PS4, texting his friend that was playing with him and he didn't want the other players to know what he and his friend were "planning", he was using the iPad to look up how to beat the level he was on and the laptop was on because the group he was playing with was about to stream their play (they basically record the game play and then stream the video so others can watch, apparently that's a big deal.)  So the more I thought about it, the more I realized that's where today's kids are coming from!  

Say, your class needs to learn about Volcanos.  Option one is the traditional stand up lecture where the teacher is responsible for giving the information about volcanos. Then there's reading the Volcano chapter in the Science textbook and the Review questions at the end of the chapter.  Maybe if the teacher is spiffy, there will be a homework assignment asking students to create a poster of a volcano. 

OR option two...CLICK HERE.

Be honest...if you were a student, which one would YOU choose?  

That video delivers content in a couple of different ways and did you notice the quiz at the end of the video?  So, in one nice little package, there is content AND a check for understanding. This is why Flipped and Blended Learning are such hot topics right now.  

As a teacher in a 1:1 classroom full of wiggly 3rd graders, I am no longer the "giver" of information.  I will also go so far as to say that the textbooks in my classroom are not the "givers" of information either.  Some of those textbooks were printed over 10 years ago!  My students should use technology to discover, learn, create and even teach someone else what they've learned!   
Video allows for teaching/learning in ways that a teacher lecturing up in front of a classroom just can not do.  A student can't rewind a lecture!

Teachers are no longer the "givers" of information, they are directors who guide students to make discoveries and then help students DO something with their learning! 

I have to say that my 3rd graders are pretty spiffy when it comes to tech. They each have an Acer netbook and can whip out a Google doc, drawing or slide presentation like nobody's business. 
So now is the perfect time to have the discussion about WHICH images are okay to use.
Today they are writing blogs posts about planting Golden Poppies. They have to include an image of this flower in their blog post and it MUST be an image that they KNOW they are allowed to use.
I started off our discussion by showing this great video by Nancy Minicozzi (@CoffeeNancy) to introduce the whole concept of choosing images to use.  

There are many, many great resources out there for teaching about and finding Creative Commons images.  But I have to be honest, even I get "lost" in some of those websites.  I end up taking an "image bird walk" and start out searching for Golden Poppies and end up looking at cute photos of Golden Retrievers! Before I realize it, I'm in the middle of a page of adorable puppies doing all kinds of cute things!  Ugh!

Another way I taught my students to search for images is by sorting the images that come up in a Google search by Usage Rights.  The basic steps are:

1. Type the subject you are trying to find an image for into a new Google tab.
   
2. Click on images
   
3. Click on Search Tools
   
4. Click on Usage Rights
   
5. Choose one of the options that say "Labeled for Reuse"
   

Feel free to use this GIF I made...

Alice Keeler has written quite a few blog posts/articles about using Creative Commons items...HERE is one of them.  And of course you can search Twitter for even more spiffy stuff!

Here is another way my students use their Googly-ness...they create Google drawings to show their understanding of a math concept.

At this point in the school year, my 3rd graders are very proficient at creating Google stuff, which is nice!  They are now to the point where they can spend most of their time creating and completing the task and not spend time asking, "Where do I click?". 
Here are a few of their Google drawings:

I have been using Formative with my 3rd graders and I really like it!  Formative stands out because as the teacher, you can see your students' work in REAL TIME!  I can immediately see which students "get it" and which ones do not.  I can give guidance at the exact moment that I see they are getting "off track"...that is nearly impossible with other kinds of assessment tools.  Unless you are standing behind a student looking over his/her shoulder while they are working, you wouldn't be able to see the EXACT moment that he/she is heading in the wrong direction!  But with Formative you can!

The video below shows what I see while my 3rd graders are taking a quiz in Formative.  

So far, I've been using Formative for quick Math "check-ups".  You can create Multiple Choice, Text Response and Show Your Work (my favorite) type of questions.  In the video above, I used the Show Your Work type of question. The cool thing about the Show Your Work question, the students can use the track pad on their computers to "draw" their answer and they can also add text boxes to explain their answers.  

Again, if you're a GAFE district, student sign up is super easy.

This video shows what the student sees when taking a Formative quiz.  (By the way, this video was made by one of my super spiffy 3rd graders AT HOME...just because he wanted to!)  Oh, be still my heart!

The support at Formative is amazing!  I signed up and I immediately received an email from Craig Jones welcoming me and letting me know if I had any questions to let him know.  He really meant it!  I've gotten a few more really friendly emails with tips and how-to videos to watch.  I had a question a few days ago, so I emailed my question to Craig and within a few minutes I got an answer!  Super spiffy!  Check out Formative...it's way cool!

All I knew about Vine was my 14-year old son saying, "Mom! Look..." as he shoved his phone in my face with this looping video playing on it. (hint: Click the tiny sound icon on the bottom right corner...I muted it while writing this. UGH!)

After reading a few tweets and a blog post by@teachthought about using Vine in education, my curiosity was piqued!  So, I downloaded the Vine app on my phone and started to play.  First I made a Vine of me feeding some ducks at the lake.

It's ridiculously easy to make a Vine!  You literally touch the camera icon and then hold down your finger.  This green bar moves across the top of your phone so you can see how much recording time you have and that's it!  I'm serious!  

Now that I mastered the Vine making process, my creative juices started to flow! Check out a few of the vines I made for teaching/reviewing Math concepts! 

How cool is that?  Please leave comments with how you have used Vine in your classroom.  I'd really like more ideas!

Really?  That's it?  That's the whole definition of "status quo"?  Five tiny little words?  And you can tell that the dictionary tried to "spiff-ify" the definition, too!  Why then, is it so extremely difficult to go against the "Status Quo"?

I can remember my first "lesson" in status quo.  It was the very first year of my teaching career and I taught at a school in an extremely rough part of Los Angeles.   I had a student who was creative, quiet, and "quirky" (which actually meant ADHD at a time when it was considered to be the student's problem not the school's).  I really liked Kevin.  Yes, he had a VERY difficult time getting his work done.  He struggled with reading and math, but he drew the most wonderful pictures and his smile was glorious.  One day I discovered Kevin under his desk with his shoes off.  I was just about to make him to get up and put his shoes back on when I noticed that he was actually working!  So, I left him alone.  The next day during Math, Kevin was again under his desk and shoeless.  And again, Kevin was working so I allowed him to continue.  About a week later, a veteran teacher came into my room and saw Kevin under his desk without shoes and she asked me why.  As I proudly explained what I discovered about Kevin, her face crinkled up and she said loudly, "This is NOT how we do things here.  Get that child up off the floor!"  That was Status Quo lesson #1.  
Lesson #2 came the next year.  I was walking with one of my students down the hallway and another teacher stopped us and began to yell and berate my student about his clothes and his attitude.  I just stood there watching this whole demeaning episode and I said NOTHING!  In my defense, I was brand new and I felt like this teacher knew more than I did.  But, again the lesson in status quo was "loud and clear"...different was not acceptable.  
Another story, again from early in my career; I was on the Leadership Committee and my principal was discussing whether we should add a "Warning Bell" and have the students line up 5 minutes early so that they were inside and learning by the official start of the school day.  I, along with the other teachers on the committee agreed.  After this new bell routine was announced, a veteran teacher lectured me about how I had jeopardized all that the "old-timers" had worked for and that I had just given away teachers' before school prep time.  Status quo lesson #3...don't change anything because "it's always been done this way."

Then something wonderful happened.  Something that has completely changed the way I teach.  Something that has given me the confidence to kick "Status Quo" to the curb!  Last year my district went to 1:1 devices and along with Common Core Standards, and a supportive administration; I swear to you, I am now more excited than ever to get to work!  When we got our netbooks, an exciting world opened up not only for me but for my students!  We began to learn in ways that I've never before experienced!  I began to share the wonderful little things that my students were doing with my district's Director of Tech and I found an unexpected "cheerleader", a kindred soul.  I was constantly emailing him and saying, "look what my students did today!" and he would always answer back with "...just imagine what they will do tomorrow."

I was perusing that wonderful place that is Twitter one day and I came across this quote tweeted by @Justintarte and it really made me stop and think.

That quote was just what I needed to take a deep breath and kick "Status Quo" in the ass!  I am no longer under the crushing thumb of "Status Quo"!  I am proud that I am different and that my ideas are crazy!  I have revived that rebellious spirit that was always inside of me and it now roams freely!  At the beginning of this school year, I threw out ALL of my student desks.  My room looks more like a comfy coffee shop than a classroom and we all LOVE it! 

I have a bulletin board covered in bright green fabric for making greenscreen videos.  We have a Graffiti Wall.   My homework is optional and parents know this!  From the first day of school, my students understood that THIS year will be different!  From an impromptu learning session about Katydids because one flew into our classroom, learning about audience by writing in student blogs, to student-led parent conferences;  my students have been on a vastly different learning path this year.  For the first time in many years, I am proud and excited to be an educator!

Here is my plea...Join me!  All of you rebellious, non-conformist, wild and crazy march-to-your-own-drum, wonderfully innovative people; join me and tell "Status Quo" to kiss your ass!  Let's find each other somehow and form a giant "Anti-Status Quo" conga line grabbing people along the way so that our dancing becomes so infectious that people can't help but think and reflect on how schools should work!  Let's nurture each other's ideas!  Instead of saying "I wish we could...?" let's ask, "How can we make this happen?".  After all, has anyone ever done anything truly great by keeping the "Status Quo"?  I think not.