Blog 10-"Sick" of make-up work!

We have all been bombarded by news of the swine flu but I think many of us are now seeing the swine flu in action. I believe we have encountered flu season a little early this year and I am seeing the affects more this year than I have ever in the past. In my school that has six classrooms of kindergarten and first grade students for a total of 91 students had an average of 23 students gone each day last week. We also had two of six teachers gone for a day. The students that are missing school are usually out for about 3-5 days. In my classroom I had 7 of 16 students gone for two days and I now have a huge pile of make-up work for these students.
I read an article from the St. Cloud newspaper that discusses similar problems. Many of their schools have had large numbers of students gone and teachers as well as students are having trouble keeping up with all of the work students are missing. Parents are calling to pick up make up homework and some teachers are having trouble keeping up with those demands. When students return they are overwhelmed at the work they have missed. Some of the teachers have tried to offer lessons students have missed online through blogs. Other teachers have just been scaling back on homework. They will spend some class time reviewing the previous day lesson and only assign the necessary homework in hopes that students won’t feel so overwhelmed when they return. I also found online that Scholastic has 20 days of work that students can work on while they are missing school. I didn’t find it super helpful but it is a nice resource to have available and I give Scholastic credit for trying to help!
I think schools and teachers are doing the best they can in this situation but I am finding myself and my class is a tough situation. Last week I slowed down my teaching and did lots of reviewing so the students missing didn’t miss so many new concepts but I can only do that for so long. The long weekend helped so the students missing had some extra days to recover but they still have a large pile of work to do when they return. I have gone through and picked what I find necessary for them to complete but I still feel that I need to go back and do some re-teaching for the handful of students who missed all three days last week. Is that the right decision or should I just send the work home and hope that parents do their part and catch their child up so the rest of my class isn’t sitting there bored or should I be letting students go home with little homework since many are still working to get healthy? Have you had similar problems in your classroom? I have not tried doing a blog or anything like that because I don’t think there is too much I could do through a blog. Have you tried anything different to help students catch up? I would love to hear anyone’s input on what the school or teachers could be doing different during this flu season because I’m afraid it’s going to be a long one.

Blog 9-Online high school

I was listening to the radio the other day and I heard an advertisement for online high school and immediately I was thinking, what in the world! I quickly formed an opinion (I do that often) and thought that is wrong, a student needs to go to high school and gain the experience. Then I sat back and thought about it more in depth and changed my opinion (I do that often too). I initially realized I had to think about this more because here I am enrolled in an online graduate program so I must think online learning works!
I decided to do an online graduate program because I wanted to continue working, travel and lead a busy life but still complete courses on my own time. I do not know many high school students who need to continue a full time job or have funds to travel constantly so I researched more about virtual high schools and found some good reasons for these online classes. Students take these online classes if they have illness or injury that makes face to face high school difficult, need credit recovery or they want to take classes that are not offered at their school. Some students are able to take advanced classes or classes that will earn them college credit. One article stated that online high school was allowing students to take classes that were not a high demand in their area and without these online courses the student would not had the opportunity to take such a class. I did find out from the North Dakota Center for Distance Education that a student could also graduate from an online high school. The courses run very similar to our online courses. There is a cost and the student is liable to pay the course fees and textbook costs.
What do you think of this idea? If your son/daughter wanted to complete high school online would you allow them to? Do you think a high school student can gain just as much from an online high school as they can from attending high school? This may be something that has been around for awhile but I haven’t heard of it much before so I’m interested to hear any information that one has. I do think this type of program or class would appeal to the 21st century learner. It is a great opportunity for a student to take a class that they are interested in. This type of class is also a great way to prepare for an online college course.
Another website dedicated to Virtual High School discusses how virtual high school works and it is very similar to our graduate classes. This specific Virtual High School even uses Blackboard.

Blog 8-Who is doing homework?

Homework, it is something we have all experienced and as educators it is a part of our profession. I teach first grade and even them at a young age have homework almost nightly. That is a whole other conversation but I ask myself, am I giving my students homework or their parents. I read an article from The Wall Street Journal about parents helping their child too much with their homework. I think this is starting to happen more and more and with a variety of age levels. It is causing students to become helpless and too dependent on adults.
Schools are urging parents to take part in their child’s education and that includes homework. Families are living very busy lives and often times have events and activities on school nights. This adds pressure to complete homework after a long day before bedtime. Parents provide extra help which usually includes giving more answers than assistance because they feel they have to make sure their child is keeping up with the competitiveness of the current education system. A great example of this happened in my classroom today. A little guy was having trouble with a math problem and as soon as others started to finish he came up to me and said, “I’m just going to take this home so my mommy can help me.” I was shocked that he wouldn’t just ask me (the teacher) for help. When I said he needed to finish it at school he started crying. I’m sure we have also seen the big projects that come with mom’s and dad’s touches to them. They look perfect and when you ask the student how they completed it or why they did it that way they don’t have anything to say. I have seen this every year, one project specifically. Every Thanksgiving we send home a turkey that the students are supposed to disguise and many return very cute but very much done by a parent. When I say done by a parent I don’t mean they did it when their child was in bed, I mean the parents put more work or influence on the project than the child does. In my opinion this is destroying our children. Students compare their work to work that was mainly done by an adult and they get frustrated when they don’t see the same results.
I found one article that gives a suggestion to set ups a homework area in the home. Another article gives suggestions to use at home to make homework go smoothly and less stressful. The most important points are to have a certain time and place that homework occurs so it is consistent and turn the TV off!!! I really liked this site because it offers tips and answer the common questions on how to guide your child through their homework not do it for them. I think this is a great article to share with parents at a conference or in a newsletter.
Are you noticing anything like this in your classrooms? Do you have suggestions for teacher or parents in this situation?

Blog 7-To bounce or to not bounce...

Can you imagine how much you would accomplish everyday if you students just sat down! I teach first grade and my students are consonantly standing up or moving around but I have a feeling this isn’t just a first grade problem. I have had student’s sit on seat cushions from our OT specialist and that has worked for some. I recently heard of the idea of using yoga balls, also called stability balls or fitness balls instead of chairs. They come in a variety of sizes and prices. After a few days of wiggly students I would love to try this so I decided to research it tonight and use the information for my blog this week.
I found a few articles from this past summer discussing the use of fitness balls in the classroom. One article is about a fourth grade teacher in Panama City, FL who used them in her classroom last year. Samantha Rogers student taught in a Missouri classroom that also used them in the classroom and learned about it in a workshop that discussed different learning styles. Rogers saw great results. The students paid more attention and she found it successful to promote good behavior. Mayo Researchers also promote that the use of fitness balls increases blood flow, increases oxygen intake, and improves posture. All of those reasons help the brain work so it sounds like a great idea, right? I think it would really help students concentrate longer. Students may sway or lightly bounce and I think that would be ok. I do have a few reservations about the use of these bouncy chairs. I would hope that after a few uses of the ball they would not be viewed as a toy by students and won’t be a distraction but that can’t be known for sure and this is an expensive “experiment.” The balls are also very expensive and I do not think I could ask parents to pay for something so costly and I’m not confident that my school would purchase them either. Parents out there, would you buy a $25 ball for your students to use in class or would you find this a ridiculous request? There obviously is some concern about the safety of sitting on fitness balls but Rogers says she has not had any accidents where students were injured. I find this a small concern because students fall of their chairs all the time (I told you they like to wiggle). On paper it seems like it would really increase student learning.
The school in FL where Rogers teaches uses the balls as a reward for honor roll students and I strongly disagree with this. I think it’s great to recognize high achievers but I don’t think this is the right way. In my opinion, the students who would gain most from this are the students who may struggle with their work because of the short attention spans.
I found a fitness article that suggests tips to incorporate the new sitting tool in your classroom (or office). They stress that you should introduce them into your classroom with ease. Don’t make them mandatory and have students use them in short time frames until students get used to them.
Well ladies and gentleman, any advice or stories for me on this issue? Should I try it? I was thinking I could bring in a few to try out this year. I would appreciate any comments.