Podcast PD- Twitter Chat #whatsyourstory

Posted on July 26, 2020 by

#whatsyourstory poddcast

Are you wanting some PD before school starts? Wondering how to do projects in distance learning? Would you like to podcast with your students?

I’m inviting you to a Twitter chat I’m hosting on Monday – I’ll be working with WeVideo to share podcasting ideas on their #whatsyourstory chat at 4:00 p.m. PST. You should join us!

Here’s a peek at the questions – if you can’t make it live, please schedule your responses starting at 4:05 and every 5 minutes after we’ll start a new question! You can also search #whatsyourstory later to see the amazing dialogue I’m sure we’ll have!

podcast
podcast WeVideo

If you’re looking for some pre-created free podcasting lessons, check out my links below:

Podcasting Project HyperDoc

Kids Take Action Project HyperDoc

Can You Hear Me Now podcast intro project

Another great resource for podcasting as well as other video projects is WeVideo’s book called “WeVideo Every Day: 40 Strategies to Deepen Learning in Any Class” by Dr. Nathan D. Lang-Raad, and my podcasting lesson is featured!

WeVideo

I’ve written about podcasting on mamawolfe before – check out some of my previous posts for more ideas and detailed walk throughs of how I podcast in my classroom!

Podcast In the Classroom with WeVideo

Podcasting: Why You Need To Try It

WeVideo: Creating Audio and Video Projects on Chromebooks

I sure hope to see you on the Twitter chat, or to connect with you afterward on Twitter or Instagram!

Miss the live check? Here’s my curation of tweets!

Jennifer Wolfe

Jennifer Wolfe, a writer-teacher-mom, is dedicated to finding the extraordinary in the ordinary moments of life by thinking deeply, loving fiercely, and teaching audaciously. Jennifer is a Google Certified Educator, Hyperdoc fanatic, and a voracious reader. Read her stories on her blog, mamawolfe, and grab free copies of her teaching and parenting resources.

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The COVID Chasm: Educators Stuck In The Pandemic Divide

Posted on July 15, 2020 by

Educators, do you feel the COVID chasm?

“The time for the healing of the wounds has come. The moment to bridge the chasms that divide us has come. The time to build is upon us.” – Nelson Mandela

Since March 13, when my 29-year teaching career suddenly pivoted into unknown territory, I feel the COVID chasm growing deeper in education.

So much of what we always did, what we always knew, what always ‘worked’ dissolved with the movement to online, crisis teaching.

Some teachers literally pivoted over night. Some, like me, had an amorphous ramp-up time, highlighting the literal and physical break in our system.

Four months later, rethinking how we ‘do’ school isn’t a place most teachers thought we’d be. Many of us thought we’d be out of the building for a few weeks at best, just enough time to let the virus blow over. We’d be back for the last quarter, be able to see all our hard work pay off with celebrations, projects, graduations, and promotions – all the best parts of the school year showing themselves off.

When we left our classrooms, many of us never realized we wouldn’t open the doors again for months, not anticipating it would be like unlocking a time capsule that would bring us to tears.

And the most disturbing part is, this chasm, this great divide between what we knew then and what we know now, continues to widen, to separate and fragment, and is leaving all educators – particularly teachers, wondering where to find solid footing.

The COVID chasm divides

This COVID chasm divides the risk-friendly with the risk-averse, crisis teaching with online instruction, parents with teachers, the government with education, people of color with what’s equitable, and what YOU say with what I hear.

It’s the reason why teachers are scared – me included.

Before, the split between education’s early adopters of technology, (the risk-friendly types), and mainstream teachers (the more risk-averse types) was less visible. Suddenly, ALL teachers adopted technology in order to keep the school going – thus exposing students and families to staggering levels of preparedness. Those who used to rely on ‘the way we’ve always done it’ found themselves lost, isolated, and overwhelmingly untrained to execute distance learning.

The COVID chasm exposes

COVID chasm

It exposed a systemic problem in education, a deep, broken and yet firmly foundational system that locked our schools in place – and a system that can benefit from disruption.

When conflict happened pre-pandemic, it was easier for parents and teachers to ‘agree to disagree’. Many times – or most – teachers would breathe deeply and try to remember that they are the education experts, even when parents were telling them how to teach. With teachers planted as responsible for a failing economy if we refuse to support face to face instruction, the chasm between parent and teacher gapes.

As our country confronts the COVID-19 crisis, the deep separation between the ‘haves’ and the ‘have-nots’ reveals the inequity in educational funding. Big business bailouts versus devastating cuts in education pit neighbor against neighbor, political parties against each other. Educators, expected to do more with less, feeling devalued and expendable, wonder if it’s worth it anymore. Why wonder if they can be expected to resume ‘business as usual’ and put their life on the line. Do teachers need to die for their jobs?

And the chasm between BIPOC and whites, between those who are most impacted by the virus, least likely to have healthcare, job security, or choice about sending their kids back into school buildings – including BIPOC educators – perhaps they feel the COVID chasm most intimately.

Educators can tell you what’s best for children – it’s to be surrounded by people who care, people who want to listen and hear what they’re saying, by people who understand that the trauma of being put into unsafe school situations is greater than the trauma of missing one fall or one year of face to face instruction.

Educators know what to do

COVID chasm

Educators are trained to do what’s best for kids – and when you say, “It’s not that bad…kids need to be in school with their friends”, what we hear is, “Your life is less important than mine – otherwise I would be fine hosting all 30 of my kid’s classmates for a play date”.

When you say, “We need to have a Zoom meeting to discuss re-opening ideas”, what we hear is, “The virus is too dangerous to meet in person, but not too dangerous to put teachers in classrooms”.

When you say, “Just put up a tent outside – it’s safe out there”, we hear,”Teachers are babysitters and camp counselors, not educators”.

And when you say, “Distance learning didn’t work for my kid last spring”, we hear you say, “Teachers failed – even though we did our best with little time and no training.”

It’s time to think about Nelson Mandela’s words: “The time for the healing of the wounds has come. The moment to bridge the chasms that divide us has come. The time to build is upon us.”

Bridging the divides

We know better and we can do better. Together, we can bridge the divides before us, and take this disruption and run with it. We can take care of our students, we can figure out solutions – but only if we take the time. The time is now. It’s time for teacher training in online learning and increased government funding for education. We need equitable access to healthcare and collaboration between families and schools. This pandemic shouldn’t bring out our worst – let us work together to heal our wounds and do what’s best for our kids.

Teachers shouldn’t have to be forced to decide between their profession and their life, or the lives of their families. That’s not going to make education better. That’s one chasm that we cannot bridge – but so many of these we can.

What do you say – are you willing to help fix the COVID chasm, or not? Remember – you are what you DO – not what you SAY you’ll do. Time to step up for education.

Jennifer Wolfe

Jennifer Wolfe, a writer-teacher-mom, is dedicated to finding the extraordinary in the ordinary moments of life by thinking deeply, loving fiercely, and teaching audaciously. Jennifer is a Google Certified Educator, Hyperdoc fanatic, and a voracious reader. Read her stories on her blog, mamawolfe, and grab free copies of her teaching and parenting resources.

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It’s Hard Not To Feel Sad Right Now

Posted on April 22, 2020 by

Are you finding that it’s hard not to feel sad right now?

It’s lingering right there, all the time. Some days life feels somewhat ‘normal’ – we’re adapting to the new routines, becoming used to the safety of our homes. And then other days…it’s just hard not to feel the weight, the enormity of what is unfolding in our world.

For the first week of the shelter at home orders in March in California, I slept. A lot. 12 hours or so a night. That counts the time I lay awake around 2 am, wondering how this was all going to play out. That was before I really understood what safe at home would be like. How distance learning and virtual teaching would transform education – and my job.

It was awhile before I realized how very, very sad this would make me.

Routines

I tried to get up ‘on time’, tried to cut back on coffee, to write my daily gratitudes, to reach out. I filled bird feeders and pulled weeds and watched my backyard slowly grow and give me a new space to just be. Never venturing too far from home I took twice-daily walks, just looping around and around my neighborhood, staying in the familiar, close territory to home. I switched out educational podcasts for audiobooks, responding to my need to hear and read stories, letting myself loose in the narrative. I made myself pull on a pair of well-worn jeans every morning, just to start some sort of routine.

Over the following three weeks, I dove into training teachers. I’m prepared for this – and I love being able to share my skills and excitement for educational technology with educators who feel scared, vulnerable, and yes, sad.

There’s a grief factor to what’s going on now if you’re an educator. The ‘old’ way of teaching and running a school died with the decision to close the buildings, to pivot into Google Classrooms and WebEx and Zoom to deliver curriculum and connect with students.

We hardly had a moment to take a breath. We had no time to be sad. Educators had to act fast, come together and figure this out.

We’re good at that – the quick decisions, the thinking on our feet.

And now…

And now, two weeks into our virtual classrooms, it feels a bit more routine – a bit more ‘normal’, whatever that means. I’m waking up earlier – too early, in fact. I’m starting my days outside, coffee and journal and birds and blooms. My walks are longer, taking me on new paths, new landscapes. I’ve had a few moments, even, where I feel almost settled.

But, despite my heroic attempts to push it aside, to break it down and not deal with it, I’m finding the sadness creep back in.

The postponements started trickling in, the canceling, rescheduling, the pushing-back on things that we’ve been looking forward to. Graduations. Weddings. End of the school year projects. Family trips. Funerals. College.

We’re flattening the curve, most definitely. But we’re flattening ourselves at the same time. Days blend into each other. The routines that helped me make it through the day feel comforting and monotonous simultaneously.

The dark side

I start to let the dark side crawl in. The spiraling, swirling sense of never-endingness. Of worry. Of wondering.

I’ve been using a ‘Weekly Check-In’ form with my students to build community and maintain relationships even when we’re not in the same physical space. You can see a copy of it here. They have options to tell me how they’re doing – ‘’I’m happy”, “I’m silly”, “I’m stressed”, “I’m angry”, and “I’m sad”. You can make a copy of my form here.

And guess what – sadness topped the list this week.

When a 7th grader shares their sadness on a digital form, it hurts. The impact of knowing they’re isolated at home, away from the structures and systems and community that we’ve created in our schools makes me sad.

How do I respond to that? Ignore it? No way. Brush it aside? Nope.

I agree.

I am sad. THIS is sad. Challenging. Scary. Unsettling.

I want them to know I feel it, too. And that it’s ok to feel sad.

What I do

I ask them what they do to feel better and I tell them about how I go outside every morning, curl up under a fleece blanket on my patio, and sip my coffee.

I write to them about how I walk around my garden first thing, looking for new blooms. About how I take photos of my flowers and post them online, just to bring a smile to someone who is looking out the window at the snow.

When I feel sad, I say, I take a walk around my neighborhood. I look at the little things, the trees, and flowers and try to notice changes from the day before.

Sometimes I share how I look up at the sky, searching for birds and butterflies and clouds, and how I smile at other people as we walk towards each other, and then step out of the way. Sometimes I cross the street, just to keep my distance.

I still smile, even though it makes me feel sad.

I tell them about how I pick grapefruit off my backyard trees and leave them in a bag on my front lawn with a sign that says, ‘Take some for your family. I’ll keep sharing. Stay home”. And how I smile when a few hours later, the bag is empty.

Wishes

I’m sad, for sure. I wish my mom could drive here and spend the weekend. I miss being able to jump on a plane and visit my daughter. I’m sad that her wedding is being postponed, colleges are shutting down, that trips and graduations are canceled and that people everywhere are sick and dying.

This loss of control over our lives, the lack of feeling like life (and we) aren’t moving forward, leaves us feeling like wanderers in a dark, dense, forest. We know there is a path, somewhere -it might be overgrown or trampled down, or we might have just taken a step too far to the side to stay on track. We know that once we get through this part, the scary, solitary steps we make will eventually lead us to…somewhere. Better than this. Definitely a different landscape.

I think I need to just leave it here, to be with the sadness and sink into today – to what is right here, right now. Robin Wall Kimmerer says, “If grief can be a doorway to love, then let us all weep for the world we are breaking apart so we can love it back to wholeness again.”

I’m ok with that kind of doorway. I’m ok with weeping a little bit now and then – I’m pretty sure our tears are just a lens to magnify the stars, anyways. With that kind of grief – that sadness that we can fix with love – I trust that we will find our way.

Do you?

Jennifer Wolfe

Jennifer Wolfe, a writer-teacher-mom, is dedicated to finding the extraordinary in the ordinary moments of life by thinking deeply, loving fiercely, and teaching audaciously. Jennifer is a Google Certified Educator, Hyperdoc fanatic, and a voracious reader. Read her stories on her blog, mamawolfe, and grab free copies of her teaching and parenting resources.

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I’m Grateful For Birdseed Today

Posted on April 9, 2020 by

I’m grateful for birdseed today. I’ve found that spending the early morning outside, first thing as the sunlight streams along the path, listening to the birds sing and the world wakes up, helps me center and feel calm. It’s beome a favorite ritual to help me in these days of stress.

I’ve got three feeders in the view from my back patio, each full of birdseed – well, four if you count the hummingbird feeder, sparkly red and inviting. Right now, though, the bold White-crowned sparrows feast every morning. They flit in and out, up and down, trilling their welcoming call. The chunky Mourning doves come by every so often, eating what’s leftover on the ground. Sometimes alone, their plaintive call for their mate echoes in the morning hush.

https://youtu.be/hoBkOrZ7LzA
Play and listen as you read!

All they need

I’m guessing the birds don’t really realize what’s happening either, how obsessed I’ve become with keeping them fed. Or maybe they’re just confident that they have all they need right here at my feeder.

I’m grateful for iris bulbs today, planted over the last few decades I’ve lived here. For the last 28 days, I’ve been watching them every morning, watching the birds dig around at their strong base looking for discarded seeds. The purple iris always appears first, followed by pink. I’ve noticed their dagger-like leaves sprout strong stalks, morphing from the base like diamond-shaped arrows to the sky. They always amaze me, these iris, how the powerful bud pushes forward, wanting so much to bloom.

Today, I’m grateful for space right outside my door, the red used bricks beneath my feet and the honey locust trees above barely budding, the sky open vast and royal blue. I’m grateful for the jasmine vines tangling in treetops to my left – so grateful that I never got around to pruning them. The grass is growing high and green waiting expectantly for attention. Grapefruits and oranges drop abundantly from the trees along the fence line, opening up space for next year’s fruit. The Calla lilies don’t seem to mind quarantine either; they know it’s time to bloom, no matter what’s happening in the world.

These days start with gratitude

These days start with gratitude, with reminders that this, too, shall pass. I’m finding the time moves just as before, but now there’s no reason to rush. I’ve no control over the unfolding of time anymore now than before – and when the time is right, this unbelievable journey will unfold and life, maybe not as before, will resume.

The sparrows are done feeding now, moving to their game of tag between the shelter of the buddleia and pittosporum. They’re small enough, these slight little creatures, to take shelter quickly, their tweets taunting their hidden friends. The menacing blue jay squawks and pops in, grabbing a sunflower seed and tapping it open on a branch above my head. He wipes his beak side to side, determined. Simultaneously, one half of the pair of doves waits on the wire overhead, snatching bits of sunlight.

It’s time for the last sip, closing my morning pages and getting on with the day. I’m grateful for these small moments of ordinariness – the silver linings of sheltering at home. For the birdsong, the beautiful, distant symphony of sound, each sharing their gratitude for simply being alive.

The hug of the Universe

I’m feeling the hug of the Universe, wrapping me in safety and beauty in this extraordinary time. I know I’m being taken care of, being reminded to slow down and turn inward. When everything in the world seems to have gone sideways, I find serenity in the extraordinariness around me – and the joy of giving thanks and feeling peace.

And the gratitude for the birdseed that draws it all into focus.

Jennifer Wolfe

Jennifer Wolfe, a writer-teacher-mom, is dedicated to finding the extraordinary in the ordinary moments of life by thinking deeply, loving fiercely, and teaching audaciously. Jennifer is a Google Certified Educator, Hyperdoc fanatic, and a voracious reader. Read her stories on her blog, mamawolfe, and grab free copies of her teaching and parenting resources.

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thinking routines

3-2-1 Thinking Routine

Posted on February 22, 2020 by

My 7th graders have been exploring perceptions and reality using thinking routines. We started out with a 3-2-1.

Have you heard of thinking routines before?

Thinking routines take all sorts of forms – and while they’re not all necessarily digital, I love using Ed-tech tools to help students make their thinking visible.

This 3-2-1 thinking routine template was originally made by the masterfully creative Heather Marshall. I’ve adapted it several times over the years to match the learning outcomes my students are working on.

You can get a copy of my Perception and Reality 3-2-1 Thinking routine here.

How thinking routines work

In my class, I’m a fan of building engagement through curiosity and exploration of a topic BEFORE I do any sort of instruction.

When students ‘buy in’ to the topic/concept with exploration (have you seen my posts on HyperDocs?) energy just starts to flow all over the classroom.

We started our latest unit of study with a MMTS ( I shared a post about that here). Next, we followed up with a more directed 3-2-1 thinking routine which focused on our next mini-unit on meeting our pen pals from Spain, letter writing, commas, adjectives, and communication skills.

Using this thinking routine feels a little bit like lifting the cover off of a new sculpture or work of art. The students understand bit by bit and by the time they have written their ‘bridge’ statement, they are DYING to get started!

We began with a topic:  kids from Spain/kids who don’t speak English. Next, my students wrote three ideas they immediately bring to mind on that topic, two questions, and one analogy. The analogies are the hardest part for sure. The cool thing is that they just keep getting better with the repetition!

Next, we explored the topic by reading personal letters from our pen pals in Spain. My 7th graders were absolutely GIDDY with excitement! Many immediately wanted to know if they could continue to write to them AFTER the assignment was over. When does that ever happen?

On a side note – I connected with a teacher in Madrid through my work with TGC and the Fulbright program that took me to Indonesia in 2012, but there are other ways to find global pen pals.

The next step

thinking routine

Then, it was back to the 3-2-1 for one more repetition of thoughts, questions, and analogies. This time my students were more directed towards the pen pal they ‘met’ through their letters. They were 100% more invested in their questions, as they knew the next task was to respond to the letters and add their own inquiries!

Then, my 7th graders eagerly began their letter writing. Many of my students are bilingual, and asked if they could write in Spanish – how cool is that? The class discussions were on fire – kids sharing what their pen pal wrote, laughter at the commonalities between Davis and Spain. They were in awe over discovering the Spanish school had a pool (of course, we searched their website, too). They had an overall joyful spirit of excitement and connection. And on top of it all, they were writing with an authentic, genuine purpose.

After their letters were completed, it was back to the 3-2-1 for one more repetition of thoughts, questions, and analogies. But this time, we utilized tech tools to make their thinking visible. Answergarden helped share their thoughts. We documented our questions on Google classroom, allowing kids to earn a different perspective on ALL the pen pals.

The final step to the 3-2-1 thinking routine is the bridge. Students complete this statement: “I used to think ________________, but now I think __________. By using Padlet, all my students could share their perspectives and comment to each other. Their understanding of the topic took off!

thinking routines

Why thinking routines are so amazing

thinking routine

To me, using these tech tools makes ALL the difference. Instead of continuing to hold only their own perspective, by making their thinking visible my 7th graders are able to deepen their critical thinking about the topic. It’s a beautiful way to learn to value others’ opinions.

As of today, we have sent our letters to Madrid. The next rotation will involve actually ‘seeing’ our friends via video communication! I hope you follow along to see the next steps in our exciting global classroom experience!

Jennifer Wolfe

Jennifer Wolfe, a writer-teacher-mom, is dedicated to finding the extraordinary in the ordinary moments of life by thinking deeply, loving fiercely, and teaching audaciously. Jennifer is a Google Certified Educator, Hyperdoc fanatic, and a voracious reader. Read her stories on her blog, mamawolfe, and grab free copies of her teaching and parenting resources.

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