Full disclosure here: my students don’t get to paint as much as I would like them to, mostly because of the mess factor. We are in a classroom in the portables and are a long way from a sink for clean-up, making painting a big undertaking every time we do it. It was fun watching my students paint, though. Some who are not generally artistic or drawn to the arts really got into it and it was fun to see the visceral painting style of students who are generally more athletically inclined.

I believe in arts in the classroom, not only because it complements other areas of the curriculum (in this case: Canadian heritage), but also because I think students should be exposed to art and be encouraged to make beautiful things. How sad would the world be if we streamed kids at such a young age and asked them to put themselves in rigid categories?

I have been a runner since I was a teenager. I don’t claim to be very fast or to be able to go very far, but I do LOVE it. I decided to add yoga to the routine because all I was doing was pounding my body with the same old same old four times a week. I have done yoga before but it never really “took”. I do love the dim lights and the quiet, the incense and the chanting, but I am the kind of girl who needs a runners’ high. I want to feel like I have worked hard. I never really felt like I was amongst my tribe.

Yoga for runners blew my mind:

I showed up in my running tights and thought, “meh… They’ll do the trick.” Little did I expect every other yogi and yogini to look like me! The room was full of Nike and Sugoi and not the hemp and bamboo I had expected. They all had feet like me: rough, and bent. Every other yoga class I had been to was full of people who seemed to respect their feet more than I did, but this class seemed to be full of people more interested in where their feet could take them. I found power in knowing every one of those runners had a tight front body and a weak back body. Camel pose that goes straight up and down at best? Yup, that’s me. There is power in finding people with like interests.

I found myself wanting feedback rather than wanting to disappear into the background. The teacher demonstrated, described, and provided feedback. She used words, a demonstration, and sometimes a hands-on realignment of our position. I was not afraid to get it wrong! Rather, I was more concerned with getting it right. There is power in being allowed to make mistakes.

Several times she said, “There is no judgement only practice.” That right there? That blew my mind! I was not right or wrong but on a continuum towards my best me. How freeing to not be afraid to get it wrong! She provided us with feedback and then let us try each position again. The feedback came in the middle of the practice, not at the end where I would have forgotten before the next session. There is power in just-in-time feedback.

She guided us to the ropes and wall hooks where I was incredibly intimidated: what torture device is this? But she made it fun! My first inversion! Did I look like a fool on the outside? Probably. Did I feel like a five-year-old on the playground on the inside? Absolutely! Let’s not forget the value of play in the classroom! There is power in fun!

The class was Robin Hilton’s Hips and Hams at the Bodhi Tree and I highly recommend it. I also highly recommend putting yourself in the student role occasionally and experiencing the slight discomfort of learning something new.

I have found that Twitter has completely changed my PLN, introducing me to tons of new people who share my view of education and with whom I can collaborate at anytime of day or night. My #pdgeeks are awesome!

So I signed up for and Ed tech massive open online course with 1200 or so other colleagues from around the world. I’m very much looking forward to learning and sharing. And I’m a little intimidated by the skill level already demonstrated by some other participants. This is gonna be good!

I think that Evernote notebooks have the potential to be an education game changer. As I previously noted on Twitter, I had a student with organizational challenges begin using Evernote about two weeks ago. Here, he is able to store pictures of organizers, record audio responses to some work, and write a journal that is generally of higher quality because the iPad is pointing out his mistakes to him (it has been interesting to watch him work – I can here him say “Oh! That’s how you spell (fill in the blank)? I didn’t know that!)

When he was away for a couple of days, I put his missing work directly into his Evernote and he was able to access everything directly from home.

Today’s work was writing a journal. While I would like to get better at doing this, today was a first step. Ten students wrote their journals in Evernote and I was able to access their work from my desk on my iPad. I recorded feedback for them using Explain Everything and sent them a copy back that they can watch and use to make corrections to their work.

I think this will be a powerful tool for students as I can have a virtual 2 minute meeting with each student after they are already gone for the day and make improvements to their work.

This lesson covered so much: science, language arts, art perspective.

One of my students even remarked: Mme! We’re having fun, but we’re learning, too!

The students traced their hands and feet, then they drew their faces and bodies. Students were required to include three rock samples and one cloud sample, all of which could be identified by a viewer. After drawing, students outlined their work with a sharpie and painted with water colour. Finally, students blogged their rock and cloud samples and a QR code posted next to their work takes viewers to their site.

I loved this project and I think students were pretty pleased too!

Evernote, again, is awesome. I have started using it with a student who has trouble getting organized and so far it’s been like night and day. No more papers to go missing. No more “I left it at home on the kitchen counter”. We also had enormous success with this student’s writing today. He was able to photograph the organizer and write on it with Skitch and save it to his Evernote.

eclicker has an updated app for $14 and I splurged. It’s much streamlined over the old version and a great way to have students review. I had groups of students use the “host” version (eclicker presentation) to write multiple choice, true and false, and open question questions that they will share with peers at the next science lesson. The app, brilliantly, allows users to bring in image files and is so easy to figure out I had kids up and running in minutes. The “audience” version (free) allows students to buzz in their answers all at the same time (class review) or at their own pace (could see using this for quizzes).

A colleague showed me sock puppets, and we’re going to try it Friday with our reading buddies. Looking forward to sharing our results with you!

Also, I have lately recommitted to using my SMARTboard everyday in a meaningful way and have had good success this week. More on that later!