The Week That Was In 234

This week marked the start of a new chapter in my teaching career. I’ve transitioned to Batavia Middle School, where I’m now teaching 8th grade social studies in room 234. While the subject remains the same, I’m facing new procedures, new students, and a new textbook.

Thursday and Friday – Frayers, 3xCER

Adapting to Change

At my previous school, we used TCI History Alive, but now I’m working with McGraw Hill’s Voices of the Past. This change has presented some challenges. Previously, I could easily transfer TCI sections to a Google Doc and link it to activities (like EduProtocol), or directly link TCI sections to activities. However, with McGraw Hill, I can’t transfer content to Google Docs or create links in the same way.

This limitation is particularly frustrating because I prefer using Google Docs for its accessibility. It allows students to quickly access sources with a simple click, which streamlines the class and maintains a good tempo. I’m currently brainstorming ways to work around this issue.

Another adjustment I’m facing is the longer class periods. We now have 65-minute classes, compared to the 47-minute periods I was accustomed to. While this extended time offers more opportunities for activities (as they say in Step Brothers, “There’s so much room for activities”), it’s challenging from a timing perspective. On the bright side, I now only have four periods of Social Studies and co-teach one period of reading workshop with an ELA teacher.

Despite these changes, the first two days flew by.

Thursday: Building Connections

Thursday marked the first day back for everyone. As always, I began by emphasizing the core values of our classroom: respect, value, support, connection, challenge, and empowerment for everyone in room 234.

Although the students won’t receive their Chromebooks until next week, it wasn’t a problem. EduProtocols are versatile and can easily transfer to paper. To foster a sense of value, respect, and connection among the students, we started with a “Frayer a Friend” activity. This exercise included various prompts such as:

• Their name and birthday
• Four things they like
• Four things they dislike
• Three items they’d want on a deserted island
• A sketch of their dream vacation

I initially set a six-minute timer for the first round, but many students couldn’t finish in time. That’s perfectly fine – it’s all part of the learning process. On the back of the Frayer, I incorporated an idea from Ariana Hernandez: Sketch, Tell, and Connect. Students sketched something they noticed during their interview, wrote a quick sentence about it, and then explained how it might connect to them personally.

We followed this with another round of Frayer a Friend, this time reducing the time to five minutes. Impressively, 90% of the class finished this round. I used this as an opportunity to reinforce our class goal: improvement with each repetition, doing a bit more each time.

Next, we moved on to a REPP (Random Emoji Power Paragraph) activity with their partners. This is always a hit, bringing great energy and laughter to the classroom. It’s one of my favorite EduProtocols.

To wrap up the day, since we didn’t have Chromebooks, I introduced the Marker Game. Students found a new partner, and each pair received a dry erase marker to stand up between them. I read True/False statements about the syllabus and my class. If they thought the statement was true, they grabbed the marker; if false, they left it alone. This game was a blast and a great way to review important class information.

Overall, it was a successful first day, though I’m eagerly anticipating the arrival of the Chromebooks.

Friday: Deepening Connections and Introducing Myself

On Friday, I wanted to maintain the momentum we’d built. We started with another Frayer a Friend activity, this time partnering students with someone from a different table. I set a four-minute timer, and everyone successfully completed the task.

Next, I introduced the Wicked Hydra activity. I had prepared five images related to me and my life, taping them to poster paper or whiteboards around the room. These images included:

1. A picture of my family
2. Me receiving the OCSS MS Social Studies Teacher of the Year award
3. A photo from my NKU tennis days
4. A Zach Bryan concert where Bruce Springsteen made a surprise appearance
5. A picture of Dominic Helmstetter and me presenting at NCSS (interestingly, two classes thought Dominic was Ronaldo and were impressed that I had “met” him!)

The goal of this activity was to introduce myself through questioning strategies while simultaneously developing students’ historical thinking skills of observation and questioning. I rotated all groups through all pictures in 15 minutes.

Following this, I combined a 3xCER (Claim, Evidence, Reasoning) with the Wicked Hydra activity. I emphasized that everything we do in room 234 serves a purpose. In this case, their observations and questions would help them create claims about me. After explaining claims, evidence, and reasoning, I gave the students 10 minutes to come up with claims about me based on the images they had observed.

We concluded the activity by having students share their claims. I answered their questions and shared more about myself, creating a wonderful opportunity for connection and engagement.

This class period was a resounding success, and I’m definitely planning to use this activity again in the future.

In conclusion, despite the challenges of adapting to a new school environment, these first two days have been incredibly rewarding. I’m excited to continue building connections with my students and helping them develop crucial skills through engaging, purposeful activities.