Now because I do not have the curriculum yet, nor do I know the exact expectations for the class, I am trying to work on classroom routine information that won't change. Hear are the items I have been working on:
1. My Syllabus
So this year I wanted to do a foldable syllabus. As I plan to do an interactive notebook this year, I thought that this format would best suit my needs. I bought a syllabus from The Marvelous Middle TPT store here. After looking at this great syllabus, I decided to create my own and take only parts of this one. I really liked some of her pages and added very little. I will only be posting pictures of my foldables, as I used some of her wording in my syllabus and don't want to break any laws! I will give you a blank template though that I created and that you may fill in on your own! Here are the pages I have in my syllabus:
- Cover (cool design that can be colored in by the students. Also requires the signature of the parent and the student. I will be sending home a "quiz" with the student to do with their parent as well to ensure that they have actually read it!
- The Basics: This includes items they need everyday, my contact info, best ways to contact me, order of consequences, and the big NoNo's in my classroom. (I took most of this from the syllabus I bought). I added the contact info and the best ways to reach me part.
- The Curriculum: This page shows students what they will be held responsible for throughout the class and gives a general timeline of the units we will cover in the class. I changed the format of this, but the idea came from the original syllabus I bought.
- Grade and Work: I changed a lot on this page as my grading this year is mostly proficiency based. (Or I hope it will be!) Included on this page is: homework/classrwork grading policy. late work policy, vocab quizzes, final assessment, redo info, and classcraft expectations.
- Expectations: Here I kept a lot from the syllabus I bought. I added an email etiquette section as this is one of my biggest pet peeves as a teacher.
Here is my Email Etiquette section that I included:
Teacher is not your slave! She is a professional and should be
communicated with as such. When you send
an email to her, please include a subject line with your class hour and
name. Also, remember to include an
appropriate greeting and farewell to your email. Being able to email your teacher is a
privilege, please request help; don’t demand it. If you
send an email before 6pm, teacher WILL respond before the end of the day. Weekends are to be enjoyed by both student
and teacher. Please respect that teacher may be busy on the weekends. If
you email her during the weekend, do not expect a response right away. If she can, she will respond by 6pm Sunday on
most weekends. Please check your
messages to see her response. Not
following these expectations will result in your loss of this privilege and
teacher will not correspond with you via email.
- Policies and Procedures Page 1: I kept some parts from the original syllabus I bought. Including: Entering the classroom, Tardy Policy, Two Minute Countdown, Exiting the Classroom, Getting Teacher Attention, Bathroom/Locker. I tweeked each of these to fit my needs of course.
- Policies and Procedures Page 2: Absence expectations, Device expectations, How to earn euros, sub expectations, and the cauldron.
2. Classcraft Expectations
I loved using Classcraft last year with my French students! The kids were participating not only because their participation grade was linked to it, but they also just liked the idea of it! What started off as a "we'll try it, but it might not work" idea became one of the staples of my French class last year! So, with my new understanding of the program, I plan to use it again this year at my new school! Last year I created a poster that had all of my students' names on it as well as all the ways they could earn XP. When a student earned XP in my class they went and put a tally mark in the correct column next to their name. After school I would add up their points and then add them to their profile online. The kids enjoyed putting tally marks on the poster, but eventually I fell behind on adding on the points because the task was a little cumbersome. So, this year I had 1,000 business cards printed from VistaPrint and each card is worth 50 XP. I will hand these out to students during class and then they will turn in their cards in a numbered shoe holder. I will add their points every other day (or so). These points will be what their participation grade will be linked to. All students will be required to earn the XP points, but if a student doesn't want to play the game, they don't have to. I created a Classcraft guide for students...but I just realized that it is still on my school laptop for my other job... Hopefully the tech guy will come through for me tomorrow and save it off my laptop before it is wiped... if not, I will be recreating it I guess!
So with the use of Classcraft, my euro system becomes almost unnecessary, but I love having a class store and I know that the students love it too. So, this year I will be using euros to pay students for doing a job well done on quizzes and tests, and for completing their classroom job satisfactorily. I am hoping that this means that the store is a more treasured and that euros will be also be more treasured as they will be hard to come by. Honestly, I thought of using the Gold pieces on Classcraft instead of euros, but I like that students must hold onto their euros and keep track of them. It instills a little responsibility!
Ok, so I know that a lot of teachers use classroom jobs in their classes. I have tried it for the last 2 years and I am horrible at keeping up with it! One major problem I had last year was that I asked students to apply for the jobs. This was a mistake... the same kids applied every time for the most part, AND I often forgot to remind students to apply for a job. So, this year I am going to just assign jobs and require that students do their assigned job. Rather than doing something voluntarily, I will expect all students to pitch in to help my classroom run a little easier. Here are the jobs I am thinking of using:
1 - Classcraft XP Treasurer: I will have 2 of these and they will be responsible for counting the XP cards in each pocket of the shoe holder. I know this is a risky move, but my plan is to have them record the number of cards and then leave the cards in the pockets. I will check random pockets to see if they are reporting correctly and if they are not, they will have a dire consequence!
2 - Class Secretary: This person will be responsible to track the absent students and to fill out the "While You Were Away" slip in my absent binder. See my Absent form that I use here.
3 - Class Filer: This person is responsible to get file all work for absent students into the absent binder.
4 - Class Photographer: This person is responsible for taking pictures of all ISN pages and of any fun activities that we do in class. They can either email the pictures to me or turn them in on our Google Classroom. I will have my personal camera available to students who don't have a device that can take pictures.
I loved my interactive notebooks that I created in my English classes last year. My French one didn't actually work out so well. Honestly I think it failed because I didn't have the same dedication to it as I did in my English classes. (That and there are way more examples of how to use an ISN with the English curriculum than there are in French!). So one of my major goals this year is to make the ISN work in French class! I hope to post examples of my ISN pages to this blog and reflect on its use in the WL classroom.
Things I want to include in my ISN:
- Student Proficiency Tracker
- Vocab pages
- Free writes
- Notes
- Stories
- Syllabus
- Bathroom pass
- Weekly Phrase to Know (bell ringer)
I'm not really sure yet how I want to grade these....
Okay, last year I had training on standards based grading and one thing that really stuck with me is the idea of late work. After thinking about it, I really think that a final grade should reflect the student's abilities in my class and not reflect their behavior. I know that is annoying to have to grade late work, but I after the training from last year and eading a few books, I don't think that students should be penalized for late work (as long as they turn it in). Now, of course you are going to say, well what about those kids who never turn in their work? This won't change them! I agree and I disagree, I think that the reason a student doesn't turn in work can vary immensely. Some students might not turn in a late assignment because some late work policies make it impossible to get a good grade on anything that is late, or a student might not turn in an assignment because their dog died the night before and they were too distraught to think about homework. In the end, I want to know what the student can do. So, this year, I will have students fill out a missing work log and turn this in at the time the assignment was due. This will be my signal that there is a missing assignment. The log will give students a chance to tell me why their assignment is late and what they need in order to get the assignment turned in. They will also be able to give themselves a new turn in date (reasonable of course). This paper will be kept by me and if I don't receive the assignment by the new return date then I will have to take matters into my own hands (after school detention, required study hall, etc). But what about those students who don't ever turn in work? Well, here is my solution to this, A student cannot take the final assessment for a unit until they have completed at least 80% of the class/home work. If a student has not done this, they will work on their missing assignments as the other students take the assessment, and then they will have to come in on an assigned day for a different version of the test. This second version will not be harder, but it will not be in as nice a format. For example, the first assessment may have given some suggestions or some sentences starters to help the students complete a written piece, or it gave options on how to present information. The second version of the test will not have this. The test will be on the same materials, but it will not be formatted as nicely for the student who has to take the test late. This will hopefully encourage students to take the test at the same time as the rest of the class! I made this form as well.. unfortunately I believe it is also on my old school laptop. I am really hoping the IT guy can help me out!! If he can, I will post it when I have it (either I remake it or I get it back!)
3. Purpose of My Euro System:
So with the use of Classcraft, my euro system becomes almost unnecessary, but I love having a class store and I know that the students love it too. So, this year I will be using euros to pay students for doing a job well done on quizzes and tests, and for completing their classroom job satisfactorily. I am hoping that this means that the store is a more treasured and that euros will be also be more treasured as they will be hard to come by. Honestly, I thought of using the Gold pieces on Classcraft instead of euros, but I like that students must hold onto their euros and keep track of them. It instills a little responsibility!
4. Classroom Jobs
Ok, so I know that a lot of teachers use classroom jobs in their classes. I have tried it for the last 2 years and I am horrible at keeping up with it! One major problem I had last year was that I asked students to apply for the jobs. This was a mistake... the same kids applied every time for the most part, AND I often forgot to remind students to apply for a job. So, this year I am going to just assign jobs and require that students do their assigned job. Rather than doing something voluntarily, I will expect all students to pitch in to help my classroom run a little easier. Here are the jobs I am thinking of using:
1 - Classcraft XP Treasurer: I will have 2 of these and they will be responsible for counting the XP cards in each pocket of the shoe holder. I know this is a risky move, but my plan is to have them record the number of cards and then leave the cards in the pockets. I will check random pockets to see if they are reporting correctly and if they are not, they will have a dire consequence!
2 - Class Secretary: This person will be responsible to track the absent students and to fill out the "While You Were Away" slip in my absent binder. See my Absent form that I use here.
3 - Class Filer: This person is responsible to get file all work for absent students into the absent binder.
4 - Class Photographer: This person is responsible for taking pictures of all ISN pages and of any fun activities that we do in class. They can either email the pictures to me or turn them in on our Google Classroom. I will have my personal camera available to students who don't have a device that can take pictures.
5. Interactive Notebooks
I loved my interactive notebooks that I created in my English classes last year. My French one didn't actually work out so well. Honestly I think it failed because I didn't have the same dedication to it as I did in my English classes. (That and there are way more examples of how to use an ISN with the English curriculum than there are in French!). So one of my major goals this year is to make the ISN work in French class! I hope to post examples of my ISN pages to this blog and reflect on its use in the WL classroom.
Things I want to include in my ISN:
- Student Proficiency Tracker
- Vocab pages
- Free writes
- Notes
- Stories
- Syllabus
- Bathroom pass
- Weekly Phrase to Know (bell ringer)
I'm not really sure yet how I want to grade these....
6. Late Work Policy
Okay, last year I had training on standards based grading and one thing that really stuck with me is the idea of late work. After thinking about it, I really think that a final grade should reflect the student's abilities in my class and not reflect their behavior. I know that is annoying to have to grade late work, but I after the training from last year and eading a few books, I don't think that students should be penalized for late work (as long as they turn it in). Now, of course you are going to say, well what about those kids who never turn in their work? This won't change them! I agree and I disagree, I think that the reason a student doesn't turn in work can vary immensely. Some students might not turn in a late assignment because some late work policies make it impossible to get a good grade on anything that is late, or a student might not turn in an assignment because their dog died the night before and they were too distraught to think about homework. In the end, I want to know what the student can do. So, this year, I will have students fill out a missing work log and turn this in at the time the assignment was due. This will be my signal that there is a missing assignment. The log will give students a chance to tell me why their assignment is late and what they need in order to get the assignment turned in. They will also be able to give themselves a new turn in date (reasonable of course). This paper will be kept by me and if I don't receive the assignment by the new return date then I will have to take matters into my own hands (after school detention, required study hall, etc). But what about those students who don't ever turn in work? Well, here is my solution to this, A student cannot take the final assessment for a unit until they have completed at least 80% of the class/home work. If a student has not done this, they will work on their missing assignments as the other students take the assessment, and then they will have to come in on an assigned day for a different version of the test. This second version will not be harder, but it will not be in as nice a format. For example, the first assessment may have given some suggestions or some sentences starters to help the students complete a written piece, or it gave options on how to present information. The second version of the test will not have this. The test will be on the same materials, but it will not be formatted as nicely for the student who has to take the test late. This will hopefully encourage students to take the test at the same time as the rest of the class! I made this form as well.. unfortunately I believe it is also on my old school laptop. I am really hoping the IT guy can help me out!! If he can, I will post it when I have it (either I remake it or I get it back!)
