Caldwell - 3rd Team Visit

Our 3rd KTOY visit was to the tiny 1A district of Caldwell. We started our day at the district office where we were treated to pastries and a greeting by district administration. We then started our tour by watching the Monday morning weekly mindfulness routine at the elementary. Students danced, did yoga, and celebrated birthdays. We then visited Bluejay Outlet, a student run printing class. They printed our KTOY t-shirts and showed us several skills they had acquired.

We ate an amazing lunch at a home that was once a bed & breakfast. While we were eating we were joined by some "Ladies of the Night" actors. We visited the Caldwell Visitor's Center which has been restored with the help of high school students. We went to the Opera House where we were treated to "Talking Tombstones", a skit performed recreating the lives of past citizens. The Opera House has these amazing chandeliers that were purchased from the state Topeka Capitol Building, and donated to the Opera House. Visiting a restored brothel and gentleman's parlor completed our historical tour.

Back at the school we visited a classroom that uses Classcraft as a classroom engagement/management system. The Emerging Technologies class was incredible as students proudly showed off their 3D printed busts created from their 3D scanner and a video they created with their drone.

Since it was Kansas Day we were treated with an adorable 1st Grade performance, a visit to the shop where we were gifted student created wooden pens, and a stop at the Caldwell alumni room, which was filled with a century of memorabilia. It was another incredible visit!

Haysville - 2nd Team Visit

Another INCREDIBLE day with another district visit with my Kansas Teacher of the Year team! We started out with breakfast & met the district superintendent. Jumped on the bus & went to one of the most artsy, reader-friendly schools I've ever seen! Art and books everywhere, even in the cafeteria!

 Then to a middle school with a HUGE art room and a state-of-the-art recording studio they call "Gorilla TV". Holy cow!

Then to a high school where students run not only their own coffee shop, but a bank. 

Then it was off to a super colorful grade school filled with color & shape. Notice that the hallway photos show a color & shape, which is repeated all the way down the hall, right down to the lights! 

Here's my notes from the day. I don't have a team picture yet for the day, but I'll post one as soon as I get it. If you have any specific questions on what was going on in my notes just ask for details!

Service Center (Superintendent Dr. John Burke)

• Welcome, breakfast, gifts
• “Good is the Enemy of Great” – Superintendent’s quote

Freeman Elementary School (Principal Dr. Donna Ferguson)

• Punk Your Parent – call parent from principal’s office (positive rewards)
• Library (Shelly Davis) – WOW. Just WOW. Gorgeous, overwhelming. Makerspace
• Music – drums (super cool!)
• Books all around school with seating areas - very inviting with paper machete trees, couches
• Computer Lab (Natalie Johnson)

o   all wall papers are color coded & numbered based on computer

o   Code.org, Lightbot, tinker software

• 5th Grade Reading centers (Nicole Harkins)

o   each group doing something different

o   game on following directions, listening

Tri-City (Principal Gina Keirns) & Haysville HS (Principal Mark Foster)

• Student ambassadors met us at door & gave us tour
• Teachers give out tickets that can be redeemed for prizes
• Putting in a disc golf course
• Zero hour classes
• Gym - letter stickers scattered around gym - students run & tap out their name or spelling words8/

Haysville West Middle School (Principal Ildo Martins)

• Spirit wear available for purchase in office
• Capturing Kids Hearts – reinterated again on how awesome a program it is
• New staff paid for mentoring days – 8 days prior to school starting
• Science Room (Shawna Tinich)– Interactive notebooks & foldables
• Walk the Walls to know what’s going on in a classroom
• Tiered Instruction for classes – change accommodations when kids need it, not just at 9 weeks

Campus High (Principal Myron Regier)

• Lunch provided by Mrs. Tamson’s class
• Coffee Shop & Bank tour (Mr. Kliewer & Mrs. Holmes)

o   Completely student run

o   Students have to interview to help run these businesses

o   Coffee shop $50,000 loan from board, paying it back in 6 years

o   Profits – scholarships $2500 & $1000, Winter Wishes (buy stuff for kids/families in need), Charities, helping school clubs

• Sports Medicine (Mr.Munk) – learning CPR, athletic trainer
• AVID (Mr. Lolling)) – designed for students in the middle

Ruth Clark Elementary (Principal Carla Wulf)

• Bulletin Board – Goals for School Year, Focus on the Positive
• Teamwork Works – students can run laps. Top 5 times in each grade posted. T-shirts2earned for running X # of miles1
• Blue Ribbon School

o   Blue Day Celebration – blue t-shirts (school shirts), blue spaghetti, get in blue ribbon shape outside & photograph with drone

• Focus on the Positive – students nominated & get to write their name on the board (positive reinforcement)

Remington - 1st School Visit

My first school visit was amazing! It was also in the district where my own children attended, so there was a bit of nostalgia going on. We started out with coffee, pastries, & gifts, followed by a greeting from the Superintendent who gave us a brief history of the district.

This is my group. These are eleven amazing teachers who were chosen by their districts to represent them as KS Teacher of the Year. We were missing 3 of our group, but hopefully they can join us next week in Haysville! 

Our first stop was the high school. This made me drool in envy! I would so love to have a screen printing machine so we could print shirts for my district at a reasonable cost. I'm going to approach my superintendent about this as soon as I get the chance. Other stops were to see the art room, the shop and the live streaming video class. I was amazed at what I saw!

Miss Kansas showed up to speak to the students as we were leaving, so we took advantage of another photo op!

We then had lunch, prepared by some Mennonite women who served us baked potatoes, salad, and the best brownies I've ever eaten! Then it was off to visit the middle school. We saw robotics, played a scenario explaining what life as an OCD person was like (incredible and eye opening!), talked about a work ethic rubric that helps students with soft skills. We visited a 6th grade class that was fully flexible seating. That was a first for me - I've seen variations, but this was truly an inviting atmosphere.

Our last stop was the grade school. We saw Pre-K & K creating elf traps (cuteness overload!), 4th graders creating habitats for an imaginary new creature discovered nearby, and a music teacher who taught subject integration. All I can say about her is WOW! I would love working with her! 

Having the opportunity to visit other schools and see how other teachers approach instruction is the perfect professional development. I'm excited to share what I learned with my district.

Notes from the day:

District Office

• Welcome, history of district, gifts
• Lunch made by Mennonite ladies (potato bar, salad, brownies)

High School

• HS Art Class - amazing murals on walls
• Lyn Lawlor’s Graphic Design Class - screen printing signs & banners, t-shirts
• Runs as a marketing class
• Creates shirts for cost plus $1
• Matt Regier - Science
• Mousetrap cars w/CDs, moustraps, & popsicle sticks
• Tod Johnson - shop
• Creating custom knives with custom handles
• Tim Hesseltine (absent)
• Live Stream home games
• iPad for close ups on floor - wireless stream to computer
• Utilize drone & GoPro
• Man Cave Talks - Teacher Interviews
• Class for Juniors & Seniors only
• Advisory Period - Yoga, Mindfulness, Team Building, Community Service
• Each group does one per week, rotating activities
• Ramp Up to Readiness - $1500 startup, no additional fees
• Mindfulness - Ted Talks - pay attention to breathing, what you see, living in the moment
• No cell phones, no outside devices (1-1 Chromebooks). Use dish racks to store - students don’t take home
• $4.50 per device for Haperra - can see each device in room, can send messages to students
• Photo Op with Miss Kansas

Middle School

• Language Arts - OCD Activity (see picture) - write phrase with multiple directions
• Social Studies - students grade themselves daily on work ethic, discuss monthly student progress. Teachers fill out rubrics on each student as well.
• Place-Based Education - discoveringfarmland.com - Netflix video - entire curriculum included
• PLTW - Inventor Software
• 3D printer - cube/pegboard toy
• Robotics - each individual group contributes to a larger working project

Elementary School

• Marketday - all classes make something to sell. Money earned funds extra items for classroom. Plants, necklaces, ???
• Pre-K & K - Elf Traps
• 4th grade - imaginary animal made of 3-4 different animals. Create habitat for new animal
• Music - songs to learn math facts, science facts - subject integration
• Music K8 magazine - $100 year subscription, share w/all teachers
• Free music on website
• 6h Grade entirely flexible seating

My "Learning to Sew" Journey

 As an avid learner I am constantly striving to learn new things. My latest journey has been in creating matching "Mommy & Me" dresses for this cutie & her dolls. She loves dressing up and is small enough (and cute enough!) that my sewing mistakes aren't as obvious. I love living in the age of YouTube tutorials that will walk you through all those crazy complicated steps in the instruction books. 

                                                                     

                        

My 2018 KTOY Journey as a non-winner Leadership Training Conference & New KTOY Announced

Mid-November the KTOY (Kansas Teacher of the Year) leadership training conference was held. All state nominees and regional winners (high school and elementary) met for 1 1/2 days of intense training. The one thing I realized is that while I do have this overall idea of why I teach, I haven't really narrowed it down to the WHY. I have been reflecting on that concept for a few days now and realize that my WHY is going to change often. It has changed since I wrote and re-wrote all those papers last winter. This is a powerful idea. I don't want to be that teacher who teaches the same thing every year for 20 years, I want each year to be fresh and new, with new challenges for my students. This is such a basic concept, but to actually come to terms with it was shocking! As you're reading this, I challenge you to think about your own WHY!

Then we got introduced to our teams. Holy cow but I'm excited!!! Our teams get to spend several days visiting each other's schools. There can't be any better professional development than that! My team is incredible - a wide range of ages but all have something amazing to share. This is going to be the most exciting year in my career (and I've been teaching for 24 years now!) I'm going to update this blog after each visit, with LOTS of pictures to share!

My KTOY Team - soon to be close friends!

Saturday night we were treated to a London Broil dinner, paraded across the stage again, got to see this year's "Teachers of Promise" (2 nominees from each college in Kansas - pretty cool!), and listen to the speeches from the 8 Regional Winners. Listening to them made me realize they had done one thing I had not - reflected long before that paperwork was started. I plan on revisiting my WHY on a regular basis from now on! Last year's KTOY gave a goodbye speech and sang to his team - very touching! Not hard to see why he won last year! Then the 2018 KTOY was named - Samantha Neill! What a wonderful choice! When she was giving her speech I guarantee there wasn't a dry eye in the house. I'm so happy for her! I will update my blog again in January when the visits start!

Crazy story - when I got home from the conference I discovered I had lost my 30th wedding anniversary ring. I was devastated! I called the conference center & the guy was super nice on the phone. He took down my number & called me back after about 45 minutes. He told me that he & his staff had torn apart the room we were in but hadn't found my ring. I figured it was gone for good & was trying to accept my loss. Then, about 2 hours later the guy from the conference center called back - someone had found my ring in the parking lot & turned it in! The world is full of awesome people! <3

My Journey as a Non-Winner for the KS Teacher of the Year - the Regional Winner Banquet

This sounds depressing. No, I didn't win. But you know what? My district nominated my to represent them, and that alone is pretty darn cool! It all started last winter when I was nominated. I had to fill out paperwork. A LOT of paperwork. I wrote, edited, deleted, wrote, edited, deleted. I don't know how many times I restarted that darn paperwork! But in doing so I did a lot of soul searching and reflecting. I looked at my students working on their art, and I wondered just what makes me a good teacher? What makes me worthy of standing in front of anyone and telling them why I deserved the title.

September was the awards ceremony. My husband, superintendent & HS principal all came to watch me not win. At first I was really bummed, but then the speaker started talking and boy did he make sense! He said "you may not think you're the best teacher in your district. Heck, you may not even think you're the best teacher in your hallway! But you were nominated. You DO deserve to be here." I let that sink in. I know I'm good for kids. I cry with them, I laugh with them. I watch them grow up & leave the nest. I love them all, even the ones who are a bit hard to love some days. And, because I'm a competitor at heart, I started replaying everything over in my mind, kind of like an athlete reflects after losing the big game. Not because I lost, but because I AM a good teacher, and a good teacher reflects on what goes right, and what went wrong.

So now that I've rambled on, I'm going to let you in on the workings of all this, cause it is pretty darn cool. Kansas sure knows how to promote it's teachers!

KS Commissioner of Education Randy Watson, Me, Deputy Commissioner Dale Dennis

All the KS High School Nominees from Region 4 with our State Educational Leaders/Super Supporters!

Me receiving my certificate while I stood with KS Commissioner of Education
Myself, Deputy Commissioner Dale Dennis, and (I'll have to go find out who the last man was - everything was a blur!)