Tammy Andrew's Blog

Posted by Tammy Andrew

I love music, and seem to come up with a song for most occasions. It is almost like living in a musical!

One that comes to me the first snowfall each year is Suzy Snowflake. I can still visualize my mother's old 78 record that she would play during the holidays, and hear the voices sing out, "here comes Suzy Snowflake, " but otherwise haven't heard it anywhere else.

It is a fun song with simple lyrics and a catchy melody. The lyrics are:

Here comes Suzy Snowflake,

To tell you she's in town.

I haven't long to stay.

If you want to make a snowman,

Suzy's come to town.

To hear the original with Rosemary Clooney singing, visit Susie1114.

For some history and ideas for movements with the song, read Best Overlooked Holiday Song for Children.

Posted by Tammy Andrew

Children love to be recognized for who they are, and what better way than with a special award at the end of the school year. My own children proudly wave their awards each spring and we add them to the collection started in preschool: Teddy Bear Award and Drama Queen sit nicely next to the occasional ribbon and laminated star.

Add a small party or special activity, such as creating a memory book, and you have created a memorable afternoon for your students.

Posted by Tammy Andrew

A lesson that contains rigor is student centered and engaging. It challenges students to confront their feelings about topics and make connections to new ideas using what they already know. Students frequently work in groups and conduct research while pushing their understanding. It is more about a depth of knowledge than breadth of topics.

But our current testing requirements feature the opposite. Standardized tests emphasize a breadth of math and English topics and highlight the need to teach skills relevant to test taking. Many teachers, schools and districts find it frustrating to be required to "teach to the test" when students learn and enjoy learning when challenged by rigorous projects.

I would love to know about research being conducted into how well students do on standardized exams when more time is spent with rigorous lessons than with the rote learning so frequently seen as necessary. If you know of any, please drop me a comment!

Posted by Tammy Andrew

I love gardening and am thrilled when my children come home with a new seedling they started at school. There are so many ways that growing plants from seeds can provide hands-on educational fun. As I put together some curriculum ties in the article Choosing Plant Seeds for Botany Lessons I started thinking about how schools could turn this into a community project.

From those thoughts sprung the idea that schools could initiate victory gardens and the article School Victory Garden Plots was born. And why not - it is educational, productive and fun! It also fits very well in the current movement to minimize the distance our food travels from farm to table.

Posted by Tammy Andrew

I was amazed when I read the statistics about how many teachers leave teaching, and it isn't primarily due to retirement! I can understand leaving for personal reasons - life happens to everyone - but to leave because of lack of support and dissatisfaction for a career for which you had to have once had a passion towards shocked me.

Even when teaching children and teens, adults want to be in a professional environment. Administrators need to find ways to support their teachers, both new and established, so that they can succeed at their mission to teach. At the same time, teachers owe it to themselves and others to do what they can to prevent burnout, which can easily lead to a spiral of dissatisfaction.

When I find myself stressed about school I head right for a hot cup of herbal tea and a hot bath. Sometimes, it takes a rough and tumble tickle fight with my children to relieve the stress. Whether it is relaxation or physical activity and laughing that releases the pressure I know I will be better able to think my way through and find new ways to approach the problem once I have taken care of myself.

Posted by Tammy Andrew

I am diverting from my traditional education topics and diving into a fun way to relax, bread shaping. Not just baking bread, but kneading the dough and creating bakery-inspired shapes. It is an emotionally fulfilling hobby since I can take out frustration on the dough while kneading it and, when my tension has lifted, have a chance to be creative and contemplative. What's even better are the sounds of joy from my family as they slice into the fresh, warm breads that I create. It is better than any therapy session I have heard about! My current favorites are bakery bread shapes, dinner rolls and, my youngest's favorite, Teddy Bears!

Posted by Tammy Andrew

I enjoy using projects in my computer classes. Project based learning is easy to include in a class where there is a prerequisite skill set. Projects can also be used for reviewing material. This type of review typically encourages higher order thinking.

Projects are more than a creative diversion from teacher-centered learning, they can be useful ways to assist students with summarizing new material. I find they are not always simple to create, but project based reviews can be a way to include rigor by giving students a new way to apply or think about the subject matter recently covered in class. Students then make new connections in their mind and this helps them remember the information, too.

Posted by Tammy Andrew

Valentine's Day parties, and classroom holiday parties in general, tend to mean more to some students than just a day of sugar and fun. I know several children and families for whom this means challenges.

A few parents have serious objections to some of the characters depicted on the store bought cards due to the nature of the characters or the violence they portray. One even commented to me recently that it is easier to block channels on the TV or sites on the Internet than the card swap at school. One way around this is to return to making cards in the classroom.

Another challenge is for children with food allergies or other food related medical issues. Nut allergies are well known and many schools do not permit nuts in lunches or snacks. Other issues include young children with dental appliances who cannot have anything gooey and sticky and a few children who are highly sensitive to sugar. For these children it is important that the classroom teacher knows about their limitations and that the treats provided at a classroom party involves not only nutritious choices but a variety of options so that all children can participate and enjoy the day.

Posted by Tammy Andrew

I've recently been thinking about the benefits of online courses for students. It allows the flexibility of learning when they want to, the freedom to choose classes not typically offered in all schools and the responsibility to do it on their own. I've found two that I really like, though there may be more (please leave me a comment if you know of an excellent source for online classes for middle or high school students!). The National Success Academy, which I literally stumbled into while furthering my knowledge about at-risk, or shadow, children and Virtual High School, which has been around for a while and has a positive reputation.

Posted by Tammy Andrew

The past few workshops I've attended have emphasized the need for students to have better soft skills. Those skills, like team work and problem solving, that are difficult to give a grade to but employers say are more important than specific knowledge. Teachers already have students use these skills, but how do we highlight the importance these skills carry in the workplace?

This is a great use for analytical rubrics. Those are the rubrics that do not easily provide a grade but allow for students to see how well they do compared to what they should be able to do. Even a little exposure to the fact that these skills do matter helps students to acknowledge that they exist.

Posted by Tammy Andrew

When I first took education courses, back in 1996, I was fascinated by rubrics. They made so much sense to use, but a challenge to create. I played around with them once I began my first teaching position and soon found several other teachers in the building who also wanted to use them but were struggling with how.

The more we played around with rubrics the better we became at creating and use them. Around 1999 or 2000 I learned that there were actually two types of rubrics, analytical and holistic, each with a different focus. What I was using were holistic rubrics which are easy to create and conveniently produce a traditional grade. Analytical rubrics are wonderful for skills assessment, which is now a state requirement for my technology courses, but are not typically designed to produce a meaningful percentage or letter grade.

My school district is now using analytical rubrics for school wide expectations for learning. Problem is that reporting the quality of a student's performance in a class is not easily handled by our grading software. I'd love to know if other districts are encountering this and how they are trying to solve the problem.