Tables vs Desks

I'm not one to start talking big about the whole layout of a classroom, but at the semester break my principal followed through on his promise to exchange some of my traditional desks for tables.  It was enough to replace about half of my desks.  It's a nice start, and a way to get my feet wet, so to speak.  I have had my kids set up in horizontal rows, instead of vertical rows, all year. They've been seated with 4 desks to a row. So what I did was remove the two desks in the middle and replace it with a rectangular table. Then I book-ended each table with a traditional desk.  This still left groups of 4, and still basically in their horizontal rows, but now with a bit more space for group work and those chrome books.

Day 1:

We walked into the room, and there were all of my wonderful tables! The kids were excited. Then they turned to me and asked me where they were supposed to sit..... While the request was quickly filled for the tables, nobody thought to request chairs with them!!!!! Lesson learned! So, our custodian thought quickly and brought us a set of lovely and oh so uncomfortable brown folding chairs that we set out for plays and graduation and things.  Throughout the day he was able to exchange about half of them for the regular blue student chairs, and I was promised an order would be placed.....

Months later: 

Still half brown and half blue.... It's an exercise in who can get to the room first! The first to the room grab the blue chairs and trade out the brown, the last in pout about the uncomfortable brown chairs.  Some still like the desks, so I'm glad that I didn't trade it all out. It seems to work out nicely.  The ones that like the desks, have one. The ones that prefer the table, have one of those, too.  I've been considering purchasing some alternative seating options, like balance balls, but maybe over the summer for next year.

Update:

Across the legs of the tables, I strung an extra large rubber band.  The kids love it!  It's not strong enough to completely support the weight of their legs, but it is enough that they can rest their feet on it, or play with their legs swinging on it when they are restless.  I've been trying to see if it is reducing the number of disruptions with my active freshman boy class.  It's reduced, but I'm not ready to put it all on seating just yet....

Side Note:

We started the year with the colored light covers.  I admit I was skeptical at first, but I really like them.  I bought one package of off-white and one of blue (for tranquility).  First, I experience headaches, and have had noticeably less of them this year.  My eyes do not tire out like they normally do, so big plus on that.  As far as the tranquility part, jury is still out, but I think I'll keep them!

Chromebooks in the Classroom

Ok, so what's the big deal about a blog.  Right now it seems to be like a good way for me to keep track of what I do and share it with my colleagues. Hopefully, it will have the added benefit of allowing me to look back and check what I did because my crazy memory I only remember bits and pieces. I have the files on my school drive, but I never seem to remember about it until later.  So... here goes.

Chrome books in the classroom!

I now am the proud owner of a class set of chrome books!  What to do with them..... it's been a crazy year finding out, and I wish I would have created this blog at the BEGINNING of the year so that I had that record I referred to. But I'm going to start now with reviewing what I remember as my most popular of last year, and start prepping for next year. We started off the year by trying out new programs and web sites every week, but we seem to have gotten stuck in a rut toward the end of the year.... I'm just going to call them our favorites!

Websites we liked best:

Kahoot!
Kahoot was a great review website that the kids loved.  I could search out pre-made ones or make my own.  The kids loved racing against each other to have a higher score.
Pros: Kids got competitive and really tried hard to answer.
Cons: All multiple choice so sometimes it was easier to guess based on choices than try.

IXL.com
Great for practicing.  Modified so if they get it wrong it shows them good steps on how to properly do it, then asks them a similar problem and if they get it right it tweaks it just a bit and asks another problem gradually getting harder.  Includes a "smart score" like a percent if you were to take a test right now.
Pros: Gets the kids used to doing math on the computer. Individualizes the assignment: allows me to see who needs additional help while challenging those who understand. Students can compete with each other with their smart score. If have a subscription can get a report.
Cons: Need a subscription to do more than 20 problems or save their progress. Once they've reached a smart score of 100, they can never do those problems again, even for review.

Powtoons
Allows students (or teacher!) to create short, animated videos.  I used these for student review projects.
Pros: More fun than a powerpoint. Allows the students to just push play when presentation time, and have all prep work done.
Cons: A lot of subscription only areas.

ThingLink
Interactive poster.  The students upload a picture, then add dots to the picture.  Each dot is then a link, video, or picture that you can click on and see.  I used as a student review project.
Pros: More fun than a powerpoint.  Allows students to interact with the poster when presenting.
Cons: Can simply link the internet and not do a lot of actual work if you don't be specific about requirements.

Socrative
Kind of like Kahoot in that it is questions to be answered, only you have options of multiple choice, free response, or true/false.  Students then answer on their own device and the "race" is against correct responses not against time answered.
Pros: Variety of response styles. Students can take their time. Students still have the competition against each other. Not difficult to create your own.
Cons: Not a big data base of shared tests, need to make most of your own. Can't have more than 20 students, or it will put some of them together as a team.