Monthly Archives: February 2014

Are you down with OBPP?

Ok, so I have to admit making a really old reference to a less-than-great song from the early 90s with that title, but hey, it sounded good. 🙂

What is OBPP, you probably wondering?  OBPP stands for the Olweus (ohl-vay-us) Bully Prevention Program that we have recently started at our school.  It’s not new–just new to us–and is actually been around for years and based on some great research.

We began our Olweus journey with a very important definition.  Regardless of what we (or our students) thought bullying was, this is now our school-wide, shared definition:

Screen Shot 2014-02-09 at 2.40.42 PMWe started talking about this definition last fall, after we discussed what we thought it meant.  What we found out was that we were not all on the same page.  How important that we’re all now speaking the same language!

The second part of starting Olweus with our kiddos came by way of learning some new bullying rules.  They are related to the Robinson Road Rules that we already have in place, but are specific to what every kiddo (and adult!) should do if we see bullying happening:

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After we’d been working with these two important documents for a little while, and after the staff/teachers had done some learning together about OBPP, we were ready to officially kick this off with our kiddos.  This happened on a really spectacular half-day in January.

Check it out!

We started the day off together as a whole school in an assembly. The energy in the gym was so great--wish we could do this every Friday!

We started the day off together as a whole school in an assembly. The energy in the gym was so great–wish we could do this every Friday!

5th Grade sang “Everyday Heroes”

Following our assembly, 3-5 grades rotated through some activities designed to get us motivated and excited about the work ahead.

First, we had a class meeting around our new bullying rules, and our thoughts about them.

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During our 2nd rotation, we got to go to the gym to work with Mr. Lee on some tae kwon do.  He’s been to our school before, and always has a great presentation for us.

Here we’re learning about how bullies are more likely to target people who seem like they don’t have confidence….

 

Among some other things, we also did some exercises.  In this video, Landry did an AMAZING job of leading us.  He is BEAST!

 

For our last rotation, we participated in something that teachers around Robinson do all the time–look at data.  As part of the Olweus work from last year, every kiddo in grades 3-5 took a bullying survey and we were looking at the results.  There were graphs up all around the cafe, and our job was to silently comment on what we thought about what we saw. (As a point of clarification–our answers are represented by the 4th grade data.)

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What an amazing day of inspiration and learning!  We are ready and motivated to make a difference in our school and our world!

EdcampSTL-take 3!

I went to my first EdcampSTL two years ago.  At that point I was a newbie on Twitter, and although I was excited about learning something new, I let my discomfort of going there by myself get in the way of having a great day.  I didn’t talk to anyone, didn’t make any connections, and can’t even remember walking away with anything.

Then there was last year.  EdcampSTL #2 was about 3000% better than the first go-round.  I know that some of it was because I went with friends–my best friend, my hubby, actually :)–and since I had been on Twitter a year longer, I had some familiar faces I’d “met” online to connect with, as well.  Plus, I guess like with most things, the second time you do something it’s always easier.  I met a great new friend, as well, and have been able to learn and share much with her since then, too.  Much better experience.

This year was the 3rd EdcampSTL, and it had the largest enrollment yet.  We were actually hoping for a record, but I think the weather kept some away from the fun. 😦 For those of us who were there, though, it was a great day!  I have to give a shoutout to by little bro, Chuck Baker, who is a fabulous teacher/father/tech guru/blogger, who came today for his first time!  He even got in on the fun and presented a session.  Gotta love the initiative there–I haven’t had the courage yet. 🙂  And then, yep, my more-than-fabulous hubby (who is also an amazing teacher, father and blogger in his own right!)  Grant was in on the fun again, too; I love that we can do this whole teaching thing (as well as our Masters’ program) together.   Adds a different level of help, support and even collaboration when he “gets” what I do.  LOVE YOU, honey!!

While I attended several great sessions this time around, I think I am most excited about the one where I learned more about Makerspaces.  I’ve been looking into Genius Hour for a little while now, and am also interested in problem/project based learning, and this was exciting to hear; two middle school science teachers shared real-life examples from their classrooms.  While it won’t look exactly the same in my situation, I’m interested in getting it all figured out.  I’m thinking about doing a really basic, Valentine’s version of a makerspace this week for Valentine’s boxes.  Not exactly how it’s supposed to work, but I think it could be a good way to introduce it.  Guess we’ll see!

I know to some it seems weird to go to school on a Saturday, to make a choice to get up early to learn on your day off.  Believe me, I wouldn’t do it for everything, but for EdcampSTL, it’s totally worth it!  Join me next year, will ya? 🙂

 

How Do You Feel Cared For?

This week we were revisting some EQs from earlier this year as a means of reflecting on our behavior, as well as how we’re doing as a community.  One that was really interesting was “How do you feel cared for?”  There were so many different answers, and I wanted to see them all together, so I made a Tagxedo of our responses.  Here’s how it turned out:

How_I_Feel_Cared_For

What do you notice?  Do you notice any patterns?  How would YOU answer this question? 🙂