Backe, backe Kuchen

I love baking, and I've blogged about baking with my students.

Last fall, I decided I was ready for a new adventure and started working as a pastry chef for a local Bloomington coffee shop.

Other than getting up early in the morning, it's completely different from teaching.  

I usually work with one other baker, and we prep doughs and bake from 6:30 AM - 2:00 PM.  My current favorite things to bake are brownies (the frosting is fantastic!), gingersnaps, and sugar cookies, but we also make scones, muffins, rice crispy bars, quick breads, and mini quiche.  It's a relaxed and friendly atmosphere, and so far I really enjoy it!

People have asked me if I miss teaching, and I do miss the teaching part.  But I no longer spend my days trying to keep teenagers off TikTok, and I can go to the bathroom whenever I need to.  Overall, it's just much less stressful.  

People also ask if I'll go back to teaching.  Maybe.  I've written that I believe public schools are a mirror: they reflect the state of our communities back to us.  Our country right now has a lot of division and anger.  That's how it feels in schools, too.  So, for the moment, I'll keep baking.  

 

Advice for Multilevel Classes

I was recently corresponding with a new German teacher in South Carolina (schöne Grüße, Frau Becker!), and she asked for advice about planning for a class with both German 2 and 3 students in it.  Multilevel classes are pretty common in upper level world languages, so I thought I'd put my reflections here in case they can help anyone else.

The combination of two levels is tough for teachers. Administrators don't seem to understand how much more work it is for the teacher and how the students are shortchanged. They just look at numbers. As I was told, just be grateful we're letting you do this level at all.  At my school it was a 3/4 split. (And one year I did a 4/5 split, though we only had German 5 that one year!)

When facing a multilevel class, first of all, be kind to yourself. This isn't easy and you won't be able to give the students the same learning experience as if they were separate classes. You are one person and can only do what you can do. 

The upper level students (I'll call them German 4 here for clarity since that was my experience) should be seniors and, at least theoretically, more mature, so focus on the German 3 students, and give the German 4 students more independent work. 

You may be able to have your German 4 students play the role of conversation partner or assistant teacher. Give them a note card with a speaking question that they ask of the German 3 students one on one or in small groups. 

This isn't what you'd do if you had separate sections, but it is using the language and does benefit them. If parents complain, explain that it isn't under your control and ask them to take their concerns to administration. Overall, focus your energy on German 3, where you likely have more students, and do what you can about German 4, but don't expect yourself to be two people.

Summer 2023 Update

 Here's what I've been up to lately:

• Two elbow surgeries, one case of COVID, and one sinus surgery in 2022.

• A trip to Germany in the summer of 2022 to visit our son at the end of his exchange year in Schwebheim, Bavaria.  This was our first major trip since 2019 - it was wonderful to travel again!

• A return to teaching during the 2022-23 school year as a part-time middle school math support teacher at St Charles Catholic School.  I worked every other day from 10:30-2:30, and the school is a 15 minute walk from our house.  It was a wonderful way to return to the classroom, and being there helped restore my love of teaching.

I still love (and miss!) German teaching and creating lessons for German, so I'll definitely keep my blog up for others to use.  I might even post lessons or ideas if I see something I just can't resist sharing.

A Success Story from 2022 - Yule Blog Challenge

I read about the MTBoS Yule Blog Challenge on a blog I follow and thought this might be a good way to return to blogging.  The challenge is to blog 12 times during your winter break, and there are prompts to get you started.  I'm starting with

A Success Story from 2022

My success story from 2022 is a pretty big one for me personally - I returned to teaching.  

I took the 2021-22 school year off and wasn't sure if I would return to teaching afterward.  When I started looking at options for this school year, I knew that I was only interested in a part time position.  Unfortunately, the district where I worked for the past 10 years would only let me return full time.  

Then, friends put me in touch with the principal of St. Charles Borromeo School, a K-8 Catholic School which is a 15 minute walk from my house.  (Our younger son went to preschool there.) They were looking for a Spanish teacher and knew I had taught German and had taken some Spanish.  Sadly, I don't know enough Spanish to teach it, but when I said I was also licensed in math and really enjoy supporting struggling students, the idea of my position as math support teacher started to take shape.

I help the middle school math teacher with a 6th grade math class and a 7th grade pre-algebra class.  The middle school is on a block schedule, so I work every other day from 10:30-2:30. I mostly work with students individually or in small groups, and I love it!  It's a wonderful way to return to the classroom and return to math teaching without being overwhelmed.  I'm so happy to be back!

Going Green

As of Monday, October 12, we're officially in Phase Green.  Thankfully, this was also the week of Fall Break, so we only had 3 days of school before a 4 day weekend.  

Case numbers and percent positivity remain low in Monroe County.  We're averaging 2 or 3 COVID cases in the high schools per week, but these seem to be acquired in the community and isolated quickly so that we haven't had noticeable in-school transmission.  

 

I had previously been nervous about having all of the in person students in the building at once, but so many students have switched to all online that the in person numbers are not too high.  My largest class has 17 in person students, which I can fit in my room while maintaining physical distancing.  My smallest class is 8 in person students.

Things don't look as good in the rest of Indiana or in much of the country, so I'm not sure how long we can maintain our Monroe County bubble.

Some positives about Phase Green:

• I now only have 2 groups of students to keep track of: in person and online, instead of 3 groups during Phase Yellow: in person A-K, in person L-Z, and online.  It's surprised me just how much easier this is!

• We've returned to our normal maroon/gold alternating block schedule.  During hybrid, we had a modified block schedule of maroon maroon gold gold alternating Fridays.  It took me about 5 years to get the hang of a regular block schedule, and this new twist nearly pushed me over the edge.  Students had two days of class in a row, followed by almost a week off, which is terrible for language learning.  Not to mention keeping track of who is where on which day.  I don't recommend it!

• It's more practical to teach a lesson in person now than it was on a hybrid schedule.  I've been using the flipped classroom model and pre-recording lesson videos, which works well for some students, but many don't have the self-discipline to watch the video carefully and take good notes.  On Wednesday I taught the lesson live for in person students.  That way I could make sure that they were following along and could check for understanding.  Most of them preferred this method, and it definitely gave me a better feel for their comprehension.

• This isn't specific to Phase Green, but I LOVE my contact-free bathroom signout!  It is even better than my bathroom pass flowchart.  I'm keeping this forever!

Overall, it's really a year of figuring things out as I go and doing what I can.  I'm super grateful to be half time because all of the changes/new procedures/worries are exhausting!  

A teacher in Mishawaka (northern Indiana) expressed it eloquently to her school board this week:

A Whole New World

 

We returned to in-person hybrid instruction this week after 4 weeks of all online learning to start the school year.

It was my first time teaching students in the school building since March 12, 2020.  It's definitely very different.

(sanitizing shoe mats)

After all of the planning, discussion, changing of plans, and worry, I have to say that the first week went pretty smoothly.

About 1/3 of our students have remained completely online, and the remaining students are split into two groups that alternate attendance days.  So, instead of 1600 students in the building every day, there are more like 600 on any given day.

This certainly made maintaining physical distance easier.  My classes have between 6 and 12 students in them, which allows everyone to be well spread out.  

We have block scheduling, so that plus the hybrid schedule meant that it took all 4 days of the week before I met all of my in person students.  It was like 4 first days of school!  Needless to say, everyone was exhausted by Friday.

But students have generally been cooperative about mask wearing and physical distancing in the classroom.  

It's difficult, though, to figure out how best to help a student from 6 feet away and how to continue to work with my online students when I have students in the classroom.  I'm using a flipped classroom model, which is not how I chose to teach BCE (before COVID era), but it seems to me the best option in the CE (COVID era).  Many things just aren't ideal right now.

The first few days just felt weird, but by Friday I did feel like I was starting to get a little more comfortable.  It's just a very different school world now, and I think it will be for some time to come.

Contact-free Bathroom Signout

 

People who have been reading my blog for a while know that mid-class requests to use the bathroom are the bane of my teaching existence.  

I thought I had solved that issue once and for all with my bathroom flowchart.  COVID-19 now laughs in the face of my naivety.

In preparation for a return to in person classes after Labor Day, I spent yesterday afternoon pondering a way to keep track of student bathroom use for contact tracing while not using a pass or a paper signout sheet.  

The solution: a Google Doc Contact Free bathroom signout.  

From the Course Resources page on Canvas, students click on the Restroom Signout button,

which takes them to a Google Doc which they can all write on.

Students will sign themselves in and out and will be able to check if they need to wait because a classmate is in the restroom without my involvement.  Hallelujah! 

Because 2020.

Need one for your German class?  Contact-free German Bathroom Signout Form

It's β is not ß season

I think you have to have a healthy level of year to year amnesia to be a teacher.  Otherwise, no one would do it more than one year.  Case in point:

β is not ß season

There's always a phase about a week or two into the school year where my German 1 students struggle with typing German special characters, most especially ß.  

I give them a menu of options to chose from:  

But an ess-tset does look a lot like a Greek beta, so more than a few students type that instead of ß, and their answer is marked wrong even though it looks right.

It's especially intense this year since I have 3 full classes of German 1, which makes about 90 students.  

It's also harder to get the word out during remote learning.  In a classroom, once I notice it happening, I make multiple loud announcements, and this catches about 95% of the students.  

There really isn't an equivalent to a loud classroom announcement in remote learning.  I've put an announcement on our LMS, and I'm going through assignments to try to catch the students making this mistake.  And of course I'm replying to emails and Canvas messages asking "Why is my answer wrong?"  It definitely felt like that was all I did on Friday.

Sigh.  This too shall pass.

I need bells!

Me and Pavlov's dogs, I guess!

I've learned during the first few days of online learning just how dependent I am on bells.

This is our schedule:

It pretty much mirrors our in person schedule, though live classes are now only an hour (instead of 80 minutes), and there's a live instructional support / independent work time block to start the day which we don't have in person.  

But because I'm not in the school building, there are of course no bells.  And apparently I really need bells to help me not lose track of what class period it is.  

So, this morning I got smart and set timers on my computer to ring to remind me when a period is almost over.  (I tried my cell phone alarm first, but it kept startling me.)

It's a really good reminder to get up from the computer, stretch, and maybe get a little fresh air.  If you're teaching remotely, I highly recommend it!

 

New Routines

 

My morning routine BCE was to  start the day with a Duolingo lesson (I've been doing the Arabic class for a little over a year now - slow progress, but fun!) and then checking email while eating breakfast and drinking a cup of tea.

My CE routine still starts with Duolingo, but now it includes a check of the Indiana Department of Health Dashboard before I go to email.  

Here's how things look today.

Statewide:

Monroe County:

I try not to obsess about the numbers but still stay informed about how things are going in my county and in the state.  (I wonder if statistics teachers are using COVID data with their students...)  I don't think this new routine is going away any time soon.

Help! My German textbook is in German!

 

Happy Friday, everyone!

Today was the second day of class for my first two groups of students.  (We're on block schedule.)  On today's agenda was setting up students' notebooks and signing up to access the online textbook.

I was expecting to get lots of messages saying that students were having trouble connecting or the access code didn't work.  Nope.  Not one of those.  

I did have 2 students try to join the wrong section, but 2 out of 63 is not bad.  (Not everyone has signed up yet, so there's still time...)

What I did start getting was some variation on the theme of "Help!  My German textbook is in German!"  

Well, yes it is.  This is pretty standard for textbooks from German publishers, as their books are designed to be used in many different countries, not all of which are English-speaking.  I'm not opposed to a textbook by an American or British publisher, but there just aren't many to choose from out there.  

I've blogged previously about our struggles to find a good textbook.  We adopted this book in the spring, and it's the third textbook I've used at Bloomington North.  I think it's the best one we've had yet, but of course it isn't perfect.

So, I prepared this to help my students

Welcome to German class!

Detective Work

 

  Detective work describes what I did today during my prep time.  

On the first day of online classes, nearly all of my students logged in, did at least some of the lesson, and/or contacted me in a live meeting.  I consider that a win!

But...not everyone completed the lesson, which involved submitting a short video saying "My name is _____." in German.

So, my first task was to sort through the missing videos to see whether those students had completed the first item on the agenda.  If not, had they managed to log in to the course at all?

For my first two classes, I had only 4 students who were completely MIA. I sent out emails to them and their families to check in and see if there were any problems with technology or access that I could help with.  I heard back from 2 right away, so now I'm just missing 2 students.  

Students who had logged in but not done their video got a message in our LMS checking to see whether they understood what they needed to do and if they needed help with the technology.  I heard back from several more students after that, so I think my students are off to a good start!

Morning Commute

 Breakfast at my Kitchen Table

School office at my Kitchen Table

Bloomington is not a huge place.  My drive to school BCE (Before COVID Era) took only about 15-20 minutes.  

Now CE (COVID Era) my commute is 30 seconds.  I love it!

Since my district switched to all remote learning to begin the year, teachers were told that they could work from school or home.  I really appreciate the flexibility that they have given us.  It's nice to be able to go in to the building to get materials I need, which we couldn't do in the spring due to the Stay at Home Order.  For the most part, though, it's been more convenient to work from home, and I'm enjoying the short commute.

One risk of working from home is that you never physically leave work to go home, so you never stop working.  I've been intentional the first few teacher prep days in switching out my tulip quilt for my German flag quilt in the morning at 7:30 when I "go to work."  Then, when I'm done for the day, I turn off my laptop (instead of just putting it in sleep) and switch the quilts back.  It feels a little silly, and I don't know that I'll always do this, but so far it's helping me remember that it's healthy to be done for the day and to focus on non-school things.

First Teacher Day

Today was originally supposed to be students' first day of school, but that was pushed back a week, and it's now it's the first of 5 teacher professional development and work days.

Successes:

• I recorded a very short video clip introducing myself for an introductory video that my school is putting together for students.  

• I participated in our school faculty meeting on Microsoft Teams and was then able to organize a separate meeting on the fly with two colleagues on Teams.

Not yet:

• After multiple tries, I cannot get my microphone to work within Microsoft Teams when trying to record a lesson and share my screen.  Grrrrrr!  Super frustrating.  It works fine when I am meeting with people and share my screen, but once I start recording, my microphone cuts out.  I may give up on Teams for recording a lesson and try Zoom.

Dusting off the Blog

I haven't blogged since the end of last school year, and I didn't really have any plans to get back in the habit, but this morning I saw this:

And I thought, maybe it is time.  No promises that I'll blog every day or that every post will be great, but as I often tell my students, something is infinitely more than nothing.  So here goes...

If an image is worth a thousand words, here's mine for my teaching life at the moment:

That's what I'm working on, anyway - accepting and living with the uncertainty of the current moment.

My school district switched last week from an in person start to the school year (with an online option) to all online learning until at least early September, due to increasing virus rates in our community.  

Since the end of last school year, I had anticipated that when we did return to in person school, there would be some students who would still need remote instruction, and I would need to be able to provide both types of instruction at more or less the same time.  So, I've been planning during the summer with that in mind, which makes the switch to everyone online less hectic. 

During the summer, I was part of a group of teachers from my school who worked (remotely, of course!) on creating a common home page for our Learning Management System, Canvas.  The goal was to reduce confusion for students and caregivers when navigating online learning.  

I had fun learning how to make buttons and customized banners, and I got more experience with Google Drawings.  I also learned just enough html to be dangerous!

Here's what my homepage now looks like:

I'm pleased with the result, and designing it helped me think through how to structure online instruction.  

This is the first 3 day week of school:

It's not the same as in person, but I think it's the best we can do under the current circumstances, and with patience and flexibility, we can make it work.

Reflections on Remote Learning

It's been 5 weeks of Remote Learning, and we have 2 more to go.  

Often on the last day of class, I ask students to reflect back on the year and provide feedback after they've completed their semester exam.  I plan to do that this year, too, though we aren't giving exams.  In addition to the questions I usually ask, I'm going to ask students what they found most difficult about remote learning, and what things they wish they could keep when we return to some form of in person school.

Thinking about this got me reflecting about some of the positives of this new learning environment.  

My school district has adopted a Monday-Thursday schedule and has encouraged teachers to focus on asynchronous learning because students' home situations vary, and they might not all be able to attend a live video lesson on Tuesday morning at 9:25.  Teachers have "office hours" from 9-11 AM and 1-2 PM when they are available online to answer questions via email, Canvas message, or Google Meet.  

I've found this schedule to be calmer than my in person school routine (and I only work half time!), perhaps because I'm introverted.  Here are some of the positives for me:

• I don't have to get up at 5:30 anymore.  I can sleep until 6:30 or 7 and even go for a run before school.
• I can use the bathroom when I need to.  
• Teaching multiple sections of the same prep is much less tiring - I'm recording a lesson only once, rather than teaching it two or three times.
• Patrolling for cell phone use, which was a huge (and tiring!) part of daily classroom management, is no longer part of my job.
• A 2 hour lunch break lets me eat at a relaxed pace and even go for a walk after lunch.

I miss working with students in person, but I think this schedule is better for my overall health - if you leave out the stress of a global pandemic, of course!

I read an article yesterday about How to Reopen Schools Amid Coronavirus. Among the things mentioned were smaller class sizes.  Classes with only 12 to 15 students would be amazing!  

Schoolchildren have lunch at the Korshoejskolen Public school in Randers, Denmark. Denmark began reopening schools on April 15.
Bo Amstrup/Ritzau Scanpix/AFP via Getty Images
https://media.npr.org/assets/img/2020/04/23/gettyimages-1210034619_slide-adff93055917aebc5ed6b88550f6327099963c34-s800-c85.jpg

It would be great if we used this crisis as an opportunity to think about what works and what doesn't in our public schools and to make some changes.  It could be done - we just have to decide how important educating our children really is to us.

Oktoberfest 2019

After last year's exhausting Oktoberfest, I wasn't sure I'd want to attempt another one, but with my new half-time schedule and wisdom gained from last year's failures, I thought I might just give it one more try.

This year, my colleague and I were able to schedule things so that we could both be at the Oktoberfest, and two teachers are definitely better than one!

We started planning earlier and more students volunteered to bring in food.  My colleague also emphasized to the students that they should only take a small serving until everyone had been served, and there was enough for everyone.

This year I pre-made dough for Lebkuchenherzen, which we rolled, cut out, and baked during the Fest.  

Our Success period (intervention/enrichment time) is only 40 minutes long, so not all of the students' cookies were baked and cooled by the end of the period, but I was able to stay and finish up and students picked up their cookies later on the way to lunch.  They were delicious!

Most students had time to do their own dishes, though there was still quite a lot of cleanup to do afterwards.  My colleague had a class right afterwards, but I was done for the day and could enjoy some peace and quiet and dish washing.

Overall, it was a big improvement over last year and a good experience for students.  It's still super tiring for teachers, and the 40 minute Success period really isn't long enough for what we wanted to do.  Maybe we'll need to scale it back for next year and/or use some class time for part of it, but I'm glad we tried again.

Room Updates

Here's a quick look at some of the updates I've made in my room this year!

I've already blogged about my new seating arrangement (which I so far really like!): https://frauswank.blogspot.com/2019/08/a-new-look-for-new-year.html 

Here are some updates to my back board / agenda area to meet (I hope!) new expectations of our administration:

Less is the New More

My yoga teacher said "Less is the new More" to us once, quite some time ago, and it has stuck with me ever since:  More is not necessarily better.

I've known for quite a while that for me, more is not always better.  

• It's why I decided to stay home full time when our children were born.
• It's why I eventually returned to work in a half time aide position.
• And it's why I returned to certified teaching in a part time position when a full time German position was also available.

Since I started teaching two classes of German at Bloomington High School North in 2013, my school's German program has grown, and with it, so has my teaching load.  From 1/3 time to 2/3 time to 5/6 time, and finally, the past two years, to full time.  

I'm proud and pleased that our German program has grown, but the increase in my teaching load has been faster than I had expected, planned, or wanted.  From the outside, it probably looks like a perfect progression, but from the inside, it's been too much.

During the six years that I've been there, my school has had four different prinicpals, and one position in my department has been held by six different people.  There's a lot of tension and turnover in public schools currently, and my school is not immune.

For the past three years, I've requested to return to half time teaching.  Last year I tried to move to a middle school math position which was half time.  Nothing worked out, so I tried to keep going.

I blogged very little this spring because I just didn't have energy or words anymore. 

I thought about taking a year off, returning to an aide position, or leaving the profession entirely.

Finally though, this year, things have worked out so that I can continue teaching German at my current school but half time.

I am so, so thankful.  

I can feel my energy, joy, and love of teaching begin to return.  

I spent a week in Germany with my closest friend and got to attend the Deutscher Evangelischer Kirchentag in Dortmund with her.  It was the best professional development I could have imagined.    

Yesterday I saw the people at Target setting out the school supplies, and I felt quiet excitement, rather than dread, at the thought of the new school year.  

I'm currently scheduled to teach two sections of German 2 and one section of German 1, and I couldn't be happier.  I know that this slower, less is more pace is right for me.

Off and Running

(Me and my amazing colleague from Bloomington HS South.  

My younger son will be in her class this year!) 

Phew!  The first 2 weeks of school are in the books.  Here are the highlights:

• Name Tents were a definite thumbs up.  They have allowed me to change student groups daily until I find an arrangement I'm happy with.  Plus, it's easier to adapt to the nearly daily (sometimes hourly!) changes of student schedules.  I do need to adjust the folding lines a little bit so that they fold flat more easily.  And I want to change the back of the German 2 tents to include haben and sein and "Wie waren deine Ferien?" rather than "Wie geht's?"  Next year...

• German 1 has learned the alphabet, definite, and indefinite articles.  I did definite and indefinite articles in one day rather than two, and it seemed to be fine:

  
 

• My homeroom loves oatmeal.  It started when they kept asking to go to the vending machines for snacks.  We talked about how hard it is to make it until the last lunch period at 12:55 when you eat breakfast at 6:00.  I mentioned that I kept instant oatmeal in the department office and offered them some.  I had one person take me up on the offer the first day, and several on Friday.  The only requirement is that they wash their own dishes, which they have happily done.  Peaches and cream is most popular.  I think bonding over oatmeal works better for me than the more traditional ice breakers.

• The $100 I spent last year buying my own document camera, Ziggi, was money well spent.  No more running around the first week, begging anyone who will listen to connect my desktop computer to AirServer.  It would be great if schools provided resources we need to do our best teaching, but since mine doesn't, I'm glad I could get it myself.

• German 2 is a delight!  They are off to a great start, reviewing nouns, plurals, and present tense verbs while learning vocabulary about celebrations and festivals.  We've started the conversational past and watched Tiba's Geburtstag.

• I started off on day one with the bathroom flowchart.  That one item may single-handedly save my sanity this year (ok, that and A LOT of yoga and running).

I hope your year has gotten off to a good start, too!  Remember: