I am aware that my title for this post has a preposition at the end (and the word "suck" in it), but that is not the point of this post, dear reader. The point of this post is to talk about how my summer is going so far, and how I'd like it to be different from the past few summers. Cut a girl a break -- it's summer -- let me be a bit casual...
Project #1:
Here's my guilty confession: I suck at book talks. I think I just love the books so much that I go off on too many tangents in front of a live group, or give away a spoiler or two, or just don't think enough about how to frame it for the kiddos because... school. It's crazy. There are so many things to do -- and book talks are thus the first thing to go. I abandon book talks not because I don't believe in them but more so because they make me feel like the village idiot. I give the book talk, effusive and passionate, and I do get a few smiles of encouragement or laughs at my jokes. But, to be honest, live book talks are awkward for me.
But abandon talking about books? Never. I need to recommend books to students, and I need to share content with them. I just don't need to do it in my classroom five times a day. So, I created the OonziTalk-- a two minute podcast and literary elevator pitch. Keeping anything short and sweet has always proven a challenge for me, so doing a constrained exercise such as a two minute book talk forces me to focus and keep things succinct and specific. In each book talk, I include the title, author, genre, a brief excerpt and three reasons for valuing the book.
I've been wanting to try out podcasting for a while now, because I want my students to create podcasts, and I can't ask my students to do something I don't know how to do myself. But I also need to use a platform that is cloud-based and app-based so that students can use Chromebooks and smartphones to construct their podcasts. Ay, there's the rub. I have a Macbook, and I could quite easily use that to create my podcast, but that won't help my students, who need to use Chromebooks. So far, Podomatic is looking like a viable free platform for students to turn over short podcasts. In addition to playing the actual podcast in class (I'm envisioning playing the podcasts while I take attendance or while class closes), I would also send the link for my book talks via Remind messages so that students might listen to the book talks on their phones.
While I have wanted to do podcasting for well over a year now, I have been avoiding it for a few reasons. Firstly, I needed to find a cloud-based platform that I would fully understand, that was user-friendly and free. Secondly, I was considering what tasks might be conducive to podcasting. Technology is a tool that is used to solve a problem, and I have one. It's not a new problem. It's that problem that occurs when students start to close up shop just a few minutes before class ends. (Do not pretend that this doesn't happen to you every once in a while too!). Since students need to return Chromebooks to the cart at the end of every class, there is "edge time," even when the Chromebook return is delegated to a handful of students. I absolutely cannot stand when students line up at the door of the classroom as if they were punching out on a factory line. So here is an opportunity to use technology as a tool to solve a problem. Play the podcast for students in those final minutes of class, then follow up with a Remind text message containing the link to the podcast. Students who are interested in adding the book to their read-next list can then add it to their Goodreads or Litsy accounts.
Tackling what you suck at takes a village, and luckily, after attending #NerdCampMI last week, I got the help I needed from my tribe. Over a thousand teachers and librarians signed up to attend, and I had the opportunity to ask for help during the afternoon sessions. Only five of us showed up to the session, and not one of us knew what the heck to do, but by the end, I had made my very first (nine second long, now erased!) podcast. Since then, I have created my first OonziTalk on Podomatic, and I plan on creating about 60 before heading back to school.
The other village I need to create the podcast is the one in my living room. Since I knew I would need to take pictures with the books for each of the podcasts, I did my hair, put on makeup, and then got my ten year-old son to take a picture of me holding each and every book. I entrusted him with my Nikon 35mm, and he did a great job. My other sons helped too. Sometimes. And when they weren't helping, it was because they were playing with the boxes that the books came home in. Or eating snacks. Or shoving aside the leaning tower of books on the couch next to me to watch Netflix on my tablet.
Project #2:
Yesterday, I visited my plot at the community garden we joined this summer. I decided to join the garden because I want my children to experience growing their own food, and what better time than summer to do that?
Doesn't that last sentence sound so idealistic? I know almost nothing about gardening, and I did very little research prior to setting the garden plot up. But I did e-mail one of my colleagues who advises the gardening club at school, and he gave me some great tips for starting. Each and every time I have visited the garden to water or weed, I see another member who offers me feedback and encouragement. I look at my plot and am tempted to think "I suck at this," but the truth is that every other member of the community garden has been nothing but encouraging. The plot next to mine was a sight to behold -- symmetrical, bursting with tomatoes, strawberries, squash the size of baseball bats, broccoli -- the works; it was a prime specimen of beautiful horticulture. Last week, a ravenous woodchuck and/or deer attacked it, and half of the vegetables in my neighbor's plot got eaten. Talk about suckage! But I was amazed at the attitude of my gardening neighbor. She came out with new fencing, mounds of mulch and a wheelbarrow full of compost to start anew.
Yesterday, I visited the garden with my sons and found the first fruits of our crop: a few tiny green peppers sprouting, five strawberries, a little pumpkin, one squash and a tomato. I don't know if we'll ever bring green beans home to eat, but I do know that my sons loved taking them right off the vine and popping them into their mouths. There are tufts of grass growing up into our watermelons and peppers. There are a ton of weeds that still haven't been pulled, and I don't know if whatever we grow might be ravaged by a hungry woodchuck. Growth and hope persevere, though, even when things aren't perfect or ideal.
Recent Comments