How to Rock Student Portfolios using Class Dojo

Student portfolios are a great way to collect student work and showcase their learning! With how education is changing when it comes to the standards, technology, and engagement, it's important to keep families in the loop of how/what their child is doing in school, and also hold that student accountable for their learning!

Cue- class dojo!

Class Dojo emerged in the education world as a behavior management tool to cultivate a positive behavior environment that motivates students to make good choices and be recognized for their efforts. As a behavior management tool alone, class dojo is an excellent resource! However, over time the website (and app!) has included new features to communicate with parents and involve everyone in the learning process.

Students can earn points for following rules, making good choices, or any other positive behavior!

Class Stories

 Class Stories allow teachers to post updates to send to all parents in the class. You can post text, pictures, videos, and even files to share with families. They can comment, like, and you can see who's viewed it. Parents that have the app on their phone can allow for notifications, so they are updated every time you post! This is a great way to document throughout the year what the class is learning and some of the strategies that are used in the classroom to teach those concepts. I've posted our anchor charts, or videos of the students explaining how they use a strategy. I love this feature for whole group updates.

Student Stories- aka a Digital Student Portfolio

There is also a "student stories" feature, in which the teacher, OR STUDENT (yes I like this part) can post a picture, video, or text. This saves that information just for that student. The teacher, parent, and even the student (if they make their own student login) can view that particular child's "story". As I take pictures during a fun lesson I can post it just on that child's story, or maybe a video of them working out a problem. Class Dojo also provides you with a QR code that will bring you directly to your class, so your students can post themselves! For example, I've printed the QR code and placed it in my classroom where the students can scan it. When my students want to post a picture of their assignment, or their science experiment, or a great grade they just got back, they pick up a tablet, open the class dojo app, scan the code, select their name from the class list, and post! My third graders were able to pick up on the process the first day- it's very easy to follow on the app!

When students post on their story, it will go to the teacher for approval. This means when I log into class dojo, I will have notifications that there are "pending student stories". I get to see it before they post and it sends to their parents.

My students are so motivated to share their best work on class dojo and they love seeing when their parents comment on their post with words of encouragement :) It saves a nice timeline of student work throughout the year! Parents also know exactly what we're learning and how their child is doing with the concept- sometimes we might post something with a mistake. I encourage the student to find their mistake and correct it in the "comments" section of their post. We really hit hard on the growth mindset and how important it is to learn from our mistakes and grow our brain- and the parents love to see when their child is able to learn from their mistakes as well!

Examples

Below are some examples of a student's "story". I love how much this kiddos likes to post and fill his mom in on his day :) He also gives me shout outs, so of course I have to share! Even though I've blurred the name, the first picture would show the student's name, to show that they are the ones posting to the story. The second picture shows my name, so I was the one who posted that picture and comment.

If you haven't jumped on the class dojo bandwagon yet, I highly suggest it. Not only is the behavior management aspect of it pretty great, but the student portfolios are where it's at!

For more information on how class dojo works and to set you up, check out their website and watch their video tutorial here: https://www.classdojo.com/#LearnMore

Rock on,

Diana

Establishing Routines & Expectations

Here's my post about the first two weeks... a week late!  :)

We're currently in our third week of school and things are running smoothly! I'm so happy with how my kiddos are doing with math rotations and our general classroom procedures. I wanted to share some of the things I do the first two weeks to have everything running like a well oiled machine (ok it's still a little squeaky but we're getting there!)

The first big thing I push is class building. Before you can expect these kids to listen to you and respect eachother you need to build those relationships. I know there's a lot out there about being stricter the first few months and then letting off  a bit but I really feel like if you build a trusting relationship with your students they will listen to you because they WANT to, not because you scare the bejesus out of them.

Some fun things I like to do for class building are get to know you games. One we do is called a snowball fight. I found this fun idea on pinterest and the students LOVED it! You write a couple facts about yourself on a piece of paper with your name, crumple it up, and then let the kids have at it. After a few minutes of snowball fights, or until a snowball falls in the fishtank for us, the students each grab a snow ball and have to find the person who wrote it. They then read the facts about the person and get to know them a bit. After a couple of rounds I had the kids write the same facts but with no name, so they had to try and guess who it matched. Here's the link I found on pinterest if you want to check it out: http://www.minds-in-bloom.com/2011/07/back-to-school-snowball-fight.html

Another fun class building thing I do is ask silly questions. I have them either pair up,  or work with teams of 4. I then ask a silly question like "If you were a vending machine that could sell anything, what would you sell?" and each of the kids share. Then I'll share a few with the whole class and they get a good giggle out of it. Some other good questions are "what's the craziest dream you've ever had?" or "If you could be any sound, what would you sound like?"

I like to have one class building activity per day for the first full week. After that, I really like to do one a week if I can, to keep everyone working together and feeling like a trusting family.

After we knock out some class building I then go into the classroom rules and some procedures we use every day to learn. I'm a big fan of Whole Brain Teaching. If you're looking to learn more about it I highly suggest you check out the book by Chris Biffle OR you can check out a site I made for some district PD last year: www.wholebrainteacher.weebly.com

I start with how I plan to get their attention. When I say class, they say yes. The trick is, they have to match the way I say it... no matter how goofy I do it! so if I say WHATS UP CLASSY CLASS?! They say "WHATS UP YESSY YES!!" or "hey hey class" they say " hey hey yes". You can switch it up however you'd like so they don't get bored and neither do you! You'll get some laughs out of it, so whats neat is you have kids following rules and enjoying themselves as they do it. THAT IS KEY!

I then go over my 5 classroom rules. These rules have NO LOOPHOLES. So if you have a kiddo thats really tough to crack and likes to find a special way to get under your skin, they still have to follow your rules!

1. Follow directions quickly
2. Raise your hand for permission to speak
3. Raise your hand for permission to leave your seat
4. Make smart choices (no loophole here-a kid that likes to find loopholes does not want their intelligence questioned!)
5. Keep your dear teacher happy (by doing the right thing!)

I teach these rules by using "Mirrors Up" which is another WBT technique. They repeat after me with actions and words, so we match movements and words to the classroom rules (the brain is getting a workout!). I go over the rules several times a day the first week. I want the rules to be memorized- there's only 5 and if the kids learn movement with it then they can have it memorized by day 2 no joke. After the first week I go down to just doing the rules once a day, and after week 2 we try to do it once a week if we can, just to keep it fresh and on their mind.

After we've grown together as a family and set out our behavior expectations, it's time to show them that I actually will be looking for those behaviors and rewarding them. I like to use class dojo to give my students points for good behavior and for doing their work. What I like about class dojo is its online, so I can add it from my classroom computer during class, or take my phone to lunch and even give points as we're walking in line or outside of our classroom. Also, parents can log in and check their child's points. Class dojo allows you to also take away points. There's lots of different philosophies on this, but I'm ok with them losing points for excessive breaking of rules, and they lose that point privately. Students all have different totals of points so usually it's not noticed by other students. I think that's important. You as the teacher can leave a comment with the points they earn or lose, or can send a message to the parent so they are clear as to what happened. I of course like to send messages about the positive behaviors to open up dialogue with parents and have them know that I love their child and appreciate their positive qualities :)

I would like to add that students then use these points for rewards- and I do not have a prize box. Instead I do coupons for privileges, such as lunch with teacher or feeding a mealworm to our class pet Stubs. This way, the positive behavior is linked to a good feeling, rather than a material thing. It's been pretty motivating so far :)

So these are the big things we've had in place the past two weeks! The students show great compassion towards eachother and they want to do good, because it feels good :) I'm so excited to have this great bunch of kiddos.

I hope everyone is off to a great start to the school year!