MRVED Update - September 19, 2018

MRVED Business

MRVED Common Day

The next MRVED Common Day is fast approaching. It will be October 17 at the Dawson-Boyd Public School. Dave Burgess will be the keynote speaker. Registration has been sent to the Principals for them to forward on. The registration will run from September 19 -October 3 with October 5th being the last day to cancel your lunch if you so choose. The day will start at 8:40 with Dave Burgess addressing all staff in the Auditorium until it is time for lunch. Staff will receive an agenda for the day when they arrive letting them where to go in the afternoon.

Registration Link

Upcoming Meetings

September 21, 2018 Title III Paras
September 26, 2018 Superintendents’ Council
September 28, 2018 Title III Teachers

October 17, 2018 Dave Burgess-MRVED Common Day
October 24, 2018 Superintendents’ Council
October 26, 2018 Principals’ Council


MRVED Principals and Teacher Advisory Council Meeting Update
The MRVED Principals and Teacher Advisory Council (TAC) were recently at the MRVED for their first meetings of the year.  It was nice to see new and returning faces in both groups.  There was much catching up to do from a busy summer at the MRVED.  Much of the time in both groups was spent putting the finishing touches on the October 17 day with Dave Burgess as well as providing Brandon with possible sessions for MELT 2019.  Both groups are an enormous asset to the MRVED and provide the MRVED with valuable feedback as well as help in planning our common days.

2019 MELT Call for Proposals

The MRVED Educators Learning Together (MELT) conference will be held at Lac qui Parle Valley High School on January 21, 2019.  To help make this conference the best ever, we need your help.  The MRVED is looking for enthusiastic people willing to present on something great happening in your classroom.  This can be anything from Google Drive to differentiation techniques in your classroom.  Show us how you Teach Like a Pirate!  Technology or no technology proposals are welcome.  Presenters will be paid a small stipend for your work.  You may submit as many presentation proposals as you wish.

**We are actively seeking any Pre-K people that would like to present, as well as anyone that Teaches Like a Pirate!**

**By filling out this form you are not committing to presenting, just providing the MRVED with your name and topic.**


Link to Proposal Form

Tech Tip - MRVED Twitter

Be sure to follow the MRVED on Twitter.  Anytime you do something with the MRVED or anytime you want the MRVED to see what you are Tweeting feel free to use the hashtag #WeAreMRVED.  We will also be using the hashtag #TLAPMRVED to go with our professional development this fall with Dave Burgess.  TLAP stands for Teach Like A Pirate.

Teach Like a Pirate - Passion, Immersion, Rapport

Let's set sail and start our adventure!

Passion
Burgess starts the chapter in an interesting way.  He states that, "we are not passionate about everything we teach".  As an example, I am passionate about social studies, but I'm not so passionate about World War I and World War II.  It's shocking because in every class I taught, it didn't matter if it was Sociology or US History, the same question emerged at some point..."when are we getting to Hitler and World War II?"  Don't get me wrong, WWI and WWII are super important topics in the scope of world and US history, but I just don't have the passion for it as some of my colleagues.  I do, however, love the Civil War.  I am also very passionate about Sociology (but not the chapter on the fathers of sociology).

It is OK to admit you are not passionate about everything you teach.  It's nearly impossible to be passionate about EVERYTHING.  The trick is to finding a way to bring passion into the area of your content you are not as passionate about.  To do this, Burgess asks us to think about 3 questions:

1. Within your subject matter, what are you passionate about teaching?
2. Within your profession, but not specific to your subject matter, what are you passionate about?
3. Completely outside of your profession, what are you passionate about?

For example, if I am not passionate about WWII, but I am personally passionate about baseball, can I somehow meld the two to create a passionate lesson/unit about WWII?

Immersion
This is one of my favorite sections in the book.  Immersion is SO important to not only teaching, but in every relationship and interaction we have.  Have you ever been in a conversation with someone and you KNOW that person is not present in the conversation?  How did that make you feel?  Imagine being in a classroom where the teacher is not present.  Where the teacher is thinking about what is going on next hour, creating practice plans for an after school activity, or thinking about the staff meeting from that morning.  The kids can tell when you are not fully present in your teaching, and they feel exactly how you feel in a conversation with someone that is not present.  It's a HORRIBLE feeling!

Rapport

The majority of this section talks about the way Burgess plans the first three days with his students.  It's all about building rapport with students.  Making sure they feel emotionally and physiologically safe.  Showing students that your classroom environment is a safe place to take risks and ask questions.  If you don't have rapport with the students from the beginning, you will be fighting an uphill battle from the beginning.  You'll have to buy the book if you want to read in depth about his first 3 days (this part is totally worth the cost of the book by the way!).  Building rapport helps minimize misbehavior in the classroom and allows students to "buy-in" to what you are selling.  Think about a door to door salesman...what is one of the first things the salesman will do?  Build trust and rapport.  The kids will never "invite" you into their minds, much like you would never invite a salesman into your home, if they don't have the trust and rapport.