Paparazzi them to Spark Motivation...Lovin' it & Over it...

YAY! 

 It's Saturday and first I'm linkin' up with 

my high-heeled hero, Joanne,

from Head Over Heels for Teaching

for Spark Student Motivation Saturdays.

Want to know one of the best motivators for students?

Pretendin' you are the paparazzi and 

snappin' pictures of your students' faces.

I'm not jokin'.

In Florida

(don't stop readin' even if you aren't from the Sunshine State), 

any testin' grades have an online

program called FCAT Explorer that can 

be accessed at school or home.

Each grade level has different subjects that can 

be accessed.

This year, my 5th graders can work on 

the Math or Science portion of the program.

Math has 162 questions and Science has 200.

162 + 200=a lot of questions

There are questions that would be worded

similar to our actual standardized test questions and 

are basically a review of all of the standards 

that we have covered throughout the year.

The students have from January until April to 

complete this program.

Anyone that completes BOTH sections will 

get a surprise or treat from me.

Sometimes I assign it for homework, sometimes we 

do it in class, and sometimes I just tell the 

kids to go above and beyond to complete this.

For some reason it takes a looooong time for

some of them to get anywhere with this.

In January I start to keep track of their progress 

and at the beginnin' of March

I put their pictures up to show who has completed 

one or two sections of the program.

As soon as those pictures go up on the wall, 

all of a sudden the program MIRACULOUSLY gets completed

faster than I can get the blue sticky-tacky on the back

of their picture.  

No joke.
I put the pictures up this Wednesday and

by Friday I had four more people complete the program.

Just like that.

Motivation at its finest.

The pictures are mounted on spray painted CD's

to go with our Rockstar theme.

Joanne will LOVE this one...

I also gave each student a Post-it note

and gave them two numbers...random numbers.

Random to them...not to me.

Each student's numbers were different.

Then they had to add their two numbers together.

They then checked one another to see if they added correctly.

Luckily, everyone did. 

Thank goodness....I didn't want to have a nervous breakdown.

Then I asked them to get in order from smallest to largest numbers.

The person with the smallest number had completed

the least amount of questions on FCAT Explorer...

(I'm sure you know where I'm goin' with this) 

and the person with the largest

had completed the most.

I'm sneaky.

Now I've got pictures on the wall and kids lookin' 

around to see who is goin' to finish ahead of them.

I've got a competitive bunch.

They don't like bein' beat by their classmates.

I have a feelin' by the time Monday rolls around,

I'll have several more kids that have completed

the program.

I'm also linkin' up with my other favorite Ali from 

Teaching (Powered by Caffeine)

for "lovin' it & over it".

Some of you may remember that my school had

to say good-bye to a very special teacher

a few weeks ago.

Two of my colleagues and the Student

Council came up with a fundraiser to raise money

to be placed in Mary's name through the 

Susan G. Komen Breast Cancer foundation.

Students were able to purchase a pink strip of paper for

$.50 or 3 for $1.00.

The pink strips made paper chains that could be hung in each

classroom in our buildin'.

Students at my school raised around $1,000!

We had over 500 strips in our room.  

We actually ran out of hangin' space.

I had to be careful if the fire marshal came back.

He dislikes me immensely.

 I'm so proud of my Rockstars for honorin' Mrs. Martin's memory 

and always wantin' to give to others.  

They were so excited every time they brought in money

and most of them even gave up their Friday ice cream money

each week to buy pink strips instead!

The kids took the chains to our 

Student Council reps so they can attach all the chains in the

whole school.  

All of the pink chains

will be displayed in our Media Center for everyone

to see durin' our Scholastic Book Fair.

I think Mary would have truly loved this!

I have a paper cut and it hurts.

I've been sayin' bad things again.

I teased Ali that she was goin' to be my "over it"

because I emailed her and I knew she was nappin' 

and unable to respond.

It's great that she's such a good sport

and can take my teasin'.

I'm only over my paper cut!

Happy Saturday, friends.  

I'm on a boat today catchin' fishies...no I'm not postin' from there!

Just by the time you read this...I will be on a boat.