 Good morning friends! Welcome back to another Apple's NTR's vlog! 6.30 in the morning and I'm bringing in a big ol' load. These are all my son's hot wheels and tracks and I will explain why when I get upstairs. I'm going to sleep elevators. So my friend Kyle Cohen just showed this baby off. I forget if it was Instagram or YouTube or what but literally these are life saver. I've had this since last year. Mandy actually introduced it to me a couple years ago when we talked together in Mesa and they were immediately on our must buy for our next school year and then once I came here I got them. But they are a life saver. All of my Christmas lights, all of my lamps, everything is on a switch which makes everything so much easier. Okay so I had to switch filming to my phone because my camera is extremely dead and is really not wanting to charge. So today is Monday January 24th. Yes 24th. I knew it. I did a good job. I never remembered the date honestly. Like it's the last thing on my mind. It should be the first thing on my mind but it's not. So I'm here super extra early because my parents are in town and they offered to bring cash to school for me. So I get a little bit of extra work time. I do have duty this morning which is great because I have a problem. We have a problem. My school is completely out of toner, printer toner. I don't know about the office printer but teachers aren't really supposed to be using the office printer except for emergencies and we don't really need paper for any emergencies. So all three teacher computers or sorry all three teacher printers are completely out of toner. So teachers can't print right now and that is like across our district. A lot of schools are out of toner because and I believe that this is the true story so don't quote me but I'm pretty sure the warehouse where our ink is produced burned down. I think. I think it's in Japan but I'm not positive. That's the story I heard. Anyways I was supposed to print out six tracks today because I'm doing mystery science. If you guys have not heard of mystery science give me a few minutes and I will fill you in. So anyway I was supposed to print a set of these for each table team. So I have six table teams and I was supposed to print six copies of each of these now because I don't have any ink. I cannot print these. And today we're going to be doing an investigation about hills that involves hills and there's going to be no investigation if I don't print these tracks. So in my mind I thought okay well I can solve this problem. Hot Wheels tracks. So I brought all of my son's Hot Wheels tracks to school today in this big old bin. And I got on class dojo on Friday and I sent a message to all of my family saying if you have Hot Wheels tracks please send them in. If you're nervous about them not coming back to you just write your last name on the back of the track and I will make sure that they return to you. So I figured depending on how many sets of tracks I get I might put like Joey's track on table six and like Katie's track on table four and then my tracks everywhere else. So instead of making paper like roller coasters today we're going to make Hot Wheels roller coasters and we're just going to hope that it all goes well. And if it doesn't then oh well mystery science is great because at the end of every investigation it sort of concludes what the students should have seen or should have found in their investigation. So if it goes wrong oh well the kids and I are really adaptable and I think it'll be fine the kids will find it as a fun activity anyway. So I'm going to give each of the kids an equal amount of Hot Wheels tracks once I see what comes in and just tell them okay this is what the setup is supposed to look like go ahead and set it up as best you can using the materials you have. And if it doesn't work out oh well then we learn from that. And so I do have all of my son's Hot Wheels tracks here including a lot of his cars. So hopefully I'll get some more tracks. I know I have two teachers that are willing to share their Hot Wheels tracks with me which is great. So even if I just get those two teachers to bring in a ton I think I'll have enough for six teams maybe even one for me. Alright I want to talk to you guys about mystery science because it is a tool a program that I've been using for the last few weeks and I can't tell you enough good stuff about it. So I'm going to prop you up here in front of my screen and teach you about mystery science. This is not a sponsored video by the way I just really love mystery science. I discovered it a few years ago when I taught third grade but I didn't use it too too often because I didn't really get time to do science too much in my old districts which is another reason why I love working here because the kids are involved in science almost every single day. I teach departmentalized science so I teach science all day long aside from when I'm doing social studies. I do teach both but science I do more of because they are tested in science from third to fifth grade. They're tested in fifth grade here in Arizona so science is a little bit more of a priority but I do still teach social studies and I do take it very seriously. So mystery science is an online virtual program that aligns to next generation science standards. Most of them. So in Arizona I am required to teach Arizona science standards however they are pretty aligned with next gen. It's just that like a third grade next gen standard might be an Arizona standard for fourth grade so they kind of they all align it's just the year that they're going to be assessed on that standard is different if that makes sense. So at my school my principal has asked me to follow both set of standards to whatever discretion I want because at eventually the third and fifth grade band will be taught and they'll be tested on all of those standards. So by the time they get to fifth grade they will have been taught all the third through fifth Arizona all the third through fifth next gen because all third through fifth aligns pretty closely. Anyway so mystery science is amazing because it not only introduces scientific topics and concepts and phenomena but it always includes a hands-on investigation for every lesson and I love that. It also includes assessments, activities, all of the paper sheets that you're going to need, all the printout materials that you're going to need, everything is included. You may have to buy like paper clips or tape or like Play Doh or things like that but pretty much everything is given to you and it's presented in this really cool video and everything, most lessons have an anchor phenomena that the kids watch first and it's all connected throughout the mysteries or lessons and so we are on lesson three out of eight for this unit and it is why is the first hill of a roller coaster always the highest. So the kids are creating roller coasters and connecting energy, speed, force, all of that stuff within their investigation. So I really love mystery science which is why you've been seeing mystery science in the background on the TV. I just think it's an amazing resource. Another thing my district science person, the trainer, the person who does all the professional developments for the district for science, came to my class and I asked her to do a model lesson because I really wanted to wrap my mind around these three-dimensional standards across concept of next gen, all of those things. If you're not a science teacher, you probably have no idea what I'm talking about but she said that mystery science was probably the best aligned curriculum or program that she has seen thus far because it does allow students to think outside the box and really not the teacher teaching anything but really the kids investigating, exploring, and researching on their own which is hard to wrap your mind around if you're a teacher because for me it's like okay teach vocabulary, teach the concept, practice with it, do an experiment to test but really we should be letting our students drive all of it. So this does a really good job getting the kids thinking about things, getting them questioning things, making observations and I really, really love it. So if you're a science teacher and or maybe you only get like 30 minutes of science per day, mystery science is great because there are natural stopping points where you could do 30 minutes a day and still accomplish it. I really love this because I can do two mysteries a week so I should be done with this unit of energy in a couple more weeks and then I'll hit social studies for a few weeks. So anyway, that's mystery science. So last week on Friday the kids set up their bumper coaster roller coasters. Now the reason I left these out is because I'm wondering if we can use these tracks to create the new coasters and not have to use the Hot Wheels tracks. All the kids really need are to be able to make hills and attach them to these roller coasters, which I have note cards and I figure if we cut the note cards into smaller pieces we could probably make the different size hills that way. So I'm just going to come over here and shop in my little science bins. These are all science material bins by the way. I would really like to store them differently. In fact, I think next year I might put them on this little iron thing or maybe get another one. That was a really good investment because my closet is just full of more stuff that I don't use very often but want to keep. So anyway, I'm going to pull these note cards. We used these for a STEM activity a few weeks ago and so they've all been touched and crinkled and folded and prodded and all that stuff. So I'm just going to grab them and if we can use them today to create some hills, great. If we can't, if we can't create hills and do this experiment with the current tracks that we have, then I will pull the Hot Wheels tracks out and we'll try it that way. I still think it would be really cool though because the kids can connect like energy speed, all of that stuff to Hot Wheels and then maybe do some more experimenting at home. So I'm going to just hang back here for a little bit, go through this lesson one more time, update my daily agenda planner with all of the upcoming events that are taking place in here and just kind of update. I do have an observation coming up in a couple of weeks so I can work on that one and then I will get some footage of the kids when they begin investigating later. Okay, so now that my camera is charged, I'll just tell you guys how the day went. So during my first block, I ended up pulling two groups over to do the investigation with the Hot Wheels tracks. Let me show you. So this whole setup, I just put the stools there so that when the kids were walking around, they didn't kick the track over. So this was all set up over there in that corner and what I quickly realized after teaching the first block was that it's going to take three times as long to do each group separately. So for the second class, I had everybody gather around the tracks and we all observed at the same time and I just pulled a couple of kids to be my helpers to release the Hot Wheels from the top of the hill and it ended up working so much better. We got through the entire lesson in block two and I think we'll get through the entire lesson in block three. So why don't we have Taryn release it first and everybody else watch? Okay, so the bumper car made it into the goal but the hill car did not. So go ahead and move your cars to where they need to be on the trial one spot. So the first one ended in, where did it end? Put it back where it ended. Right there. Okay. So the first Hot Wheel ended in the first valley and the bumper Hot Wheel landed in the goal. Okay, so everybody move your Hot Wheels to where they need to be on your screen before we do the next trial. Oh my gosh, it's right there. It's hitting that valley. Get it Bristol. You want to replace the tape? Okay, where did that roller tape go that was on that stool? Let's replace the tapes. You're doing a good job. It worked without the tape. Okay, then let's remove that tape and we should begin. No, it's fine now. It should be fine now. Okay, let's try it now. All right, Jason Aiden, you ready? There's a little air bubble on the seat. Is it on the wheel? There you go. Oh, it shoots it out. So when the when it shoots up. So that just means that tomorrow I need to plan something that is more of like a review or something that my second two blocks can do. So that the other class can get caught up and finished. So I'm going to try to figure that out. But I do have to fill out this parent teacher conference form because those are next week. Now personally, in my opinion, I think that if teacher conferences are coming up, that notice should be given out prior to the week before I think that two weeks notice is a lot better, especially for parents who work. But what's great is that all of our conferences are online. So most parents will show up. Now because we're departmentalized, sorry, I'm just gonna grab and heat up my lunch. Because we are departmentalized, we only need to meet with our bottom 10 students and their families. Or if a parent requests a conference, then we meet with them as well. So we don't meet with every single family every time we do conferences, it's only the ones that we feel need it. So yeah, so that is how my day is going. I have not sat down once during my prep period, I actually moved some things around. So I'm going to show you the changes I made while my food is cooking. So I actually moved my black table cloth table back here to my small group area. And I like it because this is kind of like a teacher work area, or at least it was and it has been. But what I like about it is I moved the table here my flexi spot up front to be my teaching table. Instead of this one because I found that this one was a little bit small. And now I have a little bit more room for all of my stuff. I can do demonstrations on this table now. This one is great because it's like it rises and falls. But this one does the exact same thing, but it's just bigger. So I just plopped myself right here. I kind of moved some things around I moved this up here. And then this I have my flexible seating stored over there. This is also part of flexible seating now because a student can stand at that table if they need it. So I also like having that option for the kids as well. So this is all over here. Yeah, so that's what I did during my prep time. And I did have quite a few students helping me that were in the other room and Mandy's room who had lost their special. So they were happy to come and help me kind of organize this area. So now I do have a small group table back here. And what I like about this too is that I can push this back and have even more room if I need it. All right, my friend, so it is the end of the day. I just got back up from afternoon recess duty and I'm exhausted. So I'm going to end this vlog here. Hopefully you guys enjoyed and I will see you in the next one. Bye