New From the Lead Your School Lab... The Fundamental 5 Classroom App

That’s right, the team down in the lab have created a new tool for teachers, The Fundamental 5 Classroom Timer App. 

What the app does is allow you, the teacher, to program in the times for your warm-up, small group purposeful talk sessions and closing question. The app also allows you to select and enter the talking and writing prompts that you want to use during a class.  Then at the programmed time, the app chimes and displays the prompt.

You teach, the app cues, and students talk and write. Pure classroom magic!

The app is available at the App Store for I-phone and I-pad users.  Search for Fun 5 Timer, or click on the link:

https://itunes.apple.com/WebObjects/MZStore.woa/wa/viewSoftware?id=907096716&mt=8

Think. Work. Achieve.

Your turn...

• Call Jo at (832) 477-LEAD to order your campus set of “The Fundamental 5: The Formula for Quality Instruction.” Individual copies available on Amazon.com!
• Call Jo at (832) 477-LEAD to order your campus set of “Look at Me: A Cautionary SchoolLeadership Tale” Individual copies available on Amazon.com! 
• Now at the Apple App Store: Fun 5 Timer (Fundamental 5 Delivery Tool); Fun 5 Plans (Fundamental 5 Lesson Plan Tool); PW Lite (Basic PowerWalks Tool); PW Pro (Mid-level PowerWalks Tool)
• Upcoming Presentations: The Fundamental 5 National Summit (Keynote Presentation)
• Follow Sean Cain and LYS on www.Twitter.com/LYSNation and like Lead Your School on Facebook

Sunday Jeopardy from The Big Easy

I'll take "Definitions” for $200.

“Excuses.”

“What are the tools of the incompetent?”

The Big Easy

Your turn…

A Reader Submits... The Fun 5

“SC,

Loved the Fun 5 training series! These reminders and improvements to my practice are absolutely imperative to my students’ success. Making the Fun 5 the expectation for our entire campus is the unified focus and vision that we need to reach Exemplary.

Thanks to you and the LYS Crew!”

SC Response
What can I say but, “WOW!” Our goal is to provide educators with practical tools, training and support that can be used immediately. As we told you at the end of the training, you have the tools, brains and passion – now go do something great.

Think. Work. Achieve.

Your turn...

Get Your Own Cell Phone

As a book end to the previous post, “Get Your Own E-mail,” here is a second practice that can help you avoid self-inflicted career injuries. Get you own cell phone and pay for it yourself.

Again, if the district provides your cell phone or pays for your service, your cell phone call log is public information. So that long list of calls that occur during the day that aren’t business related will come back to haunt you. All the calls after hours and on weekends that aren’t business related will also come back to haunt you. And who is going to ask for the information? The teacher you put on a growth plan is one. The opposition lawyer in a special education hearing is another, as are the crusading reporter, the district business office or your boss. Not one of which you want going through you life with both a fine toothed comb and an agenda.

Now, the first refuge of the guilty mind when it comes to e-mail and cell phone service is the thought, “There is safety in numbers. If they come after me, they have to go after everyone.”

If you are having that thought, I have a one word answer – WRONG! The situations that I have described are like speeding tickets. It doesn’t matter that everyone else was speeding, you are the one that has been pulled over, and you are the one that has to deal with the consequences. On the other hand, own your own phone and pay for your own service and there is no public information, and hence, no problem.

There is another powerful reason for owning your own phone. We are in the people and information business. As such, communication and access is not only vital, but it provides us with a competitive advantage. Like the carpenter and his tools or the lawyer and her law books, the 21st century school leader needs a phone with data access. Anything less leaves you at a performance disadvantage. Yes, it’s an expense, but so is that cup of Starbucks coffee and a manicure. Equip yourself to lead.

Think. Work. Achieve.

Your turn…