Maniacs in the Middle - A Teaching Blog by Josie Bensko

Josie September 23, 2020

Outdoor Home Office with Amazon Home

*This post is sponsored by Amazon Home. Like many of you, I am working from home more than usual these days. My district is currently 100% virtual through at least the middle of October. We are required to teach live 3 days a week and have asynchronous lessons on the other 2 days. I choose to stay home and record lessons, provide feedback to my students, grade, and plan on the asynchronous days. At the beginning of this unusual school year, I was going crazy working inside the house on the days that I didn’t go into school. I knew…

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Josie August 5, 2020

How to Use Merge Cubes This School Year

If you haven’t heard of Merge Cubes, then I think you may have been living under a rock for the past few years! If you want a class set of Merge Cubes and a free subscription, stay tuned until the end of this post! Three years ago my technology coach came to me with a Merge Cube in her hand. She was so excited to show me this new augmented reality cube to use in my science classroom. All you need is a cube and the app! The app reads the code on the cube and creates augmented reality through…

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Josie July 1, 2020

Simply Tidy with Michaels

I am so excited to show you a little sneak peek into my new at-home office! I have always wanted an office at home because all of my teacher related items are usually just all over my kitchen, bed, floor, etc. (you know the drill). I wanted a space that was dedicated to all of my classroom supplies I needed at home, while still being organized. I also didn’t want to break the bank while designing a space at home. With all of the unknowns with the upcoming school year, this organized space will also be perfect for teaching at…

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Josie April 19, 2020

How to Play Review Games Remotely with Your Students

Each week, I have an open Google Meet session with my students. Every teacher on my team is assigned a different day of the week so that every day the students can meet with a different teacher. This is NOT required & is just a time for them to ask questions, get feedback, hangout, and honestly just socialize with their classmates. We have around 140 students on our team and we have around 25 students show up to our virtual meetings. This is just reality! I have tried to have a plan of attack so it’s not just 30 minutes…

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Josie April 13, 2020

10 Tips to Start a Teacher Instagram

So You Want To Start a Teacher Instagram… Many people in my personal life have started teacher Instagrams after seeing my journey. These are the exact tips I have told every single one of them. You’re in on the secrets! My Instagram Journey Let’s go back to June 2016. I had just finished my first year of teaching. I was living with two of my best friends (Kelli & Lisa) who had also just finished their first year of teaching. This was the beginning of the teacher Instagram take-off. We were following two teachers, Hannah West (@misswestbest) & Brittany Briggs…

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