6th Grade Minute Meetings!!!

6th graders....please answer the 4 questions below when you meet with Mr. Barry for 1 minute. Help Mr. Barry meet with 141 6th graders in 141 minutes over the course of 3 days. And welcome to Carlisle Middle School!!

Bullying in Sports: National High School Coaches Convention

I'm excited to have the opportunity to present to coaches from across the country today who have an interest in learning more about bullying and how they can be a big part of the effort to stop bullying before it happens. Here is a version of the powerpoint that I am presenting today. I am not sure if the links work and if the background formatting came through like I hoped, but I may edit it later to fix these. Thank you!

Bullying presentation for National Coaching Convention

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National High School Coaching Convention Bullying Survey

  Coaches, thank you for attending these two workshops on the topic of Bullying in sports. Please take a quick moment to take this 5-question survey. And even more important than taking this survey, I will show you how to make and publish your own survey so you can get data on your players, students, parents, teachers, community, etc. Data should drive decisions....so doing some quick surveys can help you make the first step in preventing bullying on your team and in your school. Thank you!

Want to Foster Creativity in Your Child? Watch This 2-Minute Video!

   I had to share this video. It is a great video for teachers, but also works for parents too. It is a very simple experiment or task to show how a simple change in wording and design can make a child really use their imagination and creativity. As I think about how I parent this summer and teach next fall, I plan to keep this video in mind.

More infographics....This Time on Sleep

Lots of infographics today. Thank you to Larry Ferlazzo and his Websites of the Day for some of these. These two infographics I found on his blog as well and they are good. Simply put, our teens do not get enough sleep. Maybe studying these charts may help them understand the importance of sleep. Hopefully, they are all getting lots of sleep now that summer break is here!

30 Lesser Known Facts About Sleep infographic

Interview Questions and Suggested Answers

For all of my 8th graders out there still looking for a summer job and for any high school students or adults looking for a job and interviewing soon. Here are the most common interview questions and suggested answers. Glad to see much of what I tell my 6th and 8th graders is in this list! Good list to copy and save for when you prepare to interview.

Bullying Infographic

  Lots of great information contained within these 4 infographics about Bullying. Take some time to look through them. School may be out for the summer, but bullying can and does still occur. The difference is that parents, friends, peers, and community members will see it more often and need to step in and stop it.

Student Bullying  infographic

The Truth About Bullying infographic by iLanskiii.

Zero Tolerance: Stopping Student Bullying infographic

Great Links from the Partnership for a Drug-Free America

Well, summer is here and I finally have time to catch up on my blog reading and blog writing. After skim reading about 100 blog posts from the Partnership fro a Drug-Free America, here are some of the articles and links that I thought were the best and the most important for parents and teens in our community. Take a moment today or this week and read these articles. Great information for parents and our teens. Thanks!

 Kids at Risk of Overdose due to Parent Medications
---Very important read for all of us. I take 2 medications daily and try my best to keep these away from my own little 4 children. But as they get older, I need to protect this medication even more to keep them away from possible danger.

Social Hosting Laws:
  ---Although Iowa apparently has no statewide Social Hosting laws according to this interactive website, it reminds you that local communities may. Not to mention the emotional damage that can occur if you were to allow underage teens to drink at your house, especially if they drive after that drinking.

Smoking continues to decline among teens, but drinking and binge drinking gets worse
---Good news on smoking, but bad news on drinking and binge drinking.

Myths BUSTED when it comes to parents who think letting their kids drink at home is safe and OK!
---This is a great article that shows all the myths of letting your kids drink at home as a safe way for them to learn about alcohol.

Did you know teens are using ADHD drugs to study? Most parents don't.
---10% of high school kids are doing this, but only 1% of parents think it is their child. Interesting....

Starting to drink at young age makes for heavy drinking later.
--Last article, but it is an important one.

Have a great summer and check back here often for many other updates I find as I read up on my blogs and studies on the Internet.

AIB Preview Day!

AIB College of Business will be hosting a preview day geared towards high school sophomores and juniors on June 17.  Starting at 9am, participants will learn about academic programs, financial aid opportunities, and get FREE tickets to an I Cubs game!  In addition- at the ballpark there will be FREE hotdogs and hamburgers!  If you register for the preview day before June 7th, your name will also be put in a drawing to throw the first pitch, lead the song for the 7th inning stretch, AND fire t-shirts from the bazooka bat!  You can register for this event here!

6th Grade 2013 Spring Bully/Harrassment Survey

If you are a 6th grader taking Mr. Barry's Life Skills class, please take the brief survey below. Your honesty in this survey is extremely valuable to Mr. Barry, Ms. Flagor, and our school district when it comes to dealing with the issue of true bullying in and around our school building. Thank you!

Post JA Biztown Parent Volunteer Survey

Parents.....I cannot thank you enough! The group of parents I had supporting and helping this year was amazing. All of you really helped us have 2 great days. Now, I need one final favor from you. Could you please fill out the survey that is embedded below and let me know how your group went. I use this data to evaluate our trip and reward and honor some groups and students mentioned in your survey results. It should not take more than a minute or two. Thank you again for all your efforts and time this year.

Counselors Bring Hyperstream to Carlisle Middle School, Students Create Cool Website!

Kim Flagor, Ben Barry, and Julie Thompson applied for and wrote a grant to bring Hyperstream to our middles school as a STEM initiative. We received that grant and now have our Hyperstream club up and running. While some students are building a LEGO robot, others are filming videos. And still others are making a powerpoint presentation. One group has created a website for Carlisle students and community to go to. Take a look around their site and post any feedback you have. They are in the beginning stages, but it looks pretty cool so far!

 Click on the link below:

 Carlisle 2 the World 

 Or here is the actuall web address:

 sites.google.com/site/carlisle2theworld