This I Believe and Memoirs

Leave a comment September 19, 2012 Jeremy Hyler

I want to take a moment and say thank-you to everyone who comments on my blog and actually read it. Though I don’t get a lot of readers compared to most bloggers, I am happy to be as transparent as I can be to any teacher or educator.

With that being said, I took a few days off from blogging because I have been working on my book. I will continue to give updates on the book status as things continue to progress. Rest assured, I have been writing, just not on my blog.

The last few days have been rather adventurous for my students and myself. We kicked off Monday right away with the mobile laptops in the classroom.

7th graders are writing their first drafts of their “This I Believe” essays. As mentioned before the students did a Wordle as their brainstorming and on Monday they visited a website where they could read and listen to some sample essays. They visited http://thisibelieve.org/themes/. There the students could choose from thousands of essays. The students brought their ear buds in that day and I instructed them to listen to and read along to three different essays of their choice. As they were doing this, they had their writing journals next to them and they were listing characteristics they found similar between the three essays. When they finished I gave them all a link to a Google Document titled: “Characteristics of “This I Believe Essays”. All of the students accessed this link I posted on Schoology they began to feverishly type on the document while it was projected on the screen. When students were done after about 8 minutes, we discussed all of the characteristics they found in common between the three essays by looking at what they posted on the Google Document. This class discussion let us into our rubric for their essay. I asked the students if they noticed the similarities between the characteristics they noticed and what was listed on the rubric. Many faces lit up and it started to click with them that they already knew what was required of them and it wasn’t going to be too difficult. Students then had time to begin their rough drafts that were due today.

Common Core Standards Covered by “This I Believe” Essay:

W.7.3 – Write narratives to develop real or imagined experiences or events using effective technique, relevant descriptive details, and well-structured event sequences.

Engage and orient the reader by establishing a context and point of view and introducing a narrator and/or characters; organize an event sequence that unfolds naturally and logically.
Use narrative techniques, such as dialogue, pacing, and description, to develop experiences, events, and/or characters.
Use a variety of transition words, phrases, and clauses to convey sequence and signal shifts from one time frame or setting to another.
Use precise words and phrases, relevant descriptive details, and sensory language to capture the action and convey experiences and events.
Provide a conclusion that follows from and reflects on the narrated experiences or events.

W.7.4 – Produce clear and coherent writing in which the development, organization, and style are appropriate to task, purpose, and audience.

W.7.6 – Use technology, including the Internet, to produce and publish writing and link to and cite sources as well as to interact and collaborate with others, including linking to and citing sources.

With the narrative unit pushing forward in 8th grade as well as 7th grade, the 8th graders continued their work on memoirs Monday. Similar to the 7th graders, they had to look at two memoirs and discuss the characteristics they saw in each of them. I then asked them to extend their thinking and give each one of them a grade and give reasons as to why the student earned the grade they gave them. It was very interesting to see the grades assigned for each of the memoirs and the comments the students gave. Many students discussed detail or lack of detail, grammar mistakes, and spelling mistakes. Both essays that were given to the students were polished student writing and we discussed this as we began to discuss the rubric for the memoirs. A great extension would be for the students to grade the pieces using the rubric I assigned to them. As with a lot of things I used a rubric I found online that is aligned with the Common Core State Standards. Again, the students were given time to start their rough draft in class.

Common Core Standards Covered by Student Memoirs:

W.8.3 – Write narratives to develop real or imagined experiences or events using effective technique, relevant descriptive details, and well-structured event sequences.

Engage and orient the reader by establishing a context and point of view and introducing a narrator and/or characters; organize an event sequence that unfolds naturally and logically.
Use narrative techniques, such as dialogue, pacing, description, and reflection, to develop experiences, events, and/or characters.
Use a variety of transition words, phrases, and clauses to convey sequence, signal shifts from one time frame or setting to another, and show the relationships among experiences and events.
Use precise words and phrases, relevant descriptive details, and sensory language to capture the action and convey experiences and events.
Provide a conclusion that follows from and reflects on the narrated experiences or events.

W.8.4 – Produce clear and coherent writing in which the development, organization, and style are appropriate to task, purpose, and audience.

W.8.6 – Use technology, including the Internet, to produce and publish writing and present the relationships between information and ideas efficiently as well as to interact and collaborate with others.

We are rolling! Not only are the students writing narratives, they are reading narratives. The 7th graders are reading The Acorn People by Ron Jones and the 8th graders are reading The Outsiders by S.E. Hinton. Though we just have just started the reading part, the students are going to be busy. Between Article of the Week, writing their drafts, and completing vocabulary assignments, we are moving forward with full steam. Enough for now.

Cheers!

Listening Skills and Article of the Week

2 Comments September 11, 2012 Jeremy Hyler

7th GRADE

As we continue our narrative unit in class, I added something new today with the 7th graders. I typically spend 2-3 days on a short story. I use our literature book for the short stories and poems as a prelude to reading a larger work such as a novel. The 7th graders already read “The Fan Club” as homework at the end of last week. Today, I wanted to have the 7th graders practice their listening skills and, as a teacher, I feel it was important to cater to my auditory learners. So, the students opened their books, I plugged the CD into the computer and they listened away. I did require them to follow along in their books and gave them a few focus questions so they were listening and reading for a purpose. Afterword, we discussed the story a bit more an moved on to a writing handout I had for them. When I decided to do this particular activity for the 7th graders, I assumed with my knowledge of the CCSS, listening to the story covered a speaking & listening standard. Though it may be a stretch, I believe I have covered standard SL.7.2.

Analyze the main ideas and supporting details presented in diverse media and formats (e.g., visually, quantitatively, orally) and explain how the ideas clarify a topic, text, or issue under study.

I really like this excerpt about new technologies and the CCSS.

New technologies have broadened and expanded the role that speaking and listening play in acquiring and sharing knowledge and have tightened their link to other forms of communication. The Internet has accelerated the speed at which connections between speaking, listening, reading, and writing can be made, requiring that students be ready to use these modalities nearly simultaneously. Technology itself is changing quickly, creating a new urgency for students to be adaptable in response to change ( Information taken from the mastery connect website about the CCSS).

8th GRADE

Today I went through some guided practice with Article of the Week for my 8th graders. Last year I tried to introduce article of the week, something I found from reading Kelly Gallagher’s Readacide. It flopped last year, not because of what the students did, but because I failed to follow through and assign it. It won’t happen this year. I am also more organized by providing a guide to the students to use when they are doing article of the week (I can direct anyone to sites where teachers have created guides or if you want my guide, let me know). I reminded my 8th graders the importance of reading informational text and stepping outside of their bubble. In class we went over the guide to completing article of the week and then I had the students read the article once without doing anything but read. Then, I had them decode the text and make notes in the margin so they demonstrated closer reading. In the end the students will need to write about the article. For example, they need to give me a brief summary, who was the intended audience, what was the author’s purpose, and what was their opinion about the article. I give the students one week to complete the article and I try to return it within a couple of days. I told the students I will post the articles for them to retrieve on Schoology. If students can not get access to the article, I can print it off for them. I also have the guidelines posted to the site as well. You can get articles on Kelly Gallagher’s resource page. With the students doing article of the week I am covering the following standards:

RIT.8.6 – Determine an author’s point of view or purpose in a text and analyze how the author acknowledges and responds to conflicting evidence or viewpoints.
RIT.8.2 – Determine a central idea of a text and analyze its development over the course of the text, including its relationship to supporting ideas; provide an objective summary of the text.
RIT.8.3 – Analyze how a text makes connections among and distinctions between individuals, ideas, or events (e.g., through comparisons, analogies, or categories).

Tomorrow I am introducing my 8th graders to Youth Voices. In addition, my 7th graders are doing their Wordles and I need to start getting student’s Gmail up and running for the use of Google Drive.

Cheers!

Narrative Reading and Writing

Leave a comment September 7, 2012 Jeremy Hyler

After giving my 7th/8th graders a small grammar pre-test, I launched my first unit for the year. When examining the Common Core standards I decided to launch a narrative unit first. Generally speaking, students really enjoy writing narrative pieces and reading them as well. I kicked off the unit by displaying the CCSS literature standard and the writing standard on the whiteboard:

(RL.8.2)Determine a theme or central idea of a text and analyze its development over the course of the text, including its relationship to the characters, setting, and plot; provide an objective summary of the text.
(W.8.3)Write narratives to develop real or imagined experiences or events using effective technique, relevant descriptive details, and well-structured event sequences.
a. Engage and orient the reader by establishing a context and point of view and introducing a narrator and/or characters; organize an event sequence that unfolds naturally and logically.

b. Use narrative techniques, such as dialogue, pacing, description, and reflection, to develop experiences, events, and/or characters.

c. Use a variety of transition words, phrases, and clauses to convey sequence, signal shifts from one time frame or setting to another, and show the relationships among experiences and events.

d. Use precise words and phrases, relevant descriptive details, and sensory language to capture the action and convey experiences and events.

e. Provide a conclusion that follows from and reflects on the narrated experiences or events.

*I am displaying the 8th grade standards here as an example.

I then wrote a few I can statements on the board so the students know what they will be able to do by the time we finish the unit. I do not put all of the I can statements on the board at once. I only put the ones on the board that the students will be currently working on. In a given day students could see up to four I can statements. Today, I had two on the board.

I can analyze plot (the events that happen) to determine a theme (author’s overall message).
I can define narrative and describe the basic parts of plot (exposition, rising action, climax, falling action, and resolution).

After sharing the standards and explaining what we are going to be doing, I share with my students the CCSS website. In addition, I share with them the mastery connect app where they can access the CCSS at anytime to see what they will be learning. I did actually have one student download it to their phone.

With all curriculum talk aside, I introduce my students to memoirs. We discuss the characteristics of memoirs and then provide them with some models. The book I introduce them is The Freedom Writers. I give the students background information on the book and then read a few passages out of the book. We then focus our attention back to memoirs and I assign them to write a 6 word memoir. I provide the students with several examples and then release them to write a 6 word memoir on Schoology. I put their assignment under the discussion tab and ask them not only write their 6 word memoir here, but to collaborate and respond to one other classmate. Tomorrow students will go back and create their first writing piece to put into their portfolio by revising their 6 word memoir and adding a picture and putting it into Google Docs. The 6 word memoir is the start to how the students will scaffold into a more complex memoir and narrative. My 7th graders are going to write a This I believe Paper and my 8th graders are going to write the more complex memoir. Below are some student examples of 6 word memoirs.

Dance all day, sleep all night. (7th grade)
Everything is lost, nothing is found. (7th grade)
Ate Mom’s cooking; died right there! (8th grade)
Keep smiling, even without the camera. (8th grade)

On a side note, my 5th hour class ran into a Schoology glitch today. Schoology decided to shut down their site for an update or something along those lines, it was very inconvenient and instead of panicking, I had the 8th graders research online what is an osage orange and if it has a realistic purpose.. You always have to have plan B ready to go!

Cheers!

Not Enough Time: Digital Citizenship/Mobile Devices/Discussions

Leave a comment September 5, 2012 Jeremy Hyler

Day 2 of school had its bright spots and its challenges. We are fortunate enough to have a mobile lab with 30 Dell Laptops for our students to use. After finishing some typical house keeping items, I was ready to deploy the laptops to my students. Before I assigned students to a computer, I began by asking students to help me make a list of examples of mobile devices. The list the students compiled looked like this:

laptops
cell phones
Kindles
PSP
Nintendo DS
Ipad
Ipod
Itouch
Nexus
tablets

It was clear to me, whether it was 7th or 8th grade, the students had a clear grasp on the concept of what a mobile device is. Upon completing our list on the whiteboard, I shifted their thinking to another topic that involved using mobile technologies; digital citizenship. As an educator and an advocate for the use of mobile technology in the classroom, I was disappointed when I posed the question: “Who has heard of digital citizenship?” Out of all three of my 7th grade classes, not one student raised their hand. This is a problem. By 7th grade students need to be made well aware of what it means to be a responsible digital citizen. Needless to say, I felt it was necessary to discuss this topic with them. During our conversation we discussed the characteristics of being a citizen. Students knew that a good citizen participated in community activities, was respectful, followed rules/laws, and needed to be helpful to others. After students exhausted all the characteristics we talked about how they apply to being a digital citizen as well. Furthermore, I took the time to address cyber-bullying and sexting. By the end of the week, I would like to develop a handout or sheet for the students to put inside of their planners stating their responsibilities as a digital citizen. I also want to send the handout home to parents to help educate them as well. The 8th graders were much better when it came to digital citizenship and that is because I discussed it with them last year. I did revisit cyber-bullying and sexting to pound home the importance behind what NOT to do when using a mobile device.

Even though I took more time discussing digital citizenship than what I wanted, it will be worth it in the long wrong. Laptops were handed out to each student. I called up 5 students at a time and assigned them a number. The number they are assigned will be the same number laptop they will use in other classes. This helps us as the teachers and our tech guy who to talk to if the computer has been used maliciously or it gets broken. On the whiteboard the students were given written directions on what to do with the computer.

Turn on the laptop
Login to your school account
Access Internet Explorer
Go to www.schoology.com
Watch the short video on the home page

After all of the students completed the tasks on the board, I walked them through the sign-up process for Schoology. Students were given their individual course codes and then they had to fill in their names, usernames, and passwords. I directed students to use their last name and first initial of their first name for their username. For example, mine would by hylerj. I asked them to make their passwords something easy to remember or use the same password they use for Facebook. Schoology has an excellent feature available to teachers where they can reset a student’s password if they happen to forget it. Now, I did run into a few glitches today with students not being able to log in to their school accounts meaning they couldn’t use the laptop that was in front of them. Such is life when it comes to technology. I had these students look on with other students who didn’t have difficulty logging in.

Despite the typical issues that came about today, I was able to get everyone signed into their courses I created. We then walked through the files/links tab and the discussion tab. We focused more of our attention on the discussion tab. It is here where we will be collaborating as a class. I will have the students post discussion questions for socratic discussions we will have in class. It will be a place I may post reading questions after the students finish a reading homework assignment, and it is a space where students can ask me questions about homework or other assignments. Today, I simply posted the question, what is your favorite music, music artist and why? I instructed the students to post their reply and respond to 2 other members in the class. Prior to releasing them to work on their own, I modeled for them what a quality response is to another member. Responses like nice, wow, I agree, I like that, and great are not accessible. I want my students to actually have a discussion, so I direct them to ask questions, be thoughtful and to put some time into their responses. This conversation and modeling is worth it because students really start to have quality discussions. Below is an example of what a discussion page looks like.

Once students got started, there weren’t any issues with them operating the site. A lot of students were shocked how much it is like Facebook. Even though it appears my students may not have done a lot in class today, they did complete at least one of the Common Core Standards.

Standards W.7.6 and W.8.6 – Use technology, including the internet, to produce and publish writing and to interact and collaborate with others.

Students were able to identify technology (Schoology) and collaborated with peers and their teacher through technology to enhance their writing.

By the time the end of the day came, I felt like I had been holding my breath all day long. It never seems like there is enough time to cover what needs to be done. Tomorrow brings us to Narrative reading.

Cheers!

1st Day Reflections

2 Comments September 4, 2012 Jeremy Hyler

As mentioned in my last blog, my goal is to write every day this year to reflect back on my experience. Perhaps some of what I write tonight should have been written prior to the start of the first day of school, but if I didn’t take time to think about what I did, I couldn’t reflect, right?

This is my second year teaching both 7th and 8th grade language arts. I have to say I am completely amazed at the differences between the two grades. There is a huge difference in maturity, both socially and academically.

Despite the differences, I felt both groups of students did fairly well today. I am not sure what other teachers do on their first day of class, but I do not go over any classroom rules with my students. Part of me believes that is what their expectation is from me and I like to keep my students guessing. Bwaaahaaahaaa! That was my evil, take over the world, laugh. Instead of the rules, I jumped right in and had both my 7th and 8th grade students take a narrative reading pre-test. The state of Michigan has required teachers and schools to measure student growth. Our district has decided on a pre and post test as a way to measure student growth. I was not about to give my students an eight page reading document and 36 questions for the reading portion. Instead, I discussed with my principal how I have broken down my units into Narrative, Informational, and Argumentative. This mirrors the Common Core Standards and three major areas of writing that the CCSS focuses on. I do not however, teach just tree units, I teach six total units. So, I have broken down my pre-tests and the students took a short seven question narrative reading pre-test. This is only one part of the narrative pre-test. I will be giving them a small grammar pre-test in the coming days over the grammar concepts we will cover during our narrative unit. As a language arts department, the students will show growth through a writing portfolio throughout the year. I know, it sounds confusing right? If you haven’t already checked out Kevin Hodgson’s blog today, I encourage you to do so at Kevin’s Meandering Mind. I think we all feel the way he has portrayed the teacher in his comic when it comes to juggling the Common Core.

I also addressed the homework policy for my classroom. Now, as any middle school teacher knows, it is our job to prepare them for high school. I am always amazed at the 7th graders response when we go over the homework policy. Usually their mouths are wide open and they are disbelief. This year I feel I am going hardcore my students. To put in simply, they lose 50% for being one day late unless it is a major project where they will lose 30%. If it is more than one day late, they get no credit. If you would like a copy of my homework policy just leave me a comment. If my students bring it back signed by them and their parents tomorrow, I will give them extra credit.

I also took time with my students today setting up their writing notebooks or journals. This is important because most days we start the hour by doing “writing into the hour”. I set my notebook up very similar to how Jeff Anderson discusses journal writing in his book Mechanically Inclined: Building Grammar, Usage and Style into Writer’s Workshop. My classroom is indeed a writer’s workshop and this book was read by our language arts department prior to the start of last year. This year we are reading Write Like This by Kelly Gallagher. “Writing into the hour” is basic. I give students a topic to write about. The students can choose to write about the given topic or they can write about what is on their mind that day. In addition, I allow my students to even go back to a previous days entry and either continue or revise that piece of writing. With having so many choices, the students have no excuse not to be writing. I give my students 5-7 minutes to write and ask them to forget about the editor in their head and just write.

With those two activities, there wasn’t a lot of time left in class. I did hand out reading textbooks to my 8th graders and I tried to become more acquainted with my 7th graders by playing 2 truths and a lie with them. It isn’t the most thought-provoking activity, but it is fun and the students seem to enjoy it.

Now tomorrow and the rest of the week is going to bring in a whirlwind of technology to the students. Tomorrow the students will set-up their Schoology account and I will demonstrate and walk them through the reason we will be using this digital tool. Thursday the students will set-up their Twitter accounts and Friday we will do a recap and then move our way towards getting our Celly accounts ready. It is a busy week, so I am off to bed and ready to start another adventure tomorrow. Email or leave a comment with any questions

Cheers!

Welcome Back

Leave a comment August 31, 2012 Jeremy Hyler

Well, my summer break was officially over this past week as I trudged through my mornings with my coffee in hand trying to fall back into a routine that will be a part of my daily life starting Tuesday. To those teachers and administrators that have been back for awhile, I hope all is going well. Welcome back everyone!

It has been a busy summer and one of the best I have had since going through the summer writing institute in 2010. With that being said, I went back to school Monday with an open mind and an understanding that things were going to be different again. It seems over the past 5 years that I have been teaching at the middle school level, there has been some type of change; whether it has been teaching assignments, new staff, or even new administrators. The week was interesting, but also very trying.

I applaud my principal for keeping an open mind to the use of technology in the classroom. We had a two hour segment titled 21st century learning and there were three staff members who presented, including myself. My principal wanted us to share what we were doing in our classroom to engage today’s learner. Three different digital tools were presented to the staff:

Moodle
Celly
Schoology

I of course being the big Celly user introduced this to my colleagues.

The middle school science teacher discussed Moodle, which I do not use and do not really care for. I find it difficult to navigate and not very user friendly for the students.

Finally, one of our high school language arts teachers showed Schoology. All 7th-11th graders will be using Schoology this year as a way to communicate, get access to assignments, and collaborate. Parents can even see what is happening in class.

One of the bigger issues at the helm was student growth. Our beloved politicians in my state want teachers to be able prove they are doing their job by displaying there was student growth. What is this supposed to look like? Well, that is superb question. One way our principal wants us to show student growth is by giving a pre and post test. In addition, we were to discuss other ways within our departments how we could potentially show student growth. The language arts department discussed writing portfolios and the possibilities digital portfolios bring. With students from grades 7-11 using Schoology, it would be easy to pass their digital portfolios from year to year. Schoology syncs well with Google Docs, so students can create folders within Google docs and put their writing samples in it. The more important question is what is the definition of student growth? If a student scores one more right on the post-test than what they did on the pre-test, is that considered student growth? What is classified as being proficient? 75%. 80%. It was a conversation that quite frankly literally gave me a headache.

I deem myself as a hard working teacher and I know my students get better by the end of the year, but what truly is an accurate way to measure student growth. I am curious if there is anyone who has suggestions.

I am blessed to have a job and I love being a teacher. I know I will have another successful year based on the mere fact I will engage my students each and every day. I want my students begging me to keep reading and writing. That is my measure for student growth.

Keep reading and spread the word. I want to write everyday during the school year. I want to use it as a reflective time to help me form my thoughts for the book I am working on.

Cheers!

Positive Social Media

Leave a comment July 29, 2012 Jeremy Hyler

My brain has been swirling around a lot of 21st century learning this past week and I know the only to keep my thoughts straight is to write about it. There is no doubt social media is becoming more and more apparent in the classroom. Though school policies may ban it from districts, teachers and students are fighting for it. Yes, I know, I may not be saying anything new, but I wanted to share what will be taking place this year in my classroom and at my school and how I came to this point.

What to choose?

Twitter, Facebook, Celly, Edmodo, Schoology, Remind 101, Etc. I am sure I am missing a few. It is tough to decide which social media platform to choose. It can be really overwhelming and rather perplexing. First, I suggest choosing something you are either familiar with or you can familiarize yourself with and won’t take up too much of your time. My wife uses Facebook. She is a band director and at the beginning of this summer she launched a group page. She know I am technology savvy and asked me how to do it and I honestly could not give her an answer because though I have a Facebook account, I am not the huge of a fan of Facebook and didn’t know how to complete the task she was asking. She trudged through, figured it out and now has a over two hundred parents and students as part of that group. She uses it to send out reminders, answer questions, create events, and keep an open line of communication of between herself and parents. It works for her and she is having success. For example, she had a fundraiser event and she had over forty student volunteers because her students are a part of that social media page/group. Facebook, on the other hand, doesn’t work for me. Facebook was never intended to be used in schools and therefore, you have bullying issues and students can private message each other and that opens a dangerous door. Other social media platforms are simpler to navigate and upload images,files, assignments, etc.

During the 2011-2012 school year, I tried to use Edmodo in my classroom. Edmodo is a great social platform that mirrors Facebook and students can dive right in and they don’t skip a beat as Facebook users. Messages can be posted along with links, assignments, etc. The issue I have with Edmodo is that students can get off topic easily (This can be an issue with any social media website) and students can still send private messages to each other like Facebook. My student’s wound up creating digital debris this past year because the more I worked with it, I didn’t care for it. Teachers can belong to groups and get other ideas from teachers. I am sure with more training and practice, I could have made it work, I just wasn’t sold 100% on it. This doesn’t mean it won’t work for other teachers.

Celly was my main social media platform I used this past year and you can read about in my other blog posts or go to the National Writing Project’s Digital Is website and read about it.

What I Am Doing 2012-2013

At the end of the school year we had a department meeting. My high school colleague introduced Schoology to myself and another language arts teacher. Like a professional poker player, I am all in! Schoology rocks because my students and parents can join it once I give them an access code (Edmodo does the same). Students can NOT private message each other. All messages are public and viewable by me the teacher, eliminating cyber bullying. Resources can be shared amongst teachers, assignments can be uploaded to students along with links. The greatest thing about Schoology is the fact students can upload Google docs to the site, which I have not seen with other social media platforms. I use Google Docs in my classroom and essentially had a paperless classroom by the end of the year. We are going to be a Google Apps school this year and we will house the students portfolios there. We agreed between the three of us we would incorporate this social media platform into our classes. It makes sense for us to keep our lines of communication open with our students and parents and we want to properly assess our student writers by using a writing portfolio that can be passes from grade to grade. We will at least have grade 7-11 covered using a digital portfolio.

What ever you consider or choose, just keep in mind that there will be students and parents who may not have internet access. Also, consult with your principal and read your policies on using such a tool. Also, create a sample student so you see things from their perspective too. Believe me, it helps! Each of these social media sites have apps for smartphones too. I believe the Celly app is still in the beta stages. Also, investigate Youth Voices too. I will be blogging about this site this year as I incorporate into my writing lessons. Social media is a digital writing tool that should be considered for any classroom as we teach the 21st century learner. The collaboration can be endless with using such a tool. It isn’t just about students sitting in front of their computer, phone, or mobile device.

Look for more blog posts this week. I am going to try and do one at least 3 times this week. Connected Learning kicks of this week too at NWP.

Cheers!