Teacherof20

Best Science Lessons for Kindergarteners - Science is FUN!

2024-06-07T11:29:00.000-07:00

Students' early years (5 to 10 years old) are a time of incredible brain development and learning with the help of hands-on science lessons for kindergartners.

During kindergarten, they will be learning to recognize patterns and formulate answers to questions about the world around them. It means forming a way how to learn, adapt and perceive new concepts at school.

This is a critical time. That’s why experienced teachers recommend parents expose kids (5-10 years old) to science, which can help them develop necessary thinking skills, creativity, and problem-solving abilities. Science lessons can also help them build a foundation for future learning and success in school and beyond.

In this blog, we will educate you about how to indulge your students' curiosity in learning science and recommend the best science lessons for this academic year.

Why is Science Education a must for Kindergarteners?

Develops Critical Thinking Skills:

Science lessons teach kids to ask questions, gather evidence, and come up with conclusions.

Encourages Creativity:

Science is all about exploring and experimenting. This can help your kids develop their creativity and problem-solving skills.

Builds Curiosity:

Science lessons help kids learn to help them spark their curiosity and encourage them to ask questions.

Promotes Teamwork:

Many science lessons require kids to work together to help them learn how to cooperate and collaborate with others.

Provides Real-World Skills:

Kids learn skills in science lessons, including problem-solving, critical thinking, and creativity.

You should check out these well-structured science lessons for Kindergarteners. It includes interactive kindergarten science topics from Earth sciences, Science, General Sciences, and sciences subjects, such as types of stones and what they are, and Interactive exercises with Boom Cards.

Experienced and certified kindergarten teachers with years of practical experience design science lessons. The concept of one-word definitions and recalling exercises with boom cards is to cross-check how much your student understands the concepts of each word.

How Is It the Best Science Lesson for Kindergarteners?

Visual & Spatial Learning:

One usual setback parents experience is that their kids need clarification on multiple words and what they are, function, or look like.

Here are our realistic pictures with basic definitions. They are too easy for kids to learn, adapt and understand. Next time your kid will recognize all sorts of stones, parts of a plant, and the texture when out in the yard.

Interactive Fun Study Methods:

Let’s make learning science lessons for kindergarteners fun again! Learning science doesn’t necessarily have to be boring or monotonous. Our expert teachers introduced a flexible way of knowing for kids, breaking down complex topics into more straightforward exercises, and made fun learning games to ensure the kids give undivided attention to their lessons.

Boom Cards

Surprise your kids, make them curious, and initiate critical thinking with Boom card activity. Our Boom cards check their memory recall system and cross-check what they have interpreted yet from the sciences lessons.

Mistakes from My First Year Back in the Classroom

2023-08-15T13:48:00.001-07:00

1. Being Too Friendly

Students in 4th grade come across as very grown up. Even though their height may deceive you (especially in the 2nd semester), 4th graders are oscillating back and fourth between tweens that are exerting their independence by rolling their eyes at you and babies that look up to you and cry on your shoulder. This was quite shocking for me to see the disparity in behaviors, but now that i've done it once this year I know the subtle balance of being a 10 year old. This year I am going to know the balance between joking around with students and when students are expected to exhibit a certain behavior. As a first year teacher, you will have to play around with this and learn the difference between building relationships and rapport with your class and letting them walk all over you or cause you to be inconsistent in your expectations because you're trying to be the nice guy. An example: "Do I have to come to the carpet?"

2. Not Having Behavior Systems in Place

When you walk into a fourth grade classroom, kids are no longer as sweet and they don't think it's cool to sing songs. However I learned last year that this doesn't mean they won't work towards a tangible or intangible reward of some sort. I learned that having systems and structures in place are essential to running an efficient classroom. This year, I will start by having a star card. Each student gets one and is in charge of coloring in the stars and keeping track of their card. I like to run it off on bright paper so they stand out. Students will color a star when I see them doing an expected behavior. When they fill their star card they may choose from a list of prizes predetermined beforehand. In the end, I learned that it is more rewarding to 4th graders to get the star than the actual prize. But having it to work towards give them an incentive to fill out their card. If you want to know more about class incentives and table incentives and how these are different form individual incentives i am happy to do a video on that. Leave a comment below letting me know because I have a lot i learned about that as well!

3. Butchering My Classroom Setup

My small group table was in a corner of the room. It needs to be in the center of the room equidistant from all other locations where students would be. Inevitably, last year the three students at the classroom library were chatting about things other than academics and/or using their ipads for something other than the assignment.

4. Not Knowing Correct Boundaries with Technology

My school, as all others in the US post-COVID, is a 1:1 campus. This means that students had access to their own iPad all the time. My plan for that this year will be to have students physically put their iPads in a bin/cart when they walk in and only get them when they need them. I don't know how well I will be able to stick to this as I've never tried it. I will also have to check with my partner teacher when we switch classes to see if she is ok with this idea. I think having kids put their ipads in a cart before switching classes and transferring the cart over will help transition time run a lot more smoothly as well. I was wanting to get a cart like this one, and students #1-5 ipdas go in the first slot, #6-10 go in the second, etc. for easy access.

5. Not Taking it too Personal

One of my favorite teacher volggers said it best when she said "Everyone is going to be who they are going to be." Parents WILL have negative things to say about you adn they'll have positive things to say. I think when parents have negative things to say, we pour so much of ourselves into this profession (whether or not you are burnt out) that it is so hard not to take it personally. In the end, people ultimately see you through their lens, and it is important not to loose sight of that. If you are doing what you think is best and it is coming from a good place, you will be at peace with yourself and that is who you have to live with for the rest of your life! Be open to constructive criticism and make changes where needed but "haters gonna hate. proverbs 9:8."

Strategies to Teach Cause and Effect for Elementary Grades

2023-07-21T17:00:00.004-07:00

Meet Stephanie, the teacher behind School House Rap with over 20 years of experience and enjoys creating picture book companions. She's a picture book fanatic and loves using them to teach her elementary and middle school students. In fact, she's been known to break out with a spontaneous rap in the classroom, using picture book characters as her inspiration. Don’t worry; she won’t quit her day job. Understanding cause and effect is a critical skill in children learning to process the world around them. From recognizing that pushing a toy will make it move to understand that studying for a test can result in higher grades, grasping the concept of cause and effect forms the basis for problem-solving, critical thinking, and scientific reasoning. But how can elementary school teachers make this abstract concept more tangible for their young students? Let’s explore some engaging strategies to teach cause and effect to elementary students, making the learning experience educational and fun!

Start with Concrete Examples

Begin by introducing your students to cause and effect through well-chosen real-life examples. Choose everyday scenarios that they are likely to encounter or be familiar with. For instance, talk about how watering plants help them grow or how turning on the faucet causes water to come out. Ensure your examples are relatable so students can easily understand the connection between actions and consequences.

Use Visual Aids

Visual aids can greatly enhance learning, particularly for young students struggling with abstract reasoning. Consider using illustrations depicting various cause-and-effect scenarios, comic strips demonstrating actions leading to consequences, or flowcharts showing multiple causes leading to a single effect or vice versa. Short video clips can also provide engaging examples of cause and effect in action.

Use Hands-On Activities

Engaging students in hands-on activities is an effective way to reinforce their understanding of cause-and-effect relationships. It’s an awesome way to integrate science in your reading lesson. Here are a few ideas for hands-on activities you can try in the classroom: - Domino Effect: Set up a row of dominoes and ask your students to predict what will happen when they push one domino over. Knock down the first domino together and observe as its effect ripples through the whole chain. - Baking Soda and Vinegar Experiment: Conduct a simple experiment by mixing baking soda and vinegar in a small container. Be sure to explain that the vinegar's reaction with the baking soda causes gas bubbles to form, resulting in an exciting eruption. - Egg Drop: Challenge your students to design devices using household items that protect eggs from breaking when dropped from various heights. The task demonstrates that providing cushioning or support can significantly decrease the impact force, preventing the egg from cracking.

Encourage Text-Based Analysis

Once your students have gained experience understanding cause and effect through hands-on activities, introduce them to text-based analysis. Studying cause-and-effect relationships in books or articles helps students further sharpen their analytical skills. Choose age-appropriate readings that clearly illustrate the concept of cause and effect. As a class, identify the actions that result in particular outcomes, and discuss other possible consequences if those actions differ. Encourage your students to pay close attention to textual clues that signal causal connections, such as “because” or “as a result.” Here are a few picture books to use for Cause-and-Effect: If You Give a Moose a Muffin (or any If You Give…book) by Laura Joffe Numeroff Ish by Peter H Reynolds On Account of the Gum Adam Rex

Play Cause and Effect Games

Games offer a fun way for children to practice their newfound understanding of cause-and-effect relationships: - Inference Bingo: Create Bingo cards featuring various actions and potential outcomes (positive and negative) for these actions. As you read an action or outcome, have your students cover the corresponding squares on their cards, aiming for a full row. -Cause and Effect Matching Game: Students take turns flipping over cards printed with either causes or effects, attempting to find matching pairs. -Chain Reaction Game: Students create a cause-and-effect chain by linking cards containing events and their consequences. These games sharpen students' understanding of cause and effect and foster teamwork and communication skills.

Encourage Journal Writing

One effective way for students to apply their understanding of cause and effect is through journal writing. Encourage them to choose a topic or event from their daily lives and discuss the causes leading up to it and the effects that followed. This activity allows students to practice recognizing cause-and-effect relationships in a personal context.

Scaffold Learning with Graphic Organizers

Graphic organizers, such as T-charts or flowcharts, can help students better understand cause-and-effect relationships by visually representing them. Provide templates for your students to complete as they read texts or engage in discussions about cause and effect, filling in boxes with either causes or effects for each given scenario. Gradually scaffold this process by offering less support until students can confidently organize their thoughts without assistance. To sum up, comprehending cause and effect is a vital ability that contributes significantly to children's perception of the surrounding environment. This concept forms the bedrock for critical thinking, scientific reasoning, and problem-solving. Cause-and-Effect is an important skill for students to learn and challenging for students to understand, it can be achieved through effective teaching strategies, all while having fun! If you want to see picture book recommendations for different reading strategies, you can check out School House Rap on Instagram @school_house_rap or Facebook. Sign up here for weekly freebies delivered to your inbox.

Addition Fact Fluency

2023-07-14T17:00:00.051-07:00

When I began my teaching career as a second grade teacher, there was one mathematical standard that frightened me the most. “By the end of second grade, know from memory all sums of two one-digit numbers.” (CCSS 2.OA.B.2) I approached this standard in the same way in which I was taught my addition and subtraction facts by drilling my students with facts. I incorporated flashcards, games that required quick recall of the sum like knock out and around the world as well as weekly fact quizzes into my math lessons, but as the year progressed, there were two problems that surfaced.

1. My students were not engaged during fact practice time. To be frank, they were bored.

2. My students were not making progress on their weekly fact quizzes.

Needless to say, I was feeling quite defeated. My second grade students were not going to know the addition facts to 20 from memory by the end of the year if I continued to employ the same strategies. Luckily, around this same time, I was able to attend some professional development at my local university’s STEM Education office. Through this training, I learned about the concept of fact fluency, which is “the skill in carrying out procedures flexibly, accurately, efficiently and appropriately.” I further learned that fact fluency is developed over the course of three stages.

Stage One: Counting

When a student is solving facts at the first stage of fact fluency, they are solving facts by counting with objects, tools, manipulatives or mentally. And yes, fingers are tools!

What stage one looks like:

In this photo, we can see that the mathematician solved this equation using objects, in this case, colored pencils. They took out two colored pencils to represent the first addend and three to represent the second addend. To determine the sum, the mathematician counted the number of colored pencils.

In this photo, we can see that the mathematician solved this equation using a numberline. They started at the first addend, 5, and jumped forward two. They landed at the number seven, which was the sum of the equation.

Stage Two: Deriving

When a student is in the deriving stage, they are using strategies to solve unknown facts. Stage two is perhaps the most important to develop fact fluency, and it was the stage that was missing in my instruction.I was trying to take my students from stage one to stage three without teaching them explicit strategies. The problem was, I had no idea what these strategies were, much less how to teach them! Through some learning ( I highly recommend reading Math FactFluency by Jannifer Bay-Williams and Gina Kling for learning the specific strategies and how to teach them), I learned that there are 7 addition strategies, which are broken down into foundational and derived strategies. Mastery of the foundational fact sets must be achieved prior to moving on to the derived strategies.

The foundational strategies are:

1. Counting On 0, 1 and 2

2. Doubles Combinations of Ten

3. Adding Ten

The derived strategies are:

1. Near Doubles

2. Making Ten

3. Pretend a Ten

Proficiency of these strategies is crucial for students to move onto the third and final stage of fact fluency.

What Stage Two Looks Like:

Stage Three: Mastery

When a student is in the mastery stage, they are able to efficiently and accurately solve facts. They may solve from memory, or they may have become so efficient at using a specific strategy, that they do it mentally within seconds (sometimes without even recognizing they are using the strategy!).

What Stage Three Looks Like:

This is the simplest of the three stages to identify. A student has achieved mastery when you are able to ask them a fact, and they are able to solve it mentally within 3-6 seconds. Alright, so I now knew and understood the three stages of fact fluency, but I was still left with a problem. How do I move my second grade students from stage 1 to stage 3 by the end of the year?

Moving from Stage 1 to Stage 2:

In order for students to progress from stage one to stage two, teachers must spend time explicitly teaching each of the strategies. Teachers also must provide ample practice opportunities for utilizing the strategy with objects, tools and manipulatives.

Moving from Stage 2 to Stage 3:

After you have taught the strategy and began to provide practice opportunities, you will notice that students will slowly stop reaching for the objects, tools and manipulatives. This is a sign that the student has moved to stage two! At this point, it is of utmost importance that you nurture the student’s confidence, efficiency and proficiency with the strategy you have taught. I previously thought this should be done through flashcards and timed games and quizzes. But as we already know, that was ineffective. My students were not moving to stage 3 with those activities. Through my professional development and reading, I discovered that the best way to nurture my students’ confidence and efficiency is to incorporate strategic games play into my math block. Games increase student engagement and efficiency without stress and anxiety that can be a product of tests and timed games. I began developing games that targeted specific strategies for my students to play. You can purchase the games individually or by the bundle in my store - learn more about them here!

Some of my students’ favorites are:

Race to the Top In this game, students have a game board (that I laminate) with equations on it. They place the race cars on the bottom of the board. To start the round, they play, “Rock, Paper, Scissors!” The winner of the game solves the equation above their race car. If they correctly solve the equation, they move their race car up the board. The first player to reach the finish line wins! My students love playing these games (seriously, I get cheers when they are in my math stations!), and I love how they get ample strategy practice without anxiety. I also can track data so well with the record sheets, which lets me know when a student may be ready to learn another addition strategy!

Go Fish! In this game, students have a mix of cards with equations and sums. If they have an equation card and are looking for the sum card, they ask a fellow student for the sum of the equation. If they have a sum card and are looking for the equation card, they ask if a student has a card with the specific equation on it.

I hope that this has been both informative and actionable for you. I would love if you left a comment with something you took away from this blog post! Happy teaching! Sources: Bay-Williams, J. M., & Kling, G. (2019). Math fact fluency: 60+ games and assessment tools to support learning and retention. ASCD. National Governors Association Center for Best Practices & Council of Chief State School Officers. (2010). Common Core State Standards for Mathematics.Washington, DC: Authors.

Bio

Hi, I’m Gretchen from Learning with Miss G! I believe that all people are Math people, and I currently work as a Math Interventionist for students in Grades 3-8. I am passionate about fact fluency, color by number worksheets, national parks and a good rom-com. Check out my Teachers Pay Teachers store and Instagram for more resources and tips!

Embracing the Adventure: Math Back to School for Middle Schoolers

2023-07-08T12:24:00.004-07:00

As summer draws to a close, it's time for students to pack their backpacks, lace up their shoes, and embark on a brand new academic journey. For middle schoolers, the back to school season is an exciting time filled with opportunities to learn, grow, and explore various subjects. in this blog post, we will dive into the world of math back to school activities specifically designed for middle school students. Additionally we will introduce a thrilling no-prep activity that combines math practice with technology, promoting engagement and a sense of adventure in the classroom.

Making Math Fun

Mathematics may not always be everyone's favorite subject, but it doesn't have to be boring. One of the key aspects of a successful math back to school experience is finding innovative ways to make learning fun and engaging for students. By incorporating interactive activities, puzzles, and games into the curriculum, educators can transform the traditional perception of math and ignite a passion for numbers within their students.

Introducing the No-Prep Activity

Imagine a math activity that requires no preparation, aligns perfectly with the curriculum, and captivates students from the moment they step into the classroom. Our no-prep activity focuses on one-step equations (no negative numbers) and utilizes the power of Google Sheets to provide an exciting and hands-on learning experience. This activity, suitable for eighth-grade students, combines the thrill of problem-solving with the intrigue of uncovering a mystery message. As students successfully solve the equations, a hidden message is revealed, creating a sense of accomplishment and reinforcing their math skills.

Engaging Middle Schoolers

Middle schoolers thrive when they are actively engaged in the learning process. By incorporating technology and gamification into math back to school activities, educators can capture their students' attention and foster a love for mathematics. The no-prep activity described above is a perfect example of how technology can be seamlessly integrated into the classroom to create a dynamic and interactive learning environment. Through the use of Google Sheets, students can easily input their answers and witness the magic of the mystery message unfolding before their eyes.

Benefits of the No-Prep Activity

The no-prep activity offers numerous benefits for both educators and students. Firstly, it saves valuable time that would otherwise be spent on preparing materials, allowing teachers to focus on instruction and individualized support. Secondly, the interactive nature of the activity promotes active learning, critical thinking, and problem-solving skills. Students become immersed in the task at hand, eagerly working to decipher the mystery message. Furthermore, the activity fosters collaboration and teamwork as students can work in pairs or groups, discussing strategies and supporting one another. Lastly, the integration of technology not only enhances student engagement but also equips them with essential digital literacy skills that are increasingly important in today's world.

As the new school year begins, it's essential to create a positive and engaging environment for middle schoolers, especially when it comes to mathematics. By incorporating innovative and exciting activities like the no-prep Google Sheets activity described in this blog post, educators can spark enthusiasm and curiosity in their students. The combination of problem-solving, technology, and the thrill of uncovering a mystery message ensures that math back to school is a memorable adventure for all. Don't miss out on this opportunity to make math enjoyable and set the stage for a successful academic year. Grab this freebie now and embark on an unforgettable math journey!

Guest Blogger BIO

Hi, I'm an Italian math teacher. I have been teaching math since 2002. I believe that as

teachers we need to provide not only education for the students, but we have to try to create

better people: caring, long life learners. Specifically, I believe that education in mathematics

is that of injecting into the students a true passion for what is considered to be a universal

language, a scientific technique, but also to make them appreciate it for what it is.

https://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Store/Matemaths

Back to School Classroom Decor

2023-06-30T17:00:00.002-07:00

Looking for a cute new look to your classroom? Wanting to try something new this back to school season but don't know where to start?

Last year I began teaching for the first time in 10 years! I wanted my classroom to be a space where I could relax and unwind, and an inviting space for my students. Teachers work long hours, so I knew this would be my home away from home.

First things first, I purchased a little coffee Keurig on sale with the themed color of my classroom. I needed to stay caffeinated for sure! :) The palate of my classroom is white, black, and succulents. Teal/turquoise is used as an accent color. The succulents have a splash of purples and greens as well. I didn't want to venture too far off from that palate.

I created numbers for the backpack hooks, as well as inspirational posters (available in English and Spanish), as I know that Growth Mindset is a focal point of classrooms and of life in general these days. Both of these products can be found in my TpT store, Teacherof20.

I documented my back to school classroom set up journey in a newly created Youtube channel where I often look back nostalgically. I like to watch it and see how much I have accomplished since then, and what I experienced my first year back to teaching after a hiatus.

It has been such a rewarding experience for many reasons, not the least of which is the fact that I got to bring my own kids with me to school. It has been such a blessing, and I have so many new ideas for this new year. Perhaps I will document those on my Youtube channel as well! Cheers! And best of luck with your classroom decor this back to school season!

Three Easy Ways to Maximize Instructional Time

2019-10-01T07:00:00.000-07:00

In my time in the classroom I've seen the teachers often spend so much time teaching routines and structures thereby neglecting the content. In this blog entry, I'll talk about how to leave routines the same, to free up time for teaching the content. 1. Teach the same game with different content. There are many games floating around that are all the same basic principle. Teach it, then change up the content it teaches. For example, in this October Freebie, there is a Spin n' Jump game. You can have this be an activity at a station all year, with different content. The Spin n' Jump game could be about 3D Shapes, sight words, vocabulary terms with non-linguistic representations...you name it! The game is the same, but you'd be reinforcing different content based on what you're learning that week.

Likewise, with this Roll n' Graph game, found in the same freebie, you can use the same format, and change up the content in the game. I've used roll n' graph games for anything from sight words to number words to vocabulary terms...the possibilities are endless!

2. Anchor charts galore: you should not just post anchor charts, but refer to them often. Place them in a spot where students can refer to them. When they ask you a question, point them to the anchor chart. Praise the student publicly that refers to the anchor chart before asking you the question. Soon, all students will develop the independence that comes from looking for the information themselves. This frees up time for you to be a facilitator during a lesson, instead of the person they go to for help when they encounter a problem.

3. Have a predictable day. Every day your students should know that when they come in from recess they get their CGI notebook, and that after that they start their math lesson. Building these predictable patterns in your day minimizes confusion and transition times because you don't have to tell your students what's next. They already know that when you call their table, they will put their notebook in their cubby and go to the carpet for whole group instruction.

Teacherof20 is a stay at home mom, and past K-1st teacher and reading specialist. She enjoys making clipart for her TpT store and helping other teach, ready to go products that challenge students! You can also follow her on facebook for seasonal freebies!

End of the Year Activities

2019-04-29T05:07:00.000-07:00

Top 5 things to do to keep your class engaged the last month of school

Here are some things to keep your students motivated and engaged in class the last few weeks of school. It can be hard to keep their attention when they've checked out for summer break (even though we're only in April!!). Here are some tools you can use to help students feel motivated to finish out the year strong!

1. Balloon pop motivation

Set up balloons at the top of the whiteboard (where kids can’t reach) and the last few minutes of class pop one a day (if they've had a good day). Inside have incentives, such as no shoes the last 10 minutes of class, have a dance party, have free time with blocks and board games, etc. If the class doesn't have a good day that day they don't get to pop a balloon!

2. Games, games, games

Have students bring in their favorite board game to play with classmates at

a designated time of the day. If you need to cover academics during this time, board games are easy to turn into knowledge assessments: put math facts (addition/subtraction or multiplication/division) that they need to solve in order to complete their turn. Sight words are easy to incorporate as well. And if you want something more challenging than reading a sight word, have them read a sentence or in the uppper elementary. grades have them identify parts of speech, or the main idea of a paragraph.

3. Game show day
Divide the class in two teams and play a game of Jeapordy. Put up price points on the white board and have students from either team pick a price point, and answer a question of your choosing.

4. Shaving cream math

An oldie but a goodie! Who can resist a little shaving cream on the tables. To make it an academic activity, practice math facts, or write sight words. When the shaving cream eventually wears off, there's little clean up! It literally just dissovles. It is a good idea to have a few wipes on hand, as it does leave a little residue. It is nice to have wipes to clean off tables and hands afterwards. Kids LOVE this, and it certainly gets them excited about math!!

5. Class Field Day

Chances are your P.E. teacher will schedule a field day sometime towards the end of the year. Why not have a separate one for your class? Pick a random Friday (or any convenient day of the week that doesn't conflict with any other field trips, standardized testing, etc) and set up a hula hoop station, a jump rope station, a horseshoe station, a sidewalk chalk station, etc. Divide your students so each group can rotate through every station once. Each station can last between 5-10 minutes depending on how engaged students are with the activities. You'll likely want to make this a 30-40 minute field day tops and towards the end of the day so students are motivated to do their best throughout the day.

2019-04-22T12:08:00.000-07:00

This week’s talented teacherpreneur is Johanna from ThatTeacherJo. She started creating resources when, as a bilingual teacher, she couldn’t find any quality Spanish resources. She figured if she needed them, other teachers did as well. She’s been growing her store ever since!

The supplement resources to the Daily Five and CAFE she’s created are the most valuable resources she’s made. They have helped her structure her literacy block which was a great starting point for her 9 years ago when she became a teacher.

She tells any aspiring teacherpreneur that if you create resources for your class, most likely others will need them too. She’s often downloaded others products and used them in her class, to which she is very grateful. Take a chance and go for it. There are many tips on how to get started out there.

Her next venture as a teacherpreneur is to learn how to create digital resources on google slides. It is top on her to do list for the summer!

Talented Teacherpreneur - Ser Bilingue Rocks!

2019-04-08T07:30:00.000-07:00

This week's Talented Teacherpreneur is Angie from Ser Bilingue Rocks! She has been teaching for six years, and was originally inspired to become a teacherpreneur because of the lack of Spanish resources she had access to. Her store has steadily been increasing in growth, and she is now a very proud teacherpreneur because she creates resources in both languages that help other teachers and students from all over!

The most valuable resource in her store, and the one that's inspired her to create more hands-on engaging resources for her classroom and her store, is the 2D Shapes booklets. They are available in both languages, but her Spanish version, "Figuras Geometricas 2D" is her top seller!

Her advice to aspiring teacherpreneurs? Do your research. When she opened her store, she didn't upload a resource for another 2 months after that! She was busy researching how to create products, including how to write descriptions for the products, giving credit to other authors, cross selling other resources within the product descriptions, and making product covers more attractive. Even something as simple as uploading a square product cover can make a huge difference in how that product is recieved! She suggests investing in quality clipart and fonts for your students and not just for the sake of it. Lastly she says not to compare yourself to other sellers, and take a risk!

The area she'd like to grow more professionally is learning how to help students with special needs succeed in her classroom!

2019-04-01T10:24:00.000-07:00

If you teach K-2nd, you know that you have a certain amount of minutes dedicated to each subject. Yet the increasing rigor in the standards require kindergarten teachers to have their class reading by the end of the year. So, we find ways to incorporate ELA skills into content areas while still teaching content area standards. We hope our kindergarten science units have some grade level text. How can we incorporate ELA into science units successfullly? Here are 3 steps you can take:

1. Find grade level text that talks about what you're teaching. Some good resources are Reading A-Z. While most of their books don't directly address the Kindergarten Science Curriculum, they do contain certain science themes appropriate for kindergarten. This water clarity reader, this weather reader, and this "how objects move" science predictable reader meet the Texas

kinder TEKS. They include a predictable reader and a video that reads the book aloud to be used for a shared reading. Each reader also comes with an interactive notebook activity appropraite for kindergarten. These will soon be a part of a bundle, and were designed as a way to add rigor to your science lesson plans.

Whichever resource you choose, you can have it available after your science unit is complete. It can be put in your science center, or in children's book boxes, depending on what their independent reading level is.

2. Follow a 5E lesson plan. (Engage, explore, explain, elaborate, evaluate). If you follow this format for math and science, you will more than likely have to find text to go with the "explain" portion of your lesson. This builds in the reading component in your science lesson for kindergarten. It serves as your reminder when you're lesson planning, to incorporate some sort of grade level text. Sometimes you'll be able to fit in the kindergarten science text to the "elaborate" portion as well! In the "explain" or "elaborate" portion of your lesson you can also incorporate a written response, which brings me to my next point...

3. Incorporate a written response or reflection at some point in your lesson. If you're doing a

science experiment with your kindergarten students that day, you could have them write their prediction right before you've told them the experiment and they're excited about it. If you've just explored hands on materials for a lesson you're teaching, take the time to have them reflect. First they tell their impressions to a buddy (as a pre-writing activity). Then have them go to their seat and quietly reflect in their science interactive notebook about their findings. The aforementioned Kindergarten Science Units are a great way to do this. Each lesson contains an interactive notebook activity appropriate for kindergarten students.

4. Make sure you have a content area word bank and post the unit's vocabulary on it. Vocabulary is so important! So many of our students come to school with a very limited knowledge of academic vocabulary. Having a word bank in your classroom for each content area not only gives students a visual, but also helps you (the teacher) incorporate this vocabulary into the lesson. You can refer to your word bank throughout your lesson for students to have a better understanding of what you're talking about (especially if the word bank includes images or non-verbal representations of the meanings of words). Below you can see an example of some vocabulary cards that would be perfect for a kindergarten science word bank.

Talented Teacherpreneur: DianaJo's Math and More

2019-03-25T05:30:00.000-07:00

This week's talented teacherpreneur is DianaJo from DianaJo's Math and More! She loves to help students that are struggling with math. So much so, that she has tutored over 200 students one on one, and gained many valuable insights to lower achieving students that can help them succeed!

She initially heard of TpT when a friend of hers retired, and encouraged her to create and sell products. The idea of being able to create anything she wanted really drew her.

The most valuable product she's made for her store has been her Math and ART! products. Most of her work has been with struggling students. She had these kids in mind when she created Math and ART! These products really help struggling students because they are self correcting and fun!

One thing she'd like to know more about is incorporating STEAM into her math class especially. She hopes to do some research on this and offer related products in the coming year. After all, learning happens best when we connect numbers to real life! Another goal she has for 2019 is to expand her Math and Art! products, and make products more affordable for teachers by bundling where possible.

Guided Reading Lesson Plans Kindergarten

2019-03-18T07:30:00.000-07:00

There are five simple steps I follow for my guided reading lesson in kindergarten. It doesn't matter if I've hashed out what I'm doing with my group for hours in advance, or if I'm just fumbling through that particular week, these five steps are easy to follow no matter what amount of planning you've done!

1. Phonemic Awareness: the best bang for your buck in the phonemic awareness realm is blending and segmenting phonemes because those are the skills most directly tied to reading. If the assessment your district uses requires your students to substitute or omit phonemes, then be sure you're working towards that goal during this portion of the lesson. Otherwise, focus on the blending and segmenting during a guided reading lesson in kindergarten. Once students have mastered this, use this time to briefly review blending and segmenting and maximize time spent reading the book (Step 4 of the guided reading lesson). If you'd like more ideas on differentiating within groups for phonemic awareness, check out my video on phonemic awareness instruction.

2. Phonics Skill: In your guided reading lesson plan for kindergarten, have a phonics skill each week or so. Make sure it is the level of difficulty of the students' reading level. Do a word sort or other activity with the phonics skill. A great resource for that is Words Their Way. They've got sequential activities and spelling patterns to use with your students. Pictured here is another resource you can use for this. It is a nice supplement to Words Their Way, and can be found in my TpT store.

3. Sight word practice: For this portion of the guided reading lesson in kindergarten, I have sight word flashcards that I have students review. During this time, I only give them the sight words that I've already taught them in whole group instruction. I give each student 5 cards or so, and they read silently. When I say "switch" every student passes their stack of cards to the person on the right and we rotate cards. That way I'm maximizing the amount of time each child spends reviewing their cards, instead of listening to one child at a time read the cards. They all are reading silently and I'm listening to everyone.

4. Read the book: Make sure the book you choose in your guided reading lesson plan for kindergarten is at the group's instructional reading level. If they are at an independent reading level of 8, then their instructional level is a level 10. (Side note: if your group is at a reading level 10 you probably don't want to be doing phonemic awareness during guided reading time anymore). During this time, you preview the book. You can take a picture walk, looking at what might happen. You can also present students with difficult words they'll encounter in the text, and discuss their meaning and spelling before reading the book. Once they're ready to read the book, you as the teacher must make sure that if you see someone come across a difficult word, prompt them to use their reading strategies to figure out the word.

5. Comprehension: Once they've read the book, talk about what happened. The text structure of the story will guide your questioning. You can use graphic organizers, such as Beginning Middle End, or a Problem/Solution one. If the text is expository, you can discuss main idea and details. Also be aware of levels of questioning. There are "right there" questions, and there are those that require the reader to delve into the book, or infer certain things from the text and pictures. Both are valuable, but make sure you have a healthy mix of the two.

Talented Teacherpreneurs: Smith Science

2019-03-11T07:30:00.000-07:00

This week's teacherpreneur is Meshelle from Smith Science! Meshelle began teaching long before TPT was a thought! Creating learning experiences for her students has always been exciting for her. She was on a perpetual search for activities that addressed her content, engaged her students, and was easy to follow. Engagement was her priority, but she was determined that her classroom content was rich . If she couldn't find what she was looking for, she created it herself!

To address the many ability levels in her classroom, she created Brain Gush, a collection of mathematical challenges that incorporate 5th grade concepts but push the envelope! Her students love it when she passes out the new version of Brain Gush each week! They especially love that they can work in any order. She's found so many other teachers in the TpT community that have faced the dilemma of varying ability levels in the classroom, and have found Brain Gush helpful!

Her advice for aspiring teacherpreneurs? Those with phenomenal ideas need to share! Take one of your phenomenal ideas and write it up like you would for a substitute. Take some time and make it graphically interesting. Post it! TpT makes it easy to post. Next week or next month add another item. Make it part of your lesson planning. Think of it as sharing your ideas with the world rather than a money maker. Money will come...in time.

2019-03-04T10:09:00.000-08:00

Kindergarten math word problems are taught methodically. Your students are young, but their number sense and ability to add, subtract, and group numbers together is so innate. You'd be amazed at the capacity of your students to solve kindergarten math word problems with different strategies, and using different tools.

The way I begin is by giving my class a math word problem. I do a shared reading of it (or allow them to read themselves, depending on the time of year and level of difficulty of the text). Then, I let them have time to think about it, and solve it on their own. I give them no guidelines, or hints. Several students will undoubtedly come up with the answer, and be anxious to share it! I inculcate it in them to NOT call out or share the answer! As they work, I walk around and observe what strategies students are using. This is important for later on in the lesson. It gives me an idea of who to call on when we're at the carpet discussing our problem solving strategy.

Once students have mostly finished, we come together at the carpet, and I ask for volunteers. They are very eager to share the answer with everyone! They have difficulty explaining their thought process. I ask them questions to help with their metacognition: "how did you get that answer?" and "what did you use to help you?"

Slowly, they begin sharing their thought process based on the questions I ask. Most students at this point zone out and are not paying attention to what the student is saying, since we've already shared the answer. I explain that listening to this person's strategy today may help them solve tomorrow's math word problem, and they may get called on when we come to the carpet.

After today's student has explained his thought process, I begin an anchor chart that reads "I can solve problems by..." and I add the strategy the student today used. I explain that we can solve kindergarten math word problems by using this strategy.

Everyday I choose a different student to share their strategy for solving the math word problem. I try to choose a student that used a different strategy the next day. I add strategies to our anchor chart as the days pass, and students begin to see they have multiple ways of solving similar problem types.

The first few days I don't tell them to use any strategies because I want them to come up with ways to solve the word problems on their own. The idea is they are learning from each other. If days have passed and I notice no one is implementing a new strategy, I may choose to model a new one to add to our anchor chart. This usually happens with the number line strategy, which students are typically hesitant to use for math word problems.

Later on you can increase the complexity of the problem. I've done so using Cognitively Guided Instruction problem types. In the scenario below, I posed the problem: "There were 5 trees. Each tree had 3 apples. How many apples were there in all?" Here is how my students solved the problem:

Drawing a picture to solve our kindergarten math word problem.

Using blocks to solve kindergarten math word problems

Talented Teacherpreneurs: Fantastic Teacher

2019-02-25T05:30:00.000-08:00

This week's talented teacherpreneur is Angela from the Fantastic Teacher! Angela is currently a teacher in McKinny, Texas. She decided to become a teacherpreneur when she was working at a poor school, and started making resources for her class.

While working in Dallas ISD, her district implemented Writer's Workshop. As it was being implemented, she had a wonderful writing coach mentor who trained her and inspired her to create daily lesson plans for her class. As a result, she created hermost valuable resource, her Writer's Workshop (Taller de Escritura).

Her advice to those thinking of selling their resources online? If you love to create activities and lessons for your class, TpT is a good place to share your ideas and make money at the same time! It takes time to grow, but if it is something you love to do, it is worth it!

Her goal moving forward is to find or create a daily intervention for her students that is fun and engaging!

Subitizing Activities

2019-02-18T07:30:00.000-08:00

Subitizing is the rapid and accurate identification of numbers used to assess small quantities. Knowing how to subitize (or recognize small quantities without having to count them) enables students to gain automaticity and numerical fluency. They can add and subtract faster. They are more confident in their abilities. In my subitizing activities center, I also incorporated number words, as an added skill students can practice and a way to incorporate literacy into my math time (we will fit literacy in whenever we can!)

So, why is it important to have a math center focusing on number recognition, quantity (subitizing), and number words?

Students need to be fluent in reading and math. Number words come up on many occasions in text (one specific example is the DRA assessment). Numerical fluency is important in problem solving. Seeing representations in your mind of the quantity of a number can help with adding more on, or taking away, or even grouping (tasks that require multiplying and dividing).

In my experience it takes the better part of the kindergarten year for students to learn number words and subitizing to ten, and as a challenge subitizing amounts to twenty.

So, how do you get this information into the long-term memory of my students?

One way to accomplish this is to put it in a center, so students review the information even if it isn’t the focus for the week. It’s something we’ve learned but are reviewing strictly at that center, while I meet with groups and work on the skill we are learning that week.

My subitizing activities center has themes throughout the year. In December, students subitize with gingerbread men and women, and look for ten frames and number words to match. In March, we've got clovers and pots of gold! Each month, students have a new subitizing activity themed for that month. They also work on different skills within subitizing: some months we subitize tally marks, others ten frames, or dominoes. We sometimes throw in number words in addition to the subitizing activity.

The center also has accountability sheets, so after students are done matching the quantities to the number, they can record their work. They practice writing number words, or simply write out the number next to the quantity, depending what the accountability sheet looks like that particular month.

I set up this center next to my number posters, which have the number words and a ten frame representation of the number on the poster. This serves as a reference and an anchor chart for students who may need help matching the numbers. They simply refer to the anchor chart!

The subitizing activities center is an easy one to change out. If students get tired of it, which they rarely do, it's easy to put another activity at that center for a few weeks to give them a break. It has been my experience that students enjoy this center, particularly because of the seasonal themes it has. They mostly like it because they are working on something that they know is an important skill they'll use in first or second grade!

How to Write a Stellar Donor Choose Project

2019-02-06T19:15:00.000-08:00

My name is Nicole, and I am a past K/1st teacher and Reading Specialist. Currently I am a stay at home mom, and TpT seller at the Teacherof20 shop. In the past I've written 3 successful Donor choose projects that have gotten funded by anonymous donors within months of being written. Here are a few tips on how to write a stellar project. 1. Stay within the $100 to $300 range. The donors choose website itself will tell you that projects that are overly expensive rarely get funded. Not all projects are fully funded by a single donor. In the event yours isn't, it will take longer to fund if you have to wait for multiple donors. 2. Pick items and a theme for your project that isn't an immediate necessity. If you need the items right away, you probably don't want to rely on Donors Choose because it will more than likely take months for someone to fund your project. The three times my projects got funded, it took at least 2 or 3 months. If you absolutely need the materials right away, it's best to find another way to purchase them. But all teachers have dream wish lists or things they can do with their students if only they had the money. This is what Donor's Choose is best used for. 3. Be explicit in how you'll use the items, and how they will benefit the students. Even if it is office supplies (which are indirectly tied to student performance) always reference back to how these items will benefit pupils. For example, a paper cutter will benefit students by allowing you to cut and ready the materials faster than if you had to wait til you get around to going in the teacher's lounge. This will enable students to use them faster, or help the teacher ready the lesson more efficiently. 4. Proof read. Make sure your project write up makes sense, is grammatically correct, and addresses your audience. Just like being a TpT seller, if your product doesn't look great, no one will buy it. The same goes for Donors Choose. If your project isn't written in the best possible way, it will likely not get funded. 5. Lastly, once your project does get funded, be sure to write your thank you notes and upload pictures in a timely manner. Donors choose will write you to tell you when the deadline is. If you don't meet this deadline, it could limit your ability to write future projects. Also remember that if you want to have pictures of students in your thank you package you will have to have signed permission from parents. Make sure you allow time to get the permission slips signed, and the pictures taken and uploaded by the deadline. Follow these steps, and you'll likely have your project funded within months. I was able to get 2 tablets for my classroom which helped my kinder students use phonics learning apps. It was very beneficial for them to have this immediate feedback that the tablet provided in their literacy station. It was like having a second teacher in the room providing intervention while I met with reading groups!! Another project I wrote enabled me as a reading specialist to have tools (such as shower buckets to fill with materials and take to classrooms, and mini erasers for students to erase their whiteboard answers) with which to provide intervention. Every project I’ve written was well worth the time and effort it took to write the project and send out the thank you notes!
Teacherof20 taught Kinder for 4 years, 1st grade for 4 years, and was a Reading Specialist and Coach for 2 years. She is currently a stay at home mom, TpT seller, and guest blogger for fellow TpTers. Her TpT store is Teacherof20. You can also find her on Pintrest, Twitter, and Facebook!

Save time, and have fun!

2019-01-30T19:28:00.000-08:00

You probably don’t know this about me, but I wasn’t always the picture of teacher organization that I am today ;-).

I used to do all the things they say not to.

I had piles of paper everywhere (gasp!)

I planned my lessons at midnight on Sunday night before teaching for the week.

I realized 30 seconds before students were due to walk in that I didn’t have any copies run for the lesson they were about to start.

I scrambled to get technology set up after students were already seated and ready to go, resulting i downtime and chaos.

Basically, I spent tons of time and increased my stress all because I didn’t have a plan. It was frustrating, discouraging, and to add insult to injury, I didn’t even really enjoy what I was teaching.

If you’ve ever felt like this, lesson planning and prepping ahead of time is a total game-changer.

Once I started lesson planning earlier, my professional educator journey got a whole lot easier. Here are some of the lessons and how they've radically transformed student engagement in my classroom:

This Word Work game for Winter has games and activities to last an entire month. It teaches 20 winter words with fun and simple to follow games and my students ABSOLUTELY love this center!!

Winter Snowglobe Subtraction around the room. Students walk around the room, find the subtraction problem, and write and solve it next to the corresponding letter on their recording sheet. My students got the chance to review subtraction, while walking around and getting their wiggles out. I am now using this every couple of weeks. They never tire of it!!

Get this comprehensive, ready-made set of lessons that include the ones shown above so you don't have to worry about lesson planning this winter, (just $19 for a limited time for 2,000 pages of digital resources) and recieve my No Prep Valentine's Day Pack FREE as an added BONUS! How do you get the freebie? Fill out this Google form and it will get delivered right to your mailbox: https://goo.gl/forms/P8l0vh49B0lw5HFB3

Confessions of a First Year Reading Specialist

2015-03-16T20:18:00.002-07:00

I felt so honored/nervous/all the feelings you feel when you’ve gotten your dream job, but now the anticipation of what’s to come is looming over your shoulder. It was exactly the same way I felt when I first graduated from college, and got my first teaching job. There are so many feelings all bundled up: fear, joy, pride, nervous, etc.

I was finally a reading specialist! Sure, in the past I had provided intervention to my grade level team, I had completed my masters, I had tested and gotten my Reading Specialist certification on my teaching certificate. However, I had never actually held the title of reading specialist until now.

I couldn’t believe people actually got paid to meet with reading groups all day! That was by far my favorite thing to do during my teaching day.

Then the nerves and apprehension set in. How well would I know my students if I wasn’t spending all day with them? How do I provide intervention to 4^th graders if I’ve only taught kinder and 1^st in my teaching career? How do I progress monitor children so I can track growth?

Well, that was August. This is March. I have slowly figured out the answers to all of these questions, and am finally beginning to feel like a master at my craft. I have figured out a system to progress monitor all my students, and provide useful data at ARD’s and CST’s (Child Study Team is what we call our meetings about students). I have built relationships with the teachers, so that I am no longer an intimidating stranger they have to allow in their classroom. I am slowly learning all the ins and outs, working out the kinks, and honing in on what it’s all about: reading. Decoding, comprehending, attacking multisyllabic words, knowing spelling patterns, knowing where to begin instruction with each child and each reading group.

The first thing I do to know where to begin instruction with a student is look at their DRA and TPRI data. What are their comprehension skills like according to TPRI? How many grade levels behind are they in reading levels? After that, I administer a spelling inventory. I use the Words Their Way

spelling inventory.

It is basically a spelling test that you score using the sheet above. It’s a quick way to assess the phonics skills they need instruction on. Another assessment tool that helps me gain more information is the CORE Phonics Screener. These two assessments help me get a better idea of where the student falls in their spelling instruction. The CORE is administered one on one and is a bit more time intensive, so I use it at my discretion.

Our district has several resources they’d like interventionists to use. One is called SRA, and has its own placement test for students. The resource I’ve used most this year is called West Virginia Phonics, and has lessons with each phonics skill (similar to SRA). Unlike SRA, this resource does not have a placement test. That’s why I administer the Words Their Way spelling inventory and the CORE Phonics Screener. Based on these two assessments, I place students in the appropriate lesson for them. I have developed a routine using the lesson sequence in W. Virginia Phonics. It basically goes like this:

1. Introduce the phonics skill/do an auditory task. (EX) Raise your hand when I say a word with the /sh/ sound

2. Read a list of words with the phonics skill /sh/

3. Phoneme grapheme mapping: I say a word, students segment the sounds using letter tiles, then write the word, one phoneme in each tile. Here is an example, using the magic e rule:

4. Connected text: read the W. Virginia phonics passage (which has words from the word list in step 2)

**I supplement this sequence with games and other resources. Mainly, FCRR. I have developed the following resources to reinforce phonics skills. However, these are more appropriate for independent activities in a general education classroom setting as opposed to intensive small group intervention.

This semester, I made objectives for my students in order to progress monitor them. I take scores on the percentage of words they read correctly from their word lists. In addition, for groups that are significantly below grade level, I am also taking a score on words correct per minute. I do this weekly using a fluency resource from McGraw/Hill. This is information I can refer to in order to adjust instruction, or bring to a CST or ARD if I need to.

How to Implement Words Their Way in Your Classroom

2015-02-25T18:15:00.002-08:00

How do you implement Words Their Way into a classroom? It is very simple. The first step is to give students the initial assessment: it is basically a spelling test. After you have given the spelling test, you use the score sheet to score student’s answers. The score sheet looks like this:

The column that your students miss the most (the ones I’ve circled) is the one where you being instruction. The column they fall under will determine what WTW book you will use. The books are: Letter Name-Alphabetic, Within Word Pattern, Syllables and Affixes, and Derrivational Relations. I have broken down the classroom instruction so that each day we are doing an activity with our Words Their Way sorts. Here is what my groups look like in the second grade classroom I’m mentoring. I’ve changed the names of the students for confidentiality purposes:

Short vowels: John, Sam, Jane, Sally, Audrey

Digraphs and Blends: Arron, Greg, Katie

Long vowels: Mary, Marlene, Josh, Nicole, Christina

Other vowel patterns: Eli

Syllables and affixes: James, Trey

**The score sheet will indicate which book to find each of these sorts. Look at the top row above short vowels, digraphs and blends, long vowels, etc. The row above this has the book title of each book: Letter Name/Alphabetic, Within Word Pattern, Syllables and Affixes, and Derrivational Relations.

Here are my activities for the week. Words Their Way takes about 15 minutes each day from the ELA block, so it is very simple to implement. The day it takes a bit longer is Fridays when you are assessing all your groups. To cut down on assessing time, you may choose to assess some of the advanced students every other week, or alternate assessing some groups one week and some groups another:

MONDAY: I briefly model to the class what each group’s word sort is, and what spelling pattern we are looking for. They receive their new word sort, cut their words, and put them in their baggies. If time allows, we sort our words once.

Below, you can see what the short a word sort looks like. As the sorts progress in difficulty, they don’t have pictures. This is one of the simplest sorts. They increase in difficulty according to the score sheet given in the initial assessment seen above. For the long a versus short a word sort, for example, students sort CVC short a words and CVCe long a words.

TUESDAY: Students sort the words on their own, following the teacher’s scaffolding from yesterday.

WEDNESDAY: Students sort with a partner that has the same sort as them.

THURSDAY: In pairs (preferably the ones from yesterday), students take turns testing each other on the words. To record their answers, students use their Words Their Way notebook. I tell them that one of them gets to be the teacher and say the words. The other one gets to be the student and writes the words. They check their answers, then they switch roles. Students LOVE this activity!

You can see some of my students above giving each other their spelling test.

FRIDAY: Students play words their way games while I pull WTW groups and assess each group.

Based on the Friday assessment, I determine whether to give that child a new word sort or have him practice the same words from this week.

If you are interested in independent work stations for your students that go along with the WTW spelling patterns, check out these products:

CVC short a

CVC short e

CVC short o

CVC short i

CVC short u

CVC Print n' Go Pack

Vowel Pairs ai/ay

Vowel Pairs ea/ee

Cooperative Learning Strategies

2015-01-19T18:11:00.001-08:00

I've heard it said that cooperative learning strategies are hard to implement in the general education classroom. I believe that not only can it be done, but that it’s impossible to teach without these!

Here is a link on the research that supports these in the classroom. The research Marzano has done has greatly impacted my teaching philosophy. As he notes, it is important when utilizing these strategies to be systematic in their use. It is important to embed individual and group accountability, as well as ensuring the interaction and interdependence within students is positive.

I think teachers may shy away from these strategies because we can feel out of our comfort zone at times. Most of the teachers today were traditional students of yesterday. We sat in rows facing the teacher, and didn't have many opportunities to share our learnings with our peers. Even as teachers, the professional development we attend rarely implement the strategies they so adamantly teach!

In no particular order, here are my top 6 favorite cooperative learning strategies:

1. Inner circle, outer circle:

In this strategy, half the class stands in an outer circle facing in. The other half stands in an inner circle facing one person on the outer circle. They share a reflection/ask each other a question and then one of the circles rotates clockwise so that they have a new partner to talk to. I’ve implemented this strategy in a kindergarten classroom. We would do it routinely and students would ask questions to each other pertaining to our calendar time. To make things easier for kinder students, I had them stand in 2 lines instead of 2 circles. One line would generate a question pertaining to the calendar objectives, and the other line had to answer their partner.

2. Color cards:

In this strategy, the teacher has color cards pre-made. I cut up squares of construction paper of different colors, and had them in a baggie close to the front of the room so I could use them frequently. There were 4 red cards, 4 green card, etc. I would hand them out at random to students, and they would go to a spot in the room according to what color they got. They would be in groups of 4 and could collaborate. If the collaboration involved discussing a topic or sharing an answer, I had numbers on each color card. There was red card #1, red card #2, red card #3, etc. Likewise, the green cards were numbered 1-4, and so on. The member that had red card #1 would be the first to speak in that group and everyone had to listen to that person. It avoided the arguing over who was sharing first J

3. People to people:

In this strategy, everyone is walking around the room until the teacher says “People to people.” Students find the person nearest them and turn to face them. The teacher says elbow to elbow, or chooses another body part. Then, the partners stand elbow to elbow, or back to back. The pairs are asked to face each other and share the answer to a question.

4. Sound Machine:

The machine is made up of students. Each student performs a different action that stands for a word. When the machine is turned on, all students perform their action while saying the word. For example, if you’re studying the digraph /th/, the machine could be made up of different words that begin with th. Each student would be assigned a word and make a motion showing the meaning of the word. This is a good strategy to preview vocabulary before a story. You could make a sound machine of the vocabulary that you will see in the story.

5. Stage picture:

After you’ve read a story, students work in groups to make a statue of what might have happened after the story has ended. This is a great strategy for teaching inference. When one group stands as their statue, the class can predict what is happening in the statue before the students have a chance to tell them what they’re doing.

6. 60 second summary:

In this strategy, students have 60 seconds to plan a play about what happened in a story, and they have 60 seconds to perform it in front of their peers. It isn’t limited to stories, but can be used to act out cycles (in science class), etc.

Merry Christmas!

2014-12-14T19:19:00.003-08:00

Hello there! Merry Christmas! Happy Hanukah! Happy Kwanzaa! Can you believe it is the end of the semester already? Fall semester seems to always fly by! We’ve worked so hard to build routines and procedures, and finally have started getting into some great content with our kiddos when…boom! The holidays are here! By this time of the year, everyone is ready for a little break. Here is a great little gem I made with my kids last year. This is where they took home all their goodies from our party:

I also had them do some hand print art:

It did not take long. I had the tempra paint set up in the morning. When they came in, as they were unpacking and doing their morning work, I called them to my kidney table and had them do their handprint. The next day when it dried, we drew our snowmen and glued a snowman poem to the sheet. I laminated them as placemats for them to take home in their goodie bag (seen above).

Here is an easy template for the reindeer bag if you’d like to do it for your holiday party! J

Creative learning initiative

2014-11-26T21:19:00.001-08:00

My school is involved in the Creative Learning Initiative this year. Our got training at the beginning of the year, and CLI coaches come to our campus and co teach with teachers to help them implement the strategies we've learned. My big take away from the first session in August is that drama based instruction (which is what our trainers refer to it) is a lot like cooperative learning strategies. A strategy I tried this semester was the character x ray, where after reading a story you give students an outline of a body. They are supposed to write events of the story on the outside, and feelings the character might have felt because of those events on the inside. It was a very challenging activity because the characters don't always say how events in the story made them feel.

We went to a follow up training a few weeks ago. Here are some strategies I took away:

1. People to people: students walk around the
room. When the teacher says "people to people" students find the person closest to them and partner up. The teacher says another body part and students put their elbow to their partner's. Then they answer a question relating to the lesson.

2. Build a Phrase: can teach sequencing, beginning/middle/end, or story elements:character, setting, problem, solution. As the teacher does a read aloud, you stop at various points in the story and create motions for what is happening. At the end of the story, students retell the story with their motions. From those, you could have them pick one motion that most accurately represents the beginning of the story, one for the middle, and one for the end.

For informational text, you could build a phrase with all the supporting details to find out the main idea. This strategy would be perfect for struggling readers in the upper grades. It is interactive, and can make the learning more concrete for them.

3. Stage picture: after the class reads a story, groups work together to create a still picture of what happens after the story. Then the class makes pedictions and inferences about what the picture could mean while the group poses and doesn't say what is happening.

These are three great new strategies that could increase student engagement, and impact student achievement. I had so much fun at this training! :)

Inferencing

2014-09-12T14:49:00.001-07:00

While most of the country is Common Core aligned, Texas bases its standards on the Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills, otherwise known as the TEKS. Our standardized test is called the STARR. In it, a vast majority of the questions require 3rd, 4th, and 5th graders to use their background knowledge in combination with what the author has told them to make pedictions, or inferences, about the text. The problem is, how do STARR test writers know what background knowledge children have? How do you write inferencing questions that ensure the background knowledge required to answer them is the background knowledge that most 3rd through 5th graders have?

As a reading specialist, I provide support in a 3rd and 4th grade classroom this year. I have been on the look out for ways to make teaching inferencing easy. So many teachers have told me it's a hard skill to apply, and that it may not be developmentally appropriate. Unfortunately, we still have to teach it. Here are some things I've found that might help:

1. The other day I was reading the book The Very Busy Spider by Eric Carle to my daughter. I noticed an opportunity to reach inferencing using this very simple book. As the spider is building her web and the animals come to invite her to do things, there is a fly flying around on every page. Based on what we know about how spiders catch their food, and knowing the text shows us she is building a web, what can we infer will happen to the fly? Sometimes teaching a hard concept using simple books will help make it more attainable to kids.

2. I really liked this activity I found on havefunteaching.com. again, it is something simple that the teacher can later tie to text.

These are just two resources I've found that have made me think of ways to simplify the concept of inferencing so that kids get it. I'm sure as the year progresses I will find more ways to teach this complicated concept. I will be sure to share these here!