Tuesday, July 31, 2012

WBT: Hands and Eyes

"A good listener is not only popular everywhere, but after a while he gets to know something." Wilson Mizner

One of the most important things to happen in any classroom is listening. Many people would assume learning would come first, but the truth is, if your students are not listening, they cannot learn. Therefore listening is the first skill a teacher must teach every year.

Sometimes in order to learn, a teacher needs to teach a class how to focus so they will hear what they are saying. In my classroom I found myself usually alternating between two different focusers. Sometimes I used "If you can hear me, raise your hand," while the rest of the time I usually relied on "Magic Hands". Magic Hands seems to be very much the same as Hands and Eyes. I would call it out to my class while they were seated at their desks, and they were expected to clap their hands loudly over their desks, clasp their hands together and smile up at me.

Hands and Eyes is basically the same, except the students aren't loud with their hands, instead they repeat the teachers command and stare intently at her. I would combine the two, and expect to see happy faces smiling up at me after they repeat the command to show me their Hands and Eyes. I like how this focuser is more of a follow up to Class-Yes than it is a replacement. When students hear it they know they need to hurry up and pay attention!

As a teacher without a classroom, I like how this could work with both my preferred elementary age groups as well as the high school students I could end up substituting when I go back to work. In my experience when you are called to sub, about half the time you are brought to a classroom where the teacher forgot to leave you her classroom management plan. This plan would be easy to use when dropping in on a class for a single day, without taking too much time to teach and begin to implement.



Class-Yes
Teach-Okay
Scoreboard


If you would like the poster please click on the image to go to the Google document.






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Lumberjack Stars Clip Art




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Sunday, July 29, 2012

WBT: K-4th Scoreboard Game



"We need to make education a community obsession." Joan Kowal

Every classroom needs a way to motivate its students to learn; they’re not going to want to learn without a reason. While some students already have some external motivation in the form of their parents and older siblings, there are many others who need to be pushed from day one by their teacher. But having the teacher pushing you can make a few students feel self-conscience, so the introduction of a motivational tool which makes the classroom a community can be a godsend. The WBT Scoreboard seems designed to become a class wide obsession which will form a diverse group of students into a cooperative community.

How does the Scoreboard do that?
It's actually a very simple classroom management system. As a class, students are rewarded or not depending on class wide following of rules and directions. Unlike other systems where students are often rewarded with tangible things like extra recess or prizes, and lose recess or have detention as punishment, the WBT scoreboard awards students with a one second party for class wide attention, or a Mighty Groan when a great portion of the class is not following directions quickly and properly. Students get to use their voices and body for each smiley and frowny achieved, but of course will be motivated to win one second parties for their class. No student in the class is singled out for earning the class a Mighty Groan, but a classroom obsession with earning parties should help to build a community of achievers.

The cons to this system at first glance seem to be very few. In many classrooms there will be one or two students who fail to be motivated by the silliness of this motivator. They will be the ones that teachers will have to find a way to give them their own motivation to want to become part of the classroom cooperative community. I look forward to learning more about this part of WBT to see what suggestions are made for this con by Biffle and other teachers using the system.

I look forward to seeing how such instant motivation will encourage my future class towards forming a tight knit community for the duration of the school year.


WBT
Class-Yes
Teach-Okay

To get the scoreboard header just click on the image at the top to go to the Google Document.








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Friday, July 27, 2012

WBT: Teach-Okay (Superhero Included)

Hands up if you're guilty of relying on worksheets.
Is your hand up? Mine is...
Tell me I'm not the only one to use them more than just as a review...
"The medium is the message"- Marshall McLuhan.

Wouldn’t it be nice if our students could be involved in their learning? Hopefully after learning more about Whole Brain Teaching, I'll be better prepared to make my students the medium of their learning instead of endless worksheets. One of the foundational methods of using WBT in the classroom is Teach-Okay, and I believe this is one way that can do just that. It enables the students to use the four learning modes recognized by WBT- seeing, saying, hearing and doing. Having these four learning modes activated simultaneously should prove to be the way to make students be the message they are learning. In other words, they are completely involved in their learning.

But how does Teach-Okay do this? Students are directed through the teachers double clap to turn to their partner and teach their partner exactly what the teacher just taught the class in words and action, and then have their partner teach them in return.

Seeing- they see the actions performed by their partner
Saying- they repeat the lesson (message) verbally
Hearing- they hear their partner say the words
Doing- they perform the teachers actions for the lesson (message)

     By breaking up my own teaching of concepts, and by having the information repeated so many times and ways simultaneously, students become more able to hold onto new knowledge in their short term memories. Why is this important? That is because traditionally teachers talk for long periods of time in front of their class, and students are unable to hold onto concepts because we would too quickly move onto the next without adequately checking for understanding. With teach-okay students are given many chances to repeat their new knowledge before switching concepts.

     In my future classroom using teach-okay will help my students critical thinking skills because they will have immediate review. There will be no waiting until homework or a test to see if they've held onto it; they'll know for themselves immediately by whether they can or cannot teach their partner. How will they know? Either they will completely blank on the concept, or their partner will kindly inform them that they missed something, and will teach it to them again. While I walk around the room observing teach-okay, I will be able to see who isn't comprehending, and will know that I need to teach again, or that I can continue onward to the next mini concept. It's much better to find out when I'm initially teaching something that my student doesn't get it, that way I'm not trying to build on a foundation that's not strongly built.



WBT
Class-Yes


To obtain my Superhero poster, simply click on the image to go to the Google document.







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250 Squiggle Art Pages




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Imaginary classroom project #1

If you've been following me for awhile, you know I'm on Canadian Maternity leave, and don't have a class to prepare for this year. But that isn't stopping me from imagining what I'd like to do in my future class.

Today I was thinking about the crate seats everyone is making, and I've wondered in the past how easy it would be to beg a set of crates from the milk man. Then just now I was reading Nancy at First Grade Wow's post about making hers with buckets she found at Lowe's. So that got me thinking about how I could make that project even cheaper.

How?

Do you have a cat?
I don't, but mom does, and for awhile she's been buying the buckets of kitty litter instead of the bags because they work out cheaper, and are easier to use with no mess. When she empties a bucket she stacks them inside each other and has quite the collection. We're currently using one as a garbage pail in our bathroom. (Don't worry, it doesn't look tacky. We took the label and handle off and it blends right in).

My idea?
Take six of these buckets, remove the labels and turn them into seats!

And just like Nancy said, great for storage, yay!!


To This!


If anyone uses this idea, I'd love to see how it turned out!

EDIT: Search Kitty Litter Seats on Pinterest, there are a LOT of samples now of people who FLEW with this idea.





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Letter Reversal Bundle



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Tuesday, July 24, 2012

TpT EEK!

Today I put my first item up on Tpt, eek!

To those of you with me for over a month now, you've already seen my Journal papers, but I've decided to make that the first item I transfer there from Google Docs.

I present full and half pages in a variety of font sizes for the elementary classroom.

Here's a sneak peek:

Just click on the cover to go to my new store!


UPDATE 2017: This resource is no longer available in the store. HOWEVER it IS part of the collection you receive a link to soon after joining my email list!
PLUS I have created a much better quality package which is now available in the store.

Superhero Writing Paper (Journals)



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Letter Reversal Bundle


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Friday, July 20, 2012

Newbie Blog Hop!!

Hi there, and thanks for "hopping" over to my little blog. Thank you to Janis for hosting this great idea.



    1.  what state you are in
    2.  your current teaching position
    3.  your teaching experience
    4.  when you started blogging
    5.  share a blogging tip / blogging resource


1. I'm in the beautiful East Coast province of Nova Scotia right now, it's also where I'm from.

2. Unfortunately none. My last position fell through last school year, and since I wanted to get enough work hours to qualify for maternity leave, I didn't even substitute last year, choosing to work in retail instead. If I had been able to hold onto the position, they'd have to be holding onto it for me.

3. I substituted for 3 years before accepting a full time probationary position in Northern Manitoba on a Cree reserve, where I taught for two years. The first year in grade 3, and the second in grade 2. After that I came home and subbed for half a year before landing a term teaching grade 1 at a private school.

4. I started near the end of my year teaching grade 1, AKA last spring.

5. Comment, comment, comment. And whenever possible, leave a live link to your blog.

Your turn!


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Thursday, July 19, 2012

Kindergarten Memories

Actually, for me they're Primary Memories because here in Nova Scotia that's what we call that grade. Weird I know, but it's the system I'm used to. I think it's because of the British connection?

Here's my class picture from 1985.

I can remember, in no special order (because honestly, who remembers the order things happened 30 years before?)


*Making tissue paper flowers that remind me of the poms teachers are making today to decorate their classrooms.

*Being out sick with the Measles, and my mom having to bring proof that I HAD had my booster shots. Nevertheless, I still had to get it again, ouch!

*The most popular game at recess was "Kissing boys and Kissing girls", where we chased each other around to kiss them. I stayed clear, but still managed to get my first Kiss from Christopher Pickles.

*Our classroom teacher, Mrs. Rathbun, also taught us gym. I don't remember the rules, but we had to chase each other around for one game to steal the "tails" of other students. Probably at Easter time?

*The cut off date for the start of school was in a weird place of the school calendar, and so I missed out on starting school by only a week. As a result, I was ALWAYS the oldest in my class. I hated it. I felt like I had failed at some point. If I was starting school today, I would  have been a whole year ahead, but I wouldn't have made the friends I did.

* My teacher had ten little Indian posters on the wall for learning to count. I bet today they wouldn't be allowed!

* Every first day of school my grandparents took a picture of us (me, my sister and two cousins) on their front porch before we walked to school. It's actually a nice tradition I want to continue when my baby gets older.


I'm linking this post up with Jennifer from Simply Kinder.



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Tuesday, July 17, 2012

WBT: Class-Yes (Superhero included)


This is my first post about Whole Brain Teaching, yay!

I’ve been watching my Google reader feed for months now, and have noticed a steady increase in the number of posts dedicated to the various aspects of Whole Brain Teaching. (This may be in part because I keep adding bloggers whose ideas I’ve fallen in love with via Pinterest.)

 It’s been over a year now since I first saw a video of a teacher using this in her classroom, and I wish I had learned about this so much sooner because in my first two years of teaching I taught in a school with major discipline issues, and I’m sure that using this system would have helped make me a more confident and comfortable teacher.

In the past to get my students attention I used the very standard “If you can hear me, raise your hand” or "1 2 3 eyes on me", and I alternated my voice volume and what I wanted my kiddos to do. I had them tap their nose, clap their hands, stamp their feet, wave, bow, etc. But sometimes it got ridiculous, and it took far too many repeats of the question to get the attention of the majority in my classroom, and I got very frustrated. Too often I lost attention of the first few to hear me. I did however, reward my class with high fives for successfully paying attention.

What I think will make Class-Yes a better tool in my future classrooms is that it’s a much shorter command, and it’s a verbal response, so the kiddos who didn’t hear me say “Class”  should be quickly notified by the verbalizations around them instead of the growing silence I used to hope would notify them.

I love how the kiddos still get the fun aspect I was trying to get by changing where they were touching or the action they were performing with the addition of voices (Accents), whispers, and wording (Classity-class-class).

I wish I had a school to use these in when my maternity leave is over in February, but I’ll definitely get to use them! I’m going to try and use as many aspects of WBT as possible in my Sunday School classroom starting this fall. In February if I’m lucky enough to be called as a substitute teacher in my board (where there are way too many subs due to teacher reductions the last several years). If a teacher I’m subbing for forgets to leave a note explaining her management plan, I’ll get the chance to implement Class-Yes, Yay!

To celebrate my newfound love of WBT and my constant sharing of Freebies matching my posts, here are two posters for Class-Yes. One is for use in Sunday School (which is where I hope to use it) or a Christian School, and the other is for my Future classroom where I’m currently obsessing over a Superhero theme. I plan on creating matching posters for each aspect of WBT in both themes as I explore them.

Just click on the one you like to go to it's Google document!



This post is in response to: Class-Yes

Thanks for dropping by!


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Thursday, July 12, 2012

Child Safety Photo Tip

The last couple of days I've seen this image floating around Facebook, Pinterest and the Blogosphere.

Please take it as you wish, but I think it's brilliant! Pass along please, so everyone in charge of vulnerable children sees this suggestion and uses it. I know I will.



What do you do to ensure your kids/students safety



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Saturday, July 7, 2012

Past Projects #1

I've decided to share some past projects of my students. For some I have pictures, for some I don't, but I hope you'll find something you can use!

When I taught grade 3 on a Northern Manitoba reserve, I taught a lesson about welcoming immigrants to Canada. Part of this included an art project which was a poster to make those new immigrants feel welcome. It was a hard concept for my kids since the only newcomers on a reserve are other Native Canadians, and rarely the children of the teaching staff or the RCMP. When I was there, the only students in the school were locals.

On my chalkboards I wrote a title in fancy letters to encourage them to not be boring on theirs, and on the other side we brainstormed how the new immigrant would feel. I left this list up when we brainstormed a list of Canadian symbols. Since not all my kids were good readers, I also drew pictures beside the symbols. I almost always drew pictures on my boards to remind students what was written there.
Do you like my green squiggle representing the Northern Lights?

Here are my kids hard at work on their posters:



How do you teach about immigration?





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Thursday, July 5, 2012

My miscellaneous discipline/classroom management plans

My current obsession  in classroom management is the totally awesome clipchart, and if my position would have been renewed, that's what I was going to use last year. Now I would also supplement it with the secret person.

But in the past I've used a few different ideas, some which worked well, some which needed a bit of tweaking.

When I taught for those three years I took a TON of pictures IN my classroom, but not OF my classroom, so what I can show you is clipped out of other images.

If you have any other comments or questions, please leave a comment, and I'll reply back.


1. On the back of the large file cabinet by my classroom door, I taped folders holding my daily attendance forms to send to the office, and the school-wide discipline forms. Every grade from K-8 had the same form to send down with a student who was misbehaving. I HATED sending these down, but sometimes the discipline problem was so extreme I had to send my kids out.

2. My kids had a lot of trouble remembering school and classroom rules, and even simple things like putting their name on their papers. Instead of putting focus on the offending student, I would say that "Kenny" had forgotten to walk in the hall, or to use an indoor voice, or whatever the current issue was. Since I had an empty desk, we gave him his own desk in the room.

3.a) Kenny also had trouble remembering to put his name on papers, so we pinned any nameless papers on this board. Once a name was put on it, it could be returned to my in box for marking.
b) Students were given a series of warning which could be erased with behaviour reversal. I always put a sad smiley face on the list.
first- name of board
second- check mark
third- circle around name
fourth- send to office with note from number 1 above.

4. Where do you post your classroom rules? I prefer to put them on the back of my door so we can review them every-time we're lined up to go somewhere. Here they are in my second classroom.

5.a) Under today's date and day of the 6 day schedule, I put the order of subjects for the day, which got erased as items were completed. My kids loved seeing us get closer to the end of the day. The picture shows only the first item of the day, I think it was a storm day, and we were waiting to be sent back home.
b) I've posted before as a freebie, my Smile savers, and in this pink bag is where I put them after students wrote their name son the backs for our daily drawing.

6. In my last classroom I had a lot less behaviour management problems, but I still wanted to reward great behaviour, so I made up this little board by my desk and gave students who were on task a sticker. When the post-it note was full, they got to take it home and start again, as well as get a prize from my drawer.

I hope you found some inspiration from my past classrooms!

I'm linking this up with:


A Little Magic


Please check out their great ideas!







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Have something you'd like me to blog about, or are interested in guest blogging? Please comment below.

Want to find awesome resources for your Early Childhood Education classroom? Visit Reading With Mrs. D on Teachers Pay Teachers.
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