Individualized Education Plans (IEPs) is an invaluable tool for supporting students with diverse learning needs in preschool classrooms.
Scaffold your instruction with these teaching scaffolding strategies to help bridge readiness and mastery for your elementary students!
Differentiation is a word that is used a lot in teaching. We know a good teacher uses differentiation strategies daily to meet the needs of…
Use this list of 107 instructional strategies to fill-in that lesson plan or teaching portfolio with some high quality teaching strategies.Or, try some of these strategies out when you’re low on ideas and looking for a fresh way to teach in the classroom!
Personalize the content, process, product, or learning environment.
The 5 Best Methods & Specific Tips on HOW to Incorporate Each in Your Own Classroom Being a teacher is a tough business. It can be hard to navigate the classroom and know if your teaching methods are
Here they are: 15 formats for structuring a class discussion to make it more engaging, more organized, more equitable, and more academically challenging.
Here are six teaching strategies I use every lesson, every day.
Discover research-based instructional methods teachers, coaches, and administrators can use to enhance their everyday practices.
Differentiating your instruction can be overwhelming. I get it. When you hear the word "differentiation" do you automatica...
I am so excited to launch my first "series" of blog posts! It's making me feel all grown-up and blogger-like :)My first series is going to be on increasing student engagement in the classroom. Over
Tried and true strategies to re-engage students and keep them engaged in their education for the rest of the school year.
Planning vocabulary activities that are meaningful and engaging can be challenging. Here are some ideas with a freebie to get started!
When trying to differentiate instruction for our students, it's easy to feel overwhelmed. Here are 6 Easy Ways to Differentiate Instruction
Be a great social studies teacher with these use-tomorrow, science-backed teaching strategies.
A flipped classroom ensures that your students have content before you get "hands-on" with it in the classroom...and it works!
In this Aquarium Perspective Lesson, Middle School students will dive right into learning about the principle of perspective while designing an aquarium.
If you haven’t started using student data folders, it is a tool I highly suggest. These folders are in the hands of the students. They’re tracking and
These engaging strategies to incorporate movement in the classroom are perfect for the fidgety students & kinesthetic learners in your class!
Checking for Understanding Formative Assessment Exit Slips
Using MoveNote in the Classroom to record presentations. GAFE integration. Technology in the Classroom
Student engagement is my number one goal in the classroom. None of the academic goals can be achieved without student engagement. It is essential! My biggest advice to you is to decrease teacher talk and the time students spend in their desks.I want to share some more specific ways that I keep my students engaged
Use the special ed inclusion documentation forms to keep track of service times, lesson plans, and more. Streamline it all quickly and effectively!
Sometimes it feels crazy overwhelming to keep assessing students and know exactly what they do/don’t understand. That’s where these quick and easy formative assessment ideas comes in! M…
Let's dive into some new options to teach vocabulary, for those who have the time and energy to pursue them. In this post and podcast, I'm sharing ten ideas for making the study of vocabulary something students might even look forward to.
Curriculum mapping is an essential skill for educators. Curriculum Mapping ensures a teacher teaches all the standards for the grade level by mapping out what…
Understand the importance using a scope and sequence. Learn how pacing guides can structure, organize, and align lessons to your curriculum.
Hands-on pre-reading activities that encourage your elementary students to access their prior knowledge and make predictions.
Using strategies to make thinking visible can be incredibly powerful. Their power, however, hinges almost entirely on how willing teachers are to learn about their students. Far too often, I see vi…
Want to learn new pedagogy in education best practices? Read how I attended professional development and gained new knowledge. Click here!
Closing the gap between the language rich and the language poor is of upmost importance for educators. A proven way to shrink the literacy gap between the "rich" and the "poor" is by explicitly teaching vocabulary words. Research supports that teachers should be directly teaching 3-5 words per text selection and teaching them in a way that students "own" the words. Owning a word means you have a deep understanding of the word. You can pronounce the word. You understand it's meaning. You have the ability to use the word during conversation and in writing. An owned word is one that is a member of your personal lexicon. Vocabulary instruction is important for all kids, but it is vital for students who have under developed vocabularies. Teaching students vocabulary terms should happen before a text selection is read, and should be done using the following routine. 1. Pronounce the word, write it and read it. Always introduce a word orally first. Kids need to know how to correctly pronounce the word. Say it, and have them repeat it back to you. If the word is multi-syllabic, talk about the syllables and say the word in syllable chunks. Next, write the word. Say each sound, or each syllable as the write the word for all students to see. Example: Our new word is plain. Class, say plain. How many syllables does plain have? Lets clap the syllables in plain. How many sounds does plain have? Lets tap the sounds in plain. There are two spellings for the word plain.....plane and plain. We are going to learn about plain, spelled p....l.....a....i.....n. Plain is an adjective (which means it describes a noun). 2. Tell students what the new word means Use a student friendly definition of the new word. This ensures that students understand what the new word means. However, after a student friendly definition is given....don't be afraid to elevate a student's vocabulary by giving a more technical or advanced definition. Additionally, talk to the students about word origin. Point out prefixes, suffixes or any base words that may exist. Finally, give students a more concrete way to grasp the word by showing pictures, video clips, demonstrating an action or providing a hands on experience. It is always best to find real images to share as opposed to clipart images. Example: Plain means ordinary. Something that is plain is not flashy. Plain looks like this: 3. Say more about the word and give examples Once students have an understanding of the new word's meaning, use the word in several sentences. These sentences should help students further understand what the word is and what it isn't. Example: If I wanted to use plain in a sentence, I could say: My outfit is plain today because it doesn't have a lot of colors. Or, I enjoy eating plain yogurt that is only one flavor and doesn't have any mix-ins. 4. Ask Questions about the Word's Meaning Ask students yes and no questions about the word to really help the meaning sink in. Example: Students, are the outfits you are wearing plain? Is your bedroom at home plain? Do you like plain food, or food that doesn't have a lot of spice or ingredients? 5. Provide opportunities for students to use the word To help students truly "own" a word, they need ample opportunities to use the newly acquired term. Encourage students to use the word in writing and speaking activities. Have students write sentences using the word, or share a sentence verbally. Example: Students, I want you to think of a sentence using our new word plain. After some think time, have students hand up, stand up and pair up to share their sentence with a partner. Interested in seeing the vocabulary routine in action? Check out the following clip of explicit vocabulary instruction taking place in a kindergarten classroom. Make sure to check out this article from Reading Rockets, A Multidimensional Approach to Vocabulary Instruction: Supporting English Language Learners in Inclusive Classrooms, for eight more instructional tips regarding vocabulary instruction.
Wondering how to engage students in meaningful learning? This ultimate list of active learning strategies is a great reference to use while lesson planning.
Are you struggling to meet the needs of all your learners? Learn how to differentiate for EVERY student without spending hours prepping!
Defiance is an inevitable and generally not a welcomed part of a classroom. You are spending your day getting through your content, building community, and regularly demanding that students do tons of tasks. From time to time, they are going to have different ideas. Even walking down the hallway can be a struggle without one
We had another class Monday night with our new dual/ELL staff members, and this time we focused on differentiation and what that may look like across the subject areas. As we have done in the past, we had the teachers participate in a gallery walk and thus rotate around with their groups to add to a series of posters focused on this topic of differentiation. Yet again, our wonderful staff did not disappoint and came up with a wide assortment of ideas as to how instruction can be differentiated for our students! I typed up their ideas on a nice one page spread for them, and thought you all may find it useful as well! Click on it to grab a copy for yourself or a friend. Graphics/Fonts: Scrappin' Doodles, Rowdy Fonts, My Cute Graphics Also, (as if you haven't already heard ;)), I wanted to let you all in on the big secret. TpT will be hosting a "3 Million Teachers Strong" sale February 27-28th. In using promo code TPT3, you can get up to 28% off at my store along with so many more! How exciting is it to see this community of teachers growing and working together :)!
Teachers like vocabulary strategies that make learning more meaningful and lasting. Check out these 15 Strategies to Ramp Up Vocabulary Instruction.
Your new favorite teaching strategy: This pared-down version of learning stations keeps the movement, interactivity and variety while minimizing the prep work.
