Read about five TED Talks that are perfect for teachers trying to make a difference!
Today is the first day I'm linking up with Jivey for her Workshop Wednesday! I'm thinking there should be some sort of formula used by school districts: x number of school related pins = x number of recertification points! haha Wouldn't that be nice? I think I'd be set for the rest of my teaching career! I wanted to start out with a cute little back to school idea I used last year and plan on using again this year. I had these little treats hidden in a cabinet and during a restroom break on the first day I had my aid pull them out as a surprise. This worked great because I was able to give the kiddos a welcome treat and everyone had a snack on the first day! I just ran across this beautiful idea yesterday and I know I'll be doing this next year. I've never been very good at posting the books we read as a class because I don't know where to put them, so this looks like the perfect solution to my problem! Source: room-mom101.blogspot.com via Courtney on Pinterest Source: allsewnup.com via Courtney on Pinterest Source: sparklinginthirdgrade.blogspot.com via Courtney on Pinterest And because I cannot get a break between these two pictures for the life of me I'll just write about the last pin here! :) I'm planning on doing a major revamp of my reading homework this year and I found this great sheet for FREE! I definitely have in mind doing something like this where students respond more to what they read.
Teacher professional development leaves us feeling overwhelmed. Here are the 10 best types of PD teachers would love to see.
With the beginning of a new school year looming (sorry...not trying to rush your summer, folks), administrators across the land have mandated the next rounds of professional development, loaded with the latest and greatest educational "shiny objects," designed to occupy every free moment of your time. I'd like you to take a moment and think about the last worthwhile PD session you attended. Time's up. Having been on both the planning and receiving ends of countless professional development sessions, I have compiled my own list of 5 suggestions for presenters when planning your next PD sessions, making them meaningful for your audience. 1. Differentiate! Contrary to current popular belief, PD should not be one-size-fits-all! Just like the students in your classrooms, teachers embody all levels of expertise and have different needs. New teachers need different PD than veteran teachers need. Primary teachers' needs are different from intermediate teachers. Secondary teachers would love professional development focused on their subject areas. Instead of the one-size-fits-all mentality, make PD meaningful for everyone by offering choices. Have groups or teams come up with a year-long plan for their own professional development. Use the data, but don't assume what you have in mind will work for everyone. Offer book study groups, giving them a choice from a list of books that will best meet their needs. You're still guiding their PD by facilitating, while trusting them to be the life-long learners they are. 2. Practice what you preach! We want students to be active learners, yet in most PD, teachers are passive recipients, focused on the sage on the stage. Involve your audience. Respect their knowledge, and use it to your advantage. Give them a small-group task, a short time to come up with a solution, and then present to the group. Use a jigsaw approach to share information. Offer something they can take back to their classrooms and use right away. 3. Make it short, sweet and snappy! Why takes 30 minutes to say what can be said in 10? Chances are your staff has heard variations of the same thing many times before. Instead, give teachers time to process what they've learned and time with their teams to develop a plan. Nothing is more irritating than having no time to process and figure out a way to implement what we've learned before we're whisked away to the next greatest idea floating around. Remember: Less is more! 4. Ditch the chart paper! I'm positive in every school district there is a black hole where all PD chart paper goes to shrivel up and die. Kids aren't the only ones who enjoy learning with the latest in classroom technology; and what better way to introduce it than to use it as your PD platform. Yes, it's time to marry all the modern advances in technology to your professional development. If you're not sure how to get started, here is an excellent guide to educational technology. 5. Make them laugh! Not only does laughter bond groups together, it releases endorphins, and it makes people (and animals :) happy. Basically, what works in the classroom will work as good professional development. Sadly, many of our professional development days are all about pouring over data, but it doesn't have to be that way. Here's an idea. Why not start off a staff meeting, a professional development day or kick off a new year with an "escape?" Escape the School has teachers working for beans (Ha! So what's new? :) ) as they focus on current educational issues and have some fun in the process. Become part of the solution to make your PD meaningful. Join planning committees. When they ask for feedback, offer helpful suggestions of what you'd like to see. OK, back to my original question: What was the last worthwhile professional development you attended? What made it memorable? I can't wait to hear from you!
5 summer book companions to use when implementing a literacy-based speech therapy approach with your preschool & elementary students.
Engineer PD activities on your own terms, whether it's inside your own school building, among far-flung teacher friends, or out in the teacher-friendly Twitterverse.
Here are 12 research-based books every pre-k or kindergarten teacher should read to become a better teacher. Add these titles to your professional library.
I met a HUGE summer goal yesterday and entered all of my Professional Development hours online! I'm not sure what the requirements are for other states, but to renew our license, Indiana teachers are required to submit the number of hours, a brief description, and scanned documentation for each professional event on the "LVIS" site. Thanks to my principal, the organized person she is, she suggested we keep a log of hours/meetings we attend throughout the school year. It wasn't fun entering all of those hours, but it sure was a lot easier with everything already documented! I recreated my PD Log for next year. Feel free to download the form below if you could find it useful! Free Fuzzy Bump Border from Frog Spot graphics On another note, I wanted to share a few of my fun purchases! I have always wanted a microphone/speaker system of some sort for my classroom. The possibilities for its use are endless (i.e. sharing Star of the Week, reading, presentations, etc.). I also think it could be a really good motivator. I did a little searching online last year, but couldn't find anything wireless or affordable. Well, I found a system on Amazon last week for only $70! Since it was so inexpensive, I was a little worried about the quality, but it came in yesterday and works perfectly! I'm so excited to use this in my classroom next year!! Here's the one I bought: I sure hope it lasts......yikes... Also....did you know that Skippyjon Jones is at Kohl's!?? It's a $5 Kohl's Cares item by the checkout lane! They have books, too! If you love Skippyjon, you better make a trip soon! :)
High-quality professional development for world language teachers is hard to come by. Look here to see the top 10 actionable resources you can use tomorrow!
Quality Professional development does matter. The Professional Development Activities packet was a big request from my followers and principal friends
Here are 12 research-based books every pre-k or kindergarten teacher should read to become a better teacher. Add these titles to your professional library.
As one-size-fits-all PD fades away, more personalized professional development models have emerged. The Pineapple Chart may be the greatest of them all.
Each Monday we collaborate with our building's new and Dual Language staff members for a professional development session based on what they highlight as their needs and/or desires for learning! This week we focused on Daily 5 ideas as all of our staff are currently working hard to get their stations and guided reading up and running! The teachers who attending the session came up with a variety of wonderful ideas and activities that could potentially be used throughout the year in these work stations. I thought some of you may enjoy taking a gander at what they came up with as well! Just a little background... we utilized a strategy many of you may be familiar with called "Round Robin" to gather ideas during our meeting. The staff were given the anchor charts with only the titles and asked to add any activity ideas they were doing, would like to do, etc. based on the title on their paper. We gave each group 1 minute to brainstorm and write their ideas, and then they were asked to pass the poster to the next group. We continued to do this until all posters had made it to all groups. This is a great strategy that you could use with your students as well to assess their background knowledge and/or learning of concepts. You could even do it at the beginning of the year to see what activities they already know and enjoy doing during Daily 5 if they are familiar with it from the year past! This may give you some insight as to what they may want to do in your classroom as well! Alright now onto the posters...keep in mind these were quickly written by our staff and we discussed them a bit after as well, so not everything may make perfect sense! But feel free to ask questions in the comments if you have any and I would be happy to try my best to answer! After our meeting, I also took some time to type up all of their ideas onto one page for them to hold on to and refer to throughout the year. You are welcome to a copy if you'd like- just click on the image below :)! (Graphics: Scrappin Doodles, Priscilla Concepcion)
Para classroom jobs and expectations to manage and work with your classroom support staff, while building positive rapport. Learn More at Mrs. D's Corner.
Using a photo of the day is a great way to help develop and increase your students' vocabulary and background knowledge.
Ten recommendations for teacher professional development books to transform your practice, for both new or seasoned teachers.
Helping K-2 Teachers Like You Save Time, Grow Instructional Skills, and Teach With Confidence!
I've just started Harvard's Making Thinking Visible course online as part of our Professional Development program here at ISM. I'm really excited about learning some new strategies. We've actually used several visible thinking strategies in the classroom already, as I've had the book checked out from our library all year (because I'm a book hog...shhh): Making Thinking Visible: How to Promote Engagement, Understanding, and Independence for All Learners Today I thought we'd do another See-Think-Wonder with the goal of having students recognize some connections between their prior and acquired knowledge with our inquiry into energy. I added a Connect box to the activity to help students get there, so it didn't seem so superficial. I made up 7 posters with images related to energy in the center and sections around the image labelled "I see... I think... I wonder... I connect..." (not so easy to see as I just used a class iPad to get photos this morning). We revisited the See-Think-Wonder format on the Activ Board by discussing synonyms and sentence starters for each term so I could (hopefully) help students get to some deeper thinking when they set off and give my ELL friends some vocabulary to use: (let me tell you, some of this was like pulling teeth...) and then we did an example together: Clearly, we have some work to do ("I see colours" ???). Then the kids roamed around for fifteen-twenty minutes to add their thoughts/comments/questions to each poster. As I circulated to hear the students talking about the images (and various other things, like cats, recess, Pixel Gun, dance parties, "songs that are awesome".... that's a regular morning, right? So much for accountable talk!) and read some of their comments, it was amazing to recognize the different levels within my room. It was something like this: "I saw a rainbow once." (Okaaay, I guess it is a connection...) "This looks like coal, which is a fossil fuel and that's bad :(" (Now we're talking!) "What if the picture is upside down?" (Um... hmm. Relevant?) "I noticed that this is hydro energy and that's connected to our energy inquiry!" (Hurray!) "My connection is that [the electrical wires] looks like a cat because you can sort of see ears." (I know, deep.) Afterward we shared as a whole group, which is when the discussion started to get so much better and the beauty of See-Think-Wonder began to come alive. It's pretty great when a comment like, "I see a white car" can turn into discussion about the type of fuel the car uses and whether the owner could use a biomass source, like corn, if it's available. True story - that conversation happened!
Students benefit from hands-on activities to help boost their conceptual understanding of math. This focuses on measuring liquid volume.
What is differentiation? A great preschool teacher differentiates all day long! Learn more about this important concept and how it affects students.
An ESL teacher has a unique job in that s/he has to fulfill a great variety of roles on a daily basis. The four main ones are described in this article.
In this huge list are 50+ texts {including poetry, picture books, and more} that you can use when modeling comprehension strategies to your readers.
Reading comprehension strategies for all types of learners. Encourage and
My sweet friend Elizabeth is hosting a linky party all about my favorite social media....INSTAGRAM! You link up your 3 favorite instagram photos, but there are a couple of rules: 1. You can't link up a product. 2. Make sure to check out three others who linked up. If you would like to follow me on instagram, my username is @mrs_pauley. It was so hard to choose only 3 favorite photos, I wanted to break the rules and choose 5 ;) Without further ado, here are my 3 favorite photos: This photo was taken during our vacation in the Ozarks. I just love going there because it is so relaxing. This is pretty much what I did most days. Or I was on a float in the water doing the same thing....haha! My son LOVES playing soccer and I LOVE to watch him. (Yep....I am one of THOSE moms who yell from the sidelines...don't hate me!) I took this photo this fall during a soccer tournament he was playing in. My daughter is such a girly girl and I have a sneaking suspicion that she will want to be a cheerleader in high school. This is from the cheer clinic the high school cheerleaders put on. She had so much fun and looked absolutely adorable! I hope you will head on over to Elizabeth's blog and link up! I can't wait to see your instagram photos and don't forget to include your username so we can follow you on instagram as well! I am also going to link up with Simply Kinder for the Teaching Blog Round Up. I am excited to find some new blogs to follow through this linky as well! I have formed many wonderful friendships through blogging and I am so thankful for that.
A top list of professional goals for teachers. Take your teaching career to the next level with these SMART teacher goal-setting examples.
It's crucial that instructional coaches, teacher leaders, and administrators choose the best professional development books to build teachers!
Building background knowledge is like building a bridge. It’s meeting your students where they are and then continuing to build on what they already know. Eventually you guys will keep building until you reach mastery and that bridge is completely constructed. It is a crucial part of learning and helps students make meaningful connections so […]
These UFLI aligned worksheets are not endorsed by UFLI Foundations nor are they affiliated in any way. No part of these worksheets copy any material found in the UFLI manual. They are brief reinforcement activities aligned with the lessons.This resource was designed to provide foundational reading ...
Cooperative learning. Find out what it's all about and get some great resources to help you use this strategy well in your classroom.
Looking for a Dyslexia Reading Curriculum or just need a hands-on reading curriculum to use in your homeschool? Check out the Dyslexia Toolkit from PDX Reading Specialist!
Congratulations third grade teacher! Teaching third grade is such a fun experience. The kids are still excited about school and easily impressed by things like crayons. Yet, they can be quite independent, especially by mid year. Now that you know you will be teaching third grade, you are probably starting to wonder what resources you
Download the Ontario Curriculum in a checklist format grade by grade instead of by subject. Easy to use. Now updated to the 2019 learning outcomes!
Want to learn new pedagogy in education best practices? Read how I attended professional development and gained new knowledge. Click here!
How to teach ELL students to read challenging, on-grade level texts through Visible Reading, a differentiated, process-driven reading strategy.
