With the arrival of the nice weather, it can be increasingly difficult to keep students on track and focused. As Mike suggested, coaching them to the finish line is a must. However, what helps immensely is when they are interested and engaged enough to put out the effort, which for Grade 8’s at this time of year is a challenge. I thought I’d share something that my grade 8 students seemed to respond well to. We have been studying the passé composé for some time now (in a more isolated grammatical fashion) and it was time to start using it in a more concrete fashion. Seeing the success my colleague had with the Six Word Memoirs (see previous blog), I decided to kind of mirror that and have them write out their 5 most memorable moments. I wrote out an exemplar based on my own personal memories (excluding marriage and birth of children – didn’t think they could quite relate to that) and then we brainstormed most frequently used verbs and them listed on different charts according to verb endings. Just to make it a little more interesting, I came across some really nice watercolour paper and had the students paint a background. The project was short enough that it seemed feasible even for the most reluctant students and was a bit of a creative outlet for the artistic types. However, even with 5 sentences (more or less), I was able to see if they had in fact grasped the concept. The photos convey what they were able to come up with.
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Time To Smell The Roses
As the year now shifts to the final months of academia, it is important to take the time and reflect on the growth of yourself as a teacher, the academic gains that your students have made and the endless best efforts that took place in your learning community. We often start to stress or feel the pressure of the year ending with so much curriculum yet to cover that we neglect the opportunity to recognize the gains accomplished thus far. By instilling in your students (and developing in your teaching practice) the skills to reflect on their effort, accomplishments and next steps we pave the way for students to become a partner with us in the educational journey.
The timing is critical as it will allow all parties involved the opportunity to give and receive feedback that will direct them in their goal setting for the last two months of the year. If this feedback is provided too close to the end of the year there will not be an adequate amount of time to use it to create change. This is an essential time when I focus on the accomplishments of each student and work with them to establish next steps. An analogy that I would use is when a coach takes that final timeout to share a plan and pump up his/her team for that final push to reach their goal. The message the student receives is that I am capable, I have been successful and it is important for me to keep it going rather than coasting into summer vacation. Enjoy this time of year and take great pride in what you have been able to accomplish with your students.
Promoting Prosocial Behaviour
Most students, if asked, know not to bully or know not to litter. Yet, you may see those same students exhibiting behaviours that contradict what they know.
Prosocial behaviour is behaviour that uses positive words or actions to benefit others. Rather than a desire for personal gain, students are prompted to act this was by empathy, responsibility to others, or moral values. Much of the responsibility to teach this behaviour is falling on schools and teachers.
To promote prosocial behaviour, consider some of the following:
- Encourage a caring school community that includes everyone from teachers to caretakers and lunch room supervisors.
- Implement a positive discipline approach that includes clear expectations, discussions, and modelling.
- Initiate school-wide programs such as “learning buddies” that match up older and younger students to work together in a variety of activities (computer lab, shared reading, picking up litter, community walks).
- Integrate value or character education to learning in all classrooms
Integrating Learning with Technology
“Some teachers feel technology is being pushed on them, especially those who struggle with it. They might start using technology just for the sake of using it. This has shown to be an ineffective method for both tech-savvy and tech-challenged teachers. There is a big difference between using technology to teach and the successful integration of technology into lesson plans.“(http://www.edutopia.org/blog/help-teachers-struggling-with-technology-josh-work)
- in primary grades, use programs like Kidpix to have students create 2-D representations to demonstrate understanding for Science (Life Systems, Structures and Mechanisms)
- watch videos of dance performances, (YouTube) and have students respond
- have students select nature/architecture photo from images or take a photo with iPad and write poem to accompany photo/image
- using spoken word poetry in the classroom https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLC5PJtWBigV2f4TM4Gx7IlPe1ummqg5jt
- in junior or intermediate, use YouTube to allow students to compare the same scene from a novel with several film adaptations
- students use iPads to document steps in Science experiments
- create a class wiki for students to write and entry about specific topic (character from novel, etc.). To create go to www.wikispaces.com
- design a webquest for a language or history project
- 50 ways to use twitter http://www.teachhub.com/50-ways-use-twitter-classroom
- 10 ways to use instagram http://www.weareteachers.com/community/blogs/weareteachersblog/blog-wat/2013/07/22/10-ways-to-use-instagram-in-the-classroom
Care for Materials
When reading Mike’s blog entry “I Lost my Pencil” I was struck with how I have struggled with the same dilemma this year. Coming from a Kindergarten class I was comfortable being a “Materials Manager” for the classroom. All the materials were shared and they were intentionally presented in an inviting way to encourage use, conversation, and expression. There was time in our day to return all the materials, and to do so as a whole class.
In my current grade 5/6 classroom, I started the year with a materials centre. This was set up with a few shelves to hold pencils, erasers, rulers, scissors, glue sticks, and markers, etc. I was surprised to discover that within a few weeks the items were no longer accessible for the whole class. I would find rulers twisted and bent on the floor. Pencils left on shelves and also dropped to the floor. The scissors had scattered as well.
I think my plan for the new school year is to be more explicit with the care of our class materials. In order for students to be interested in maintaining a materials centre, more time will have to be provided. Although I may model care for materials, I need to be more explicit in my modelling and give the time during our day to make it a priority. I also plan on acknowledging the students who maintain the materials. Mike has suggested in his blog that each group of students has a materials manager that looks after a kit. I may look for volunteers or rotate students in a group to work together to maintain the class materials centre. The care for classroom materials is connected to character trait education. It can also extend to care of the school and the community.
Shared Learning – Not Competition
In a learning community the focus becomes a shared learning, teamwork and helping each member to reach their potential. This collaborative classroom design creates a community of risk takers, where talents blossom and are shared for the good of all over time. Now, lets shift the scene to a school staff. It is made up of a wide variety of individuals with unique talents and levels of experience. A diverse talent pool that when shared creates a school portfolio that meets the needs of all of its learners.
I share this blog topic based on my many years of teaching in a wide variety of schools and communities. My early years of teaching witnessed classrooms as separate entities within a larger building where the only sharing that took place was at staff meetings. The most rewarding settings were always where classrooms were not a competition between teachers but rather a continuum of grades that were seamless in their beliefs and goals. Teachers seeking help from each other was encouraged and not frowned upon. The sharing of resources should be common practive and not items to be hidden. Mentoring, teaching partners, grade level planning are all significant enhancements to teacher planning pedagogy. Regardless of your level of experience, I highly encourage that you make time for colleague collaboration for it will become a regular part of both your learning and planning. “Even Einstein asked questions!”
Six Word Memoirs – How Much Can Be Said With So Little
There’s not a whole lot of positive things to be said about French à la carte, but something I have learned to appreciate this year is going into the different classrooms and seeing what other teachers are doing. My colleague, who is the Homeroom teacher of one of my French classes, is phenomenal on many fronts. Most of all, her depth of analysis and critical thinking means that her assignments are always creative and engaging, so much so that I find I’m almost wanting to do them myself.
The other week, she showed me the latest. As part of her memoir unit, she had her students communicate the essence of their lives and characters into six word memoirs. Some of the examples she provided them with were the following:
“Author of so many unwritten books.”
“Yes, I still have Superman sheets…”
“Was a painting, now a mural.”
“My rise to fame went unnoticed.”
“Smart girl wants love, gets dog.”
It was fascinating to see what the students were able to come up with themselves. Submitting a draft of their top six, it was amazing actually to see how they were able to incorporate wit, perspective and feeling into their descriptions. Most intriguing was matching up the words with the student and the insight it provided into their character. Finally, it was really interesting to see how effective they were as writers. They were much better at it than me. The right six words are not easy to come by – try it yourself…
Meeting the Challenge – What to Do With Immersion/Francophone Students in your Core French Classroom
Imagine the following scenario. A former French Immersion student for the past 5 years transfers schools and winds up in a Grade 6 Core French classroom and is subjected to a year of learning basic vocabulary, how to conjugate “er” verbs and doing skits with “AIM” hand gestures. What a nightmare – and our Core French students think that they have it rough!
Over the years, I have had several competent French-speaking students who end up in the Core French stream for a variety of reasons. It can be quite daunting as a teacher to try to effectively accommodate and integrate them into the classroom. It’s almost like having a first year university student suddenly join your Grade 8 History class. I also find, somewhat ironically, that they can be even more challenging to deal with than your neediest students and actually pose the same problem. The difficulty becomes how involve them in the class in a way that they remain interested and motivated to keep challenging themselves as French learners.
This year, I have a student in one of my classes who is a fully bilingual Francophone who went to all francophone school up until the end of Grade 6. After conferencing with him at the beginning of the year, he felt most comfortable learning alongside the rest of the class. I obviously altered the scope of the work and assessments and in consultation with him, designed some individual project. I still noticed that he wasn’t bursting with motivation (perhaps he never was) but still felt guilty at the thought of his languishing away.
Finally in a conversation, it came up that he really enjoyed the time I had him working with a group of students on their pronunciation for a presentation. Suddenly, I had an idea. One of my most vivid memories of being in French Immersion in high school was getting to speak in small groups with an older (very good-looking by the way) student from France named Yves. We would go visit with him and just spend the time having a natural, relevant conversation. I thought this could serve two purposes: Charles would feel valued as an expert helping his peers and my students would also benefit by increasing their conversational skills.
Every Friday, I reserve the last 20 minutes of the period for Charles to lead the discussion group. Students must then report back to me and demonstrate the new language they learned so that everyone is accountable on all fronts. So far, it’s been a welcome experience for everyone.
I Lost My Pencil
If I had a dollar for every time I heard ‘I lost my pencil. I don’t have an eraser.” I would, well I wouldn’t be blogging about it. This is just one of many ways that off task time takes away from instructional focus. Over the last several years I have experimented with a communal focus in terms of supplies and materials. My intent was to reduce the energy spent and ultimately time lost looking for basic working tools. I started by having containers that held pencils and containers that held erasers and they were placed on work areas. The idea was the students just had to get their book out and the writing tools would be there right in front of them. The students would just return it to the container where they borrowed it from. This produced immediate results in that as a group we seemed to be organized and ready to go sooner. This routine had to be taught and consistently applied. Of course students were allowed to use their own tools, but quick access was just an arm’s reach away.
As this plan evolved I had to figure out how to keep the pencils sharpened, rotation of old pencils out and new pencils and erasers in. Well, that ended being a great job for a team of students (student helpers). The current edition of this strategy is where I create complete tool kits (pencils, erasers, glue, scissors, rulers and highlighters) and each team is responsible for caring for their work materials. This shift in thinking from individual to communal supplies also assisted with students who have difficulty supplying their own tools, it eliminates the competition in having the most creative or expensive pencils or pens and puts the students on task earlier and for longer periods of time.
I am very interested in other suggestions around this topic. Please add your experiences.
Context – That Makes Sense
Please turn to page 134 in your Mathematics text and complete questions 1 -5. Students comply with smiling faces, complete the work, take up the solutions and then move on. Next day when you revisit a topic, it almost seems like they had forgotten everything that had been done the previous day. This is not a rare occurrence in classrooms of all ages. Research clearly points out how important the role of emotion is in learning. One of the most critical tools for a teacher is the strategy of context. I always ask myself prior to developing a unit of study what would this concept or skill look like in the everyday life of my students. That helps me frame the context for the learning task.
When I am able to make connections to the everyday lives of my students and the focus of instruction in the classroom I find that the learning is more likely to be consolidated and accessed by the student in future related tasks. Here is an example of how I used context in February. I took my class to camp for 3 days. Prior to going to camp we had to look at what the total costs would be per person as well as for the group. The level of engagement was extremely high as they explored a real life task that required them to access prior mathematical knowledge. While at camp they took photographs and filmed a specific activity they took part in. When we returned to school we did a recount of our experience that was to be shared with their families. It was some of the best writing they had done all year and it allowed me to see a transfer of the skills we had been working on since September. There was no reluctance, no hesitation as the task was real for them.