Diverse Learning Needs

January 21, 2013January 21, 2013 Katie Pryde Building Inclusion, Diverse Learning Needs

Goal Setting…Even in Kindergarten

Upon the return to school after the Holiday Break, I thought it would be interesting to see how goal setting might look in Kindergarten. We had a little discussion as a whole class about goals, and how at this time of year many people create goals for themselves. We brainstormed some common goals some people may want to make for themselves. Then, I made it specific to school, and my students brainstormed some ideas of Classroom Goals we should have for the 2013 school year. I have attached our goals for each Track that I teach. Some were very similar, but some were very creative and inclusive to that Track only. I was very proud of my students for coming up with such amazing goals.

I also got each student to write about what they would like to learn about for this upcoming year. Again, I was shocked and and so proud of the goals many of my students came up with!

See these goals at: https://mobile.twitter.com/class_pryde/status/289774661540147200/photo/1

https://mobile.twitter.com/class_pryde/status/289774263022534656/photo/1

Goal-setting can happen…. even in Kindergarten!

December 5, 2012December 5, 2012 Tina.Ginglo Literacy, Planning, Use of Technology

Writing Workshop and Technology

I am pleased with how our third grade writing-program is evolving this year. Students are at the point in the term where they are working independently. They know when they need to meet with their writing partner. They know when they need their laptops. They are learning how to publish their personal narratives using Microsoft Word, and use tools such as grammar and spelling to edit their work.

Our writing workshop is a simple process. First, all writing begins in the Writer’s Notebook. As I mentioned in an earlier post, I began the year introducing students to the narrative genre with “small moments.” Small moments are short pieces of writing that use action, dialogue and thought/feeling sentences. I provided writers with a number of strategies for generating ideas for writing, providing time for writers to practice each strategy. After several weeks of practice, I then introduced longer personal narrative writing. Students have a strong understanding of the success criteria for personal narrative writing.

Success Criteria:

You have written an effective personal narrative when:

your story has a beginning, middle and end;
the main character tells the story using the personal pronoun “I”;
you have included action, dialogue and thought/feeling sentences;
your story is a “seed” story, not a “watermelon” story;
you have correct spelling and punctuation.

Those familiar with the Lucy Calkin’s Units of Study resource will recognize the idea of small moments, seed stories and action, dialogue and thought sentences.

When writers feel they have finished a piece of writing, the next stage in our writer’s workshop is for writers to meet with their assigned writing partner. I decided to match writers who are writing at the same stage of development rather than pairing stronger writers with more dependent writers. This way each partner will benefit from the feedback they receive. Writing partners refer to our success criteria when giving feedback to their writing partner. I expect writing partners to provide two “glow” comments and one “grow” comment to their partner when they meet.

Following their meeting with their writing partner, the writer begins their first revision. Most students choose to type their narratives on Microsoft Word. As they begin to publish their narratives, they make revisions to their first draft, keeping in mind the feedback they just received.

In addition to meeting with their writing partner, I call writers for writing conferences each day. I usually wait until writers have completed their first revision on their laptops. I decide on a teaching focus, for example, using correct punctuation when using quotation marks, for our conference. A writer will walk away from our conference with a skill to practice as they continue to revise a piece of writing or when they begin a new piece of writing in their Writer’s Notebook.

For many, the most exciting step in writing workshop comes next. After writers have revised their personal narratives, they log in to Edmodo.com and post their narrative in their assigned writing group. I have created five separate writing groups on Edmodo.com. There are four to five students in each writing group. These groups are more heterogeneous. When writers post their narratives in the writing groups on Edmodo.com, they ask members of their writing group as well as their teachers for descriptive feedback. It is the responsibility of each writer to read their colleagues’ personal narratives and provide them with descriptive feedback in the form of glow and grow comments. Students’ writing partners are not assigned to the same writing group. Therefore, each writer in our class receives descriptive feedback from five to six of their peers as well as their teachers!

We are now at the stage where writers are reading their feedback on line and returning to their posted piece for a second or third revision. They then repost their narrative to share with their group members. Ideally, I would like my third graders to learn how to leave a piece of writing. They can start a new piece in their Writer’s Notebook and perhaps return to earlier published pieces later in the year.

Integrating Edmodo.com into our writing program revealed additional benefits I didn’t anticipate. Edmodo is basically acting as our class’ private server. Students can access their stories from any computer at school or at home. This eliminates the need for flash drives. If students want to work on a piece of writing at home, they simply log into Edmodo.com. I also have easy access to student writing. I can provide feedback to students at my convenience without having to carry writing folders. Parents can also see what their child is writing at school. When parents log in using their assigned parent access code, they only have access to their child’s posts.

I promise that not all my posts will be about Edmodo.com, but it is really exciting to see students engaged in the writing process. It is amazing how this technology enriches our writing workshop. However, our writing program is not dependent on technology. If the technology were to disappear, our writing workshop would continue, just less efficiently.

November 24, 2012November 25, 2012 Katie Pryde Diverse Learning Needs, Learning in a Real Life Context, Professional Learning and Growth

Outdoor Education

Outdoor education is something I have been trying out this year in my Grade 3 classroom. I have tried giving my students opportunities to use the outside world to explore and learn from it. As our first social studies unit was First Nations people, we decided to go for a class walk to a nearby forest/pond area near our school. We took some time to explore and look around at the environment we saw around us. After some exploration, we came together and had a community circle to discuss things we have seen. We pretended to be First Nations people, and discussed things we would use in our environment to survive (trees for building our homes, ducks for food, water for drinking water, etc). It was a great experience, and students were able to make social studies connections to the environment around them.

Although I have been trying out some of the outdoor education ideas, I felt I needed more. So, I signed up for an Outdoor Education Workshop. It was called Outdoor Education: Look and Learn, which was provided to me through my school board, Halton District School Board and Royal Botanical Gardens in Hamilton, Ontario. The day started off with us playing some outdoor games, which came from the Project Wild resource book. Then, we went on a hike where we were able to use our 5 senses and explore the environment. We all used our cellphones, or were given cameras to take pictures of things that interested us. It was a rainy/foggy day, so we were able to take some beautiful pictures. After some exploration, we were given some birds seed and these chickadees flew right down to us and ate the seeds from our hands. As adults, we were so excited about this, so I could only imagine how our younger students would have enjoyed this.

We were all assigned to choose a few leaves that stood out to us and share what types of activities we could do with them. The leaves were so beautiful with bright orange and red colours. Some ideas were to sort them leaves based on different properties, use the leaves for art (making leaf turkeys for Thanksgiving, or leaf rubbings) and using the leaves for math by looking at symmetry.

It was a wonderful workshop, I learned many things and felt more confident about doing outdoor education with my students. We also were given some wonderful resources. If you are interested in reading more on Outdoor Education, please check out:

Into Nature: A Guide to Teaching in Nearby Nature
http://www.back2nature.ca/resources-research/education

Happy Exploring!!!

November 15, 2012November 15, 2012 Tina.Ginglo Building Inclusion, Diverse Learning Needs, Social Justice, Use of Technology

Equity and Access to Technology

I am committed to equity and inclusive practice. Each day I “check in” with myself and ask those important questions: Do all my students feel included in the classroom? Have I excluded any students from the learning I have planned today? With technology these questions are particularly important to consider. In particular, I want to address the concerns around students’ access to computers. As I mentioned in my last blog post, my students and I are fortunate to have unlimited access to technology, specifically, laptops, wireless Internet and digital cameras. Access to these tools presents us with endless opportunities to make learning meaningful and engaging for students. The students are so excited about learning. They want to take their flash drives home to work on writing projects and they log in from home to contribute to their Edmodo groups. However, there are some students who don’t have computers at home. What about these kids? These students can quickly feel left out if they are not part of the “virtual” in-group, so how can I make the most of the technology I have and not marginalize any of my students?

I have been working closely with one of my mentors since October. He has helped me create a vision for my class use of computers. I want to get my students to the point where they decide when they need the computers and when they do not. At the beginning, I had all the control. I directed students when to take out the laptops and when to put them away. In the first few weeks, you could walk into our classroom and see all the students working on their laptops at the same time, doing the same thing, like a computer lab. This didn’t feel right for me. Now, more often, you could walk into our classroom and see some students on laptops, some not. The students using laptops will likely be doing different activities. A few may be logged on to Edmodo contributing to their discussion groups, some may be working on a second or third draft of writing, others could be reading or doing research, while others could be engaged in an on-line lesson from Ontario’s Education Resource Bank. I believe that this kind of learning environment helps students develop independent work habits, increases student engagement and by allowing students to have some control and choice in their learning, I hope to see an increase in student achievement and a decrease in classroom management issues. I also believe that such an environment will allow all students to participate in and keep up with on line learning during the school day. It may not completely resolve my access concerns, but I am sure it helps.

November 15, 2012November 15, 2012 Tina.Ginglo Professional Learning and Growth, Use of Technology

Introducing a New Tool for Learning Takes Time and Patience

I have been absent from Heart and Art for too long! I have not forgotten about our followers or my fellow Heart and Art bloggers, but I have been distracted with a new challenge. Last spring, I successfully wrote a proposal requesting laptops for our third grade program. In mid October the laptops arrived, and since then I have spent every spare moment working to integrate this new learning tool into the heart and art of my teaching and student learning. I trust that my absence from Heart and Art has not been in vain. It is my intention to share my new learning and growing pains with Heart and Art followers. I hope that Heart and Art followers will benefit from my recent “distractions.” Each month I will share how the third graders at my school are taking ownership of their learning and growing more independent as they use technology as a tool for learning.

The proposal I drafted commits my students to collaboratively generate inquiry questions that connect to the science and social studies curriculum. My students have begun to use laptops to mind map their ideas and questions using off-line software. We have just started to use MS Office software (Word or Excel) to keep track of their jot notes and sources and the plan is that they will share their research through meaningful projects such as scripted video documentaries (Windows Movie Maker), scripted video/podcast how-to guides (Audacity), digital scrapbooks, pamphlets, or public service announcements. I have recently connected with a grade 12 Media Studies teacher who teaches at our feeder high school. We are discussing the possibilities for doing a project together. I really hope this pans out! You can trust I will share our learning on Heart and Art!

We are at the early stages, but my students are starting to share their inquiry questions, research and new learning using Web 2.0 tools. For example, I have created a teacher account on Edmodo.com. It is FREE! All my students have created student accounts and they now use Edmodo to share ideas and new learning with each other in school as well as from home in this secure educational social media site. I started by simply posting questions students to consider and discuss on-line. To date, I created three groups for my students to join: Science, Social Studies and Room 204- Announcements. I will share how I use the Announcements group in another Heart and Art blog post. I am interested to learn how other primary teachers are using Edmodo in their classrooms. I am following a number of teacher groups on Edmodo, but most of the contributors are junior, intermediate and secondary teachers. I do believe that Edmodo has its place in the primary classroom as well. I will post the different ways I am using Edmodo in future blog posts. My next Edmodo project is to take my literature circle groups on-line.

Obviously, there is a skill set that my students need to possess in order to conduct research and use spread sheets and flow charts to record their learning. It has been a slow process. Although most of my students have computers at home (19 of my 22 students have access computers and Internet at home), their keyboarding skills, ability to save their work and access files is limited. There are times when I think to myself, “This is consuming so much time!” But I am committed to using 21^st century tools in my classroom and to creating an environment where students learn with and from each other within the walls of our classroom and beyond the walls of our classroom. When I get frustrated, I just tell myself to “Trust the process!” I hope to join an international project as well this year…all in time…one day at a time…stay tuned!

November 12, 2012November 15, 2012 Carmen.Oliveira Learning in a Real Life Context, Literacy, Professional Learning and Growth, Resources, Social Justice

Opening Hearts and Minds Through Social Justice

I recently blogged about an excellent new resource created by ETFO entitled “Social Justice Begins With Me.” In my post I described how we implemented one of the lessons in the classroom and then extended our learning by taking it out into the community. It was such a meaningful experience that I decided to share it with the entire staff as well as the teacher candidate working with me. As a result, staff members have now begun to try the lessons in their classrooms and the faculty supervisor overseeing my teacher candidate’s progress has also shared it with the faculty students. The feedback has been phenomenal which is why I have decided to give you all a quick overview of the resource.

Social Justice Begins With Me targets Primary, Junior, and Intermediate grades with literacy focused lessons that are linked to picture books and short novels that target social justice issues. The lessons guide teachers through various activities that embed both social justice issues and character education. One of my favourite aspects of this resource are the ideas that support community involvement, thus taking the learning out of the classroom into a real-life context. The lessons are also supplemented with graphic organizers, assessment tools and strategies, along with well organized lists of texts that include each synopsis. The reproducibles are very helpful and applicable to a variety of activities.

My students have enjoyed the experience so much that they suggested we find a way to share our learning with the community in some way or another on a monthly basis. We have just finished our fictional narratives by writing short stories which the class suggested we share with the folks at a nearby nursing home. “We can take some scones or biscuits and sit with the elderly to share our stories,” they suggested a few weeks ago when we started the process. “A lot of times old people are not treated very nicely or their families forget them. This is one way we can tell them about what we’re learning,” one student commented. Brilliant idea. And it all started with a lesson on thanking those in our community with unappreciated jobs.

If you want to integrate social justice into your classroom, this is one of the best resources available. Try it and please share your experiences with us. I would very much enjoy to know how the lessons came alive in your classrooms!

Below I have included the direct link for those who want to take a closer look at the resource.

http://www.etfo.ca/resources/new/socialjustice/Pages/default.aspx

September 30, 2012October 1, 2012 Katie Pryde Diverse Learning Needs, Professional Learning and Growth, Resources, The Daily 5

The Daily 5

This year, the initiative our Primary Team has taken on in regards to literacy, is implementing The Daily 5 and CAFE. For those of you whom are unfamiliar with the 2, they are based on books written by “The Sisters”, Joan Moser and Gail Boushey. These books are a great (easy) read and gives you a wonderful basis and understanding of the 2 concepts, and how to set it up in your classroom. The Daily 5 is a framework that allows students to participate in 5 different activities each and every day: Read to Self, Read to Someone, Listen to Reading, Work on Writing and Work on Words. CAFE is an acronym standing for C- Comprehension, A- Accuracy, F- Fluency and E- Expanding Vocabulary, and are the strategies good readers and writers need to be successful. The 2 work very well and I feel, go hand in hand with one another. If you buy (or read) both books, they give you examples of how your first few days will look like when you are setting up the program in your classroom.

Since the 2nd week of school, I begun implementing these programs, one by one, illustrating what each Daily 5 looks like. We also created anchor charts that have been posted around the room illustrating the “expectations” both students and teachers have during our literacy block. Our chart is set up with the headings Students Do vs Teacher Do. Many of the activities are very similar in what the students and teachers are expected to do. Students, for the most part, are expected to work the whole time, remain quiet, work in one spot, get to work right away, and have fun! The teacher is expected to work with students at the guided reading table, conference with students, and watch/listen to how students are reading/writing.

The first concept I introduced to my class was Read to Self (independent reading). When we were practicing,
we were working on our stamina. This means, how long our brains are working without any breaks. Students should be reading for 20 mins each day, but first, we needed to build up our stamina, to reach the 20 mins. My students are quite fabulous, and really enjoy reading and it only took us 7 days to reach of goal of reading for 20 mins consecutively without any breaks. I encourage my students to have 2-3 books with them at their desk so if they finish a book before the 20 mins is over, they will have some more books at their desks so they can continue to read without stopping and interrupting others by getting a new book. Then, we moved to Listen to Reading, which is when I introduced our class read a loud. I brought in all my old Goosebumps Books for our classroom library, and my students are now obsessed with them. So, we took a classroom vote, and our first read a loud book was a Goosebumps Book- The Ghost Next Door. Then, we moved on to Read to Someone. How I set this up in my classroom, was by practicing buddy reading. We discussed how it looks like when you are reading to your buddy and EEKK (Elbow to Elbow, Knee to Knee). We did this for 2 days, and built up our Read to Someone stamina of 20 mins. Then, I introduced Work on Writing, where students had the opportunity to write in the writing journals. We created success criteria for journal writing, so students knew exactly what was expected of them when they wrote in their journals. Finally, I taught a mini lesson on syllables, and our Work on Words introduction allowed students to add their names to the class word wall, and they needed to sort all the students’ names based on the number of syllables in each name.

Once we went through all of the lessons and talked about what each Daily 5 looked like, as well as modelling some of the CAFE strategies (such as Check for Understanding, Choosing Good Fit Books and Go Back and Re-Read), we started our Daily 5 centres last week. The Daily 5 is all about choice, but for the first week, I decided to split my class into groups and they rotated through the Daily 5 centres so they could become familiar with the whole process. In our 100 minute literacy block, my students have the opportunity to be engaged in the Daily 5. My students first start off with Read to Self, where they read independently for 20 minutes. Then, I ring the bell which is an indicator to my students that they need to quickly tidy up and meet me on the carpet. Then, I teach a mini lesson on the CAFE strategy that we are currently working on. Sometimes, I read a read a loud picture book to my students and either model how to use the CAFE strategy, or get students to help me with it (so it becomes a shared reading and shared use of the CAFE strategy).
Once the lesson is complete, students are told which centre they will start off with. Students will rotate through 3 centres in one day. Last week, our centres were: Read to Someone (Buddy Reading) or Read to Someone (Guided Reading with Ms. Pryde), Work on Writing (journal writing which integrated with Social Studies- If I were a First Nations person, I would live… I would eat… I would travel by…), Work on Words (Read and Write the Room) and then I would finish off the 100 minute literacy block by reading a few chapters from our chapter read a loud book. Students spend 2 min at each centre. Next week, now that the students have had the opportunity to complete one complete rotation of our Daily 5 centres, students will be able to choose which centre they will go to and will keep track of which centres they would like to go to (a great Responsibility indicator, for students to make sure they go to each centre at least once, as well as keeping track of it on their own).

So far, it has been a success in my classroom and I look forward to seeing how it will look like in my classroom this week!

June 23, 2012June 25, 2012 Roz.Geridis Celebrating Success, Diverse Learning Needs, Planning, Use of Technology

End of the Year is Near!

Summer is almost here and the kids know it. Their lack of attention and wanting to be outside in the beautiful weather is hard to compete with. What do I do to keep the boys attention? How or what do I keep teaching when my reports are completed and in? No air conditioning or fan – my room is known as one of the hottest in the school. Why fight it – I take their learning outside and still teach curriculum.

I try to keep them inside as long as we can handle it; which means sometime between morning recess and lunch. At this point of the year, I am changing my day plan slightly. It is based on which lessons do I need the whiteboard or computer connection for? I teach those lessons first. For language, I take a book and read it to them while the boys are lying down under a tree. I ask questions about inferring, point of view, comprehension and relating the reading to their own life experiences. However, this is all completed orally, some questions are discussed in partners (while I go to every group and engage the students) and some are large group discussions.

For Math, I may take them on a walk looking for 3D shapes or angles in nature. This can also be done in your playground. I also may play a game with them related to probability or multiplication baseball. I look for ways to connect Math to their real world experiences. Having the students show me and themselves why we need Math in our everyday lives.

For Art, we have gone out into the community and sketched trees and flowers; items in our environment. We also have used digital cameras to take pictures of structures in our environment and used photoshop to add to their pictures.

I also am finding ways to take the kids on affordable field trips. While planning field trips, the boys have an input and have often asked for the trip to be just our class. We have one planned for the division to go to a Park, and my class want to go to a different area of the park. We are taking the TTC and exploring our city. Doing a walking tour of the city (while taking pictures) was one of the boys’ most favourite trips this year.

At this point of the year, I am finding ways to have fun with the class and also relate it to the curriculum. They seem to be enjoying it and even understand why we are learning certain aspects of the curriculum. The community environment we have developed is one I hope the boys will always remember.

June 18, 2012June 19, 2012 Roz.Geridis Diverse Learning Needs, Learning About Your Students, Planning, Professional Learning and Growth, Resources

Planning for Next Year

As the school year is coming to an end I use this time to reflect upon my lessons and look forward to next year’s planning. What will I keep, what didn’t work, what needs to be tweaked for next year’s students? Some of this planning will be based on my next year’s students needs and learning styles. Where do I go for new ideas, support for planning and resources?

1) I sit down with the previous teacher.

Most schools will have sheets or some sort of meeting to share information and build the new classes. Looking to evenly distribute the boys and girls, ESL, Special Education, HSP and which kids should be or not be placed together. The sheets are usually given to next year’s teacher to help understand the student. I find the information on the sheets give limited information and don’t always share who the student is as a learner. I listen to the information being given, take notes on every student and review all this information later. At some point, I go back to the previous teacher and ask for further information. If the previous teacher is an LTO, I need to connect with the teacher before s/he leaves for a new school. If you are a new teacher to the school in the Fall, ask for the sheets and try to connect with previous teachers as soon as possible.

2) If you are lucky to get the same grade, I look at my previous year’s planning.

Now I know a little more about my new students. What are they going to be interested in? What do I need to change? Everything should be tweaked for my new class.

If I am teaching a new grade, I still look at my previous year’s planning and build the new year from that starting point. I have learned more about my personal teaching strengths and areas of professional development which I will look into.

3) Where do I get new ideas?

Most boards have teachers who specialize in curriculum areas and provide that support with ideas and resources. Some can even give field trip ideas, support with combined grade planning, will come to your class and teach a model lesson. If you are finding it difficult to locate a name, ask your librarian or administration.
Your board website should have some resources available to the teachers. Many board website resources are open to the public and are available for all to find information. There are Science and Social Studies units available for combined grades. I usually don’t use all the information available on the websites but it helps me gather ideas and lessons for my unit.
Sitting down with my colleagues to team plan. New people have new ideas. This year, I was the only grade 6 English teacher and my Extended French colleague had already developed his program and found it difficult to devote the time needed to team plan. But we still found smaller opportunities to team plan. I also found support on line, a volunteer who went to different classes throughout the board, student teacher and colleagues who were in the same board but in different areas of the board. Many people have ideas, I find ideas help get me thinking. Whether I take the idea as is or tweak it to suit my student needs, I find all ideas are helpful.

4) Next year’s class – the students.

As we all know, students achieve more when their interest is in the lesson. At the beginning of the school year, I ask my students what you would like to do, what would you like me to teach you in language. This year, my students wanted to write a graphic novel using bit strips. I took their lead and used graphic novels to teach them about narrative writing and to help develop their plans for writing. I also share the Science and Social Studies units and give them an idea of when we are covering certain units.

At this point of the year, you are looking at finishing things off and planning for your next year. I personally prefer to reflect and think about my next year’s planning now. For some people, they need that down time before they reflect and plan for the following year. It is up to you and what suits your lifestyle best.

May 25, 2012 Erin.Grewar Assessment, Diverse Learning Needs

Assessment Strategies for the Communicative Approach

I’m not sure about the rest of you but I’ve sometimes found that it is difficult to assess a summative speaking task. In response to sitting through the umpteenth (sometimes tedious) round of presentations where one has to equally focus on assessing the presenters while keeping the rest o the class quietly engaged, I was forced to diversify my methods. To deal with the latter problem, I found peer assessment to be an effective and useful tool. I constructed a rating chart with levels one to four focusing on the following criteria: spoke clearly with confidence and expression, spoke using vocabulary and language structures taught in class, spoke with natural flow and only minor hesitations, spoke using a variety of communication strategies (asking to repeat, using gestures, asking for clarification), came prepared to present and was focused during other people’s presentations.

I divided the class into strategic groupings beforehand to balance out the “distracted” students, varying levels of ability and particular dynamics. Once in their groups, students took turns presenting while the others evaluated and provided feedback. At the same time, I was circulating around the class and also simultaneously evaluating those students who were presenting. If I missed someone, I came back and asked them to repeat a portion of their presentation. To finish off and showcase some of their work, I asked each group to nominate one person/group to present to the class. At the end, students handed in their written evaluations providing myself and each other with valuable feedback and insight. What was also a major accomplishment was we had also managed to have everyone present in one period as opposed to the course of a week.

Using the same rating scale (minus the bit about being focused and on-task during other presentations), I also had students come up to see me individually. Asking them 4 to 5 theme-related questions, they had to answer them spontaneously. This allowed me a true insight into their level of speaking and an opportunity to hear them talk without any kind of prop. At the workshop I attended, they had suggested videotaping each student so that you could go back and evaluate from the footage but I found that this would make many students self-conscious and thus impact the results and in all honesty, I knew I wouldn’t have the time to do so.

The results were definitely interesting and in some cases surprising. I would strongly recommend attempting this as a final assessment once students had frequent opportunities to become comfortable and familiar with the vocabulary and pronunciation through the many opportunities of practising in class.