I decided to focus the discussions this week on creativity.
As I read this part of the book I constantly thought of the many creative staff members we have in our building and district. I see creative ideas all of the time, but many of you may not describe yourself as creative.
A few quotes I found about creativity were...
"Creativity is allowing yourself to make mistakes. Art is knowing which ones to keep."
Scott Adams
"Another word for creativity is courage."
George Prince
"The principle goal of education is to create women/men who are capable of doing new things, not simply of repeating what other generations have done."
Jean Piaget
"The man who has no imagination has no wings."
Muhammad Ali
"As a teacher, the more creative strategies you have in your bag of tricks, the better."
Ron Clark
My questions for this week are...
1. Ron Clark gave an example of a creative lesson that he did while his fifth graders were reading The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe. Give an example of a creative lesson you did or saw someone else do. You could also give a creative idea for classroom management.
2. Ron Clark discussed the fact that after going through tests with his students he realized that the students did not know the vocabulary. He came up with a Rockin' Words book where his class worked hard to master a list of 1,000 words. As you know, Vocabulary is one of our weaknesses when it comes to OAA testing. Share some of your ideas to help build vocabulary. Also be creative and try to think of something new to try, then let us know how it goes. Think outside of the box... take risks... then share your stories!
3. Another thing that Ron Clark talked about was using those teachable moments. Share a teachable moment that you have had.
Thanks for the great discussions! It is great hearing your stories and reading what others have to say about it. Keep up the GREAT WORK !
Have a great week and try something new and creative!
I have to admit I struggle with being creative. One activity I use for vocabulary words is "I have, Who has". I didn't come up with this myself - I saw it in a book and know other teachers also use it. It really keeps the students attentive and after playing it a few times they know most of the definitions. When I taught living skills my semester exam had 45 vocab words. We always reviewed with "I have, Who has" and the students were amazed themselves at how well they learned the words. Most of them thought beforehand that they could never learn that many definitions. Anyone wanting to know how to play, please contact me and I'll be happy to show you.
ReplyDeleteWhen I did my student teaching I had a very elaborate “wedding” for the letters Q and U. The kids loved it! I sent invitations just like you would for a wedding. All the students were involved. Some were in the “wedding” as the Q and U, there was a flower girl, ring bearer, maid of honor, best man, and in the audience the kids wore qu- words around their necks. I make Q and U cut out cookies. I won’t lie it was a lot of work but to see the students have so much fun with it made it all worth it. I am excited to see what other people have done in their rooms!
ReplyDeleteI think a fun way to help children with vocabulary is to make a recording. The teacher or student says the word, defines it, and then uses it in a sentence. Make if part of a center. The more the child interacts with the word the better. Have a word of the day in your classroom. Have the students define it, draw a picture of it, find a synonym and or antonym, or anything else you can think of.
A couple years ago I was doing a long term sub job in a 1st grade classroom. It was my first week and there was a mother that came in to volunteer around the classroom. As I was talking to her I discovered she worked for the Anthony Thomas candy company. I thought it would be a great project for the students to come up with interview questions. I worked with them on creating open ended questions. The next week when the mother came back in the class interviewed her using the questions we had worked so hard on. The students loved doing this! In an ideal world, I would have loved to take them to the actual factory to take a tour. I was so thank for that parent opening of for the students. Getting to know the parents of your students or students in your school can really open a lot of doors and introduce new experiences to your class!
ReplyDeleteI like to do story retells with puppets and creative ways for my students to recall the sequence of the story. When we did the 3 Billy Goats Gruff I used paper bags for pulling the troll out from under the bridge and the kids drew a bridge on the side of the bag and then made stick puppets of the 3 goat characters. We used the bag and puppets for understanding setting, characters, beginning, middle and end of the story. The kids loved pulling the troll out of the bag each time to try to get each goat. I know my students understood the things I wanted them to learn from this project. I had a "Teachable Moment" when I used the 3 Billy Goats project to talk about using "voice" when retelling the story. I would not usually teach that topic, but it fit into the project so well.
ReplyDeleteVOCABULARY: The new reading series has really improved vocabualry work in my room. There are 3 new words to learn each week and I have the students do a vocabulary exercise where they copy the word and draw a picture that defines the word. We review the vocabulary words that we have covered.
In preschool we have a lot of connections, such as Ron Clark w/ his book. As a 2nd grade teacher it was one of my favorite things to bring learning through literature to life. One of my fav books is The Tale of Desperaux (I prob spelled his name wrong), I read it to my second graders and we just loved it...we would stop and spend time discussing sections, writing our reflections in our writer's notebooks, discussing vocab ('cuz that's a tough book..) then when we finished we had a ball (it was schoolwide, since the last year I was there we decided to read the book to all the 1st and 2nd graders). Students dressed up, we served soup and cheese (cheese balls), it was the best:)
ReplyDeleteI think vocab is challenging on the test because it requires two skills, decoding and comprehension. You have to know prefixes and suffixes, word chunking and then you have to go back and read it in context to understand what the word means. Now, in PK we work a lot on vocab because my students are working on speech and language so much...the only way to do it is to make the words real...or as real as possible. Through meaningful experiences, bringing in items on the vocab list, finding them in stories, looking for videos that demonstrate the word (for example, last week's Blue Footed Booby...they loved the bird dance:)
I think the reason that the Rockin' Dictionary got such acceptance is because it was fun, it was fun and meaningful.
Anyone who teaches little people knows that we are all about teachable moments, I write a lesson plan, and I try to stick to it, but if someone asks the difference between a jaguar and a tiger we go with it...I have that luxury in PK...but I think that it can be done at any level with a little flexibility, especially when you have children who are more independent and can break into research teams and find out all kinds of things on their own...teachable moments I think have more to do with enthusiasm than creativity...because if we are excited about learning our kids will be too:)
Being in the arts, every lesson in itself is creative! I LOVE that about being a music teacher!! For me, creativity entails much more than just coming up with creative lessons (although the possiblities are endless.... as long as we the time to prepare those creative lessons!)... my ultimate goal is to push and encourage the STUDENTS to break through whatever boundaries/walls/roadblocks they've put up and grow in their OWN creativity. It is so fun/interesting to observe the difference among all the grade levels- the younger the students, the more they allow themselves to be "free" in music- dancing, singing, performing like no one is watching. 5th grade becomes much more of a struggle to keep that "I don't care who's watching" mentality. But oh what a wonderful moment there was last week with a group of 5th graders: We were looking at Christopher Canyon's book for Take Me Home, Country Roads, and Grandma's Featherbed- observing the illustrations while listening to the songs. When Grandma's Featherbed started (very bluegrass, knee-slapping, banjo-picking goodtime sound!) a few students got up and started dancing- swinging partners, do-si-do-ing, etc. Well the rest of the class kind of sat there watching... like "uuuuuuhhhhhhh..... I don't know. It looks like fun but I'm too afraid." So I dropped the book and kicked my legs up and danced my way back to the room, pulling kids out of their seats on the way back. It was so much fun! Everyone was up, moving, dancing, actually BEING KIDS (instead of trying to be "cool middle schoolers" which so many of them think they already are). And with this particular group of 5th graders- that was pretty amazing. Even the toughest of kids cut loose. Kids absolutely FLOURISH and come alive when they are allowed and encouraged to be creative. They are already naturally creative- so in that realm, we could learn a lot from them!
ReplyDeleteI try to put some type creativity in all my lessons, but I love to do interactive bulletin boards. I have several that the students can manipulate and enjoy working with. They often use their recess time to play with the bulletin boards. One of my favorites is the "Layers of the Rainforest" bulletin board. Students place animals in the rainforest according to what layer they live in. I also have one called "Name that President." There are 10 silhouettes of past presidents and clue cards under each president. The students have to guess the president and check their answers by opening up the card. Inside the card is the actual picture with the presidents name.
ReplyDeleteThis year I took LBD's idea of a vocabulary journal. We use this journal for all of our subjects. The students' favorite part is drawing a picture for the vocabulary word. I assumed it would take a majority of our time to complete the journal entries, but to my surprise it takes about 5 minutes out of our day. I also have activities on the SMART Board to reinforce the vocabulary words we are learning or have learned. I like Susan's idea about recording the vocab. My students love to hear themselves.
I use teachable moments every day. Students ask so many great questions and if you ignore their curiosity you might miss some wonderful opportunities to learn. Those teachable moments engage students and feed their passion for learning.
Creative teaching strategies are essential for me to be an effective teacher. I try to be creative everyday with teaching the curriculum in a way to reach all my students and have them engaged with their creative side as well. Hook the students and dazzle them with auditory, visual and tactile presentations. Food is a great motivator in Math. Pretzels can make angles, bread can represent area and perimeter math vocabulary terms. Many times we sing or rap songs to learn math terms. Many great sites on the web for this. In the content area it is easy to take the material that is to be covered and take ownership of it. For example, in Social Studies we do acting out parts or role play what we have already read and discussed. I have their attention this way and have seen shy students wanting to role play a certain part of a history lesson. The students make connections and create images to facts being learned. The students are engaged and their creative side is infectious to other students.
ReplyDeleteThis year, like Jen, we use the LBD Journals in Reading. We have also started to give Vocabulary quizzes on the words from our LBD Theme Units. We use vocabulary journals in all subject areas as well. I also use my Word Wall for Math Terms that we are learning. The closer we get to OAA testing I use the vocabulary language from test questions. We also write,define, and draw pictures for most of our words across the content area. Charades is a great way to introduce vocabulary terms. We play vocabulary Bingo with spelling and math terms.
Teachable or spontaneous moments come into play everyday in my class room. I agree with Jen, I have to seize the moment and try to make the most of the questions the students ask. If we don't know the answer we find it. I was reading a story to the class and they had no idea what aloof meant. That became the word of the day and we had to use that word at least once when we communicated with each other. Creativity can be collaborative since ideas emerge from joint thinking. I am a risk taker and I let my students know that. I encourage them to be risk takers with their learning. I agree with Bethany that we can learn a lot from our students.
A creative lesson I do every year to kick off our study of MLK is I bake cookies. I tell the kids that I have baked for them and they are so excited but they don't know why I baked them or even that we are leading into a discussion about MLK. I scope my classroom and find a characteristic about a few of my students and only give them a cookie (initially). This year I gave a cookie to 6 girls (they all had some sort of hair "thing" in their hair). The kids without cookies get mad, sad, and say things like, "This isn't fair!" They know something is up because they know I would never do something to hurt them. It's hard to keep a straight face though! One year, when I taught 2nd grade, I had a little boy go as far as making a sign that said, "This is wrong!" After I let this go for just a few minutes, I ask the kids with cookies how they are feelings and I hear comments like, "I'm lucky I got a cookie." "I'm sad my friend didn't get one." One year I had one little girl start breaking her cookie into teeny tiny pieces to share with the kids at her table. I also ask the kids without cookies how they feel. Then I pull the kids that did get a cookie up in front of the class and I tell the class that I picked these students to get a cookie because of a particular reason. They have to guess what they notice they all have in common. From here, we get into a huge discussion about segregation. It really hits home for them and they learn a great deal. I also have them write about the experience. On my newletter, I tell parents to ask their child about our "cookie experiment" to encourage them to talk with their child about the experience.
ReplyDeleteLike most of the others, I have a vocab journal I use from LBD. They write about the word (in a way that's meaningful to them) and then they draw the word as well. I love this because the words apply to the story, the poems, the strategies, etc. that we are studying that week so they make multiple connections with the words.
I have loved reading about creative ideas our teachers are using! I try to use new ideas I hear other teachers are having success with and I try to find new ideas from publications or internet sources, but I feel like I should definitely be more creative in my teaching. I think that since I have such a short amount of time with especially my reading groups and I try to get as much reading and writing accomplished as I possibly can, I don’t put enough thought into being creative. I have loved getting used to having a SMART Board in my room, though, and am trying some new things that I think the kids will enjoy and will learn from. As far as vocabulary, I, like Linda, have used the “I have, Who has” activity. This is a good way to teach new words and meanings and a fun way to keep students involved in learning. Currently, with my really young students, we follow the IBD lessons and try to associate vocabulary to real life situations and make connections to what they already know. It always amazes me to learn that they don’t know a lot of things that I assumed they DID know. I never let a teachable moment pass by. I think they are essential to telling us, as teachers, what kids want to learn about and it is our responsibility to teach them about it, no matter what.
ReplyDeleteI really enjoy reading about all of the great creative ideas as well! I work with many teachers in the building, and I feel like I see creative ideas constantly. I tend to struggle with being creative, but I always try my best to be a creative, engaging teacher, and I also look to others for ideas. One creative use of technology that Kelli used this year in our math class was a video on the SMARTboard. She found a video of 4th grade students rapping about mean, median, mode and range. It was a great way to teach students the meaning of the landmarks. They really enjoyed listening to the song every day, and I believe it helped them remember what each landmark was.
ReplyDeleteOne thing that I did during my student teaching in order to review vocabulary was designing a Jeopardy game. Now that we have a SMARTboard in our room, we could design a Jeopardy activity on the SMARTboard as well. Students would probably find this very engaging.
I have had many behavioral teachable moments this year, especially with the Wildcat Way. There have been many moments where students have not been displaying the Wildcat Way, and I have used those situations as teachable moments. Students really seem to respond to the Wildcat Way, and it seems as though they have higher expectations for themselves and each other. I have really enjoyed utilizing the Wildcat Way phrase this year in order to guide students towards appropriate behavior.
1. Ron Clark gave an example of a creative lesson that he did while his fifth graders were reading The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe. Give an example of a creative lesson you did or saw someone else do. You could also give a creative idea for classroom management.
ReplyDeleteA creative lesson that I did with my students during my student teaching was I had the student draw a number and that number belonged to a different type of butterfly. We were learning about the life cycle of the butterfly so I had them draw the life cycle of their butterfly, tell be about their habitat, their family name, and any other facts they learned. The students go to use the internet to research about their butterflies. We then learned how to put together a power point and they presented their power points to the class. The students loved this and took so much pride in their research and power points. It turned out better than I had ever expected.
2. Ron Clark discussed the fact that after going through tests with his students he realized that the students did not know the vocabulary. He came up with a Rockin' Words book where his class worked hard to master a list of 1,000 words. As you know, Vocabulary is one of our weaknesses when it comes to OAA testing. Share some of your ideas to help build vocabulary. Also be creative and try to think of something new to try, and then let us know how it goes. Think outside of the box... take risks... then share your stories!
In one of my field placements I had a teacher that used Vocabulary words as a center. The students were in partners and they would ask the student the word to go along with the definition they had given them. The students had a word bank of those words to choose from for that week. Each week were new words that the students should know. The students enjoyed this center, because each day they would get more right than the day before.
3. Another thing that Ron Clark talked about was using those teachable moments. Share a teachable moment that you have had.
During my student teaching we were doing an experiment with the egg and the bottle. I had shared all the material with the students and then asked them how they thought the egg was going to fit into the bottle and what made the egg to into the bottle once it did. After we talked and the students thought about the experiment I then asked them to share their ideas about getting the egg out of the bottle. The students gave their ideas, but I had a girl want to come up and show how she thought the egg should come out. Once she came up to show us what she was thinking, she began to show us. She put her mouth at the end of the bottle and started to suck in (now I knew that what she was doing was right but I wanted her to try it) so she started sucking and blowing changing the air to cool instead of hot. The egg started moving closer to the opening and all the kids were at the edge of their seats. The egg finally came popping out and it hit the girl in the nose. Her facial expression was priceless; she was shocked, but so proud of herself. This teaching moment I will never forget and either will she, she still brings it up whenever I talk to her.
This is a hard topic to discuss! I think everyone who is a teacher has creative side! I am sure there are things I do that are creative but I can't say anything sticks out to discuss! It is just part of what I do. Teaching and preparing engaging lessons requires thinking outside the box and using creativity. I constantly think to myself, "Do I find this boring?" and if I do then I know my students will as well and thats when I try to find a fun or creative way to learn the curriculum. Kids love to do anything that involves some sort of technology. They love to do powerpoints, create lessons, digital stories, type reports and add clipart. Any time you can incorporate technology into a lesson the kids become the creative ones! I would have to say our 5th grade poetry night is one creative idea I had to motivate the students to learn about poetry and to also make it real reason to write poetry.
ReplyDeleteTeachable moments happen all the time! The real question is do we take the moments as they happen? When I think of a good example I will be back to share!
No question from Dave this week?
ReplyDeleteIt should be there soon :)
ReplyDelete1. I did a lesson talking about the different forms of advertisement. I assigned two kids to one product and had them create competing ads. They presented their ads and the rest of the students decided which one to buy from. We talked about why certain ads were more appealing. It came up from one of the students who “lost” that it wasn’t fair. We talked about that and things real companies do that aren’t always fair.
ReplyDelete2. I think we should have our kids create mini-posters to hang in the hall of words they learn. The posters could include the word, definitions, and a picture. To make it into a learning experience, each hallway could create a challenge and cover up the word when the poster if first hung up. Have students guess what the word is and place all correct answers into a drawing for the week. They could win something like an extra treat at lunch or a Wildcat Way pencil.
3. I try to turn each word pattern study into a teachable moment. When I ask students to come up with words that follow the pattern, I place all words on the board in two lists. Words that do and do not follow the pattern. After we talk about the pattern, we talk about the other list of words and why they might make the same sound. It would be very easy to just ignore the words that don’t follow the pattern but I think the exposure will help with spelling and recognition.
I like the mini-poster idea Meagan! I think that many students would respond to a "challenge" like this, especially when a name would be drawn for a reward. Great idea!!
ReplyDeleteI have had some great luck in creating lessons that were a lot of fun for the kids. I've had the kids work in groups and research how I am to go to certain cities in the summer ( for Dave of course). they had to plan my route using maps, give me driving times, find reasonable motels, and tell if there were any worthwhile places to visit while I was there. Then in the summer I would send them post cards from the city they sent me to. The kids really got into that lesson.
ReplyDeleteWith the Rigby we are really concentrating on increasing vocabulary this year. We have a composition book divided up into the different letters and we are forming our own dictionary to use. I think this is helping them to learn new words beteer. We also make flashcards and play games with them. I have seen a big improvement in their reading vocabulary quizzes.
As far as a teachable moment I can't pick just one one because they crop up almost all the time. Especially when you have the kids really interseted in what they are learning. Their enthusiasm leads to multiple teaching moments.
One of my favorite creative teaching memories was the year I turned my classroom into a rainforest. We researched the plants, animals, and climate. We made design plans for our room, and models of the animals. We wrote about all we learned. We eagerly covered our room, floor to ceiling, with crepe paper vines, paper bag trees, tissue paper flowers and then stategically added our animal models. The room looked great. Boy were we suprised to come to school the next day to find that overnight humidity caused our vines to droop to about 3 feet of the floor.
ReplyDeleteI think the book projects we do allow for creativity with our kids. I love when siblings say "I remember my brother had to do this project." Or the occaisional "We still have my sister's project at home." This lets students feel connected to the work and lets them have their turn at the fun. I also do the games, songs, etc. that other's have mentioned. I would love to do more but I have trouble finding the time to "plan" creative lessons.
Teachable moments happen everyday and you just have to be willing to throw out your plans and go with them.
It is hard to remember a "creative" lesson but if I broaden the definition to include modify someone else's idea, I can remember better. For example, I adapt labs regularly to make them better fit Ohio content standards, my students, and our facilities.
ReplyDeleteWhen it comes to vocabulary, and there is a significant amount of vocabulary in physical science, one thing I encourage is mnemonic devices. You probably know Roy G Biv for the colors of the rainbow, for example. Some that are useful for me aren't for the students, but they can often come up with suggestions. And that is another avenue which is to ask other students to share how they remember. Just last week Miranda Buettner told several students she remembered the symbol for the element tin (Sn) as "Sin Tin."
Finally, I love happening upon a teachable moment. We were discussing nuclear changes, but someone asked about electricity. We had also been discussing ions (atoms with charges), so we quickly reviewed those concepts and then I led them into the electricity (in this case, static electricity which is build up of charge) which is where we are heading next. Lovely, natural, segue!
My best way for reflection is right on my lesson plans. They are on my desk at all times, I have to make notes because I teach the same thing for 4 periods and the same thing for 3, so I have to "keep track" of what I have and haven't said, done, led, encouraged, etc. When something "works," I note that and ditto when it doesn't, especially with things I am trying for the first time. I really don't like doing lesson plans, but I couldn't teach well without them. I don't think I have ever taught exactly the same way or thing any two years, but these notes are very helpful. I do notice some methods work better with some years and different ideas with students from other years.
Kathy, I love the idea of turning your classroom into a rain forest. I would have loved to see that! What a creative idea, and I bet your students learned more about the rain forest than they ever thought possible!
ReplyDeleteThe most successful creative lessons I've taught are when I pair up with a colleague; it helps me stay on track. The last couple of years Erica and I have taught economics by having our students produce a "product" and then having a combined shopping day where students can purchase the products from each other. Last year, it became a teachable moment when one of my groups sold a service (hair design) instead of making a product. And yes, they used different combs on each customer.
ReplyDeleteFor vocabulary, the most fun we've had this year is drawing pictures on small white boards & displaying them for the class to guess which word is being illustrated. Everyone wants to get up and share their illustrations.
Last week I found a SMARTBoard lesson on the water cycle that turned into a great teachable moment. At the end, it had a diagram to be labeled & it took us a while to get it right.
Lindsey, I love the cookie idea for teaching segregation! We talk about that and the ending of slavery in reading in gr. 5. What a cool way to start that! I will definitely use that next year.
ReplyDeleteI wanted to comment on Danae's comments about the Poetry Night we came up with. This year we added a twist to it. We wrote military letters to family and friends who are or were stationed overseas in November. We have started to get some responses. We invited each person to our Poetry night in the letters. We will start our poetry unit in late Feb./early March, but to keep the military heroes in our minds, we will start reading books about the revolutionary war soon and that will segue into the Poetry. Our poetry book will include our "military" poetry in honor of our heroes. We know that we have one person who replied that he will be at Poetry night. He will be in Columbus that week and will bring a couple of his Marine buddies! We were just trying to connect to our "real world" with the letters and it grew into this! We are excited! The kids are too! Can't wait!
I agree with almost everyone in that teachable moments happen every day especially when you are teaching the same thing 5 times each day. SOme days I get through everything that I had in my plans and sometimes not, depending upon the class. When they do occur, you just have to drop everything and go with it!
ReplyDeleteCreativity, I try to put in each lessson. I ask myself, are they going to be bored learning this, and how can I make it fun? Off the top of my head, we were talking about acids and bases in Science. Experiments are always a great way to get the student's attention, and to help them learn the topic. I brought in OJ, Lime juice, Lemon juice, pepto bismol, and baking soda and a water solution. We used litmus paper to determine if this items were acids or bases with the litmus paper being the indicator. It really worked well, as the next day we did a smartboard activity in reviewing acids and bases and all 5 periods did well on this topic.
As far as vocabulary, we study vocabulary every day. I use the smartboard, they play concentration as they have individual cards with the words on them, we use the whiteboards, or we just review with the whole class or just with a partner.
During my student teaching, I did a unit on Ohio animals and their habitats. I had my students in groups based on their habitats (pond, forest, and farm). They then had to find ways to act out the different animal behaviors during the four seasons. It was really neat to see the kids use their creative ideas to act things out and they were also excited to be the ones that had to teach the whole class about how animals behave in their habitats during the four seasons. As far as classroom management, I have tied in my theme of puzzles and instead of using the regular cards for discipline, my students have to pull a puzzle piece. They think it's a creative and different way to show that they have "kept their puzzle together" instead of just staying on green all day.
ReplyDeleteFor vocabulary, I like to have my students play vocabulary pictionary. I have the students in groups with a whiteboard and dry erase marker, then they each get to pick a piece of paper with a vocabulary word on it. Each student gets a turn drawing a picture to describe their vocabulary word then the other students get to try to guess what the word is. They always have fun doing this game.
Vicki’s questions- Week #2
ReplyDeleteCreative lesson- I remember teaching a lesson over the continents. I had South America, so as the students walked into the room, I greeted them with some words from the languages in the continent. I also had a power point presentation with pictures from South America along with artifacts from different countries that they were able to pass around. The students really enjoyed the lesson.
Vocabulary- When it comes to learning new words, I like to use hands on materials as much as possible. There were some science terms that I was teaching and I felt the best way to help the students remember the terms were to make the activity fun and hands on. We acted out the words, use materials in our hands and pretended to be things and the students remembered the words on their test.
Teachable moment- I think these moments can happen when you least expect them. Sometimes you may have a lesson that you had planned out so perfectly in your mind and then it doesn’t happen the way you expect. But the best thing can happen next. The students may take the lesson in a different direction and the most amazing thing can happen. They have figured it out on their own and they may remember this moment for ever. I was going in one direction for a math lesson. It did not go as well as I expected and I started to lose the class. But then one of the 1st graders had a question and it helped me go in another direction and they ended up understanding the concept! It was great.
I try to fit creativity in my lessons any time the opportunity comes up. The Everyday Math curriculum is great; however, if you sit and do journal pages day after day it could become very boring! I integrate many other teaching resources into my lessons. Two resource book I use quite a bit is Hands On Math & Math through Art! Any time the students can become part of the math problem helps! We will be starting our Geometry unit very soon and I have an art project the students do. They use a variety of math skills such as measuring, using a ruler, compass, & protractor, classifying angles and making shapes. The students can apply their math skills to make a creative art project!
ReplyDeleteVickie, you are correct when it comes to students struggling with vocab! I have math vocabulary rings that the students use to practice and quiz one another. I have also had the students make a memory game using vocab words where they have to match the word to a picture or example.
When I think of teachable moments, my advanced math class pops into mind! I have many teachable moments with this group of kiddos. Since the students technically skip 5th grade math and are being taught 6th grade math there will be times I am up there teaching away and when I look at the class they are all staring at me like I'm talking a foreign language! Therefore, there are many days my lessons have to be scratched so I can go back and teach or review certain skills, but I love these days because that reassures me that these students are being challenged!
This year we have been doing a lot of role play during social studies. I think a lot of the kids find all of the names of people, dates and locations hard to remember and they easily lose interest. To spice it up a little, we role play different historical events. A few examples are we have divided into groups representing the French, Indians, and British for the French and Indian War. We've pretended to be colonists and the British, complete with paying taxes and writing a Declaration of Independence while studying the Revolutionary War. The part of King George was played by one of the boys while wearing a sparkly tiara provided by one of the girls.... Funny and unforgettable at the same time! :)
ReplyDeleteAs for vocabulary, my students are well aware that vocabulary is one of our weakest areas. We do a lot of vocabulary work with our new LBD series and the students seem to enjoy this. We play games and complete activities on the Smart Board. I also make a big deal whenever a student uses a larger vocabulary word on their own when they are sharing ideas with the class. For example, I'll ask the students for similes of certain words to try to expand their vocabulary. It's hard to name just one teachable moment. I think when these moments come up, and students have great questions and you have their full attention, you have to take full advantage of it.
I am very thankful to be able to use the “History Alive” program to teach Social Studies, because it allows history to come “alive!” Lessons are presented in many different ways allowing students to understand and live events that have happened in history. From a literal tug of war to demonstrate the power of British vs Continental Army to helping students “settle” in the classroom where they want in order to help students understand why Native Americans settled throughout the Americas. One of my favorites is an activity that helps students understand why the colonists rebelled against the British when they were taxed and their freedoms were taken away. I start by telling the students they get to plan our next class party. They begin planning when, where, the snacks, the games, etc. The sky is the limit. Then I sit down at my computer to check my email why they are doing this. I pull up an email from Dave that states he and the PTO agree that parties are not appropriate for school, they take away learning time, unhealthy foods are shared, etc. The students react with such frustration, anger, and disappointment! Then I explain that the American colonists were given much freedom for over 100 years. Then when the British needed tax money because of wars they were fighting and the fighting that occurred with the natives, they started to take more control over the colonies. The Americans rebelled and this eventually led to the American Revolution. Needless to say, they aren’t very happy with me, but at least they understand history better!
ReplyDeleteI am very thankful for the “teachable moments” that occur throughout the day. In repeating lessons 5 times a day, without them I would struggle with the excitement of teaching. Students’ questions and interests lead to researching different websites, sharing experiences, etc. It makes teaching fun!