Within the first couple of weeks of school, blog about an experience that you have had within your classroom/school. And then - Please come back to the blog to check and see experiences others are having and feel free to help answer any of their questions. Have fun with this!
Hi All,
ReplyDeleteWow - has this been a wild August. I ended up switching schools and jobs, which was a fun/exciting and anxiety filled time. I am now a Learning Support Teacher at Pulaski Community Middle School. I am working with teachers and administration implementing best practice, working on curriculum, helping gifted and struggling learners, implementing technology tools, and anything else they can find for me to do. I am sad to leave all of the great relationships and projects which I was part of at Kimberly, but I know my relationships I have there will last a lifetime. Tonight is an exciting and anxiety filled time for teachers. The smell of new materials, the excitement of starting off fresh and new, and the look on the great students who enter our classroom. Enjoy the first day of school tomorrow and remember the decisions that you make should be the best for kids. You are all great and wonderful teachers and people and everyone involved within your schools will be proud of all the hard work and dedication you are putting forth. Be positive and bring the energy. As Barney would say - "Get some fire in your life!"
Wow, Tom that is very exciting! My first few weeks have gone great! I started to implement Whole Brain Teaching and it is working wonders! My kindergartens are really enjoying it and it has really gotten all of the kids involved. I have also concentrated on creating stronger parent/teacher relationships this year. It really seems to be paying off, although we are only a few weeks into the parents are already very comfortable contacting me and I think it is really beneifting the kids! I look forward to seeing everyone this up coming weekend. I hope everyone's first few weeks have gone as great as mine!
ReplyDeleteHi everyone! I can't believe were already approaching our 1st weekend, that's okay though because I'm excited to see everyone and see how they've been. Though I haven't done as much as I'd like to yet, I've tried to do team builders in my Mechanical Design class. The few I've done have seemed to make a difference in the level of communication this early on in the class. Students are more comfortable with each other and we are having better discussions.
ReplyDeleteJust got your email Tom....I'm doing my work : )
To wrap this up though, I realize the conscious effort it will take on my part to keep implementing something new and to not fall back into old habits. See you all soon!
Take care.
Hi there!
ReplyDeleteThe one thing I planned to include in my teaching this school year was Multiple Intelligences. I use past tense because I feel that it failed and I no longer want to continue it!!!!
I wanted to integrate this activity with technology so I found an online quiz for my student. He could answer the questions while getting more computer use. This was the website I used that I really liked: http://www.edutopia.org/multiple-intelligences-learning-styles-quiz
My issue that leaves me feeling so negative is that his answers did not say much. They were mostly none, or no, depending on the question style so that left his scores “lower”. I have the feeling that he didn’t answer the questions as accurately as possible. Without it being a “true” assessment, I don’t really want to use the results or rely on them to help me understand the way his brain works. He had one area that stood out, which was bodily-kinesthetic, and I already knew this about him. I wanted this to be a tool that both of us could use to learn more about him/himself. It still gives me answers, but I think I was expecting a lot more from it and was disappointed.
“SO WHAT?”….I guess I’ll answer that at circle time or whenever I find the answer! ;)
The following is my student’s results.
This chart reflects your range of learning styles. Each score ranges from 0 to 100. Higher scores represent your strengths.
Naturalistic
33%
Bodily-Kinesthetic
50%
Musical
25%
Interpersonal
31%
Intrapersonal
38%
Visual-Spatial
8%
Logical-Mathematical
13%
Verbal-Linguistic
42%
Good evening/morning,
ReplyDeleteThe school year is off to a fast start I am very excited to see everyone again. As far as implimenting things I feel I have not done my home work. I did try the multiple intelligences but I don't really feel that I did it justice. I would like to try the opening and closing cicrle with my construction kids but I am not sure that they would get to the community stage. This class is my first class with the majority of the class is group work. I am very interested this weekend to learn new things that are community based and also refresh on the things that relearned the last two sessions. Well good night all see you in a day. Hope all is well with everyone.
Marshall
Hello out there!
ReplyDeleteAfter reading many of your posts, I am feeling very lucky to be able to study with such outgoing, constructivist teachers! So glad to hear that almost everyone has had such a smooth start to the year!! I spent the first few days of school talking to my students about "community." We began with a few energizers (they loved the balloon/belly one) and now each day we do a "Pool Break." Like Randy, I wanted to try some type of energizer to build a positive relationship with my students. This has allowed students to get comfortable with one another a bit at a time each day. Students love that I call a "Pool Break" after 20 minutes of class. They can get up, stretch & talk to someone who they don't know very well & chat for a bit. This has been essential in getting each of my Language Arts classes past the pseudo-community stage. "Pool Breaks" have been a great way for me to get to know my students better too :) I am absolutely looking forward to getting back together in Pulaski this weekend. See you soon!
Alicia
No laughing all you tech savy people but this is the 5th time I am attempting to post so this is going to be short and I will elaborate at opening circle.
ReplyDeleteI have been placed in a co-teaching situation with a teacher who is more "old-fashioned" in his teaching but not in his discipline. It is a group that has a "bad reputation" with teachers, students and parents. I have been taking baby steps to implement energizers and community building. We did a multiple intellegence survey but I have not been successful in getting others on board to using this to help guide the classroom structure.
Can't wait to see everyone and get some input from everyone.
Sarah
Here are the directions for registering for your classes:
ReplyDeleteDirections for on-line registration
1. Go to Silver Lake College homepage
2. Go to Campus web; then campus web login.
3. Login
4. Class registration
5. Click graduate
6. Click Teacher Leadership
7. Answer questions: Are you Hispanic/Latino race. Then enter your race.
8. At bottom, click on “Check this box.” Then hit continue.
9. Department; go edu. Choose Saturday; Choose 8 A.M. Search
10. Looks for building and Pul* PHS Hit Add.
11. Find each Pul* PHS and add EDU 500, 529, 535, 601, and 690.