Back To School

Today was our first day of school, and we had a blast! Go Noodle videos are always a crowd pleaser! I love this picture of my students dancing to Pop See Ko!

 



Read Across America

Read Across America

Our students enjoyed learning about the lost collection of Dr. Seuss stories. Thanks to Ms. Becky for reading to us, bringing us treats, and teaching us a little more about Dr. Seuss!

Book Reviews

Odd/Even Student Tutorial

Student tutorials are a wonderful way to help students explain their thinking and increase their own level of learning. My class is super excited about our first video tutorial. They are eager to create their own in hopes that it will be chosen for the blog in the future!
Today, this sweet second grade student would like to teach about odd and even numbers!

Vocabulary Games

Do you use games to help students learn content vocabulary? If so, here's one you might want to try. It's called musical vocabulary. It's similar to musical chairs. Several students sit in a circle facing the outside. The same number of students stand and walk around the circle while the music plays. I like to use the latest Kidz Bop songs or Disney TV shows' theme songs. I will randomly stop the music. When the music stops, the students who are standing select a definition to read from their paper. The student sitting must give the word that matches. They do not have a paper. If they match the word correctly, the students switch places. If they give an incorrect response, they stay in their same places. I will start the music again after they have had enough time to switch places (if needed), and we will continue the game several more rounds. The students who are standing at the end of the game are considered the winners. This is something that all of my students enjoy, and we have seen improvements on our vocabulary assessments now that we have been using this game. There's a lot of research to show the importance of vocabulary development, and there's also research that supports the effectiveness of the retrieval-practice that this game requires.
    Read "Make it Stick, The Science of Successful Learning" by Peter C. Brown, et al. This book will help you to see importance of continuing to teach in the manner that so many of us already do for the benefit of our students!

http://makeitstick.net

Click the link to read reviews of this amazing book.