Elona, a Canadian middle school special education teacher and author of Teachers At Risk, writes today about the inequity of excluding special education students from activities designated for gifted students.I’d like to think these things happen only in Canada but they don’t. I’ve written before about how technology tools like movie making are often saved …
Category: Classroom Mangement
Give Up Control
Although teachers tend to view Open Court as a scripted program, there are some places in the program (or any other) where teachers need to give up some control. Not everyone is comfortable giving up control as a teacher. Are you? My classroom management has always been firm. I’m not someone who likes a free …
Parent Conferences
Parent Conferences are this week for many LAUSD schools. Here is some information to help you with parent conferences… Parent Conference Considerations 27 Tips Planning Parent Conferences Student Led Conferences More info on Student Led Conferences
Sorting Assessment (SOAR) Data
Here’s an idea for sorting assessment data (SOAR) using Microsoft Word. submitted by Francie Kugelman >Here’s an idea for sorting SOAR Data using Excel in Microsoft’s Office Suite. submitted by Francie Kugelman This is an idea of entering SOAR data from Open Court tests in a template. Using the Word Table helps me instantly know …
The Trains Run On Time: Have a Schedule
I get asked all the time how I fit in anything “extra” into the Open Court program. I don’t think I’m doing anything “extra.” I just make sure I have time for writing and independent work time/workshop each day. Your writing and IWT times are when you differentiate your instruction in ways which you can’t …
It’s Not Easy Timing Green
This e-mail was received about how long to spend on each section: Our literacy coach has been told that 1st grade should spend ONLY 30 minutes on the GREEN section of OCR and 45 minutes on the RED section. That is obviously wrong. However, I cannot find my notes from the summer trainings regarding the …
Open House Tips
contributed by Doug Yonce HOW TO SURVIVE OPEN HOUSE Great opening tips here: not to sit in a place of separation behind your desk, and not to plan specific activities – find out why here in this positive spin on making a challenging Open House Night a wonderful meet and greet event. http://www.inspiringteachers.com/tips/parents/open_house.html OPEN HOUSE …
Break A Leg!
Wishing everyone a healthy and productive school year and a great start this week!
See Students As Individuals Not As Diagnoses
This post is a wish for a perfect world but if you agree with me, you can do something about it fairly easily. I am really trying to make a conscious effort to adjust my own thinking and the way I talk about students. I think we need to be careful not to refer to …
Five things to do before starting school
1. Revamp your workshop/independent work time. No doubt by the end of the previous school year your IWT was starting to fall apart. It always does even if only slightly. Plan to start IWT off right this year. I usually start in the second week of school by picking a time that will remain sacred …