Tag Tuesday - Some resources from other sites I have used lately

Yesterday I sat at home, dabbing a running nose, nursing a headache, loving the sound of the rain and watching a little too much of Bones. However, having just bought a laminator, on Sunday night, I couldn't totally let the day pass by without some resource gathering. In order to extend my resources for early finishers, I've turned to pinterest and other bloggers to find resources I could easily print off, laminate and use time and time again. So here's a quick list before I run off to find the tissue box again.

Numeracy:
Oh no seven! (just add dice for an addition game, google dice games and you'll come up with plenty more)
Mystery letter (I copied their monster/number grid, but included my own sums, allowing me to add a little variety and change the letter/number that was hidden in the grid)
I have, who has (made up my own basic template as it is easier to do than to find one I like which looks easy to read. Of course, a blank template is not limited to numeracy and can be done as an early finisher activity for a small group or a whole class activity)
Why so few numeracy sheets? I tend to find the class already has maths games the children love or number charts and dice I use for games without sheets, so the demand for such activities is very low. I also have my 31 math challenges freebie for a back-up when needed.

Literacy:
Scattegories (a simple version for students which could be used to introduce nouns, just add a timer or have students yell 'stop' when the first person fills their page)
Nursery Rhyme Reading Mazes (this one costs $7, but I like the idea enough to DIY one which fits with a theme, text, or level that I find myself in often)
Spelling Battleship (designed in such a way that it can be used with any word list, so long as it fits, so win for differentiation!)
DIY comic strip (students can create pictures and text in the provided bubbles for a fun story-telling method)
Complete the comic strip (theme and pictures already provided, students are challenged to create a dialogue between the two characters on their first day of school)
Hangman (Okay, no link here to a resource, I basically just typed up the letters and made a quick template myself)

That's it for now, but what more does a girl need? What resources do you bring out time and time again for early finishers?

Satisfied Saturday - General reflections after a week of relief

I am glad to announce that I am feeling my routine returning! Returning to teaching after a break can take some adjustments and a bit of reminding, but judging by this week's results, I think I am back to my regular practice. Let me just enjoy this for a moment...

Okay, now that I've enjoyed that, it's time for some reflection! Here is a general run down of thoughts from this week:

• I have found that since refusing to help students spell, the writing sessions have been going much smoother. When I explain my approach to the students, some like it, others shrug their shoulders, and I haven't had any complain. You can see my approach to this, along with a few other quick problem solving strategies in my last post.
• Teaching in schools with different student groups can highlight strengths and weaknesses. While I have been working on my awareness of what is going on around the classroom while working with specific students, I have had two students run out of my class this week! In such situations, awareness should be immediate as possible. Since then, I have planned to buy some bells for a door hanger, allowing me to know when students run or wander out, or even in, without my knowledge. On Thursday, I also implemented another point system: class exit points. We started the day with 30 points. Any time someone leaves the room, unless I have sent them for a job, the class loses a point. If they didn't ask permission, they lose multiple points. At the end of the day, we still had about 20 points! While this class did not have any reputable 'runners,' I do believe that it reduced the amount of students asking to go to the toilet unnecessarily. In fact, it's one of the few times I would have one student asking to go without someone else also asking. Of course, when talking about this, we did discuss that it is better to lose a point than it is to wet yourself, so if you really need to go, you'd better go!
• When spelling words have not been left or are not clear, I have found that it is best to change up the schedule a bit and do spelling activities after writing. This way, I can mark students writing on the spot and they can use their misspelled words as their spelling words for the day. Due to my approach to spelling during the writing session, I have only had one student not make mistakes, but looking back through his book we were able to find words. Spelling roll-a-word has become my staple activity now. The students love it and it is the perfect 'reward' for taking risks with their spelling.
• When no work or specific routine has been left for me, I now have my own routine down to an art. The morning session is literacy focused (and while my writing was strong, I have had to do some research on reading activities and groups, so follow me on Bloglovin' if you want to keep updated!). The middle session is maths focused. In the final session, we work on completing work and have free time, if they have earned it (at the beginning of the day, they are told that in order to have free time, they need to complete their work and not waste my time. Each minute they waste of my time is a minute off their time). The benefits of this timetable is that I have time at the end of the day to catch up on marking, the children fulfill their responsibilities for their rewards and most, if not all, of the work is finished before the end of the day. This leaves the regular teacher with no loose ends when they return.
• In order to encourage meaningful activities for early finishers and those enjoying free play, I have also spent the weekend collecting resources for 'challenge packs.' These will require a few more resources than my previous challenge capsules freebie and will provide include a greater variety of learning activities such as science experiments. If you are interested in these freebies, do make sure you go to the sidebar and follow me, allowing you to keep updated.

That's it for today, but as you can see, there should be more coming soon, so don't be strangers.

Learning is a lifelong journey, even as teachers. What have you learned lately?

Wisdom Wednesday - Empowering children for life

Why do children need an education?
My answer: to prepare them for life outside of school and after school.

I have found that the more relevant and explicit this link is for children, the more readily they engage, especially if the content is linked to something they care about outside of school.

For example, which would you think your children would get more excited about - learning decimals or working with money or learning how to become rich?

What? Learning how to become rich? Yes, working with money is more motivating for students, but if you amp it up even more, dramatise it a bit and attach a tangible reward, the investment, excitement and motivation in the lesson is amplified as well...

So, what bits of wisdom can you offer your students?
I just completed the planning of a whole day of teaching the children how to be rich. In fact, when I plan for relief around a theme, I tend to plan broadly for a range of activities for a range of subjects, so I could teach multiple grades over multiple days on the same subject. Basically, the idea is to take a topic of interest, amp it up, and teach skills or wisdom in that topic.

For example, on the topic of being rich:
Literacy - Learning to write a business plan, USP, persuasive letter to a client, news release to a reporter, marketing material, or a persuasive text on how your business will succeed (with points to consider provided).
Maths - Working with calculations to decide which is a better business choice, calculating returns on investments, calculating how long it takes for small sums of money to add up to large sums.
Social studies - Responsibilities associated with being rich. Plan as a class to take action on an issue now and execute in coordinated small groups.

Basically, I am working within the curriculum, but adding in relevant themes and wisdom they might otherwise never hear. How many of us learned about USPs while writing persuasive texts in literacy? Yet well written USPs can make the difference between being unknown or successful. While we all learn about calculating monetary sums in class, how many of us were taught how to handle that money and make wise decisions? My husband had to teach himself how to budget, and as a result of this, he is one of the few in his family who handles money wisely. Teaching our students such skills may be woven in naturally to the curriculum and give them an advantage they may not otherwise receive.

As a relief teacher, I am constantly reminded that my time with the children is limited, so I cannot continue such a large theme across a long amount of time usually. This leaves the children without the whole picture. However, I believe that even with one day, a difference can be made, skills can be taught, a passion can be sparked, a journey can begin, and the influence can last much longer. Choosing a huge topic, such as being rich, and starting with small, practical goals can be exciting enough to become a memory that pushes them to greater things. As a child, I hated the news, but I there are single news stories that impacted me, which I will never forget, and that was in a fifteen minute time span, but we have hours with the children. Let's make our lessons memorable, inspiring, practical, and worthwhile!

What real-world wisdom do you have that you believe students should learn about in class?

Wording Wednesday - Planning a day around reporting skills

How many of your students read the newspaper? My bet is, not too many. I remember often being expected by teachers to be a fan of the news, though I am still not sure why. Is it because it is current, local, informative or what? I will openly confess that I still don't read the news. However, I have always loved those reports on certain shows which are known as 'interest articles.' As a child, I used to fight about bed-time because I had sat through over 45 minutes of news to watch that one report that interested me.

Writing or recording interesting reports to draw in young people is certainly a skill. How many of your students will graduate with it? As I continue to gather and create resources for my relief folder, I plan on sharing them here, hence the second freebie in a row now. Today's little freebie is a rough outline from which to form a plan for a lesson, day or even a couple of days running, all based around article writing. Students can involve a wide range of subjects, engage in topic of interest to them, and create a class news presentation, paper, magazine, blog or YouTube channel (these can be private last I checked). This could be done as individuals, partners, or small groups and could end up being published in some form or link to a social action unit. The options are huge so it can be used across a range of grades and adjusted to fit an appropriate time frame.

So here is at least a day of reporting.

Want some resources to compliment this idea and aid in the more detailed planning? Well I happen to have found some I like:

• This form for peer reviews from Classroom Teacher Resources.
• TPT- A Peer Edit Guide to Write Right - While I would not buy this one for the ages I tend to work with, I love the five questions mentioned in the description and can see these being effective on a peer feedback form for opinion and news writing.
• Online Chart Tool - A free online tool for creating bar charts, line charts, pie charts, scatter plots, bar line graphs and more.
• ABC - Behind the News - An online news website designed with children in mind to introduce them to news reports.

Do you see yourself using such a theme in the classroom? How? Do you have any handy resources to add to the list?

Terrible Tuesday - Learning through our mistakes and making them acceptable

So this week I discovered something terrible. I had made a mistake. I had confused eligibility to teach with the approval to teach documents, so when I went into schools to make myself officially 'available for work' in NSW, I was told I am not in the system. Oops! With all my research and hours of reading, I had not realised there were two separate forms for two separate reasons and I needed both to get a casual job. Cue the strings as I return to my computer to write the humble email back to the other schools to admit to my mistake and keep them aware that I will be available soon.

A quote from Elementary Matters in an article on failure.

Let's be honest now. Mistakes are embarrassing. Students are fully aware of this when they stutter during a presentation and hear the giggles among their peers. However, taking risks is part of growth and mistakes are a part of learning. As a result of this, we have all come across those students who will not complete work, will not start work, or will constantly be asking for either help or approval. If you have the joy of multiple students with such inclinations, completing tasks can become quite the battle and your attention stretched thin.

Let me introduce my plan for attacking risk-taking, mistake-making fears. To start out the day (with a literacy lesson), I read a Dr Seuss book filled with nonsense words. Don't you love them? In fact, here's a whole list of books with nonsense words in them for your collection. The more dramatic the reading and confusion over the nonsense words the better. Make sure when you are finished (or finished certain pages) that you ask the students what has happened? Point out that despite these ridiculous, meaningless words, they can understand it.

Next, comes the challenge for the day. They are to go and do their writing (whatever that may be for the day, perhaps in a similar topic to the book read), but they are not to ask for help! Describe different strategies they could use to attack unfamiliar words. I am sure my younger students will forever remember me standing across the room saying "sound it out and try" and turning away to another student or task. Of course, there is a time for explicit teaching, but sometimes students learn just as much from problem-solving and taking risks themselves. Remind them they can use dictionaries or other texts in the room and if you have a focus strategy already this is a perfect opportunity!

Before the students think you have totally abandoned them, explain the purpose of the task. They are to write independently, proving their awesome capabilities, and experimenting with new words. At the end of the lesson (yes, warn them of this too), you will look through students work. The most amazing words which are spelled correctly will be announced and demonstrated for the class. The 'mistake' words which are mis-spelled will be re-used, because sometimes mistakes might not be great in one context but are brilliant in another. These words will be combined in a special class story, celebrating the risks they took during writing.

What story? You have no time for writing stories? Well, luckily for you, there is a teacher still awaiting approval in a new state, and she has nothing but time for developing handy resources. Just make sure that when you choose a nonsense word for the character's name that you are consistent and use the same word. I have made the spaces for her name red to make it easier for your. So here you go!

Wanting still more support for encouraging risk-taking in your class?

A quote from Neil Gaiman that is circulating pinterest.

Check out:

• Education Week - Students Not Taking Risks? Maybe It's Us and Not Them: A challenge to encourage risk-taking in the classroom.
• All Things Upper Elementary - Building a Culture for Risk Taking: An epic blog post with suggested activities and approaches for encouraging risk-taking.
• Edutopia - Making Friends with Failure: Ainissa makes the point that certain areas of the curriculum should actually encourage risk-taking and accept mistakes.
• Anxiety BC - Helping Your Child Overcome Perfectionism: A guide for parents which may also provide useful hints for teachers.

Do you have any experience with risk-taking or students who struggle with making mistakes? How about first hand experience with making mistakes and making ammends? Please share in the comments!

Timing Tuesday: Activities for those early finishers and how to present them

Pinterest addict as I am, I found this idea a while ago - challenge capsules. Heard of them? The idea is that when students finish early, they grab a challenge capsule to keep them busy and quiet enough for the rest of the class to continue working. Depending on your personal pedagogy and professional beliefs, you may choose to include additional activities or a bit of fun. As a relief teacher, I never know what grades I am going to be in from day to day. Considering this, I chose a range of open-ended questions and activities which range from word games to creative writing activities to poster designing. The aim is that these challenges allow for diversity in skill levels and will provide an interesting challenge for all. This freebie will be attached in this post, but first the all important question of how to present these challenges.

Typically, searching for the challenge capsules, you will see a picture similar to this:

This originated from Mrs Gold's Class and works fine. It's practical, quick and simple to put together and use. An idea from Teacher's Pet is to create challenges for different ability levels or grades and colour code them. This enables you to tell them 'grab a blue capsule' and know that they will be choosing an appropriate challenge. You could also do this for different subjects or types of challenges.

Then I came across a pretty variation (I thought on a blog, though I can't find it now! Lesson learned: always save amazing ideas as soon as they are spotted). Creating a candy dispenser for the capsules. Now I'm not one to say that everything has to be cute, so really throwing the capsules in a bowl would work just as well. However, I love the idea of a candy dispenser as candy can be a common choice of reward (not something I personally practice) and it adds a novelty value to the capsules, associating them with rewards. Here are three examples of D.I.Y. candy dispensers which could be used.

Made using a jar and chicken feeder, the decorative limitations barely exist. You can find the instructions over at U Create.

Again, this simple container can be decorated endless ways. I have seen spots, cartoon characters and holiday themes. Check out the tutorial at Tammy Mitchell Designs.

Here is a super easy one using three disposable cups! Twisting the top cup opens and closes the opening as well. Well  worth the try, this tutorial can be found at Heidi Swapp.

Enough ideas yet? I think not! Just in case the idea of challenges in capsules in candy dispensers doesn't get your creative wheels turning, try re-thinking the advent calendar. There are creative options everywhere online. In fact there are so many that I dare not try to cover them all, but I'll show you a few I love. Again, you can decorate as you like, whether cutesy or simple AND as advents often include multiple sections, you can easily group or label them according to subject, difficulty level, time required, etc. I've tried to keep the examples small or easily movable due to the constant moving of relief teaching. Click on the pictures for tutorials on the original page.

Sew it or use envelopes.
A Beautiful Mess

Matchbox drawers could fit dice
 and other small resources.
Creative "Try" Als

Shaped stacks of matchboxes.
All About You

Use envelopes as suggested or
write on the back of pretty paper.
Serenity Now

Reinvent or redecorate a
refillable advent calendar.
Rookie Mums

With brown paper bags, you
could even include small group games.
One Perfect Day

And finally, here is the freebie I offered to start with. Three pages of open-ended challenges to start you off. Please note that I did use the puzzles I found here, here and here.

Any more ideas for early finishers? Any creative beings out there have another possible way of presenting activities? Please share!