SMARTboards

Here it is – in all it’s glory. It isn’t exactly in the place I had asked for it, and now the kids have to sit on the cold floor instead of the warm carpet, but we’ll get over that. They sure did a number on the wall behind it though with those blotches…. but besides that…. I am in love (and so are the kids).

I’ve only had my SMARTboard for about  a month, and already it is a major part of my day. We use it for the pre-loaded notebook files like balloon popping and vortex sorting – and they love the random group generator and the applauding timer. There are thousands and thousands of lessons out there. Unfortunately (like most things in my teaching life), I have to translate the ones I like, but I am getting pretty comfortable at making some of my own. I love how my SMARTboard is hooked up to the sound field system in my room, so that when I show a videoclip or play some music, there is surround sound. I love how you can write on the board with the “markers” on any screen – especially good for working on revision and correction (and that dreaded EQAO).

In doing many internet searches on teacher blogs and SMARTboard lessons, I stumbled across a fellow grade 3 FI teacher who blogged about the wealth of support and teaching ideas that she found on twitter. Twitter?? The thing I swore that I would never use? .. .. . I decided to bite the bullet and sign up. Besides a couple of friends and three celebrities (Rick Mercer, Brent Butt, Rainn Wilson), my main followers and followees are teachers. And sure enough…. I have found tonnes and tonnes of amazing things to do on the SMARTboard. I don’t tweet about what I am doing on a regular basis (i’ll keep that to FB), I tweet questions to my teacher followers.

A couple of amazing techy things that I found via twitter…

Prezi – technically Rob told me about this, but I investigated further after reading more about it via twitter. A cooler way to make presentations. It is especially great because it is stored online.

glogster – a nifty poster-maker – thinking about having my kids make Medieval Times Glogs.

wallwisher – this is a fun little site (although slow if you use it via the smart board and kids have to wait in line – a perfect thing to put up during lunch). I posted a question at the top, and the kids add “sticky notes” with their answer or opinion. I will probably eventually incorporate this somehow into other subject areas, and have them post stickies on a computer, rather than the touch keyboard.

dropbox – I love my macbook pro, but I don’t really want to unplug my thinkpad from my smartboard to plug in my mac to show something cool. I downloaded dropbox on both my mac and my pc at school and I save all of my files and bookmarks easily – no burning CDs and no memory stick. Bliss.

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I have been letting my kids stay in during recess to play with the SMARTboard and get used to it. I also shared some hilariously fun sites with them. They love to visit places around the world.

Fooled?

A couple of years ago I pulled the best April fool’s joke on my kids – inspired by my own grade 5 teacher. This year, I had nothing. Kids in my class came to school asking if they were going to write the test. Many of these kids are siblings to those who I pranked in 2008. No way am I using that test again for at least 5 years (or if I change schools).

This year, however, my kids thought they got me good. I played along. Here’s what went down.

After the bell rang after lunch for the kids to go outside, my principal got on the announcements with an angry voice telling me to come to the office asap. I finished getting the supplies I needed and headed down to the office. On my way there I heard giggling and shh-ing, so I knew my kids were up to something. My principal called me into her office and slammed the door. I caught a glimpse of one of my boys underneath her table. She proceeded to tell me that she has had so many complaints about my teaching and that she had no other choice but to fire me. You’re fired! Being a terrible actress that I am, I gasped and said “oh no”. Luckily I didn’t have to keep up the act because my ENTIRE class started laughing and got out from under the principal’s desk. How all of my students fit underneath the desk and were so quiet, I’ll never know. They were so proud of themselves though. I let them believe that they really got me.

They are so funny.

Birch Tree Love

one of our latest art projects at school – well, 12 of them at least (I wonder where the others are?). we were talking about foreground, middle ground and background, and how to represent them on paper. these trees were soooo easy to make, but they look so rad.

We started by doing a cool colour wash with watered down tempera for the sky. Then, we painted a horizon line and painted in the snow white. We drew lines of a variety of thickness coming out of the horizon line. Using a light blue pencil crayon/ twistable/ crayon we lightly traced the outline of the tree. The right side is shaded blue. Using a skinny brush and black acrylic, we painted the “shadow” on the left side of the tree. Ta-da! We took about 5-10 minutes over 3 periods of art to complete the project.

Next – artist studies!

Anchor!

I have decided to be more aware of my neatness as I make these with my students. Here is a sampling of anchor charts that we made together in the past couple of days/weeks.

Some mini anchor charts – posing thick & thin questions

A way to expand thinking about questions asked during reading

that pesky verb they keep screwing up…

Some mathématiques. La géométrie.

Love

I found this poem written on my chart paper.

Written with their English teacher.

My most favourite line is “As colourful as a rainbow.”

Love it.

Another Week

It seems as if we never left. One week in. I have 10 new little darlings, and 8 leftover from last year. I have 3 boys. Many of them are very shy – that however, may be a result of my students last year scaring the incoming grade 3s. Insisting that I throw chairs when I get mad. haha.

I have been trying a new way to “structure” my Reading Workshop – based on the Daily 5 and Café Menu. It seems to be going well. I have never modeled a strategy so explicitly in my life. I was laughing the entire time in my head- but they seem to have gotten it.

The best part is that after I modeled how to “Check for Understanding” (or on our strategy board – “Arrête et pense à ce qui est déjà arrivé”), I noticed some of the kids are actually using it when they are reading independently! They read a bit of their books, physically close the book, close their eyes (lifting their head) and remembering what they just read. They smile, then reopen the book. So hilarious.

Tomorrow I will model how to choose a “good fit” book with shoes.

Back to School

It is Labour Day. Tomorrow is back to school. I have neglected this blog, yet again. So much inspiration has passed through my hands, many weddings to talk about and new babies and new friends. New crafty projects, new classroom ideas. Yummy food, yummy drinks. Bad weather. and a NEW HOUSE! But, for some reason I just didn’t write about them. Perhaps this will change. I have a feeling that with only one car and me getting dropped off to school extra early, I will try a bit harder.

Two books that I am basing my Reading block on this year are as follows:

The Caf̩ Book РBoushey & Moser РThis is a book of literacy strategies, how to conference better, make flexible groups based on strategies instead of reading levels, student ownership. (The picture above of my classroom makeover shows the headings for the strategies)

Notebook Connections – Aimee Buckner – online free – http://www.stenhouse.com/emags/0782/pageflip.html I really like her approach to writing this book – she has the same “concerns” with her teaching as I do. The kids talk the talk of reading strategies. They can tell me that they are visualizing and they can make connections out the wahzoo, but are they *really understanding what they are doing, and is it *really helping them become better readers? This book is about how to use a Reader’s Notebook effectively (straying from F & P Blackline masters)- having the children write for THEMSELVES, and not to please the teacher. She also has some teaching strategies/minilessons in here linking writing to reading that I quite like. I will be using this. I really need to find some good French Immersion Mentor Texts. I know I have the books, I just have to figure out how they can help the kid’s writing.

For writer’s notebooks: The kids were asked to bring in hilroy spiral notebooks. They will then decorate as they please with photos and words and inspiration. Next year I might have them buy any kind of notebook/blank journal they’d like. The more you like your notebook, the more readily you are to write in it. At least, that is what I think.

For Reader’s Notebooks: in the past I used binders, but the pages rip out too easily for the 3s/4s. This year I just grabbed some of the cahiers from the stock room. I am not sure if I will have them make tabs, but if I do, they will just use stickies sideways.

The countdown is on.