It's still summer, but I'm thinking ahead to winter. I'm picturing writing workshop time mid-way through the year: Students are busy at the computers, working with an intensity that's balanced by smiles and the occasional excited whisper, "Did you see my comment yet?" Each student is fully engaged in writing comments that provide helpful feedback on their classmates' writing and I am just where I want to be at this time in the school year: being a guide on the side.
Are you looking for interactive learning structures that will help your students gain a deeper understanding of content while also developing and practicing higher level thinking skills? The Hot Seat is a strategy I've used successfully across disciplines with 3rd and 4th grade students. I borrowed it from Jeffrey Wilhelm, a well-known secondary level literacy educator, and modified it for use with elementary students.
Ever drive down the road and realize the car is wobbly and perhaps in need of alignment?
Sometimes I just know my class is going to feel the same way. Right before a vacation, the arrival of spring, or a much anticipated field trip are all challenging times that can disrupt our routines and make us feel out of sorts, as if the wheels on our learning bus are beginning to wobble. With spring break just around the corner, my class is predictably starting to veer off course, and it's time to take action.
"Maybe we'll get to teach in February." That's been the joke at my school after snow, ice, and extreme cold, plus holidays and teacher workdays meant that last month we had only nine full days of school!
When I look around my classroom, I see students making choices. The first graders I teach make choices all through the day, from the time they arrive until Closing Circle.
When principal Susan Mele arrived four years ago at Stewartsville Elementary School, the discipline was in chaos. More time was being spent on discipline than instruction; teachers were exhausted from dealing with inappropriate behaviors that negatively impacted instruction; students were rude to each other and didn't seem to care. Susan recalls,
It's getting to be the time of year when teachers' efforts during the first weeks of school begin to pay off. With classroom routines becoming well-established, a blossoming sense of community, and teachers who've gotten to know the children they teach, school days begin to fall into a rhythm. Students are feeling settled in, engaged, and ready to take on new learning challenges.
That's how long it took for school to start feeling normal to me this year. Up to then I was in full-on back-to-school mode, and so were my students. Kids' shoes were shiny, voices were either loud or silent, faces were sleepy, eyes were peeking into other rooms in hopes of spotting an old friend, and questions were CONSTANT. I felt like I moved from teaching one procedure to the next, all day long . . .
I'd like you to try a challenge I used to give myself several times a year when I was a classroom teacher. First, divide a piece of paper into three columns. In the first column, make a list of your students. Try not to use alphabetical order, grade book order, or table groups to help you remember. Just write the names down as they come to mind.
Then, in the middle column, next to each child's name, write one thing you know that child likes to do or cares passionately about.
In the third column, make a star if you're sure the child knows that you know this about her or him.
When they are working towards a common goal, engaged in a fascinating topic, or trying to figure out a solution for a meaningful problem, students feel more connected to school and each other. Engaged learners have lots to talk about, including discoveries and interesting facts, experiments, predictions, and what they are looking forward to learning next. Here are some ideas for planning units or lessons that will foster this powerful sense of connection through learning.
Teachers, principals, and other school staff nationwide are thinking about what to do and what to say tomorrow when they and their students return to school in the wake of the horrific tragedy at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, CT. Here are suggestions from Responsive Classroom consultants and authors Mike Anderson, Caltha Crowe, Sarah Fillion, Babs Freeman-Loftis, Lynn Majewski, Kerry O'Grady, Margaret Berry Wilson, and Chip Wood:
At SOAR, a network of public charter schools in Northeast Denver, Responsive Classroom practices are embedded in the daily life of schools, and the approach itself is integrated into the network's core elements and values.
What teachers have to deal with at this time of year (in addition to teaching, of course) can be daunting—writing report cards, meeting with families at conferences, grading papers, adjusting to a time change, and in some cases, even dealing with the aftermath of a hurricane. It is natural for you and your students to feel overwhelmed and tired. Do the optimism and promise you felt at the beginning of the new school year seem like distant memories? If so, you may have a case of the November blues.
