Janet Abercrombie's Blog – September 2011 Archive (9)

Classroom Management: Quick Student Groupings

Early in my teaching career, I learned that if I can manage classroom movements, I can manage behavior. If I can manage behavior, students learn better.

An earlier post discussed the importance of quick and easy transitions between activities. David Ginsburg discusses smooth transitions in terms of …

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Added by Janet Abercrombie on September 27, 2011 at 5:25am — 1 Comment

Quick Formative Assessment of Student Writing

Since reading Bill Ferriter's post on whether or not true formative assessment is possible, I've been wondering how I could make my own formative assessments more efficient. This post features a screencast of me looking at student work for the purposes of formative assessment.

Formative assessment is continuous assessment. In the context…

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Added by Janet Abercrombie on September 24, 2011 at 1:56am — 2 Comments

10 Ways to Help Students Create Quality Video and Audio Productions

I shied away from tech productions projects. I was a scaredy-cat. Why? Whenever I gave my students a video project, the products demonstrated fun and engagement, but little learning.

I needed to learn how to help students create quality productions.

Over the past three years, I've discovered a system that helps me help students create media productions that…

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Added by Janet Abercrombie on September 19, 2011 at 7:13am — No Comments

Parent Night Activities: Getting Parents and Students Actively Involved

It's never too early in the year to begin thinking about Parent Night.

The thought of talking for an hour to a group of adults seems daunting. Even with children, I try to speak no more than five minutes before directing them to an activity that synthesizes what was shared.

I have parents and students do the talking. Here are some suggestions if you want to get parents and students more active in the process:

1. Have parents active from the…

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Added by Janet Abercrombie on September 16, 2011 at 2:30am — No Comments

Beyond Compliance: Teaching Students to Make Responsible Decisions

I have been going home exhausted. Yes, I'm getting used to early mornings. But I think the most draining aspect of a new school year is fielding the hundreds of questions fired at me. I'm sure you've heard them:

"Can I call home/go to the restroom/return my book/fill my water bottle...?"
"Do I...?"
"What do...?"
"Where does this go?"

Procedural questions can be handled by…

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Added by Janet Abercrombie on September 8, 2011 at 8:19am — No Comments

Bookcasts: Podcasts that Demonstrate Reading Comprehension

: Photo accessed through Creative Commons, attributed to http://www.flickr.com/photos/grahamstanley/

When you talk to a 10-year-old about a book, the child will most often give you a rundown that includes a string of "And then...and then...and then..." How can…

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Added by Janet Abercrombie on September 6, 2011 at 4:29am — 1 Comment

Visual Literacy: Teaching Students How Video Can Fool the Viewer

One of the most important things we can teach students is to be a critical viewer of visual media. Can we believe everything we see?

My teaching partner and I created a 17-second iMovie: http://youtu.be/bnYYyL0wq30

We then gave students access to the 18 smaller clips from which the movie was…

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Added by Janet Abercrombie on September 5, 2011 at 3:00am — 1 Comment

Transitions: Classroom Routines That Respect Instructional Time

I have pretty high expectations for student organization and transitions between activities. I don't want student to lose precious learning time. That said, I don't want students to be robots.

How do I show students I care about them, honor individual quirks, and still clarify my expectations for our learning time?

Clear instructions are written on the board as students arrive - and for each transition. In the past, I wrote steps for students on…

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Added by Janet Abercrombie on September 3, 2011 at 6:00am — 2 Comments

Beginning-of-year Activities

I consciously overplan the first few days. The worst possible first-day scenario is to arrive unprepared. Over the years, I've collected a number of first-day activity ideas - far too many to use.

I've pared down the activities based on the following considerations:

My first goal is to build classroom community, making all students feel comfortable and successful.
My second goal is to establish routine.
My third goal is to formatively assess students'…

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Added by Janet Abercrombie on September 2, 2011 at 5:20am — 2 Comments