So I was sitting so unenthusiastically marking my students post test on Mass, when I come across this cherubs test paper.
The question was: what does Mass mean?
The student wrote “it means that you have to believe in yourself.”
Now it did take some deciphering and I may have had to ask him to translate for me. However while he quite obviously requires some more guidance and scaffolding to reach his goals I am extremely happy that he is clearly getting something out of our growth mindset lessons.
Let’s pump our kids up, cause this made my heart sing! 💖
I’ve been so busy caught up in the whole teaching game that I quite frankly forgot about my little blog. I think that it’s important for myself to post all of the wonderful things my students and I have enjoyed so this post will be a catch-up of some of the things that have gone on in 1T, 1 / 2 T and my current class 3 / 4 T since I last posted.
Making quiet critters with my creative helper.Welcome to Country book study and artwork. The artwork was a direct draw reflecting one of the books illustrated spreads. Both acrylic and watercolour paint were used as well natural leaves from our garden.Learning through Storytelling, dance, art and creative expression.Early reading and writing skills .Students found this experience really engaging. After reading a story about the ocean and sea creatures, the subject of dugongs somehow came up. Well naturally I ran with it and we researched and wrote about what we learned and then painted our wonderful dugongs.I was amazed by how excited these youngsters were to use a dictionary!
And there you have it. A quick snap shot of the last few years. Shocking as I am, I shall try not to forget to post in future. So many great experiences and ideas I really don’t want to forget about. And let’s be honest we do quite often forget those amazing inquiry projects and special lessons that our students really loved and found engaging. Until next time….
Term 1, week 8: The Paper Bag Princess.After reading the 2nd read, we created a vocabulary chart to describe brave and clever Princess Elizabeth and nasty Prince Ronald.Story immersion centre.
During literacy groups, students were able to engage in the story book immersion table where I had set up puppets, whiteboards and the text of the paper bag Princess, for students to engage in.
Interactive writing.
Together with the students we created a text describing who Princess Elizabeth was, how her castle was destroyed and her quest to find and rescue Prince Ronald who was extremely ungrateful!
Well so busy I have been that there’s not been much time to document our learning, as I had planned on WordPress! Here’s a sneak peak of what’s been happening in term 1 weeks 1 – 7.
In the first few weeks 1T participated in lots of small group activities, based on the skills previously learnt in kindergarten last year. This gave students the perfect opportunity, free of pressure to get to know me and their new classmates in a relaxed play based environment. This also allowed me to roam, interact and informally observe their skills, strategies and thinking at work. New year, new 1T, we are bucket fillers! sharing our excitement of beginning a new year and class with families. Photos posted to students electronic SeeSaw individual learning journals.Guided reading progress, shared on Seesaw with family of student.
Guided reading – students read with me daily to develop fluency and complete word work to improve their phonetic skills and ability to decode. This photo was shared with the family of a student to share and celebrate his progress and achievements.
Teaching students some fun and interactive math games to practice new concepts and skills, taught during our whole number math lessons. These and other math games were added to our literary group rotations for daily practice of whole number skills.Students practice their weekly list words in literacy groups. 1. Writing in their spelling books. 2. make the words on their boards. 3. Choose words to apply in a sentence.
Students play the role of teacher, testing each other with sight words. One student calls out the word while the other students write it out. They then check to see if the got the word correct.
Creative, descriptive writing: My Monster. we first created a drawing, then a plan where students added several adjectives to describe their monster. Then lastly, students used their plan to convert their dot points into sentences.
Students really enjoyed creating their own individual misters. They first chose their monster outline. Then painted in watercolours their desired effect and technique from the options they were shown. Lastly, students finished off their monsters choosing from an array of facial and body features.
I programmed Whole number based activities for students to practise their skills in during literacy group rotations. These were decided upon by reflecting on pre test data.
Students wore gloves and demonstrated teamwork and a sense of pride and respect for their local environment as they participated in Clean up Australia Day together with another class.Technology use during literacy groups.Word work with play dough.
This activity was completed before our writing task, to help the students to familiarise themselves with the sequence of events in the story. The events were discussed as a whole class and scaffolded before students went off to complete their activity.
After receiving and reading our letters that we sent in, Ecologists Vanessa and Caitlin from the Central Coast Council wanted to visit. They organised with me to come out to visit our class to answer the students questions and talk to them about their concerns and what they could do to help the environment.
How lucky are we to have a good proportion of trees and natural bush land on the central coast, compared to other areas of Sydney and the world!
Vanessa and Caitlin then responded to one of the students big questions regarding their concerns around bushland and habitats for our native animals. They drew a pie chart to show us and explained how fortunate the Central coast is, in regards to native bushland compared to the rest of the world.
Vanessa and Caitlin then conducted an interesting experiment to show students how polluted our waterways become when people allow various materials to wash down the drain. We added items such as detergent, paint, garden waste, rubbish, oil, and dog biscuits that represented ‘dog poo’ to a clean tub of water. The students took turns and watched eagerly as the clear water turned murky and cloudy. There was a lot of discussion around this experience and further discussion around what could be done to change this.
Following this Vanessa and Caitlin showed us a educational video clip about bees and how we can encourage them into our outdoor environments. This was in response to another concern that the students had around the bee population diminishing. During this video clip the presenter explained how to use repurposed materials to create your own bee / insect hotels. The students were extremely excited by this idea!
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