Academic FYI #7- Happy Thanksgiving! Thoughts on Appreciation and Gratitude

A special Thanksgiving’s Day Academic FYI. A little bit on the touchy feely side but its a great time of year to reflect upon all the great parts of this profession.

Just two quick articles on the importance of Appreciation and Gratitude that all staff and students can benefit from….  

This is a nice and timely article around Thanksgiving. This is certainly the time of year with everyone working so hard where the Holiday break is a much needed time for relaxing and reenergizing yourself.

There are some great ideas here for increasing appreciation in your work life. And if I haven’t said it to you enough: Thank you for all you do.

Teachers: Finding Appreciation at Work

Nothing is perfect but students and staff have a lot to be thankful for working at such a great school. At first I wondered if the article was too elementary but then realized gratitude is something that all students need to think about at all times. Here is another great idea for writing in your classroom which doubles as a fantastic way to start your class with positive thoughts and ideas:

Gratitude: A Powerful Tool for Your Classroom

FYI #6 - Enjoy the Weekend & Happy Veteran's Day!

Had some great walkthroughs this week. It is encouraging to see staff doing more and more stuff with literacy in mind.

This week: A helpful lesson plan template, one video, one list of journal prompts, and one more short article on working with ELL students. Enjoy! Have a Great weekend!!

1. We have been talking a lot about Unit Plans in terms of our Rubicon Atlas curriculum initiatives.

However, one thing that cannot be overlooked is a good, solid daily lesson plan. A lesson plan which has the most important components to running a good class:

Warm-ups, a good balance of teacher-centered and student-centered activities, reading and writing activities, formative assessment, and exit strategies is critical to every class.

I have been working on this lesson plan template which I hope to break down into one page. I think it is important for teachers to see the ideas below each section of the lesson plan. This is a 58 minute plan which hits upon the 5 classroom indicators Administrators are looking for. If you decided to use this template let me know how it goes:

http://goo.gl/Lw7iUm

1. A quick little video on simple Exit Tickets. You should always end your lesson each day with a simple exit strategy to see if the students have learned the objectives you planned for:

http://www.theteachertoolkit.com/index.php/tool/exit-ticket

2. 180 Journal Prompts for every day of the school year. This is an excellent list for all teachers to use. Journals are a great DO NOW activity regardless of what you teach:

http://www.dailyteachingtools.com/journal-writing-prompts.html

3. Another excellent and short article on accommodating ELL students in your classroom:

http://theeducatorsroom.com/2013/02/esl-students-in-the-general-education-classroom/