Special Education Strategies And More...

Einstein's Definition of Insanity

2012-01-30T23:59:00.003-05:00

Einstein's definition of insanity is one of my all time favorite quotes. He says simply: "The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results."

How many times, as teachers or parents, do we do the same thing we have always done and end up with the same conflict, problem or lack of learning on the child's part. I agree with Einstein. That's insane.

We are the adults who are in the lead role. It's up to us to change something first. If I continue doing everything exactly as I have done it before, shouldn't expect the same thing that happened before to happen again? And yet, what happens? The child typically gets blamed. We say things like "You need to listen harder." (quote from Rick Lavoie and FAT City). Seriously?? Listen harder? How do you do that? Or we say you're lazy or just not trying. Or we say you need to apply yourself.

I think Einstein's quote on insanity speaks to one of my favorite aspects of teaching students with special needs. The kids can, in fact, learn. We have centuries of data to prove that going all the way back to Itard, Seguin and Montessori.

It's up to me to figure out what to change.

Perhaps I change the way the material is presented. Some children can learn complex concepts with the support of visual cues or kinesthetic modes of processing the information. Perhaps I change how the student has to respond. Perhaps instead of writing his/her response, I have them orally tell it. Perhaps I change the way the student is engaged.

I find Einstein's quote to be a challenge for me to figure how to help the students in my class learn the skills and concepts they need to learn.

photo courtesy of Flickr Creative Commons; the Smithsonian Institution

States of Matter: Interactive Games and Videos

2012-01-30T20:17:00.001-05:00

My class has started a science unit focuses on the states of matter and the physical properties of matter. After searching online for some resources to support our classroom materials, I've found quite a bit. Have fun exploring!

Interactive Sites for Students:

Solids Liquids and Gases

Changing States of Matter

Material Properties

Changes in Materials

The Mixtures Lab

Short Video Clips on States of Matter

States of Matter and Physical Properties

Resources for Teachers:

Standards by grade level with links to appropriate activities.

States of Matter Unit Packet

States of Matter Article and Questions

What's the Matter: Sorting into matter categories

States of Matter Worksheets

Valentine's Activity: Hearts Everywhere

2012-01-05T22:35:00.000-05:00

If you are in any way similar to me in how you plan lessons for activities you've seen online, you need some time to read about the idea, think about how you would use it with your group, prepare your materials and then implement it. One of the teacher's on my team this year says he likes to let concepts have a chance to "marinate." We've all adopted his lingo. We like to let kids have the chance to have repeated exposure to concepts, but sometimes we also need some marinating time for ourselves.

In an effort to give everyone some time to "marinate" the following ideas, I'm sending them out early (or really late considering I took the pictures last February!)

For my pre-schoolers that I've had in the past, this lesson focused on the positional concept "on" as well as identification of common objects.

I started with the interactive book, "Hearts Everywhere", from the Jefferson Parish AAC link. I would read the book to my class using the felt board and laminated hearts. On each page, the students would take turns placing the heart "on" the object identified in the book.

After introducing the book and the vocabulary, the next day before the children came in the classroom, my assistant and I placed construction paper hearts all over the classroom. During circle time, I would call a few students at a time to go "look for a red heart" and bring it back to the carpet. When they brought their heart back, I would ask them where they found their heart. Once they answered the question, we would place it on our chart and I would call the next group of children to go look.

TIP: If you are working with pre-school age children, be sure to write on the heart the location that you placed it. For example, "on the fish tank." When you have several children looking at the same time, it's easy to miss who picked one up from specific locations. If you don't have several children looking at the same time, the waiting period gets to be too long for little ones. And if you have students at levels similar to the students I have taught, when you ask the question, "Where was your heart?" you will inevitable get the answer "over there" a few times. You want to be sure you can accurately prompt them to answer the question using the positional word "on" and the correct common object where it was.

I love activities that get students actively engaged. These types of scavenger hunts always produce smiles, laughter and excitement.

Because of that I'm trying to think of a way I can adapt the activity to be appropriate for my current third graders.

I think I will connect it to our writer's workshop lessons. We have been working on using more descriptive phrases in our paragraphs. I am going to place many hearts all over the room with their labels. Have the students put their heads down with their eyes closed and give each student 10 or 15 seconds (one at a time) to go get a heart from somewhere in the room. After they collect their hearts, they will describe where they found the heart, but they are not allowed to name the object. Then they will read their paragraphs to their classmates who will need to guess where the heart was originally.

I'll have to let you know how it goes! I'd love to see other ideas on how to use a scavenger hunt type activity to support academic goals for older students. Please post your ideas in the comments section.

Strengths Based Leadership and Special Education

2011-12-29T02:10:00.000-05:00

My brother is in town and while we were out and about he mentioned that he read this book first within a management program at work and then again within a service group at his church. As he was talking about it, it seemed as if there were many things that would interest me that go along with the themes in the book. Obviously, from the title you can see that the book focuses on finding your personal strengths as a leader. I picked it up and read the meat of it very quickly...one night. (I haven't yet read all of the "additional resources.") I found it to be an excellent investment of time! I have highlighter marks, post-its and pencil marks in the margins.

Right now, during our winter break, I have no other responsibilities pulling at me, so I could actually spend the time reading and thinking. It affected me a few different ways and in in different applications, but all related to how I think about special education (since that is where I spend most of my leadership skills).

First, a friend and I just finished running a "Christmas Camp" for girls with mild to moderate disabilities and their siblings. If this actually turns into something that we continue with, the book would be a great discussion point for us to delineate responsibilities of running camps and activities.

Second, I'd love for my two assistants to read this book and then have the three of us talk about the classroom climate and goals. While we typically think of teaching assistants in a "followers" role, the reality is, in the classroom to children, they are leaders. The two ladies I work with are quite talented and compassionate so they no doubt have leadership qualities.

Third, I'd like to e-mail the author and have some discussions on creating a strengths finder for children. The kids in my class are there based on their deficits. At their ages, (8 and 9) they are starting to become very socially aware that they are in a "special" class. I hate this aspect of my job. I can tell them all of the strengths that I see, but they (much like adults and society) want "proof." I think a strengths finder assessment for children would be beneficial!

There is a quote in the book that struck me: "At a very basic level, it is hard to build self-confidence when we are focused on our weaknesses instead of our strengths." When I think about this in terms of a child who is living with a learning disability or an intellectual disability, it frustrates me. Our current special educational model is based upon what is impeding the child from learning rather than based upon building strengths of a child who is struggling. There's another educational researcher, Torgenson (I think), who through his research has found that the single most influential factor in future reading success is prior positive reading experiences. How do we know and understand the value of strengths based performance and positive experiences and yet we continue to operate on a deficit driven model and pounding away at weaknesses? Crazy!

Perhaps my above rant clearly shows my own inclinations towards "includer" and "maximizer," but I do find the book to be generally valuable to people who have any type of leadership role within a family, community or work environment. If you have a free night or weekend, be sure to check it out!

Reading Chapter Books

2011-12-23T23:36:00.000-05:00

Yahooey! Just before Winter Break, I introduced several of my students to reading chapter books independently. Like anything else, we started small and built upon the skills that were already in place.

Since the beginning of the school year, we have spent 10-12 minutes each day with a chapter read aloud. I don't test on it, we don't dissect the book, we don't go crazy if something happens and the chapter is put off until tomorrow. My purpose in approaching it in this manner was to introduce books that were longer in length and to model reading a chapter book in small increments. I wanted the kids to see enjoyment of reading a longer book.

When I felt a few kids were ready, I hand picked some beginning chapter books such as "The Fly Guy" and the "Frog and Toad" series. This introduced the kids to the format of a chapter book but the length and the reading level was still relatively easy for them.

I finally then moved to books in series like "The Magic Treehouse" and "Cam Jansen." In order to help the kids break up the book into manageable chunks and to also let them see their progress, I stole an idea from another teacher on my team.

She shared that for some of her kids, she writes down which pages they have to read each night on a bookmark. Since I am a big fan of post its and I have a lot of them, I used her idea on a post it. I selected quite a few books and then asked the student to choose a book from my pre-selected group rather than the whole library. After he/she selected the book, we went through the table of contents together to see how many chapters were in the book. I then wrote each chapter number on the post it and gave it to them for their bookmark. As they finished each chapter, they could cross of the chapter they had completed.

It has been working pretty well. Two "bonuses" of this visual support is that it is 1) cheap, and 2) easy. As the kids finish the books and successfully pass AR tests, their confidence is growing! Hopefully, this will help to scaffold their "reading endurance" and help them continue to read longer passages and books successfully.

Reading Block

2011-12-06T16:03:00.001-05:00

This past week I had a first year teacher and her mentor visit my classroom. I've finally arrived at the point in my career where I actually enjoy this. My assistants and I "do what we do" every day and to have some one come in to observe and ask questions often prompts further reflection on what we do and why we do it. I had one of those moments with this observation.

I'm in a rather unique teaching situation within my district this year. I have a self contained, varying exceptionalities (cross categorical) of all third graders. Most of our self contained classes across the district are multi-grade.

The teacher observing teaches a class of students kindergarten to third grade. She provides direct instruction during the reading block for the first through third graders.

Her question was "How do you expose the students to grade level content in reading but still provide direct instruction at their instructional levels?" Great question! We always talk about exposing kids to grade level curriculum, but the reality is that most students in self contained classes are significantly below grade level expectations in their skills. So HOW do you do that? How would you organize teaching them at their instructional level, but still provide them exposure to grade level materials?

For my class this year, it is actually quite easy. All of my students are third graders, so we start reading block with a shared reading lesson from the grade level materials. Within this time frame we introduce the listening comprehension selection, the focus skill and the robust vocabulary words. After we complete this, we move into instructional level groups for direction instruction in strategies, phonics and comprehension skills.

However, most of the time, in a self contained class, I would need to expose the children to grade level material at three different grade levels. For example, all of the third graders need exposure to third grade materials. All of the second graders need exposure to second grade materials and all of the first graders need exposure to first grade materials.

After thinking and reflecting about it, the following is what I came up with as a structure for accomplishing the balance between grade level exposure and direct instruction at instructional levels for a multi-grade class. Keep in mind, that this is where I would start. It might need some tweaking based on student needs, assistant skill sets, school resources, etc.

I would use the two different methods (grade level, instructional level) of grouping during my reading block.

The first set of groups would be based on the child's instructional level. So no matter what grade the child is in, all the kids that are functioning in a 1.5 grade level for reading would be in one instructional group, etc. Within these groups we would work on decoding strategies, phonics, fluency, comprehension of passages the child reads himself, and focus skills that go with the INSTRUCTIONAL level rather than the grade level.

The second set of groups would be based on the child's grade level. Within these groups we would work on listening comprehension, robust vocabulary and exposure to grade level materials and focus skills.

I base my lessons on a two week schedule, so I typically have 10 instructional days.

It is important to note: My district uses StoryTown Materials. The StoryTown materials are organized into a selection lesson for one week. They also have a focus skill that crosses over 2 selections and practiced over two weeks. The pace of one story every week (addressing the vocabulary, focus skill, grammar and phonics rule) was too fast for my students. I have decided to align my lessons with the focus skills and a two week period. In short, this year, my students are only completing the even numbered selections from StoryTown. We are not using the odd numbered lessons at all. I am attempting to systematically teach the focus skills and third grade curriculum, but do so at a pace that my students can handle and master! I started the year at the pace the curriculum suggests and I had students failing left and right. Clearly something needed to change. I wanted the kids to be exposed to all of the focus skills, so I opted for using all of the even numbered lessons instead of using every lesson at a slower pace.

On Day 1 in my reading block, I would spend the time entirely within grade level groups rotating between the teacher, an assistant and an independent center (probably the listening center.) This would give the students a good long and repeated exposure to the grade level shared reading selection. As the teacher, I would want to spend this time so that I know I am introducing every child to their selection at the beginning of the unit. This also tends to be fun for my students. We act out the vocabulary words, think of pictures that help us remember the meaning and discuss the story.

Then on days 2-9, I would break my reading block into 3 time periods.

1) 60 minutes: rotation with instructional level groups
Instructional group station 1: Teacher led
guided reading and strategy work
To be perfectly honest, this is the station where I spend the bulk of my planning time. I need to think about what the kids are doing, make changes as necessary, push when they are ready for a push and pull back when content is too frustrating. I like to get a program in place for my other two stations so that I can spend the majority of my "thinking" time on my direct instruction group.
Instructional group station 2: Assistant led
If you have a scripted phonics program (i.e. SRA Reading Mastery) I would use that, if not, materials such as Explode the Code are a bit more affordable than purchasing an entire scripted program. If that is not available, I would also look to leveled readers from Science materials, media centers professional library, Scholastic News. I try to keep this station using materials that are familiar to my assistant. That way, I can spend less time planning for her and explaining what I want the students to work on. Just as kids like things to be familiar, adults like things to be familiar too!
Instructional group station 3: Independent
computer programs, independent worksheets, silent reading, TEACCH task baskets, etc. Find something that you have available that your students can do WITHOUT your help. This is critical! If your students cannot independently complete what you assign them, you will never get through your reading instruction with other groups. Even if you have to decrease the level of difficulty, this center MUST be independent or you will sacrifice your instructional time.

2) 5 minutes: Poem or Choral Read
Pull all of the kids back together at their desks or a carpet and do a poem or a choral read. This works as an instructional method working towards improving fluency, but also as a management technique. I find that transitions are easier if the students are moving to a designated place. And then leaving that designated place to group work. So the idea is to pull them all together annd then send them off again to different groups.

3) 20-25 minutes: Grade Level Groups
On days 2-9 I would probably only see one grade level group a day. The grade level groups would move through a similar rotation: teacher group, assistant group, independent group, but would differ in how many times I see them. I see every instructional group every day. I would not see every grade level group every day. Over the course of the 10 days, I would see each group 2 or 3 times, my assistant would see each group 2 or 3 times and they would be independent 2 or 3 times.
The three groups would be as follows:
Teacher led: Shared reading, critical thinking skills and grade level focus skills
Assistant led: Vocabulary bingo or other related games
Independent: Listening center with the targeted selection

On the 10th day, we would rest....oops, I mean test! I would keep the same structure as days 2-9 and complete the instructional level tests in small groups first. Then I would figure out how to fit in the listening comprehension and robust vocabulary for the grade level groups somewhere. I would probably have to steal from another time in the day somewhere!

I would love to hear what others are doing to address this question! Since I've just moved back into the elementary level this year, I haven't been in on these kinds of academic conversations and troubleshooting in a while.

"Dolphin Tale" Ideas and Resources

2011-09-29T19:05:00.000-04:00

My class is very excited about the new movie "Dolphin Tale." In science, we've been discussing how scientists can use a model to help them investigate their questions and variables.

Here are a few resources I've either found or created that you can use to support reading, writing and science through ideas from the movie "Dolphin Tale."

Power Point that can be printed or shown on an Activeboard/SmartBoard

Science Worksheet to go with Scientific Method and Power Point

Writing Prompt to go with Power Point

Scholastic Resources

Winter's Tail

Hope you enjoy!

Memorable Moment # 11: Name Changes

2011-09-19T23:17:00.011-04:00

My parents christened me with a first, middle and last name when I was born. When I got married, I took on my husband's last name. In spite of these facts, my student's want to bestow new names on me each year. In the past few years, I have been all of these:

"McFly"

"Ms. Yogurt"

"Mrs. Yo-yo"

"Yo"

And let's not forget, my personal favorite:

"Ms. Oder"

I really do shower. The last one was a result of a child's speech impairment, not my personal hygiene habits.

picture references:
http://johnlmalone.wordpress.com/2011/04/09/marty-mcfly-the-flea/
http://www.storeitfoods.com/yogurt_maker
http://freebornobiterdictum.blogspot.com/2011/05/time-for-yo-yo-to-recoil.html
http://www.shorelineenvironmental.com/odor-elimination.html

Reading Throughout the Day

2011-09-06T22:15:00.006-04:00

Some of you know I've recently switched teaching pre-schoolers with disabilities to teaching third grade students with disabilities.

In Florida, third grade is a "high stakes grade level." Children who do not pass the reading section of our achievement test face a mandatory retention.

My assistants and I are working diligently to help our students develop and improve their reading skills. We have a few systems and procedures that we have in place to help our students maximize reading opportunities throughout the day.

In this post I'll list our systems and procedures, and then in future posts, I'll explain in more detail how we specifically address each item.

1) Guided Reading Groups led by the teacher using district adopted curriculum materials (for my district this is Harcourt StoryTown)

2) Scripted Phonics lesson led by a classroom assistant using SRA Reading Mastery materials

3) "Book Buckets" that include individual leveled readers from ReadingA-Z and a reading log. Update: In December of 2011, we added some chapter books to this time. For more information, see this post.

4) Sight word practice. We store this in our book buckets and simply write targeted a sight word on an index card, hole punch it and collect them on a binder ring.

5) Shared poetry using poems from curriculum materials and other supplements.

6) Shared reading focusing on robust vocabulary and focus skills such character, setting, recalling details, etc.

7) Accelerated Reader using individualized goals and reading levels.

8) Read aloud chapter books.

9) Read aloud grade level short stories led by a classroom assistant.

10) Reading "choice time" activities (popular songs with lyrics..karaoke style, Boggle, Boggle Jr, Spell It Puzzles, Bananagrams, Scrabble, Scrabble Jr, etc).

* For more details on how steps 1, 2, 6 and 9 look in the classroom, visit this post.

We've just started our third week of school and I feel as if we are really starting to move with our reading groups and instruction. It took us a bit of time to finish assessments, formulate groups, and teach our students procedures for each of the areas we've attacked.

Hopefully, by the end of the year, we'll be able to report some good growth in our students' reading skills. I say "we" and "our" with intent because it require a team effort between the students, their families, my assistants and me!

Math Facts: Free Interactive Game Online

2011-08-17T20:23:00.002-04:00

I found a new-to-me website for practicing math facts. It's a basic "drill and kill" type of game, but it is simple and clearly presented. It also gives the user options of using different operations and different sum/difference totals. Check it out:

Harcourt Basic Facts

Big Changes.......

2011-08-01T10:18:00.004-04:00

It has been a busy, busy summer.

In addition to all of the typical summer school and summer vacation activities, I decided to transfer schools and grade levels. I will actually be teaching at the neighborhood school that I attended myself as a kindergarten student!

In the fall I will start teaching a class for third grade students with varying exceptionalities. And, although, I will miss my pre-k students and assistant terribly, I'm looking forward to the change.

photo courtesy of Chris Campbell on Flicker CC, "Top Of Antique Bell" http://www.flickr.com/photos/cgc/

Including Samuel

2011-06-08T19:37:00.002-04:00

This blog post recently came across one of my list serves. I found it worth sharing again.

Take a look:

Including Samuel

Memorable Moment #10: "Embarrassing"

2011-04-20T13:36:00.005-04:00

SCENE: There's an assembly in the cafeteria during my class's breakfast time and my assistant's hip has really been bothering her, so we ate breakfast in the classroom. (This involves getting breakfast and taking the meal roster back which is a lot if walking, so I told her I would do that.)

BUILD UP: We're potty training a little girl in my class, so before I took the meal roster back, I told her to go potty. She went in and I'm in the classroom. I hear her shout "Mrs. Y., I pee!" I hear several thumps of the roll of toilet paper and know that she is taking too much. I went in and see her with a mound of toilet paper by her on the floor. As we clean up, a piece gets stuck to her shoe. She tries to shake it off, but it doesn't come off. So we're giggling and she's trying to get the toilet paper off her shoe and I tell her "Oh Gosh, you don't want to have toilet paper on your shoe, that's so embarrassing." She giggles and tries again but it doesn't come off. So we talk again about getting the toilet paper off her shoe because we don't want bathroom germs in the classroom. She giggles and says "Embarrassing" and finally gets the toilet paper off her shoe. We wash up, she goes to the playground and I go to return the meal roster.

PUNCH LINE: I get to the cafeteria (which is about as far across campus from my classroom as you can get) and the cafeteria manager says, "Michelle, what do you have stuck to your shoe?"

Yep, that's right, I had toilet paper stuck to my shoe....

Manuel de Los Santos video

2011-04-16T18:50:00.002-04:00

My husband found this link in his wanderings online.

He thought it would be of interest to me....he was right!

I think this is an amazing story.

National Geographic Website

2011-04-10T16:05:00.006-04:00

My school is inundated with caterpillars right now. With so many natural, incidental learning experiences available, this is a perfect time to implement our life cycles unit.

National Geographic Kids has many great resources to also support this theme. Of course, in addition to bugs and butterflies National Geographic also has many other topics addressed too. Check them out!

Creature Feature: Monarch Butterflies

What in the World: Bugging Out!

More Sea Life Resources

2011-02-12T10:07:00.003-05:00

Since I live in South West Florida, a unit on sea life is particularly meaningful to my students and there are many opportunities to extend with real life experiences.

We have a field trip to Mote Marine Aquarium planned in March. I took my class on this particular field trip about 4 or 5 years ago. This year we are going to participate in the lesson about sea turtles and will actually get to make squid "popsicles" and then feed the turtles in the aquarium.

Of course, we also support this unit with many classroom experiences. I have found a few new resources to share:

Fern Goes for a Dive (free, animated read aloud story)

Fern Goes to Hawaii (free, animated read aloud story)

Mermaid Lullaby

Seashore Tap and Type

You can find other Sea life resources that I have gathered at this post, this post, this post and this post.

Literacy and Art and a Gentle Reminder

2011-02-02T19:26:00.003-05:00

Have you ever had one of those days when the stars and planets are aligning to make sure you "get the message?"

I had one today.

My class is in the middle of a camping theme. They have been having a grand time playing in tents, singing around our "campfire," pretending to roast marshmallows, pretending to grill hamburgers, reading by lantern light, etc.....all of the play based experiences you would expect to find in a preschool classroom.

The shared reading book we have been reading this week is called "The Camping Scare" by Terri Dougherty. It's a simple book with great picture-to-text relationships and good illustrations that show many of our targeted vocabulary words.

In our art center today, we had out large sheets of black construction paper, the scrap bin, scissors, markers and glue. The children were encouraged to make a camping picture as an extension of our other play experiences and the literature we have been reading.

One child took his turn at the art center and began snipping very small pieces of the scraps. I looked at what he was doing and asked him what he was planning on making. He tells me he's making a tent. (This is clearly NOT a tent...in my mind...it is tiny pieces of paper. In my head, we were going to have a great creative experience where the children could cut out shapes of their choice to create figures of tents, etc and then use the markers for the finer details.) Well, I let him continue with his art project and he continued snipping the tiny pieces of paper. Good thing!

It turns out, he used those tiny pieces of blue paper to glue an outline of a tent, then collaged the brown ones to make logs for a fire, the orange ones for the flames and cut a large purple rectangle and used the markers to draw a "friend sleeping in a sleeping bag." It was fantastic!

Clearly, we (as teachers and parents) need to remember that children (even young children) are individuals with their own creativity, thoughts and ideas. I'm so glad that this particular child gave me an experience that serves as a gentle reminder that there are times that children need to have the space and freedom to communicate their thoughts and ideas in the way that they determine rather than with what we impose.

Play based writing

2011-02-01T22:51:00.002-05:00

I have found a lovely, photo based blog entry on supporting writing skills through a play based curriculum.

Check it out. Jenny's preschool classroom writing experiences (indoors and outdoors) are fantastic!

Let the Children Play

Visiting Kindergarten: Social Story

2011-02-01T21:26:00.003-05:00

It's the time of year when, in pre-k special needs classes, we begin to think about the process of transitioning children to kindergarten.

This year, there is a little girl in my class with an interesting combination of strengths and challenges.

She has a good cognitive skills and a good ability to learn vocabulary and concepts through incidental learning. She has a solid base of kindergarten pre-academic skills (she knows all of the letters of the alphabet upper and lowercase, she can count to 15, she can identify 11 colors and 6 common shapes. She knows many beginning consonant sounds, has an awareness of rhyming words, can read all of the names of the students in class and reads approximately 10 sight words.)

She gets overwhelmed with new experiences and has difficulty transitioning to new activities (especially if it is in a different location on campus). She still needs staff support for potty training. Her fine motor skills are significantly delayed and she still needs staff support for many tasks that include visual motor planning.

We have decided to try to specifically address an area of strength with an area that is a significant challenge for her while she is still in pre-k. She is going to start going to a shared reading and phonics lesson with a kindergarten class for approximately 20 minutes a day. Since she has good cognitive skills and she does not need any staff support in our pre-k large group circle time, we are going to try to balance this with the challenge of accepting a new experience. We are hoping that she will become familiar with the kindergarten building, the kindergarten classroom and the larger group of kindergarten students. We are also hoping that our pre-k staff can go with her for a short period of time and then fade away so that we increase her independence and comfort in the kindergarten classroom.

To help her prepare for this, we have drafted a simple social story (you can download a generic copy here.) about going to the kindergarten classroom. She has a copy at home that her family has read with her for the past week and there is a copy at school that classroom staff have been reading with her too. We have also started walking past the kindergarten room and having conversations about visiting kindergarten on Monday.

We're hoping by layering in the staff support and also building on her strengths, she will begin to feel comfortable and be able to learn new skills in the kindergarten class.

Homecoming Queen: Teenager with Down Syndrome

2010-12-05T16:04:00.004-05:00

This story recently came to me from two sources: A CEC SmartBrief and the parent of a child I tutor.

I think it's worth sharing again!

Homecoming Queen: Teenager with Down Syndrome

Free Interactive Holiday Sites

2010-12-05T15:54:00.002-05:00

I found this site a few years ago. It was challenging to navigate and then go back and find the activities you wanted repeatedly. They have re-organized and uploaded many free interactive boards and activities. They have many that are appropriate for December holidays. They've done a great job! It's so much easier to navigate and find activities appropriate to skill or grade level.

TES iboard player

Here's a link to a post from a few years ago too. My students still enjoy these links!

Interactive Holiday Sites

Free Interactive Fall Games

2010-11-05T12:44:00.003-04:00

Little Critter Scarecrow

Highlights Build a Scarecrow

Squirrel Acorn Harvest

Fall Leaves Matching Game

Dora We Are Thankful

Starfall: Make a Jack O Lantern

Starfall: Silly Turkey

Embedding Literacy

2010-10-28T23:28:00.003-04:00

I'm wrapping up facilitating a very fast paced and intense course on language and literacy. Because of this, I have been engaged in a lot of thinking and reflecting about embedding language and literacy into daily lesson plans and routines.

I'd like to take a moment to share an idea that illustrates how a parent has embedded language and literacy into her child's day.

I drive through 3 school zones and countless bus stops on my way to work each morning. I often see parents waiting with their children at the bus stops.

One mom and her son (who appears to be 5 or 6 years old) used to wait for the bus each day in the manner that you would typically see....the boy had his backpack on, mom was next to him and they stood on the corner waiting for the bus.

For the past few weeks, as I have driven by, I have noticed that she now brings a camp chair (one of those canvas chairs that folds up and has a sleeve that it fits in...you can buy them at Wal Mart for about $10) and a book to the bus stop.

Now, each morning her son sits on her lap as she is reading a story to him.

Wow! So maybe they wait 5-10 minutes for the bus each day. That means her son is getting and extra 25-50 minutes of literacy and language experiences a week. If you multiply that times 36 weeks in a school year that is between 900-1800 minutes a year (or an extra 15-30 hours).

I think this is just so cool! She has figured out how to take a "waiting" period and has turned it into a language and literacy experience.

Sometimes we go nuts trying to figure out when to fit everything "in." This mom has found a way to give her child more literacy and language experiences within a routine that already exists.

How many other ways could we, as teachers or parents also do this? I bet the ways are quite creative and the number is countless!

Free Early Literacy Activities

2010-10-11T13:05:00.002-04:00

This site has recently been shared with me from our pre-k supervisor.

It has many, free printable activities that support literacy of infants, toddlers and pre-schoolers. They have a link for ideas for parents and another link for teachers. Check it out.

Center for Early Literacy Learning

Free Dinosaur Interactive Games

2010-10-08T08:07:00.002-04:00

Dinosaur Train

Diego Dinosaur Adventure

Dino Dig Fossil

Cheap! Dinosaur Measuring and Science

2010-10-05T00:02:00.010-04:00

In the current economy (and as far as being frugal and financially wise at any time!) I am always interested in lessons that can be enhanced as cheaply as possible.

My class has been involved in a inquiry based unit on dinosaurs for the past week. It seems to me that there are always easy ways to integrate language and literacy lessons in every unit, but sometimes it is more difficult to integrate math and science. Since this unit focuses on dinosaurs, science is not a problem either, but how can we integrate math concepts? Here's one idea we used.

I found these dinosaur figures at my local Dollar Tree. (Yes, it cost a whopping $1 for this lesson.)

I explained to my students that these dinosaurs were supposed to get bigger when we put them in water. We decided to measure them with a ruler, predict how big we thought it would get and then measure it after it grew.

Since I wanted to focus on some math skills, we made a big deal out of measuring the dinosaur. I left my finger on the number 4 after we measured and reminded the children that he should get "bigger." I asked them "How big do you think he will get?" as I ran my other pointer finger across the top of the ruler (showing them the most logical choices across the ruler.) They made their predictions as I recorded them and then we observed. The pictures show you where we are so far!

After we measure our dinosaur again tomorrow, we'll take him out of the water and predict what will happen. It will be interesting to see if any of the children will predict that he shrinks back to 4 inches (remember, that's where we started at our first measurement!)

Missing Pumpkin

2010-09-26T20:38:00.007-04:00

One of my favorite lessons was designed to help a kindergarten-second grade class generate questions and improve their writing skills. We called it our "Missing Pumpkin Mystery."

For a week or so in October we had a pumpkin on display in our classroom. We were gearing up for the day we would scoop the insides out, count the seeds and carve it.

This particular group of students really needed to work on generating questions and using descriptive words within their writing. So some of the school staff helped me stage the "Missing Pumpkin Mystery."

One day after their specials period (art, music, phys ed, etc) the pumpkin was missing from the classroom. Once they noticed it, we decided on a plan of action to get our pumpkin back.

The first thing we did was to make "Wanted" posters for our pumpkin. The students took a brown paper grocery bag and drew a picture of our pumpkin on it. They then had to write three statements describing our pumpkin so "others would know if they saw OUR pumpkin."

We then decided to report our missing pumpkin to our principal to see if he could help us. (I had given him, the media specialist, our cafeteria assistant and our day time custodian their scripts so they would lead us to the next person to help us find the pumpkin.)

The children had to explain what happened, ask their questions and then describe out pumpkin to each person. The principal suggested we ask the media specialist "because he saw a lot of pumpkins in the media center." She suggested we ask the cafeteria assistant because "maybe they needed it to make pumpkin pie." The cafeteria assistant suggested we ask the custodian "because he sees the whole school make cleans up all the messes." As it turns out, the custodian "put it in our refrigerator because he was afraid it would get rotten."

We had great fun with this activity and it provided the kids with a real reason to use the skills I wanted them to practice.

"Post It" Graphs

2010-09-23T18:41:00.008-04:00

Here's a simple strategy that we use a lot in my classroom. I write each child's name on a post it. Then I write a question on a piece chart paper and usually add visual supports for each column of the graph. Below is a picture of our most recent graph:

I like to use the post it graphs for lots of reasons:

1) They help children learn literacy skills by reading their name and their peers' names.

2) They help children develop language skills by answering questions and making choices.

3) They help children develop task related skills and focusing skills because they are actively involved and then they physically get to place their own name on the chart.

4) They help children develop social skills by learning how to take turns and wait for their own turn.

5) They help children develop math skills as we count the number of votes in each column and discuss concepts of more, less and the same (equal).

6) They help children develop literacy skills by becoming part of our environmental print in the classroom.

7) They are quick and easy to prep for! That means I don't spend more time preparing the materials than it takes the children to actually engage in the activity.

PBS: "All" means all

2010-09-01T21:32:00.007-04:00

When I was in college and learning about the social foundations of education, I remember being surprised to learn that the word "all" meant different things to different historical / theoretical contributors. Sometimes "all" included landowning men, sometimes it included women, sometimes it included children and sometimes it include people with disabilities, but very rarely did it mean "all."

A few weeks ago I attended a train-the-trainer workshop to teach PBS strategies to families. As I reflect more on the tenets of PBS and begin to schedule our family workshops, I came back to a slide that a friend and I created when we were training new teachers how to set up their V.E. classrooms. We came to the conclusion that when implementing positive behavior support systems and philosophies, "all" should really mean "all."

the kids who raise their hand and the kids who yell out

the kids who bathe every night and the kids who need to

the kids who write with their pencil and the kids who throw their pencil

the kids who say “I love you!” and the kids who say “ $#@% you!”

the kids who use a tissue and the kids who wipe their snot on you

the kids you’d take home in a heartbeat and the kids you hope are absent

the kids with parents that support you and the kids with parents that challenge you

the kids who respond to your interventions and the kids that exhaust your bag of tricks

the kids who consistently get their meds and the kids who don’t

Our main purpose of posing the above statements was to encourage teachers to reflect upon the following question:

Am I providing a safe learning environment for all learners?

Memorable Moment # 9: I Need the Keys

2010-08-23T17:17:00.005-04:00

Today was the first day of school for students. Since I learned my Harry Wong lessons on the importance of procedures long, long ago, the first few weeks of my pre-k classroom are spent on learning the centers, how to play in the centers and how to clean up the centers. That means I don't open every center every day at the beginning of the year.

Today one of the new students in the class asked if he could play in our puzzle center today. My assistant told him that "puzzles are closed." He stood for a second or two and then replied to her, "Ok, I need the keys."

I thought that was a pretty clever response. :-)

image from stopnlook@ flickr.com

Positive Behavior Support: Solution Board

2010-08-16T17:46:00.006-04:00

Throughout my district (as with many others) there is a large push for the implementation of school-wide positive behavior support (PBS). I am also fortunate enough to work in a community that has received a large grant to support strategies that increase mental health for children in early childhood settings. One of the initiatives funded through this grant is PBS training and materials.

Our early childhood PBS training is based on the pyramid model and training modules from CSEFEL.

One of my favorite strategies that I learned from my PBS training is the "Solution Kit." The solution kit is a strategy that teaches young children the options they may try when a conflict or disagreement arises. It helps them to learn how to independently (or with less prompting) solve problems.

You can watch a video of a teacher modeling the "solution kit" here.

Two years ago, I started using the solution kit with my pre-schoolers. I had a small plastic suitcase very similar to the one in the video and housed the kit at child level near my circle time area. While I loved the concept of the solution kit, I found the implementation to be difficult for my students. The suitcase with the clips was difficult for some of them to manage with fine motor deficits and the solutions all in a pile became quickly disorganized and overwhelming for them. I didn't want to give up on the positive aspects of using the solution kit, so I had to figure out a way to make it work for my population. Our solution kit evolved into a "solution board."

I simply printed and laminated the visuals from the solution kit and then taped them to the side of my desk. They became a permanent fixture in the classroom. The board allowed me to organize the solutions in a manner that was easier for my students to track visually and also eliminated the need for them to be able to open the kit. Towards the end of the year, for many of my students getting ready to transition to kindergarten, I could be across the room and just verbally prompt them to try using the solution board. I even had two parents who saw us using the solution board in the class and asked for the visuals to use at home!

I think the power of the solution board or solution kit (however the concept evolves for you) is that it teaches the children skills for managing their own conflicts. It gives children a measure of control over the resolution to the conflict and does not require an adult to intervene and "fix" the problem. And, ultimately, that's what we want.....for children to independently be able to come to a peaceful solution to a conflict.

Moving Before and After

2010-08-12T12:38:00.009-04:00

Last year my pre-k program was moved to another elementary school in my district. I had a choice to move with my program or teach a different grade level at the current school. I chose to move.

Since it was a district decision to move the program, they provided staff to physically move all of the boxes and furniture, but I was responsible for the packing and the unpacking.

When I walked into my classroom after the movers had all of the boxes placed, I knew I had my work cut out for me. This is one of the before shots:

Clearly, I had to figure out a plan of attack to get everything organized and ready for the first day of school. I started with my necessities: iPod, coffee and Gatorade and then got to work.

I organized my actions by prioritizing what HAD to be in place for the first day of school and what materials I would be using. I keep most of my units of study in large Rubbermaid tubs with labels. You don't see it in the picture, but in one corner of the classroom is a storage room.

I needed to to get some space in the room to move the furniture, so I started by taking all of the tubs for my units and organizing them in the storage room. Once that was done, I could push the tables to the middle of the room, put all of the other materials on and under the tables and start working on the physical layout of the perimeter of the room. Here's the start of that:

Thinking about the physical layout is HUGE! Your physical layout in the classroom can either help you diffuse problems or can actually make the problems worse. The following are some of the things I think about as I set up a new room:

What is age/grade appropriate?
What areas need to be included?
Where are materials stored for the teacher, assistant, students?
How are materials accessed? Does it support independence?
Is there a quiet space when needed?
Where are the electrical outlets and computer drops?
Traffic patterns to and from:

bathroom and fountain
backpacks and lunchboxes
time out, chill out chair, etc (if needed)
teaching tables and support materials
fire exit and alternate routes
line up

And most importantly,

Do I have visual supervision of all areas at all times?

At this point, I started moving centers around, figuring out how to address all of those questions regarding the physical layout and then unpacking materials that belong in each center.

It finally came together like this:

After living with it for a year, there are some changes that I'll make when I go back into school next week. But, I have found by thinking about the physical layout questions, I can address the most important issues first and do so efficiently....without having to do tasks twice because I "forgot" I needed to have a computer table near the computer drop or that I needed a wall for my housekeeping unit because it is too high to see over.

Moving and organizing a new room takes an enormous amount of energy and time. (That's why this post did not get posted last year when I actually moved! I was too busy attending to other things.) Make sure to ask your principal, department chair or mentor what is your responsibility and what the school/district provides. In the course of fifteen years of teaching I probably had to move classrooms 6 or 7 times before I found out that the district would provide boxes and I earned a comp day for moving. It took 3 days to organize my classroom last year. While the district didn't pay me for every bit of time I spent in there, it sure was nice to enjoy that day off that I did earn!

If you are moving or re-organizing your classroom this year good luck!

Counting Backwards and Subtraction

2010-08-12T12:17:00.006-04:00

I'm working with a little girl who is learning how to subtract.

The touch math strategies were very successful in helping her learn to add, so we are continuing with those materials and cues. However, when she was learning to add, she
had already mastered the skill of counting up. She has not yet learned how to consistently and accurately count backwards from 20. So while she is learning the concept of subtraction with differences from 5 and manipulatives, we are also working on counting backwards from 20.

I created a simple power point that she likes to "play" when we practice. I have her manually click to forward the slides. You can download the manual click power point he re. I also added an automatic slide transition for those of you who may want to use this in the classroom. You can download the automatic transition power point here.

In addition to using the power points during our tutoring session, her mom is also helping her count backwards during the many opportunities to wait during the day. They count backwards in the grocery store line, while waiting for her brothers at baseball practice, while the microwave is heating something, while a DVD is loading, etc. She has found lots of times during the day to practice with her!

Free Stories about Anger Management and Impulse Control

2010-08-09T17:51:00.007-04:00

This site offers two free books that address social skills.

The first book teaches students a strategy to manage anger using deep breathing and "train yoga." I like how it actually teaches children the words and the actions to take when they are angry and then encourages them to think of a solution. (It's very similar to Tucker Turtle from the CSEFEL site, but it's nice to have another avenue to teach the strategy.)

Jennifer (the author) is planning to add two more books to the site in September.

Free Children's Stories

Free Decodable Books

2010-07-19T19:21:00.003-04:00

A friend on one of my Yahoo! listserves just shared this site. I thought it was a great resource for emergent and early readers. It includes free decodable books that are written and shared by teachers.

Free Decodable Books

Enjoy exploring the site!

Marshmallow Painting from Childcareland.com

2010-07-06T23:52:00.005-04:00

Shelley Lovett has a great variety of videos explaining her lesson ideas at ChildcareLand.

I thought this one using marshamallows for a painting activity was a fun summertime idea. Check it out along with all of her other great ideas.

photo courtesy FlickrCC; http://www.flickr.com/photos/17425845@N00

Spray Bottles

2010-06-22T18:24:00.003-04:00

It's summer time, blistering hot in Florida and we are in the second week of summer school with a group of pre-schoolers with special needs.

I love spray bottles! We have had them out on the playground at least 4 out of the 6 days we've been in summer school. But, how are spray bottles educationally relevant and why would I use them in my class?

Using spray bottles addresses the following skills:

pre-writing skills (Look at the motions your fingers and hands use for squeezing a spray bottle. Now look at the motions needed for cutting and writing. Playing with spray bottles increases hand ad finger strength that supports writing skills.)
peer interaction skills (Our spray bottle rules are: 1) You have to ask the person before you spray them; 2) You have to spray only on their arms, legs or body, not in the face; 3) If the person asks you to stop, you have to stop. They spray bottles and play help and encourage children to initiate play and to respond to the words and actions of their peers.)
communication skills (Playing with the spray bottles naturally encourages conversation, especially if there is an adult supporting the play. We have had conversations about body parts, facial expressions, colors changing, opposites...wet/dry, high/low, hot/cold, playground equipment, actions...squeeze, spray, laugh, run, jump, etc. The active play generates many topics of conversation.)

All in all, playing with the spray bottles is just good summer fun! Actually, as I think about that, I'd challenge you to think about other activities that are just good fun! I bet you could find some educational relevance for pre-schoolers for those, too!

Another Building Structure

2010-06-11T14:39:00.002-04:00

My nephews and niece are in town for the week and have been playing with the building pieces from the last post. They were pretty excited about their creation and wanted it posted on the internet, too. Here's what they created:

Memorable Moment # 8: Building Structures

2010-06-07T18:40:00.013-04:00

Here's one of my recent memorable moments:

During the last week of school, I took a look in my storage room to see what materials we had not used yet this year and came across a bucket of plastic building materials. They have white lines and white curves and colorful couplings to join them together. I got them out and asked one of my assistants if she would support that center during our center time.

She and the kids ran with it! It was so much fun to watch.

For the first 20 minutes or so, they really explored and experimented with how the pieces fit together and what they could do with them. Then they decided to get a little bit more complex and I hear one of the kids say, "Can we have some paper and markers?"

Naturally, any time a child wants to write, I say yes. So they got the markers and paper and brought them over to the area they were playing. My assistant ended up showing them that you can make a plan for building structures. One little boy in particular really understood the relationship between the drawing and the structure. Here's what he came up with:

The first picture is the picture of his plan. The second picture is a picture of what he started building off of his plan.

My personal learning experience from this is a confirmation and gentle reminder to respect and seek the contributions and ideas of the assistants with whom you work. I didn't have a lesson plan for the children to talk about blueprints, architects, and builders. She introduced some really sophisticated vocabulary that they understood through their play and their plans. The lesson plan evolved as she responded to the children and was better for it!

My other take away is an appreciation for the personal interests and aptitudes of young children. While the plan does not look very sophisticated, it was drawn and then implemented by a 4 year old boy.

The level of symbolic representation of a concrete product that isn't even built yet is actually quite sophisticated! I wouldn't have expected this child to be able to do this, but his natural interest, his visual spatial skills and the support of an adult who was engaged with him helped him to reach a level of thinking and problem solving that surprised and delighted us!

Interactive Frog Games

2010-03-19T13:05:00.002-04:00

Leap Frog

Easy Tree Frog Puzzle

The Frog Prince Puzzle

Toad Puzzle

Pizza Activities

2010-02-19T12:49:00.002-05:00

My class is taking a field trip to a local pizza restaurant to make their own pizzas.

Here are a few pizza activities that will help us get ready for our trip!

My Very Own Pizza

Make a Pizza

Dividing Pizza Fairly with Friends

Pizza Making According to Orders Placed

Rhyming Re-visted

2010-01-16T09:12:00.002-05:00

One way I've introduced the concept of rhyming is to play nonsense rhymes with the students' names and pictures of familiar objects.

We sing just this line to Raffi's Willoghby Wallaby song and then let the kids fill in the pause/blank.

Willoughby Wallaby Wanny
An elephant sat on _______ (Danny)
(we repeat this so that all of the kids have a turn.)

Then I put up pictures of common objects on the felt board and sing it with those:

Willougby Wallaby Wable
An elephant sat on a ______(table)

Kelly's Kindergarten also has a power point you can download for free for the song Down By The Bay. She includes a link for the music as well.

You'll find other strategies that I use in this previous post.

Elf Yourself

2009-12-08T22:11:00.002-05:00

My students have been having such a fun time with this website. I've uploaded their pictures so they can see themselves as dancing elves.

For those who have goals focusing on imitating motor movements, this is very motivating!

For others who are working on requesting a turn or engaging in conversational turns, it works as a great prompt for that too!

Since I didn't pay the fee to download, we also have worked on the skill of waiting while the web page loads. We've learned words like "loading," "hourglass," "spinning," "we're waiting," "be patient."

ElfYourself

Fall Festival

2009-10-24T08:56:00.007-04:00

In two weeks, our pre-k classes will be holding our "Fall Festival." This activity is a student, family, and teacher favorite!

The Fall Festival structure uses the same rules and procedures that the children are already familiar with from our rotations in the classroom. (We used a the same lesson structure for our Rodeo Day lessons outlined in another post.)

Fall Festival is organized on a center rotation with a teacher, assistant or parent volunteer assisting at each center. Each center rotation will last 8-10 minutes. Sometimes we have centers last up to 15 minutes, but this year we have a lot of 3 year olds, so we wanted to plan for all children to be successful.

There will be three or four children in a group. (If we add another class or more students, we will increase the centers accordingly. I want a maximum of five children at a center, three or four would be best.) Activities are designed to encourage oral language development, social/emotional development, gross motor development and fine motor development.

Key component: You want to have as many children as possible actively participating in centers at any given time. It is important to practice waiting for your turn, but more active participation at any given time equals less discipline problems. Makes sense...the students are involved in the task rather than getting in trouble.

TIP to spend less money!!!!!!! We hold our fall festival AFTER Halloween. This way the pumpkin patches and grocery stores are very willing to donate pumpkins and hay bales and cornstalks.

Morning Circle:
1) Safety comes first! (hands and feet to self...this includes hula hoops and plastic bowling balls)
2) Stay in your center until the whistle blows
3) Listen to the staff and volunteers

Centers:

Pumpkin Toss
Set up:
~Gather 6 hula hoops
~Place up to 10 or 12 pumpkins spaced apart so that a hula hoop could go around it.
~Get four carpet squares. Each child sits/stands on a carpet square. We place two in one "line" behind a set of three hula hoops and two carpet squares in another "line" behind a set of three hula hoops. It visually cues the children on where they need to be. (Every child in a group should should have a carpet square to stand on while they are playing or waiting.)

Play:
~The child sitting on the carpet square closest to the pumpkin patch tries to throw the hula hoop around the a pumpkin.
~After the turn is completed, the child who was on the "waiting square" moves up to the "throwing square" for his/her turn. The child who was throwing moves to the "waiting square" to wait for another turn. This step is important because it teaches children how to wait, but they don't have to wait for very long. When you have two lines at each center like this you have at least 50% of the class actively participating at any given time. Remember: more children actively participating in the lesson equals less discipline problems.
~Repeat until the whistle blows. The first whistle blow is the cue to "clean up". After the clean up whistle, we have children point to their next center. The second repetetive whistle blow is "move to the next center". Since today is Fall Festival Day, we will "fly like crows" to our new centers.

Benefits:
Practice social/emotional skill of taking turns. We also encourage the children to cheer for their friends while they are waiting. This helps the give compliments and recognize achievements of others. Throwing movement naturally requires students to cross their midline. Great opportunities for oral langauge. 50% of the children are actively engaged at any time.

Fall Sensory Table:
Setup:
~We have two sensory tables we are using. One is based on the "fall sensory tub" video (scroll down and look for the title) from www.Childcareland.com. The other is filled with rice and vegetables from our housekeeping center.
~If you don't have a water table, Home Depot or Lowes have mixing tubs in the concrete/masonry area that would work. They look similar to this, but I have seen others for $6 or $8.
~Gather 4 or more scooping tools or tongs tools. (Our favorite tool for the fall flowers is the popcorn fork.)

Play:
~Let students scoop and explore.
~Move flowers and pumpkins or vegetables to a "safe spot" with tongs, the popcorn fork or "cheater chopsticks."
~Repeat until the whistle bows. Clean up and get ready to "fly like a crow" to a new center.

Benefits:
Great sensory activity. The practice with the tongs and cheater chopsticks exercise the muscles needed for writing and cutting. Lots of opportunities for oral language. 100% of the children are actively engaged the whole time.

Pumpkin Dip
Setup:
~Gather mix items: Cool Whip, pumpkin pie mix, vanilla pudding, gingersnaps or apple slices. (We use this recipe from cooks.com). Also get juice boxes so students can have a drink.
~Create a picture recipe.
~Gather a bowl, a spoon, small cups or bowls and a box of baby wipes.

Play:
~Have students clean their hands with baby wipes since soap and water won't be available. ~Have students "read" the recipe with you.
~Have students add ingredients and stir the mix.
~Eat the pumpkin dip with gingersnaps or apple slices and drink a juice box.
~Enjoy until the whistle blows.

Benefits:
Students practice early literacy skills when reading the recipe. Students follow a sequence of directions. Students get a chance to cool off and have a less active center. 100% of the children are actively engaged the whole time.

Build a Scarecrow:
Setup:
~Gather enough materials so that each group can make a complete scarecrow. We use: old newspaper for stuffing, jeans/overalls, button-down long-sleeved shirts, boots, gloves, hats, large brown grocery bags previously colored orange with a face drawn on it and stuffed with newspaper to create a head, string.
~Before Fall Festival use the string to tie the ends of the sleeves and bottom of the shirt, and the ends of the pant legs so your newspaper stuffing won't fall out.
~Sort all of the materials into piles of pants, shirts, hats, etc. Let students take turns picking each part of their scarecrow.
~This year since we are reducing our time to 8-10 minutes, I will have the shirts already stuffed and have the students stuff the pants and put the scarecrow together.

Play: ~Children build scarecrow with help.
~Children crumple newspaper and stuff the pants and shirts. They choose the materials to create their scarecrow as a group.
~Because this center has a task that needs to have a clear start and finish, we use this center to time the rest of the centers. The person who is leading this center gives the one minute warning for the other centers and blows the whistle when it is time to move.

Benefits: Gross motor and fine motor skills in crumpling the newspaper for pre-writing. Many, many opportunities to develop oral language skills (colors, body parts, clothing items, choices).

Corn Bowling:

Setup:
~Before Fall Festival Day, have students color a coloring page that has an ear of corn, cut out and laminate if possible.
~Gather 2 plastic bowling sets. (We use old ones from a garage sale. The Oriental Trading is the least expensive one I've found.)
~Tape the coloring sheets of the corn to the bowling pins.
~Use painters tape to mark the spots where your bowling pins will stand. This will make set up over and over much, much easier.
~If possible use hay bales as a back stop for the pins and bowling balls.
~Gather 4 carpet squares.
~We make two bowling lanes.

Play:
~Children stand on the "bowling" carpet square or the "waiting" carpet square.
~The child whose turn it is to bowl, rolls the ball towards the pins to knock them down. (We usually give 2 turns.)
~When his/her turn is over he/she moves to the waiting square and the next child gets a turn.

Benefits:
Gross motor skills and oral language skills. Social skills and turn taking. At this center we really encourage the children to cheer for their friends and give compliments or high fives.

photo courtesy of Tigerlily 09 at Flickr Creative Commons.

Free Online Fall Games

2009-10-23T14:14:00.002-04:00

Very Cool Scarecrow

Catching Fall Leaves

Turkey Flip Bricks

Fall Online Coloring With Eyedropper

Fall Leaf Match

2009-10-20T21:53:00.003-04:00

This site was sent through one of the Yahoo groups I belong to. I love it! My students and I used it on the Activeboard today as a "sponge" activity while we were waiting for our OT to come in to start our writing rotation.

Visual Dictionary

photo courtesy of chrishoward at Flicker Creative Commons

Pumpkin Template

2009-10-19T18:04:00.006-04:00

Disney has a free, interactive pumpkin template.

We use this on our ActiveBoard to work on choice making, turn taking and language skills.

The vocabulary we work on using this lesson is: pumpkin, jack-o-lantern, eyes, nose, mouth, change, arrow, same, different, shape.

After each child completes a template we print them and save them for a coloring task later.

Photo courtesy Tigerlily 09 at Flickr Creative Commons

Memorable Moment #7: Dragging/Dragon

2009-10-01T19:10:00.003-04:00

So we're walking back from breakfast and this little guy is dragging his lunch box on the sidewalk. I tell him, "Steven, you're dragging your lunch box. It will get broken. You need to pick it up." and he replies:

"Yeah, cause the dragon gots fire, huh?"

:-) LOL

(get it?…dragging/dragon)

Easy Adaptable Books

2009-07-29T22:41:00.002-04:00

Patrick at Teaching All Students has a great description about how to make an easy adaptable book for your students. Check it out.

My Dining Room.....

2009-07-29T21:49:00.004-04:00

Does this look familiar to anyone? I bet I'm not the only one!

This is what my dining room has looked like for the past two weeks. A few things have contributed to this disaster. I boxed up materials I would need for ESY for myself and let 2 other friends borrow materials for their ESY classes, too. I'm moving to a new elementary school in the fall and although ESY has ended, now I need to wait a little bit longer to give the custodians a chance to do their "deep clean" on my new room.

Thank goodness I have an understanding husband and a table in our breakast nook!

How to Become More Tech Savvy this Summer

2009-07-15T18:32:00.002-04:00

I found this article through one of the CEC SmartBriefs. I thought it was worth sharing.

How to Become More Tech Savvy This Summer

Stuart Brown: Play is More Than Fun

2009-07-13T00:15:00.001-04:00

Another excellent video from TED focusing on play. This is a talk from Stuart Brown explaining his evidence of play in animals and people. He contends that play is a biological process that is necessary (just as sleep is a biological process that is necessary.) Check it out.

Tim Brown: Creativity and Play

2009-07-12T23:40:00.003-04:00

I found this video on the TED site. I thought it was going to be geared towards education and discovery learning. Turns out it's about play as an important part of thinking as an adult. Tim Brown does a wonderful job connecting some of the elements of play and how they translate in the business and design world. If you've ever wanted a talk that validated play as an authentic learning and thinking experience, this is one to watch.

Tips for Addressing Challenging Behavior

2009-07-12T13:54:00.004-04:00

The University of Minnesota has a website that has great Tip Sheets for addressing challenging behavior in the classroom.

I particularly like the ones on "choice making" and "requesting a break." These are two very powerful strategies that can be embedded into almost any learning task.

Word Bank and Writing Strategy

2009-06-30T15:07:00.015-04:00

This summer I have been working with a group of kindergarten through third grade students who have autism. Several of the students have writing goals that need to be addressed and all of them have expressive language goals that need to be addressed. If you have read any of my previous posts, you know that I am a big fan of digital photos to build play skills, critical thinking skills and oral language skills.

Since I find the digital photos so beneficial, I decided to pair that strategy with a manipulative word bank in the hopes of having my students build sentences that they would copy to create a simple paragraph. My goal was that they would build one topic sentence and two detail sentences. We started with modeling and a lot of physical prompts, but I'm hoping the level of prompting will decrease.

Here's what we did:

1) I printed several photos featuring sea life from www.flickr.com.

2) Each student chose a picture that we glued to a large sheet of construction paper.

3) The students were given a file folder with a word bank targeting words that made sense with their picture. (I met with their SLP and we color coded the post its to correspond with the colors and word categories that they already use on their manual communication boards based on Gail Van Tatenhove's system.)

4) Then the students built a sentence by moving the post its to a sentence strip (the sentence strip is just length of file folder cut down).

5) Next the students copied their sentence on a pre-cut piece of paper. (I did this to to visually define the space of the sentence for them. This way the letter spacing and formation is confined to an area that already "looks" like a sentence. )

6) Then they glued the sentence to the piece of construction paper to which we had previously glued their photo choice.

7) We cleared off the sentence strip and started to build another sentence and repeated the steps.

Here's what our first writing samples look like:

Water and Sea Life Printable Books

2009-06-23T17:58:00.005-04:00

I've been going through my links, looking for materials for our water and sea life theme for summer school. I've found the following free books that can be printed.

Sink or Float Printable Emergent Reader

Pirate Number Word Printable Emergent Reader

I Love to Go to the Beach Printable Emergent Reader

At the Beach with the Bears Printable Emergent Reader

Red Crab, Red Crab What Do You See Printable Emergent Reader

Under the Sea free Interactive Book

Scatman Video about Stuttering

2009-06-19T11:13:00.004-04:00

Another video that my husband found and forwarded to me.......

Here are some other links and information about John Scatman.

Wikipedia Information

Lyrics posted on the Stuttering Forum

Interview script

Water and Sea Life...Bloom's Box

2009-06-09T18:49:00.005-04:00

A few years ago I was in a class that focused on differentiation and levels of knowledge. One fo the strategies the instructor shared was to create a "Bloom's Box" for assignments related to an organizing theme.

A Bloom's Box helps the teacher ensure that s/he is providing instruction at both the lower levels of understanding and at the higher levels of thinking. Essentially, a table is created labeled with each level of Bloom's taxonomy and assignments are sorted into appropriate categories. It helps the teacher make sure there is a balanced experience for all learners.

I'm going to use my Bloom's Box this summer for our Water and Sea Life Unit I have planned.

You can download my Bloom's Box here.

The following is just a list of the activities included in my Bloom's Box.

Knowledge

Students will name pictures of different bodies of water. (river, lake, pond, ocean, waterfall).

Students will name pictures of actions people can do with water (wash your hands, brush your teeth, take a bath, swim, play at the water table, drink, water plants, wash cars, ski, snorkel, boating).

Students will name pictures of sea life (sea star, shark, fish, stingray, jellyfish, manatee, urchin, sea anenome, dolphin, crab, lobster).

Comprehension

Alive/Not Alive Chart
Students will sort pictures of various familiar objects, people, animals and plants on a t-chart according whether the picture is something that is alive or not alive.

Comprehension questions
Students will answer “wh” about familiar stories and classroom activities.

Wants/Needs Action Chart:
Students will sort pictures of previously learned action words into categories of actions we need and actions we want to do.

Application

Class Aquarium
After reading the no-fiction trade book, “What’s It Like to be a Fish?” using Boardmaker icons and pictures, students will create a list of items needed to create a classroom aquarium.

Class Hermit Crab Habitat

After reading the book “A House for Hermit Crab,” using Boardmaker icons and pictures, students will create a list of items needed to create a hermit crab habitat.

Analysis

Compare and Contrast
Students will compare and contrast the homes of a sea creature of their choice with their home using Boardmaker icons, pictures and a pre-made Venn Diagram.

Compare and Contrast

Students will compare and contrast what we used to make our fish aquarium and what we used to make our hermit crab habitat using Boardmaker icons, pictures and a pre-made Venn Diagram.

Synthesis

Class Aquarium
Students will use supplies generated from their lists to assemble our class aquarium.

Class Hermit Crab Habitat

Students will use supplies generated from their lists to assemble our class hermit crab habitat

Evaluation

If I could be…
Students will draw a picture of any sea creature they would want to be. They will dictate which animal they chose and why they chose it.

Water Hole
Before reading the ending to the story, students will predict what will happen to the animals and the plants if it never rains again.

Personal Needs:

Students will predict and dictate responses of what would happen if we didn’t have water to wash our hands or brush our teeth.

Interactive Games Sea Life and Water

2009-06-06T23:40:00.005-04:00

Olivia of the Deep (skill: visual motor, visual perceptual)

Diego's Underwater Adventure (skill, sea life vocabulary, visual motor, multiple steps)

Diego's Tuga the Sea Turtle (skill: visual motor, classifying food/not food)

Dora's Mermaid Adventure (skill: visual motor)

Dora's Treasure Hunt (skill: visual motor)

Blue's Clues Sink or Float (skill: concept of sink or float)

Wubbzy's Underwater Adventure (skill: visual motor, harder keyboard controls)

Wonder Pets Save the Penguin or Dolphin (skill visual motor)

Wonder Pets Save the Sea Creatures (skill: visual motor)

Backyardigan's Pirate Adventure (skill: visual motor, visual perception)

Doodle Pad Explore the Seashore (skill: creativity)

Ebb and Flo Hide and Seek (skill: mouse clicks and exploration)

Ebb and Flo Spot the Differences (skill: visual perception)

Build A Fish (skill: fish habitats, creativity)

Fish Counting up to 10 (skill: number concepts)

Clifford Slide (skill: Matching colors)

Seashore Concentration (skill: visual memory)

Build A Habitat (skill: creativity and fine motor)

Barney Submarine Race (skill: visual motor)

Donald Duck Fishing (skill: color recognition and visual motor)

Little Einstein's Orchastra Ocean (skill: instrument sound recognition and matching)

CyberChase Can You Fill It (skill: exploring liquid volume)

Curious George Day at the Beach (skill: multiple steps, visual perception)

Bunnytown Pirates (skill: number order, positional concepts, visual motor)

Reading Activities for the Summer

2009-05-25T22:31:00.004-04:00

The Florida Center for Reading Research has a ton of information about teaching reading skills.

As summer is approaching, many parents ask what they can do to help their child with their literacy skills over the summer.

This is one of my favorite activity packets from the website. It includes many easy and printable activities to work on letter recognition.

Letter Recognition Resources

Brain Scientist and Stroke Victim

2009-05-25T11:58:00.003-04:00

My husband sent me a link to this video. It's 18 minutes long, but well worth the time. Jill Bolte Taylor speaks about the morning of her stroke, her insight into her brain's function and her reflection on her experience.

http://www.ted.com/index.php/talks/jill_bolte_taylor_s_powerful_stroke_of_insight.html

Summer Reading Ideas

2009-05-19T23:02:00.003-04:00

Our data and literacy coach just shared this site with us.

After looking at it, it really has a lot of great literacy suggestions for summer reading.

Check out the book suggestions organized according to age groups at James Patterson's

ReadKiddoRead.

Pre-k Paperwork, Planning and Packing

2009-05-19T22:16:00.005-04:00

Talk about four "p's" in a pod!

Could the end of the school year get any busier? Probably not!

Paperwork! How can you end the school year without a plethora of paperwork? Progress reports, articulation reports, kindergarten transition meetings, eligibility meetings, dismissal meetings, review of RtI data...are we done yet? I guess it just goes with the territory and the time of year. However, this year, in particular, has made me very thankful that I am a teacher and not a procedural compliance specialist!

Planning! I also just got notice that I received a very coveted summer school position. In the economic crisis, my district had many, many teachers apply for summer school jobs with less positions available this year. I'm so lucly I got a position, but of course, I have to work for my pennies. I will have a whole new group of kids to learn and plan lessons for.

Packing! I hate packing. I hate packing a suitcase to go on a weekend trip. (Obviously this is the one of the four p's that I'll let myself complain about.) My pre-k program is being moved to another school. As a result, I have to organize and pack the room. Did I tell you I hate packing?

The four P's here started my assistant and me singing today (because that's what we do in pre-k)

There are 7 days

There are 7 days left this year

We can make it

Only 7 days

Only 7 days left this year

mind games...7 days times 7.5 hours equals 52.5 (that's really only two days and a few hours)

(Tomorrow is field day and 6 days left!)

I'm Thinking of a Word....

2009-04-15T16:04:00.004-04:00

My pre-k students love this "game."

I start off by saying, "I'm thinking of a word. See if you can use the clues to figure out what I'm thinking about" and then I proceed to give 3 or 4 clues about my word.

For example, one night I pulled into my driveway and there were two very large rabbits in my front yard. I took a picture of them and used it during circle time the following morning. I told my class, "I'm thinking of a word. My word is an animal with very long ears. It has a puffy tail. It likes to eat grass and carrots. My word begins with the /r/ sound."

The beauty of this simple strategy is that it can be used any time of the day and requires very little prep work. We have used toys in the classroom, pictures from our Jack Hartman Learning Letter Sounds song and book, or as an introduction to a new topic.

I'm thinking of a word requires children to think critically about the information they are receiving auditorily. This helps to sharpen their listen skills and their higher order thinking skills. Since it is presented in a game format, the kids enjoy the thinking process!

Earth Day Games

2009-03-30T16:40:00.004-04:00

The following is a list of free interactive games that focus on Earth Day concepts of taking care of the environment, cleaning up litter or recycling.

Clean Up Your World

Every Day is Earth Day

Clean Up the Park

Free the Beach

Dora's Mermaid Adventure

Spring Babies PowerPoint

2009-03-21T08:49:00.003-04:00

My classroom has the luxury of being equipped with an ActiveBoard. I am planning on using this powerpoint to teach new vocabulary about spring babies. If you don't have a projection screen, Smart Board or ActiveBoard; you can just print, laminate and bind the book for use at circle time or in your library center.

You can download the book here.

Free Printable Emergent Readers

2009-03-20T18:44:00.004-04:00

On one of my yahoo groups there has recently been a thread talking about sight word readers.

There are many free resources available on the web.

Here are a few:

Carl's Corner
(Kindergarten emergent readers)

Samples from Reading A-Z
(a few free samples, for $50ish access to all of their books)

Hubbards Cupboard
(40 or so free printable books)

Make Learning Fun
(not all sight word based, but a lot of emergent themed printables)

Mrs. Meacham's
(awesome page with printables and more links)

Kinderprintables

Marcia's Lesson Links

Mrs. Jones Room
(lots of links to many other resources)

http://www.childcareland.com/free.html
(scroll through and look for "book" in the item descriptions)

http://mrskilburnkiddos.wordpress.com/reading/sight-words/
(scroll down, there are links to books she created in the middle of the post)

Memorable Moment #6..Perspective..

2009-03-09T20:56:00.013-04:00

"It's all a matter of perspective."

I can't remember who said this or where I heard it first, but this week this was certainly proven to be true.

Think about the following scenario from the point of view of the teacher, then think about this scenario from the point of view from the parent.

My friend has a four year old little girl in her self-contained special needs pre-k class. This little girl has developmental delays in the communication and social/emotional domains. We'll call her Lilah.

We were out on the playground and Lilah comes running over to tell the teacher that Billy was climbing up the slide. Her teacher told her thank you for telling me and called Billy over to talk about safety. If someone is climbing up the slide and someone is sliding down the slide, they could crash and get hurt. We always slide down the slide.

What seemed like two minutes later Lilah comes running back and says Bobby is climbing up the slide. The teacher has another discussion, this time with Bobby.

Low and behold, what seems like two minutes later, Lilah, herself, is climbing up the slide. Lilah had a talking to.

My friend wrote a note home telling mom about Lilah tattling on things that were mistakes and then copying the very same mistake. (My friend was rather frustrated...the little girl had clearly known that climbing up the slide was a mistake.)

Lilah's mom wrote a note back. It went something like this: "I am so proud of Lilah. She is talking so much more and noticing other kids more and more. She's finally doing things that other 4 year olds do. Thanks for all you've been teaching her."

Wow! Something that was frustrating to my friend is proof to the child's mom that the child is making progress.

Perspective.........maybe sometimes we need to look at things from a different point of view. When Lilah's mom wrote that note back, we all sat back for a second and then laughed. The lady's got a point! Four year olds tattle and four year olds push the limits. How nice it was to be gently reminded that sometimes frustrating behavior is typical! :-)

Time/Portfolios...How do you balance?

2009-02-15T15:59:00.008-05:00

I'm finishing my last class for my Pre-K Disabilities Endorsement. This week our discussion has been centered on portfolio construction. There are two common threads upon which most of my classmates agree:

1) Portfolios are a great way to document student growth.

2) Constructing portfolios takes an enormous amount of teacher time.

In the class I teach at the community college, I am constantly telling my students to ask themselves "So what?" We've learned a new concept. We've been reminded about something we already know, but haven't been implementing. So what? My purpose is in asking them "so what?" is to get them to think about the action component. We can learn many new ideas, but if we don't apply the concept or the theory to our practice, then so what?

So here's my "so what" about portfolio construction.

By no means do I think the students in my class have the greatest portfolio, there are always things at the end of the year that I wish I had done, but my assistant and I are getting better at it each year. The trouble with portfolios is that they are so vague. We have CARE portfolios, work files and portfolios...what goes where and what information is important? How do you categorize information? How do you access information needed daily? Where do you keep it?

I currently have three systems that I think help me organize my data.

1) The student's portfolio (This is 4 inch three ring binder. We put plastic page protectors in it at the beginning of the year. We add work samples inside the page protectors as the year progresses.)

2) The student's work folder (This is a file folder in my desk drawer.)

3) My anecdotal record book (This is a smaller 3 ring binder with page dividers. Each student has a section. I keep this behind my desk so I can easily pull it out at any point in the day and jot down an anecdotal or other data.)

Between the work files, the anecdotal record book and the portfolios, we usually have pretty good examples of the student's skill development and continuing challenges.

Here is the list of things that I keep in my student portfolios:

1)Digital pictures of classroom activities glued to construction paper. The child chooses a picture and then tells about the activity for a language sample. (we do approx 1 per month during small group time...by the end of the year I typically have 8-10 language samples)

2)Self portrait (one at the beginning of the year one at the end...again done during small group time)

3)Work samples from units (we pick 4 units from the year and keep 2 or 3 samples from each of the 4 units. Out of the two or three samples, the student then chooses one of them to talk about/reflect on. We end up with a total of 4 pieces for their student led conference.)

4)Any random/miscellaneous piece that I think really showcases skill development (i.e. one girl was drawing picture about a recent field trip to Mote Marine. I asked her if she could write the sounds for the pictures she was writing she wrote "stnra" and "rjn" (stingray and urchin)...I wasn't planning on keeping that piece when we started the activity,but for her I did because it was such a great example of her writing development. Another boy made the coolest picture of a robot by cutting and gluing scraps when we were making collages. I didn't plan on keeping his when we started but it was such a neat showcase of his fine motor and visual spatial skills that I kept his.)

In work folders I keep the following:

1) Brigance data (This is the assessment inventory that my district is currently using.)

2) Daily reports if the child has one

3) Any notes from home/school

4) Any discipline/referral documentation

5) Copies of IEPs and quarterly progress reports

In my anecdotal record book I keep:

1) Anecdotals (running log from day to day, I file these in the work file at the end of the year)

2) Any RtI data and intervention forms (when we go to CARE I pull the documentation and put it in my work file)

3 things help me the most with portfolios/work files.

1) My assistant rocks! I give her a list of the things I want in the portfolios and approximate time frames and she helps to remind me....we haven't done a language sample in a while, we don't have anything in the portfolio for this unit, etc. She also helps me file work samples during nap time when we have one of those rare days and every child is sleeping.

2) We schedule structured small groups every Tuesday and Thursday so if I need something for the portfolio we can build it into small group lessons during the day.

3) I almost always take at least some portion of my planning time. Pre-k teachers seem to always end up fighting for their plan time. Some teachers don't take it and some teachers can't take it. We need it. I build it into our schedule and take at least a portion of it almost every day. This is when I can look at work samples, file daily reports, write progress reports etc.

What do you include in your portfolios? What systems do you use to help you keep up with the work load? I'd love to hear others' ideas on how to keep authentic examples of student work in practical ways for teachers!

The Bamboo Story and Positive Behavior Support

2009-01-27T21:40:00.014-05:00

I'm currently involved in an intensive Positive Behavior Support (PBS) training. Yesterday was the first day of our training and the facilitators were laying the foundation and the ideas that improving challenging behavior and creating a classroom climate for emotional literacy often takes a long time. There are no quick fixes.

This reminded me of the Bamboo Story. A collegue gave me a copy of this story quite a few years ago. It was hanging behind my desk as a gentle reminder for my assistant and me. I have no idea what happened to it. It probably fell down at some point and accidentally got thrown away. I've tried to find the same story online, but to no avail. Here is what I remember and the message I took from the story I received so long ago.

The Bamboo Story:

Once upon a time there was a farmer who planted some bamboo seeds. Each day he diligently cared for his bamboo seeds in the hope that he would see the fruits of his labor in wonderful bamboo growth.

The first year passed with daily care. And yet nothing happened. No bamboo sprouted.

The farmer was undaunted. He continued his daily watering, weeding and care of his bamboo seeds.

The second year passed and nothing happened.

At this point the farmer was beginning to feel discouraged. He had consistently worked; nurturing and caring for his bamboo seeds, and yet he saw no growth.

The third year passed and suddenly his bamboo was growing a foot each month. By the end of the year his bamboo was over 12 feet tall! Finally, the farmer had evidence of his growth.

So the question is, did the bamboo grow 12 feet in that final year when the growth was evident and measured? Or did the bamboo grow 12 feet in 3 years through the daily care?

It is said that during the first two years the bamboo IS growing. It is said that the bamboo is growing roots below the ground that are a foundation strong enough to support the future growth spurt. It is said that growth was occuring as the farmer was caring for the seeds, the farmer just couldn't see it.

My recent training in PBS strategies made me think of this story again. Often it takes a long time for children with challenging behaviors to demonstrate skills of regulating their own behavior, resolving conflict or problem solving.

So as we begin our journey with positive behavior support, we as teachers must persist as the farmer did. Continually providing the daily care and nurturing of our students' emotional literacy. Those students may leave our classrooms without us seeing evidence of their growth. But perhaps, they grow by leaps and bounds one year. Perhaps those years of daily care including work on emotional vocabulary, directly and indirectly teaching social skills and providing support was a foundation for that growth. And perhaps the child's skills grew over the course of several years, but we just saw evidence of it in one.

Block Play

2009-01-12T16:36:00.019-05:00

Today was a great day. Not only did I get to hear Ron Clark speak this morning, but this afternoon, my assistant and I actually finished a project that has been on our to do list for two years. Hooray for us!

We have have been wanting to create a book that will provide visual support for children playing in the block area.

We have a few students who have difficulty figuring out what to do and how to play in the block area. Often one of us will play with the students and help them make choices and decisions. But just as frequently, we are working in other areas of the classroom and students are independently playing in the block area. By creating the book, we are hoping to make the area more accessible to more students.

We started off with the resource book "Beyond Centers and Circle Time." There is an excellent section on "Construction Play" that includes an observation scale of simple to complex block structures.

We used this scale to reproduce some similar structures using our classroom materials. We tried to create structures of varying complexity so that children of varying ability levels could use the idea book. We then took pictures with our digital camera and uploaded the images to a PowerPoint. The book was then printed, laminated, bound and placed in the block area. You can download our book here.

We also only used a few pictures within the book. The concept of the book is to help the child get started, not to dictate or direct his/her play. (The pictures on the right are a few that we used in the book.)

Since we haven't used it yet, I'll have to update you on the level of success. Hopefully, we can teach our students how to use the book and then increase levels of self directed play and independence.

File Sharing and Visual Supports

2009-01-03T14:10:00.007-05:00

A few people have mentioned that they are interested in seeing some of the resources that my friend Shannon and I used when we presented our workshop session at the Florida Council for Exceptional Children Conference.

I have uploaded a few of them at 4shared.com.

FCEC Visual Supports PowerPoint

Instructions for Make It/Take It items.

First/Then

Independent Goal Templates

Rule Board

Learning Treasures

2009-01-03T13:38:00.002-05:00

Belinda Mooney recently wrote a post about sharing blogs.

If you have clicked on any of the links that I have included in my Pirate Lessons post, you may have already seen some of the great ideas and materials that she posts on her websites.

If you're looking for printables or ideas check out her site, Learning Treasures.

Visible Thinking

2008-12-17T19:01:00.005-05:00

I learned about creating visible thinking routines at an early childhood International Baccalaureate conference I attended in 2007. I immediately saw the value of these routines and slowly began to implement some of them with my pre-k students. In a nutshell, using a visible thinking routine structures a lesson so that children can make connections and reach higher levels of thinking about a given topic.

Hands down, my favorite visible thinking routine is I See, I Think, I Wonder. This routine encourages students to make observations and connect their thinking and questions to the observations they have made.

I have created some very simple visual supports with Boardmaker software that I tape to chart paper to create a chart to record student responses. I laminated the visuals so that I can re-use them and simply tape them to a piece of chart paper. I draw lines to create three columns and I am ready to record.

I then choose a prompt. Sometimes it is a poster, sometimes it is a page from the story we are reading and sometimes it is a set of objects that we will using to create something. I set the stage and then guide the conversation according to the routine. "Raise a quiet hand if you can tell me something you see." "Sally saw a gray cloud, raise a quiet hand if you can tell me what that makes you think." "I see a gray cloud and I think it might rain, I wonder...."

Sometimes, I don't even do a "formal" lesson with this strategy, I just model it and encourage it within conversation. For example, my fish tank in the classroom was getting algae growth on the sides. While the students were napping, I ducked off campus to pick up a "sucker fish" from our local pet store. When I came back, I put the fish in the bag, in the fish tank so it could acclimate to our water temperature. It was also a natural prompt to generate conversation and thinking when the students woke up and saw it. I just followed the thinking routine guiding their comments and observations. What do you see? What does that make you think? And then finally modeling a wonder statement (which tends to be most difficult for my students) "I wonder if our tank will change?" and encouraging them to wonder also. They watched as we opened the bag and let the fish into the tank and then we started all over again.

Interactive Holiday Sites

2008-12-15T17:24:00.016-05:00

It's the holiday time of year! We are busy learning traditions and celebrations from around the world. With this comes many natural opportunities to build language through stories, crafts and games. Since my pre-k classroom is equipped with an ActiveBoard and we have fourth grade students who earn to come down on Thursday afternoons to be our "computer buddies," my students especially love many of the interactive games that can be found for free on the internet.

Here are a few of our class favorites:

Make Rudolph: Visual Spatial Activity

Make a Snowman: Visual Spatial Activity

Decorate a Christmas Tree

Spin the Dreidel

Shake the Snowglobe

Design a Snowflake

Kwanzaa Puzzle

Create Fireworks for Diwali

I'd love to find a child friendly Diwali, Festival of Ligths game and a Las Posadas game. If anyone knows of a link will you post it in the comments section?

....delays....

2008-12-03T21:19:00.007-05:00

It's been a long time since I've posted! Sorry.

In that time, my principal retired, our new principal started, a friend and I presented a session on Visual Supports with at our state Council for Exceptional Children conference and finished an online post-grad course.

Not to mention Thanksgiving, guests in town and Black Friday shopping with my sisters.

I'll get back in the groove and update you all on the IB Safety Unit we just finished and the December Celebrations Unit we are beginning.

Hot Pumpkin

2008-10-12T22:09:00.005-04:00

Shelley Lovett at Childcareland has started posting YouTube videos about the lessons she teaches with the materials she creates and gathers.

This month she posted a lesson about playing a game "Hot Pumpkin" (similar to hot potato) during her large group time.

Here are the features that I think Shelley does exceptionally well with her site and her pumpkin video:

She provides and models the materials.
She gives suggestions for alternative materials.
When she purchases materials, she tells where they are purchased and the cost.
She identifies potential problems and provides cautions against them.
She creates a lesson that can be naturally differentiated!
She demonstrates how she differentiates with different skill levels.
She explains how she makes her teacher decisions.
She tells where she gets her music and offers alternatives.

Check out more of the videos of Shelley's Lessons and explore all of the creations on her site.

Book lists and vocabulary

2008-10-01T19:09:00.005-04:00

Have you noticed my Shelfari shelf has changed? (You may have to scroll down the blog and look to the right hand side to see my shelf.)

I was originally playing with the features of Shelfari with the books that I read for myself. Then the Boardmaker listserve on Yahoo had a thread going about favorite books and correlating vocabulary.

That made me think.

Since this blog is really about education and educational strategies, what if I used Shelfari to organize the books that I use in my classroom? So I started playing with the features again.

Here's what I've decided so far:

I will post the book and how many stars I think it deserves for classroom use. Under the review feature (move your cursor over the picture of the book on my Shelfari shelf and you will be able to see my review), I will post:

theme/unit
age/grade level
concept
vocabulary words

I will try to have a blog post with a list of all of the books in a particular theme.

Since I'm still in the "playing with the features stage,"
I reserve the right to change my mind. :-)

Teaching Rhyming

2008-09-21T22:30:00.008-04:00

One of my listservs has been pretty active lately on the topic of teaching rhyme. It has been an interesting topic, because the person interested in ideas has already tried many strategies to help her particular student master the concept.

So it made me think...how many different strategies and different materials would help teach the concept of rhyming.

Ideas for parents and teachers about how to teach rhyming:

Rhyming at Succeed to Read

Rhyming Ball Game

Rhyme Time

You Tube: Teaching Rhyme with Songs

You Tube: Teaching Rhyme

Free Downloads for teaching rhyming:

Using Nursery Rhymes: Free Printables

Raffi: Down by the Bay Song

Kelly's Kindergarten Rhyming Pictures

Erase A Rhymes

More Erase A Rhymes (scroll down 2 or 3 sections)

Free Online games/videos for practicing rhyming:

You Tube: Chicka Chicka Boom Boom

You Tube: Sesame Street "et" Rhyme

You Tube: Becka and the Big Bubble

Interactive Game: Oobi Rhyme

Interactive Game: Gus and Inky Rhyme

Interactive Game: Rhyme Time Picture Match Up

Interactive Game: Scholastic Reggie Loves to Rhyme

Interactive Game: Elmo Rhymes

Products to purchase:

Jack Hartmann: Shake Rattle and Read

Lakeshore Rhyming Books

Lakeshore Rhyming Tubs

Super Duper: Rhyme Deck

These are just a few of the many resources that are out there. Have fun exploring!

Memorable Moment #5/ Functions of Behavior Revisted

2008-09-04T18:22:00.006-04:00

Have you ever had one of those moments in the classroom that could be recorded and published in text book as a classic example?

We had one today. In Memorable Moment #4, we looked at functions of behavior. To re-cap, every behavior that any person exhibits has a function. That means it gets the person something he/she wants or needs. There are four functions of behavior:

Attention: to get someone's attention (positive or negative attention)
Escape: (to get out of something)
Tangible: (to get something tangible)
Sensory: (to get some kind of sensory stimulation)

Trenton is a four year old boy with a developmental delay in the social emotional domain. On Tuesdays and Thursdays we set up a center rotation that includes 5 centers with a staff person at each station. Today's centers were: 1) playing store with my assistant in the dramatic play area, 2) playing in toys and being pulled one-on-one with me for baseline assessment data, 3) playing hopscotch with the assistant next door, 4) speech/language therapy group, 5) playing in blocks and being pulled one-on-one with the teacher next door for baseline assessment data.

Trenton was assigned to start in the dramatic play area. He wanted to start in my center. I reminded him that everyone would get a chance to go to every center, but he had to do "store first and then toys." He told me again that he wanted to come to my center. I reminded him that his job was at the "Store center."

The students all transitioned to their appropriate centers and we began our lessons.

Trenton sat on the floor and howled. Picture a low toned and constantly repeated "no, no, no." He also threw in a few "uhhn, uhhn, uhhn" moans for us.

He was sitting on the floor and wasn't hurting himself or anyone else. All of the other students were engaged and playing in the the appropriate places. I was at my center working, my assistant was at her center playing with children, and the teacher next door was at her center working with students. All of the children were playing except Trenton. He continued with his moaning and howling.

Within 5 minutes, Trenton had stopped moaning and howling and moved to his assigned center. He approached my assistant and said "Please, I can play?" Of course she replied yes and asked him to find some items that he would like to "buy." He entered the center and began playing with the other students and my assistant.

So what do you think? What would you hypothesize was the function of Trenton's behavior?

We hypothesized it was attention seeking. He wanted to start in my center and thought that if he couldn't get there with a request, then maybe I would pay attention to him if he acted out. The aspect that struck the staff as being classic was that he was truly denied ANY attention. All of the children were engaged, all of the staff in the room were busy with other children, and Trenton was just left space to cry on the floor. He eventually figured out that his behavior was not getting what he wanted and he stopped.

Pre-Planning Prioritizing

2008-08-28T18:39:00.003-04:00

For years and years, I always went into my classroom early because I couldn't get everything done during my pre-planning week. A few years ago, I finally figured it out.

I'm NEVER going to get everything done that I want to get done. There will ALWAYS be things that I could do or would like to do.

I finally learned that it was a matter of prioritizing.

There are some tasks/meetings that my district says I MUST attend.

There are some tasks that I MUST get finished within the pre-planning week or I am uncomfortable as a teacher.

There are some things that I WANT done before the first day of school but its not the end of the world if I don't get to it.

And of course, there are things that are on my never ending list of materials I would like to prepare but if I get it done this week, this semester or next summer, I will still have students who are safe and learning.

I have also found that some of the "must do's" are procedural tasks from the school or district. I have finally figured out that my assistant and I are a team. She is happy to take care of some of those tasks, if I let her! I learned to delegate and share tasks.

The following are my lists and their respective categories of importance to me:

MUST DO:

Not my choice:
1) Attend annual policy and procedure welcome back meeting for the school.
2) Attend the superintendent's video meeting and welcome back.
3) Create take home packets including: student code of conduct, emergency medical forms, room mother forms, etc. (I ask my assistant to do this.)
4) Call the families of all of the students in my class and invite them to "Meet Your Teacher."
5) Attend team meeting at my school.
6) Attend depratment meeting (pre-k teachers) at the district level.

My Choice:
1) Try to schedule any initial IEPs and staffings that have been added to my caseload over the summer. (I like to get these done during pre-planning because then I can start with students on day 1. It doesn't always work out, but I try my hardest to get it done.)
2) Get the physical layout of my room organized and ready for children.
3) Have a welcoming bulletin board outside my class (my assistant does this for me).
4) Set up my anecdotal record notebook (my assistant does this for me).
5) Set up a folder/list of IEP due dates for students for the year.
6) Lesson plans for the first week of school. (I plan and my assistant helps me gather materials or prep materials for lessons.)
7) Take my assistant out to lunch! (We frequently go with other teachers and staff, but during the school year, we rarely get the chance to have lunch together. It's nice to carve out some time during the pre-planning week to spend some time together.)

I have found, that if I complete all of the tasks that the district requires of me and I have all of the things done that make me comforatble as a teacher, then I usually have an afternoon or two to take care of some of the special tasks that I enjoy (creating new visual supports, surfing the internet for new lesson ideas, visiting other classrooms and "stealing" other teachers' ideas).

Prioritizing what the district requires and what I need helps me to stay focused on the most important tasks and complete them. As a bonus, it reduces the stress and anxiety of completing numerous tasks in a short period of time. When the stress is reduced, I'm much more productive.

Web Resources from Successful Teaching

2008-08-10T00:30:00.003-04:00

I just love the resources listed in the Useful Ideas In and Out of the Classroom at Successful Teaching.

I especially liked:
Arcademic Skill Builders

and

Visuwords.

Both sites are new to me and look like great resources to share with the other teachers on my team and to use with students I tutor.

Free Online Books

2008-08-07T22:48:00.004-04:00

I've been reading more and more about Universal Design for Learning in the past few months. I found a site that was new to me, UDL Wikispace.

As I was navigating my way through all of the cool resources, I hit on one in the Literacy Tools. There are many links to help students of all ages access literacy.

I browsed several sites with free online books that were familiar to me, but it made me wonder if there were other sites and resources that were similar.

Yes! There are tons!

Here are a few that I liked:

LookyBook

TarHeel Reader

Starfall

Literactive
(You have to create an account, but it is free.)

E-Books for Young Readers

Reading A-Z Interactive Books; RAZ Kids
(Click on free samples. A subscription to the complete library is $29-$59).

Clifford Books

Magic Keys

This one would be for older kids and adults....Mark Twain, Jane Austen, Jules Verne....wow!
Read Print

Interactive Books

2008-08-06T11:57:00.002-04:00

As I am preparing for a new school year, I have been thinking about what resources and materials I use on a weekly basis that could be easily shared.

I love to use interactive books and visual supports. I find that my students attend to the lesson and remain engaged for longer periods of time when a lesson is structured in a supportive manner.

One of my all time favorite sites for interactive books and visuals is the Speech-Language-Hearing Services of Jefferson Parish Public School System.

Here are a few tips to find great printable materials from the site:

Check out the AAC button (Augmentative/Alternative Communication).
The home page of the AAC button has many interactive books that you may download for free. This page requires the user to own a Boardmaker CD.

If you don't own Boardmaker, make sure to click on the Adapted Stories button. This is a group of shared materials that can be printed directly from the website. Under the Fall tab, I have printed, laminated and velcro-ed the Going to School book. I usually use this book during the first week of school. This was the first book I printed from this site....after using it in my classroom, I was hooked. I've printed, laminated and velcro-ed many more since.

For those of you who are new to interactive books or maybe just looking for more ideas on how they are used in the classroom, check out the Photos of Activities button. This section gives a photo of the finished interactive book and other classroom materials that the teacher used with the lesson.

Also be sure to look for the Lang Activities button. This button has many, many Power Points designed to increase language skills.

I use the Power Points as a "sponge activity" when students are bathrooming and washing their hands. My classroom is set up with an Active Board (an interactive white board). I use the Power Points on my Active Board, but you could also use them with a projection screen or connect your computer to a TV.

This year I think I'm also going to try using the Power Points with our computer buddies. We have a general education 4th grade class that visits us once a week to work on the computers. My school has a student drop on our server. I'm going to try uploading the targeted Power Point to the student drop and have the 4th graders download it to the student computers. Then they can read through the power point one on one with their partner. After they finish that, they will be able to chose an online game that supports the skill. I'll let you know how it goes!

Happy exploring and navigating the site.....it is such a wealth of ideas and resources.

Quick and Easy Communication Tool

2008-07-31T22:29:00.003-04:00

One of my friends and I have a saying.....we like strategies and interventions that are effective and "quick and dirty."

Kate hit a ring dinger because she has one that is effective and cheap and quick and dirty!

Check out her post using Dollar Store key chains for a yes/no communication strategy.

http://teachinglearnerswithmultipleneeds.blogspot.com/2008/07/yes-no-keychain.html

Math Games

2008-07-24T14:26:00.004-04:00

I'm tutoring a 4th grade student in math. He understands concepts really well, but has not memorized his basic facts, so that slows him up a bit. Since we're working on his speed and fluency, I've been searching for free online games for him that put a fun aspect to the "drill and kill." I've added them to the links under "Student Games" so you can easily find them again.

Some of these games have versions that are appropriate for many differing levels. Check them out.

Math Mayhem: Basic Facts Add, Subtract, Multiply or Divide

TimezAttack Basic Facts Multiplication (You have to download this one and provide an e-mail address. The basic version is free and the kids really seem to like it.)

Spacey Math: Basic Facts Add, Subtract, Multiply or Divide

Math Arcade at FunBrain: Math Skills all grade levels

Two Minute Warning: Multiply

Primary Games: Lots of Pre-k through 4th games

Cool Math Games

Math Playground

Harcourt Math Games (This one isn't as "arcade" oriented but I like they way it uses the math vocabulary in the problems.)

A Plus Math Games

Explore and have fun!

Anchor Activities

2008-07-22T10:58:00.010-04:00

An Anchor Activity is an activity that is readily available in a classroom at all times. Anchor Activities are one of the most important classroom management techniques because they allow for children to be productive after independent work is finished or if the teacher has to attend to something unexpected.

Anchor Activities answer the age old student question, "What can I do now?"

The value of having your Anchor Activities established as a classroom routine, is that students should ALWAYS know the answer to that question. They should ALWAYS know what they are allowed to do if their work is finished or if the teacher has to attend to another situation.

In my classroom, after I decide what activities would be my Anchor Activities, I make a big poster with the words and pictures of the activity. This is posted in my room so that every student can see it. During the first week of school, we review this procedure and practice it so the students know what it means.

The following are some guiding questions that may help you decide what activities you can use as an anchor activity in your classroom:

~ What is the length of time required to complete the activity?
~ Does it require another student?
~ Can each child do it independently?
~ Is it always available?
~ How do students begin and end the activity?
~ Where will students complete the activity?

The following are some Anchor Activities I have used in the past:

~ Read a book
~ Write in journal
~ Do a puzzle
~ Draw
~ Bonus Work: "Bonus work" is extra skill worksheets that I keep in a basket on the counter. I use a Sharpie to write "Bonus Work" at the top and just keep them all together in one stack. Students can pick whichever one they want. I think that reviewing a previous lesson isn't going to hurt anyone. :-) The bonus points are recorded for our treasure box day.

More resources on Anchor Activities:

Best Practices: Instructional Strategies and Techniques

Differentiated Instruction and Anchor Activities

More About Anchor Activities

Vocabulary Anchor Activity

Anchor Activities

6th Grade Anchor Activities

4th Grade Anchor Activities

Summer School Ideas

2008-06-17T22:31:00.002-04:00

The following are all direct links to the summer school ideas that have been previously posted. Have a great summer!

Rodeo
Rodeo Field Day, Gross Motor
Space
Pirate
General Summer Activity Ideas

Summer School Rodeo Part 2

2008-06-10T22:41:00.013-04:00

I previously posted some links about and information on my rodeo theme for summer school. Since then I've been sorting through activities and finding ideas and skills that will be best for my group of students. I found one idea about having a field day/rodeo day on one of the websites. Great idea! Time to call on my friend...she's a pre-k teacher who just happened to be a physical education teacher for 17 years. Here's what we (and when I say "we" I really mean "she") came up with:

Rodeo Day

Rodeo day is organized on a center rotation with a teacher, assistant or parent volunteer assisting at each center. Each center rotation will last 12-15 minutes, so the whole rodeo day / field day will be over in an hour or so. Just in time for lunch afterwards and singing around the campfire before!

There will be three or four children in a group. (If we add another class or more students, we will increase the centers accordingly. I want a maximum of five children at a center, three or four would be best.) Activities are designed to encourage oral language develpoment, social/emotional development, gross motor development and fine motor development. We we will ask the children to come in jean shorts or overalls. At school they will put on hats and vests they have made.

Key component: You want to have as many children as possible actively participating in centers at any given time. It is important to practice waiting for your turn, but more active participation at any given time equals less discipline problems. Makes sense...the students are involved in the task rather than getting in trouble.

Morning Circle: Sing Around the Campfire, review "Rodeo Rules"
1) Safety comes first! (hands and feet to self...this includes horseshoes, lassos and hobby horses)
2) Stay in your center until the whistle blows
3) Listen to the "cowhands" (staff and volunteers)

Rodeo

Lasso the cows:
Set up:
~Tie a jump rope to a hula hoop to make a "lasso." (You need two of these.)
~Place a big picture of a cow on a sawhorse or a playground cone to make a "cow." (You need two of these.)
~Get four carpet squares. Each child sits/stands on a carpet square. We place two in front of one "cow" and two in front of the other "cow." It visually cues the children on where they need to be. (Make sure to place them a "lasso" apart. You don't want a child accidentally getting hit by a flying hula hoop. If you have five children in a group, you need five carpet squares. Every child should have a spot.)

Play:
~The child sitting on the carpet square closest to the "cow" tries to throw the "lasso" around the "cow." We usually give 2 or 3 chances.
~After the turn is completed, the child who was on the "waiting square" moves up to the "lasso square" for his/her turn. The child who was throwing moves to the "waiting square" to wait for another turn. This step is important because it teaches children how to wait, but they don't have to wait for very long. When you have two lines at each center like this you have at least 50% of the class actively participating at any given time. Remember: more children actively participating in the lesson equals less discipline problems.
~Repeat until the whistle blows. The first whistle blow is the cue to "clean up". After the clean up whistle, we have children point to their next center. The second repetetive whistle blow is "move to the next center". Since today is rodeo day, we will "gallop like a horse" to our new centers.

Benefits:
Practice social/emotional skill of taking turns. Throwing movement naturally requires students to cross their midline. Great opportunities for oral langauge. 50% of the children are actively engaged at any time.

Panning for gold:
Setup:
~Paint rocks with gold spray paint to create your gold.
~Fill water table (if you don't have a water table, Home Depot or Lowes have mixing tubs in the concrete/masonry area that would work. They look similar to this, but I have seen others for $6 or $8.) with sand at the bottom and just enough water to cover the sand, so that it resembles a stream.
~Gather 4 or more sifting tools.

Play:
~Let students "pan for gold" with the sifters.
~Move gold to a "safe spot" with tongs or "cheater chopsticks."
~Repeat until the whistle bows. Clean up and get ready to gallop to a new center.

Benefits:
Great sensory activity. The practice with the tongs and cheater chopsticks exercise the muscles needed for writing and cutting. Lots of opportunities for oral language. 100% of the children are actively engaged the whole time.

Rodeo Clowns:
Set up:
Set up any obstacle course of your choosing. You may want to use tunnels, rocking boards, hurdles, etc. Rodeo clowns help rodeo riders stay safe when they get thrown from a horse. They have to be able to duck and move quickly.

Play:
~Set up "waiting carpet squares" similar to Lasso the Cows. This keeps a familair structure/routine.
~Students crawl through the tunnels, balance on the rocking boards and go over and under the hurdles.
~Repeat until the whistle blows.

Benefits:
Students practice taking turns. The practice following multi-step visual/oral directions. 50% of the students are engaged at any time. This is a great activity to practice action words (crawling, balancing, stepping, galloping, jumping, etc.)

Trail Mix
Setup:
~Gather mix items: for example Cheerios, raisins, M&Ms, & pretzles. Also get juice boxes (not authentic, but gets the students a drink!)
~Create a picture recipe.
~Gather a bowl, a spoon, small cups or bowls and a box of baby wipes.

Play:
~Have students clean their hands with baby wipes since soap and water won't be available.
~Have students "read" the recipe with you.
~Have students add ingredients and stir the mix.
~Eat the trail mix and drink a juice box.
~Enjoy until the whistle blows.

Benefits:
Students practice early literacy skills when reading the recipe. Students follow a sequence of directions. Students get a chance to cool off and have a less active center. 100% of the children are actively engaged the whole time.

Horse Race:
Setup:
~In previous class lessons, have students make a hobby horse. (I plan on using a wooden dowel and a white sock. PreK students will choose what color they want their mane and the eyes. We will stuff the sock and then invite an older class to help us "thread and sew" the mane. The older students will use yarn needles to push a pre-cut length of yarn through the sock. The older students will help the PreK students tie the yearn in a knot.)
~Set up waiting carpet squares.
~Set up a "corral" for horses that are "resting."
~Set up a playground cone at a distance away from the carpet squares.

Play:
~Children will take turns "riding their horses" around the playground cone and back.
~Repeat until the whistle blows.

Benefits:
Gross motor parctice galloping. Practice waiting their turns. 50% of the children are actively engaged at any time.

Cook-Out
Not really...don't want an open flame near children on school property. We will probably just eat a hot dog lunch (cooked in a crock pot) with baked beans (warmed in a crock pot) and potato chips.

Rest!
All of the cowhands, cowboys and cowboys are tuckered out! Cool down and rest...perhaps with the video Fievel Goes West.

The very cool thing about Rodeo Day is that it is fun and different but it is organized according to a basic classroom routine. We just moved the routine outside. You can use this routine and structure for almost any special event just by changing the centers to fit the skills and theme you want to practice. We use it for Fall Festival and Water Day, too.

Digital Photos and Oral Langauge Samples

2008-06-09T00:25:00.006-04:00

I really like having digital photos of students engaged in classroom activites, field trips, or special events.

The digital camera is such a useful piece of technology because we can click away hoping to capture that one moment and not worry about wasting film.

I am very fortunate at my school because we have quite a few digital cameras available for teacher use and a number of color printers that can be used to print photos. We take tons of photos and use them to promote authentic, familiar language building experiences.

We start with photos of students playing or working in classroom tasks. At cirlce time or in small groups my assistant and I model how to talk about the picture. For some groups we work on labeling the objects or people in the picture. The next step is to use a 2-3 word phrase to tell about the picture and the action in the picture (i.e. Susie painting.) We then work to increase the descriptive words and build upon the sequence of the activity.

Our goal is to show students an array of 2-3 pictures, let the child choose one to talk about and record a language sample such as this (although it may be grammatically incorrect) : "I playing water table. I getting the crab a new home. Him like his new home because him it's big for him and him safe there."

The child who told us this story demonstrates his ability to label familiar objects and to use verbs with the "ing " ending. He also demonstrates that he understands the science concept that the crab moves to a new home because it outgrew the old one and for protection. His language sample further shows that we need to continue to work on proper pronoun usage and grammatically using helping verbs such as "am".

Digital photos act as a writing prompt or an idea prompt for young children. They spark many great conversations and opportunities to see what students have learned.

Phrase question?

2008-06-09T00:03:00.003-04:00

Recently, Mrs. V posted some great word combinations that her children made up. It got me thinking....

Not that we are kids, but on a similar strand, my friend and I make up phrases to go with situations.

Our most used is "porch lag." My husband said it to me tonight when it took 20 minutes to say good bye to my mom and my sisters...starting at the dining room table, moving to the family room, then the driveway....eventually he whispered to me, "Enough porch lag, say good bye." Porch lag is the amount of time it takes to actually leave a relative's house, starting at the time you initally say "we need to go" and ending at the time that you actually leave the driveway.

My friend and I have been looking for a phrase for "the number of times you go back into your house for one more thing before you leave for school in the morning.."

Any suggestions?

Summer School Rodeo Theme

2008-06-06T19:12:00.012-04:00

In an earlier post, I shared some of the resources and ideas that I had for a pirate theme for summer school. My thought process for doing the pirate theme was to do some adventure, treasure, ships, island lessons....using a fun organizing theme that I wouldn't use during the school year.

I received my class list and I think I need to make a change. Two of my students have had some difficulties with aggression towards peers and/or adults. One of my original concerns with the priate theme was how to remove the swords and fighting and keep the adventure and treasure concepts at the forefront. I thought perhaps I could manage it with some of the students, but given the new information on the needs of my students, I want to set all of them up for success. I do not want to organize lessons around a theme that may contribute to problems.

In light of the new information and the reflection on that information, I have now decided to go with a Rodeo Theme for the summer.

I found many resources on the internet that practice oral language skills, fine motor skills and gross motor skils. Within these skills the ideas focus on books, crafts, cooking, songs, fingerplays, games and sensory table ideas.

My tentative schedule is as follows:
Entrance Routine (I use the visual routine from my entrance procedures post)
Table Work (color page, table top manipulatives, book exploration)
Circle Time (calendar work, story, phonemic awareness)
Centers (craft, small group skill work, discovery play)
Recess (playground)
Lunch
Gross Motor (organized game or play with balls, jump ropes, etc.)
Table Work ( table top manipulatives, finish craft)
Closing Circle (with the rodeo theme we're going to "Sing at the Camp Fire)
Dismissal

The following websites have provided a host of ideas to plug into my schedule and skill work.

Armadillo Rodeo by Jan Brett
Cowboys at the Virtual Vine
Western Coloring Pages
Wild West Songs, Games and Crafts
Rodeo and Western Ideas
Rodeo Printables
Texas Rodeo Time
Rodeo Western Day Lesson Plans
Wild, Wild West Lessons

Tentative Book List (I will certainly add to it and I may not read some....BTW, Some books have great pictures but too many words and concepts. I use the book but tell the story or the information instead of reading every word.)

Armadillo Rodeo by Jan Brett
Cowboys and Cowgirls Yipee Yay by Gail Gibbons
Why Cowboys Sleep with Their Boots On by Lauire Lazzaro Knowlton
Cowboy Dreams by Kathi Appelt

Now all I have to do is organize everything and prep the craft project materials................

Student Led Conferences

2008-05-22T21:27:00.021-04:00

My school was recently authorized as an International Baccalaureate School. One of the requirements of IB schools is to hold Student Led Conferences each year.

At a student led conference, parents are invited to school for a conference where the student is in charge. The teacher does not lead or guide the conference, this job belongs to the child.

As an educator, I was excited about this event. As a pre-k educator, I was a little bit nervous. How would I teach children, especially children ages 3-5 with disabilties to lead their own conference? How would I ensure that the conference was student driven, but supported enough that it would be meaningful for 3-5 year olds?

We just finished our student led conferences. They were wonderful and worth every minute of planning involved!

I explained the prep work and student led conference experience to my husband (not a teacher) with a roller coaster analogy. You wait in line for an hour and the ride is over in 2 minutes. But, if you are a roller coaster junkie, it is well worth the wait. You'll wait time and again. Year after year. That's how our first student led conferences went. An incredible amount of planning time went into them, and they were over very quickly. But they were well worth the time invested and we'll willingly schedule them again, year after year.

Tips for successful conferences:

1) Keep work samples throughout the year.

We kept 2-3 pieces for each major theme and then let the child choose which piece s/he wanted to talk about. When they chose the piece for their conference, we completed a student reflection worksheet with Boardmaker icons. The reflection worksheet helps to guide some of the conversation with parents and children.

(Note: The students did not talk about every theme that we taught nor did they talk about every piece that we saved. They spoke about 4 pieces total. Three that they chose and the fourth was a book of their oral language samples about photos of class activities.)

2) Structure and organize the work samples in a way that is easy for students and families to use.

My students are familiar with Boardmaker icons. We created a "worklist" of 4 icons about work samples they were going to talk about. A matching icon was taped to the work sample. Students removed the icon from their worklist, matched it to the work sample and then talked about that piece (very similar to TEACCH task baskets).

Parents had clues from the reflection worksheet and the work sample to talk to their help prompt their child if s/he stopped talking.

(The picture on the top is the "work list." The picture in the center is a bucket that held the work samples and the work list. The picture on the bottom is the student reflection form.)

3) Walk away!

As the teacher in the classroom you are an authority figure. Walk away from the table! This leaves the parents as the only authority figure in close proximity. If you walk away, it minimizes role confusion between the authority status of the teacher and parent. (who will prompt, who will ask a question, when to wait, etc) It also minimizes the "on the spot" climate for the student. We observed more authentic conversation about work samples when the teacher was not at the table with the parent and child.

4) Let go!

The goal of our student led conferences was to generate meaningful conversation between the child and the parents about topics they had learned. The tools and the structure were in place....let the rest go. Let the conversation emerge.

5) Listen from a discreet distance.

You'll be amazed at what the children explain and how they explain it. Student led conferences are truly a rewarding experience for the child, the parent and the teacher.

Summer School Activities / Space Ideas

2008-05-21T18:18:00.011-04:00

A few years ago I taught a first and second grade summer school class for students with learning disabilities. The primary goal of the class was to continue working on reading and writing skills. My district typically schedules summer school for 6 weeks on a shorter school day, usually 8:30am-1:30pm.

I organized my class focusing first on literacy skills and second on the theme of space. I prioritized the organization because it is often difficult to find leveled books and appropriate theme related materials for reading practice. The most important goal was to have children reading at their instructional level, not reading a book about space.

The following was our daily schedule:

Morning Work Most days I put a skill page on the students' desks before they entered the room. The skill pages came from the free theme resources at The Learning Page. You have to register and set up an account, but there is no charge.

Shared Reading Trade books such as: Magic School Bus Lost in the Solar System, Planets by Gail Gibbons, My Book of Space. I had a few of these in my classroom library and found many more at the library.

Reading Groups The books for reading groups came from the curriculum materials the district provided.

Shared Writing Journals and two pen stories...more on two pen stories in another post- the explanation was getting very lengthy! :-)

Lunch

Recess

Math We did some of the math facts adding and subtracting with theme based materials and worksheets. We also played a lot of bingo and file folder games addressing time and money. I particularly like Coin Counting Bingo from PCI. I have found that many children with learning disabilities have difficulty telling time and counting the values of money. These are critical math skills that are used throughout life, so we addressed them every day in summer school.

Read Aloud I used two chapter books. Magic Tree House #8: Midnight on the Moon, Bailey School Kids: Mrs. Jeepers in Outer Space. I like having the students exposed to books that are longer passages.

Earn Time Those students who completed all of their work could make rockets and space shuttles with legos, play a card game: LAUNCH (a space shuttle game similar to UNO), various cut and paste crafts with space thems, play file folder games, etc. Those who did not finish their work had this time to complete classwork.

Classroom Procedures: Continuation of the Benefits of Daily Routines

2008-05-19T18:39:00.016-04:00

In two previous posts, The Benefits of a Daily Routine and Entrance Procedures we discussed the importance of establishing, teaching and maintaining classroom routines and procedures. A routine or procedure is different than a rule in that it teaches a student the steps to complete a task. (i.e. The line up routine teaches students the steps to successfully line up.) Harry Wong is an advocate for only a few classroom rules (i.e hands and feet to self) but supports the widespread use of many classroom routines/procedures.

The following list are some of the routines that I find important and useful. While I cannot give specific advice on how to structure your classroom procedures without knowing details about your class dynamics, your physical layout and your school rules; I can offer some guiding questions that may help you to determine routines for yourself. I can also give examples of routines that I use and you can modify them to fit your teaching situation.

Bathroom
When can students go?
When do they need to wait?
What will I do for students who need help?
Where do they wash and dry hands?
Where is the trash can?
How do I get custodial help for accidents?
Have I shown respect for all students?

My procedure for K-2: Students could go to the bathroom anytime during the following: morning work, independent work, centers, recess, snack or lunch. They were not allowed to go during direct instruction time (i.e reading group, math group, writing). If they asked, I usually asked them if they could wait. Most frequently, they could wait. Sometimes they could not and I would let them go. However, if this became a pattern, then I began to think it was an escape behavior. I would then ask my (meticulously organized) assistant to help me remember to send them before instructional groups started.

Drinks
When can students get a drink?
When do they have to wait?
Is permission required?
How do they request permission?
When during the day can you schedule drinks in your routine?
Have I provided enough opportunities for hydration?

My procedure for K-2: Same procedure as bathrooming. Verbal reminders were given to students to get drinks after recess and physical education activities.

Pencil Sharpening
Provide an opportunity for students:
~during the first 15 minutes in the morning
~during choice time, independent work, centers

Teacher always has sharpened pencils available:
~at the teacher's table
~at the assistant's table
~on the counter for student use
Do I have a system in place to provide materials in a timely manner?

My procedure for K-2: I have to confess, this is one of my pet peeves. My procedure was created out of a need to maintain my sanity. Pencil sharpening is one the of the most distracting and irritating sounds for me. I hate it! No pencils are allowed to be sharpened during my direct instruction time. It is like nails on the chalkboard for me!

Students could sharpen pencils during the first 15 minutes of class or during center time. After that, if they needed a sharpened pencil they had to use one of mine or my assistant's. We always had pencils at our teaching tables and on a counter for students.

Line Up
Do I have a cue to tell students when to line up?
Is there enough physical space for all students to line up?
How will students move to line? (in groups, one at a time, all together?)
How will students know their place in line?
Will I have specific jobs? (line leader, door holder, light monitor)

K-2 procedure: We created a line order. The first person in line was, obviously, the line leader. The last person in line was the door holder. Each week the line leader went to the end of the line and the next person in line moved up. This allowed each child to have a turn at both jobs.

Visual tip: My husband introduced me to painter's tape. Painters tape is blue tape (easily found in the painting department of Home Depot and Lowe's) that does not leave a sticky, gooey mess (like masking tape does). I now use painter's tape as a visual cue on the floor to outline a shape for each child to stand on when lining up.

Transitioning to a new activity
What cue do you use to let students know it's time for a new activity? (timer, verbal cue, chimes)
How much time do students have to move to the next activity?
How do they know when to start the next activity?
How will they move (if required) to the next activity?

K-2 procedure: We transitioned to the next reading or math group according to a timer. When the timer beeped, it was time to move.

These are just some examples of classroom procedures that I have found to be beneficial. Teaching a procdure helps students to understand how you want them to complete a task. Procedures help students to be successful in the classroom and they help to maximize time on task by directly teaching expectations.

Testing this out!

2008-05-17T22:16:00.007-04:00

I'm trying to learn a new skill....posting javascript within a blog entry. This post is my guinea pig. Please be patient with my learning curve!
:-)

More Summer Activities

2008-05-15T18:57:00.014-04:00

It's hard to believe that I haven't even finished the end of the school year and yet I am starting plans for summer school!

When I teach summer school, I have two priorities: 1) help children practice and master the skills they need to continue working on 2) organize skill and concept work around a fun theme!

For this summer, I have been thinking about a Pirate theme. Kids seem to enjoy the excitement and adventure associated with pirates. I have to say, my conservative nature steers the ideas more towards treasure and adventure and skill development rather than a true historical representation of what pirates were really about!

The following are some resources and ideas I plan on using this summer:

Online Game: Disney BunnyTown Captain Dan http://phd.disney.go.com/playhouse/bunnytown/games/goldencarrots.html

Treasure Hunt Ideas and More
http://homeschooling.suite101.com/article.cfm/pirate_treasure__

Map Skills Ideas
http://homeschooling.suite101.com/article.cfm/pirate_skills_lesson_plan

Pirate Theme Unit
http://www.louisiana101.com/ideas_pirates.html

Lego Pirate ship
http://shop.lego.com/bytheme/leaf.aspx?cn=91&d=104

Scroll Down to the Pirate Day Idea at this link:
http://www.preschoolrainbow.org/activities-large.htm

Pirate Crafts and more
http://kidscrafts.suite101.com/blog.cfm/pirate_fun

Sunken Treasure By Gail Gibbons

Favorite Materials

2008-05-10T16:25:00.010-04:00

It's that time of year to think about.....

Transitioning students to the next grade level? (yes, but not in this post.)

Progress reports? (yes, but again, not in this post)

Graduation and end of the year celebrations? (yes, but yet again, not in this post)

Preparing summer vacation travel plans? (yes, yes , yes! but, alas, not in this post)

Now is the time to prepare materials orders and purchase orders for next year. (Even if you still have a list of things that need to be completed for this year. ughh!).

The following is a list of materials that I use year after year. They are primarily supplementary materials (not core curriculum materials). Most of the items on the list are under $50 and could be paid for out of a classroom budget.

Materials for any grade level:

Velcro and lamination Velcro and lamination make teacher created materials durable and interactive. They help to make the materials individualized to the strengths/needs of the student. I prefer velcro dots for most materials. They reduce the amount of cutting and make creating materials more time efficient. I order velcro dots from http://www.feinersupply.com/
Fortunately, my school has a laminating machine and the laminating film comes out of the school's budget. However, I like to have some pieces laminated in thicker film to make them more durable. When I purchase my own lamination film, I typically buy from Sam's Club.

Boardmaker Boardmaker is a software program that has thousands of visual cues stored in an easy to use database. The initial cost is approximately $300, but is well worth it. I use my Boardmaker program on a daily basis to create home/school questions, visual schedules, recipes, classroom rules and procedures, interactive books, etc. Visit http://www.mayerjohnson.com/ for more information.

Scholastic Book Clubs No cost to the teacher or school! Just register and this is an easy sytematic way for families to purchase inexpensive books for home. As families purchase books, that classroom earns "bonus points" that can be spent on new materials for the classroom. This is also an inexpensive way for a new teacher to build up a classroom library. http://teacher.scholastic.com/clubs/

Reading A-Z This is website of thousands of leveled readers. I use http://www.readinga-z.com/ with my current pre-k students, as well as the 2 intermediate students I tutor. I have used it in the past with my K-2nd grade class and also my 3rd-5th grade class. The website is user friendly and is a valuable resource in providing students with reading material at their instructional level. The books can be printed and sent home, so it is also a great way to get instructional/independent level passages for students to read at home. It costs about $50 per year.

Materials for primary grades or pre-kindergarten:

Matt and Molly This series includes a set of simple stories paired with 4 visual cues that sequence the story. The teacher's guide includes a set of yes/no questions and a set of "wh" (who, what, where) questions for each story. It was created to work on language skills for students with autism, however, I have found that the structure and the simplicity of the visual cues are beneficial for all of my students (especially those with autism or language impairments). There are 5 sets in the series and each set is $31.95. http://www.linguisystems.com/searchResults.php?action=search&search_term=matt+and+molly

Jack Hartman CDs Jack Hartman has many, many, many CDs that incorporate music and movement to promote skill mastery and understanding of concepts. I like all of the CDs. If you are just starting out, I would recommend I've Got Music in Me, Vol. 1. or Shake, Rattle and Read. http://www.jackhartmann.com/cds.htm

Visual Supports

2008-05-04T18:28:00.029-04:00

Do you make lists for the grocery store?

Do you use a calendar to help you remember your appointments and meetings?

Do you print out agendas for staff meetings?

Do you keep an e-mail until you attend to whatever task was outlined in the e-mail?

If you answered "yes" to any of the questions, chances are you use visual supports to help you organize your tasks or thoughts.

I have "stolen" an idea from my assistant for when I need to remember to bring something from home to school. I write a note, wrap it bracelet-style around the strap of my purse and staple the ends together. This way, when I pick up my purse the following morning, I have a visual reminder to bring what I wanted. (And, yes, I did actually pick up ladybugs from a local nursery and take them to school.)

Sometimes, if I remember something at home that I need to take care of at school the following day, I send myself an e-mail.

One of the first ways I integrate visual supports in the classroom is with a daily schedule. I have found that I prefer to make the schedule on sentence strips, glue the picture and a word and laminate each activity separately. Then depending where I post it, I put a magnet strip or velcro on the back. By laminating each activity separately, I can adjust the posted schedule when needed or when we have a special activity scheduled. It also makes it easier to discuss schedule changes that are unplanned. Sometimes things happen at school that are beyond the teacher's control (i.e. the art teacher goes home sick, it's raining). For children who rely on a schedule, it is nice to be able to tell them the schedule has to change, why it's changing and then post the new schedule (i.e. we go to music with Mrs. Smith's class, we have inside choice instead of playground.)

We also use visual supports during many of our Reading or Pre-Reading Lessons. Jefferson Parrish AAC has some wonderful books that can be downloaded, printed, laminated, and velcro-ed (ha! is that a new word? Maybe I could be like Rachel Ray and get a new word introduced to the dictionary.) We use these books to increase attention to task, teach basic concepts, and introduce new vocabulary. Literacy Visuals are also available for many common songs and stories. Again, I like to have each piece laminated separately. Then I can pass them out to children and have the child place the piece either in the story or on a felt board. Children love doing this and it requires active engagement in the lesson.

Visual supports can also be used to help students communicate. Students can point to choices, wants or needs. They can also hand a picture to a staff member to communicate wants/needs or thoughts. This is called a Picture Exchange Communication System (PECS). Check out the Boardmaker materials at Mayer Johnson or some of the free symbols at Do2Learn.

Adding visual supports to lessons, transitions or classroom routines helps children access the learning environment and curriculum. Visual supports help people organize their lives. They help us remember what we need to do. They help us remember ideas for later use. They help us prepare for upcoming events. If as adults, we recognize the use and value of visual strategies to help us perform, shouldn't we find ways to integrate this in the classroom?

Memorable Moment #4: "Bad" Behavior/Communication Tool

2008-04-29T22:11:00.017-04:00

We all know that behavior communicates something. The trick is to figure out what the "something" is and then react in a way that does not reward the "bad" behavior but honors what the child needs/wants. Let me tell you...that's a great trick!!!

Behavior analysts will tell you that every behavior supports a person's needs/wants (not just a child, not just a student....adults, too.) Behaviors are exhibited to get us what we need/want. Most of the time we identify the four reasons (functions) for behavior as: to get attention, to escape a demand or task, to get something..tangible, to stimulate our senses...sensory.

My teaching partners and I found the following "bad" behavior to be quite humorous. Of course, we have to deal with the behavior and why the student was doing it, but.....the process of that can be quite funny. (Note: Make sure when "bad" behavior is funny, you don't let your student know that it's funny because they could get conflicting messages. Chances are it's only funny the first or second time....after that it's just "bad.")

See if you can figure out what the following student is telling us.... :-)

Libby is a three year old student with Down's Syndrome. On Tuesdays and Thursdays we set up a 6 center rotation where children travel from center to center according to a timer. We organize this within two classrooms that are connected by a middle door. This can be quite demanding for some students.

Libby reached her 4th or 5th center for the day which happened to be her Language Therapy lesson. In the middle of the lesson she decided she was done!

Libby hopped off of her chair and ran from the Language Therapy room to my classroom. (The speech/language pathologist (SLP) was right on her heels.) She tried to shut the door on the speech pathologist! keep in mind...a 3 yr old, shutting the door on the speech path!

Well, the SLP and I happen to be good friends, so when we saw a 3 year old attempting to shut the door in her face, we both wanted to laugh. :-) Fortunately for us, we had our wits about us. Libby was redirected back to her group with a firm voice and reminded that group was finished when the timer "beeped." (by the way....we laughed later!!!!)

What was Libby telling us through her behavior? What was the reason/function for her behavior?

If you guessed "escape," then your hypothesis matched ours. We suspect that she was telling us that she needed to get away from work at that point.

What did we do? We try to get Libby's group within the first few rotations before she gets fatigued. This way we can ensure that her time at language therapy is time well spent. We follow up her groups with gross motor or low demand activites that support her need/want for escape. In short, we go straight back to the "Pre-mack principle." (see previous post: http://michellespecialeducation.blogspot.com/2008/04/benefits-of-daily-routine.html ).