Children's Engineering

I work at a "Children's Engineering and Design Technology" school. Basically students are given design briefs with a challenge and they build a solution. I was very overwhelmed when I first got to the school and couldn't fully understand how to implement these lessons into my plans. Well I knew how... I just didn't seem to have the time to do it. All new teachers to the school were able to attend the state wide CE&DT Conference. I sat through a session on using children's literature to create design briefs. They shared one to go with the True Story of the 3 Little Pigs and students to create a house out of various materials (marshmallows, pretzel sticks, peanut butter, twizzlers) that could withstand the gusts of a fan for 5 sections. I thought that was cool... but I was never able to create any briefs to match any books I read.

I attended a workshop last summer at the Math and Science Innovation Center in Richmond, Virginia. I was able to sit through a session where a 3rd grade teacher had created design briefs based on the Social Studies and Science Curriculum we're required to teach. Basically I had been overthinking this whole process and the light bulb finally went off.  

I created 8 Design Briefs last year and I've uploaded them on The Teaching Oasis. They're mainly for Social Studies as I haven't taught Science for 2 years. I do plan to create one for every single Science and Social Studies standard for the Virginia Curriculum.

Self Directed Learning

As usual... I was on Pinterest when I came across this blog post on Self Directed Learning. You may want to hop over there and read it now... I LOVE the idea of students creating their own schedule for learning activities. One of our goals in our district is for students to become self directed learners. After reading the blog post I had an idea for next year... STAR Fridays (Students Taking Academic Responsibility).

Students would fill out their STAR Schedule on Thursday and they would follow the schedule on Fridays.

 



I would implement it slightly different from the blog post I read. I would limit math work to the math block and reading work to the reading block and so on. Content is for Science and/or Social Studies. VIP is an acronym for their VIP Folder which holds all unfinished work. I set aside a 30 minute block just for this, if a student has no unfinished work then they would use this time for studying or possibly making study materials (flash cards).

I also want to create some type of tracking sheet and goal sheet for math, reading and writing. I want students to spend these days working toward their goals. With this being said, this is what I envision...

Math- students can sign up for a mini-lesson (remediation) with me on a specific skill (I would offer 3 different lessons, 20 minutes each), students can play a math game on the computer or one that's available in the classroom, or any task that will help accomplish their goal.

Content- this time is for science and/or social studies. I have created Design Briefs (mini projects) for just about every content topic. Students would use this time to work on these projects. (Example: when learning about map skills students have to create a classroom map)

Reading- again students can sign up for a mini-lesson with me based on the goals they have (summarizing, inferring), there's also reading games they can play, one *required* activity will be 20 minutes of read to self during that block, if fluency is a goal students could also do repeated time readings and so on.

Writing- students will be writing independently or collaboratively during this block, I also envision students signing up for writing conferences and publishing writings on the computer.

So to sum this all up...
My students will have a 1/2 inch STAR Binder that will house their...

• quarterly requirements in Reading (4 response letters, 1 reading project, 1 comprehension interview) and Writing (2 writing processes and 2 poems)
• tracking and goal sheets in math, reading and writing

Every Friday would be STAR Friday and students would be self directed for the day and sign up for lessons/ conferences with me as they need.

What do you think of all this? Do you think could work? Would you try it in your room? Pros...Cons... I would LOVE some feedback on this approach!!!

Currently...May

 

 



Wow... it's May! I currently have 29 days of school left. Where I live students start school after the Labor Day holiday, though I wish we started in mid-August and ended at Memorial Day. A girl can dream can't she...

I've been on Pinterest pinning ideas for a Teacher Organization Binder. There are some great templates out there. Unfortunately most of them are for sale on TpT. I've already started making some templates and will be more than willing to share them when they are finished. They may or may not be conducive to your school year though.

I turned 31 on April 26th and my wonderful husband purchased me a massage, manicure and pedicure. I was able to carve out some time for the massage... I just need to find some for time for the mani and pedi!

I ordered these precious School Themed Cookies from ACookieJar on Etsy. I've ordered Owls and Seuss Cookies before and believe me they taste as good as they look! I also made some cute cards with my Cricut and I look forward to "appreciating" my colleagues next week. I also made Mother's Day cards and bought candles for my teammates who are mothers.

At this point in the year, my 3rd graders are gearing up for state testing. We start testing May 13. I'm already jotting things down... ideas and changes I want to make for next school year. It'll be my 3rd year in 3rd grade and my 3rd year at this school, so it'll be that much easier next year. However, a teammate and I use to switch classes for content areas... I taught social studies to both classes and she taught science. I'm embarking on teaching all the subject areas next year... so that may present a challenge:)

What changes are you considering making next year in your classroom?

Pinterest = Math

I LOVE Pinterest! I can always count on Pinterest for a cute and effective math activity. Here are some pictures of math activities inspired by Pinterest.
 

Area and Perimeter using Pentominoes
Students choose a pentomino, traced it, and calculated the area and perimeter,
all the pentominoes had an area of 5... duh...and most had a perimeter of 12 so next year
I'll have them use one shape and two shapes combined to do the activity.

Dream Playground
Students mapped out their Dream Playground and then calculated
the area and the perimeter.

Fraction Sundae
Students decorated 6 ice cream scoops with their favorite flavors,
then they wrote the fractional parts on the bowl.

Here's the link, http://pinterest.com/jywinston/, if you would like to check out my boards or follow me!

The Teaching Oasis: Language Arts

Back in January I made some major changes to The Teaching Oasis, I decided to make all the resources I had created free of charge. I'm going to be doing a series of blog entries about the various documents and activities that are available.

Language Arts Resources:


Graphic Organizers



Reading Response Flipbooks



Rock and Roll Reading Skill Posters

Stationary

Word Explorer Work Station

Head on over to The Teaching Oasis Language Arts Resources page and check it out, I'm sure you'll find something useful! 

What's your favorite language arts resource?
What language arts resources would you like to see added? 

Testing Treats Revisited

Last year around this time I blogged about Testing Treats I intended to give my students. My students loved them!

It must be that time of year again because I've gotten at least 4 emails from teachers asking me to email them the document because Scribd wasn't working properly.

This year we have a total of 6 testing days so I needed to add and change a few things with the document. I revised it uploaded it in my Google Docs. You can access the documents by clicking the screenshot (picture) above.

This year I enlisted parents to donate some of the treats by using Sign Up Genius and I'll purchase the Cookies and Pop Rocks myself.

Do you think you'll use these with your students?

Back to Work

This week has certainly been an emotional roller coaster. After returning home from Pennsylvania my husband found out that his step-sister had passed away at the young age of 34, most likely from complications of Lupus, leaving behind a beautiful daughter. We packed up the car and headed to Williamston, North Carolina. It was wonderful to see family we hadn't seen since the wedding and family that couldn't make it to the wedding. He apparently has several family members that are educators so I enjoyed swapping stories with my new found cousins. I was even able to stop by Rocky Mount to see my mother while we were down there.

I heard this song on television tonight and it touched my spirit, we may not understand why things happen but God is Awesome and he is worthy to be praised!