It’s been one crazy year, and I’m exhausted. We’ve finally made it to the end, and my instinct is to play a movie for the last week of class next week. BUT, kids have worked hard, and I don’t want to just tap out. I’m sure many of you are in the same boat, so I made a list of activities that are fun and creative while still being moderately standards- related. Some of these require some prep, but others none at all! I hope this list helps your students ( and you!) relax and make memories as the school year. 1. Write a Thank You Note This activity can…
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How To Prepare for Equitable Remote Learning
On Friday night, my school board voted to go virtual for a week. YIKES! We teachers have only a few days to plan ( and, yes, those days are outside of working hours). Your school may have gone virtual already, and we all may be facing the possibility of off/ on remote this year. I wanted to share how I prepare my units for equitable remote learning, because with a little planning and preparation you can ease a lot of the burden from yourself if and when this happens at your school. This is also important as we are seeing upticks in the number of absent students who are quarantining…
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My 5 Favorite Classroom Tech Tools
I had to change my teaching to make it engaging for both remote and in- person students. These are the 5 classroom tech tools that I use daily.
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ELA Strategies I Love: Hexagonal Thinking
Have you ever heard of or seen a new teaching strategy from a coworker and said, “I have to try that TOMORROW!”? That was me last week when I heard about Hexagonal Thinking from the Brave New Teaching Podcast. It just SOUNDS cool. I immediately paused my podcast, put down my vacuum ( because who doesn’t listen to podcasts while they’re cleaning? It’s a thing, I swear), and ran to my computer. I googled “Hexagonal Thinking” and found Betsy Potash’s incredibly innovative strategy for critical thinking on her Spark Creativity blog. I was immediately obsessed and worked it into my Hamlet lesson for the next week. Here’s how the Hexagonal…
