Over the past twelve years of my career, I have always felt the most pressure to meet the needs of my gifted kids. This is a nuanced group- as is so often the case with teaching, I have found that there is definitely not a one size fits all solution for the gifted students. More often than not, what does work for them also works for the majority of learners. To put it simply- being a good teacher for gifted students simply requires good teaching. What does that even mean you asked? I spent the last 12 years trying to answer that question. Below are some resources that I have found helpful.
I currently am teaching Math to gifted students in grades 1st through 5th. Finding enrichment and extension activities that are worth while has been my greatest challenge this year. I have had to create a lot of what I do from scratch and will post to my Teacher's Pay Teachers store when they are store ready. In the mean time, here are the resources that I love most. Byrd Seed - I saw him present at a gifted conference. If ever you get the chance to see him speak or better- if you live in the Irvine, CA area and can some how observe him teach... jump on the chance. His strategies are highly engaging to all students- and specifically aim to please the gifted learner.
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Let my start with this: I was first introduced to Interactive Notebooks by an amazing Teachers Pay Teachers author and her absolutely fantastic Language Arts Interactive Notebooks. Her resources added what I felt was missing in my Language Arts Curriculum.
I am a STEM teacher at heart. Kids leave my classroom loving all things Science, Tech, Engineering and Math. A colleague of mine suggested we introduce some Interactive Notebooks into our Science curriculum so I happily jumped aboard. Until I saw the resources... and cringed. Interactive Notebooks are great. They are also incredibly time consuming. For grammar instruction, the time in is arguably worth it. The cut and paste activities add a little spice into a subject that is by nature boring. (I am sorry grammar lovers, but it's true!) STEM lessons scream hands on. To spend an entire lesson cutting and pasting vocabulary words into a journal is a missed opportunity to spark love for learning. While there is absolutely a time and place for the Interactive Notebook resource, please don't let that time and place be Science! Instead do this: 1. Spend time doing hands on activities Science is all about systems and process. A student won't truly understand any of this unless they get hands on with the material. The web is exploding with great STEM resources both free and paid. The activities don't have to be elaborate. They can be a quick and simple 20 minute thing or can spam over a week. Either way, the time spent is much more valuable than cutting and pasting words into a notebook. 2. Draw it out Students should be taking time to diagram things on their own. Instead of cutting and pasting that diagram of flower parts, have your students draw it and label it themselves. This is something a real scientist would do in their real journal anyway. Get your kids used to this. 3. Journaling Talk about a perfect time for a two-fer. Squeeze in some Language Arts time into your science curriculum by having your students journal about their experience. Have them record their observations and thoughts on the lesson you completed. When doing an experiment, follow the Scientific Process. Start by having the class make observations about the topic you are studying. Guide them to form a question to answer. Come up with a good hypothesis to the question. Figure out a process that will guide your experiment. Record any observations and data during the experiment. Analyze the results. And finally have your students write about the outcome. Interactive Journals are great. But in science, are they really interactive if all you are doing is cutting, pasting and coloring? I had a beautiful baby girl in February. It's now August... and time for me to get back to teaching.
I've read all kinds of blogs during my precious little's nap times in attempt to prepare for our inevitable separation. But in the end it seems that what will work best for you in such a situation is... what works best for you. So in the small quiet moments I did all that I could to set my year up to make it all as smooth as possible. The thought being the harder I work now, the more time I have during the school year with my family. Luckily a lot of the work I did before going on maternity leave set me up nicely for coming back to work. Long Term Planner This is pretty much a must have for a smooth year and where I always start my year. What do I want to accomplish? What are my teaching goals? What lessons and projects will I use to achieve those goals? With that set, I jumped to my next task... Here is what I used- it's a quick draft of the year. I gave my long term sub a more detailed week by week plan along with this! Homework This is a biggy- Homework is a time suck for teachers, students, parents... siblings- anyone involved! I wanted to make the homework thing as efficient and painless as possible for everyone. So I created a year long homework menu. Essentially, the menu provides differentiated options covering a wide range of skills and student needs. Following my long term planner, I set up homework for the entire year. The assignments all cover 4th grade standards giving students needed practice, but also leave room for adjustments in my pacing. I will get back to that in a separate post covering current research on homework and why I chose to go the Homework Menu route. Projects and Rubrics With my Long Term Planner set, I was able to solidify all of the major projects for the year. To make my life easier, and my classroom run smoother, I made sure that each project had a clear set of student instructions along with an easy to follow grading rubric. Again, my goal is to finish as much of my work at work. I want to be able to come home and spend time with my family. Setting up my year before it started will absolutely ensure that I am able to do that. You can find every project I have ever done here A Support System This one seems obvious but still worth discussing! No amount of reading can prepare you for going back to work as a first time mom. Will I be able to maintain breastfeeding? How, when and where will I pump at work? How will I cope with my baby girl being at day care?! All of these questions provided enough angst for my milk supply to drop drastically, and school hasn't even started yet. So, time to take a few breathes and figure it all out. Where will I pump? Employers are required to provide a clean and safe place for a mother to pump. After reaching out to my administrator, I considered my choices. 1- Her office. 2- A bathroom on the other end of campus that another nursing mother transformed into a pumping station. 3- The nurses bathroom. (?!) When all was said and done, I went with where I felt most comfortable. My classroom. I set up a nice, clean and comfortable pumping station at my desk. I made sure that everyone was aware that I was pumping in my room so I would not get any distractions or surprise interruptions. I have a tough group this year. I love them, don't get me wrong- and I've definitely had worse; but there is something about this year that didn't quite click in the beginning. After a friend came to visit and chat with my class about her job as a research scientist, she couldn't help but comment on the stark difference between this class, and the class I had last year. They lacked focus, respect, and were just a bit overly rambunctious.
And so, after a long winter break I reflected. Without argument the group as a whole is difficult. One teacher approached me after a week of rotating classes for science and offered help, "if you ever need a break from them, let me know- I can help!" ...not the words a teacher wants to hear. Translated, "Yes, your class really is THAT bad. You weren't imagining it!" Individually, each one has something about them that truly makes them my favorite. As a whole? I couldn't put my finger on it. They weren't my favorite class- but why? I met with an old colleague and she told me about this cool new behavior monitoring iPad app- it allows teachers to keep constant tabs on every child and will even send behavior reports regularly to every parent. The app covered any behavior you could think of- from lacking focus to down right disruptive. But it was so negative. So I decided to take another route- focus on the positive. When winter break was over- I had a long chat with my class- we discussed our strengths and weaknesses as a class. We talked about the need to respect each other and overall- the need to be kind. And I put up a "Random Acts of Kindness Tree." To start, the tree was bare. A blank slate, sad and empty looking. For homework they were told to write down any random act of kindness the committed in the past month or so. They wrote the good deeds on leaves, and the tree began to look more full. I gave them this resource to give them some ideas on examples of Random Acts of Kindness. And the feel of my class changed. The environment became more kind- the kids showed respect- and each individual child that I loved with all of their individual strengths began to work together as a classroom unit. And that app? I still haven't even downloaded it. I don't see the need. Every time a kid does something kind, they get to fill out a new leaf. And the tree keeps growing with every act of kindness. It's quickly filling out to be a bright and beautiful tree and my class is finally a bright and positive group. No need to take a break from them ;) This year I wanted to try something a little different for Halloween. Every year, we write "Haunted House" stories as our first descriptive narrative. The kids have a blast with the story writing so I wanted some new art to match the theme. I somehow stumbled across Haunted House Coffee Paintings in my search and gave it a try! This projects calls for the use of coffee (instant coffee crystals) to make different shades of brown. Kids learn about diluting solutions and have fun painting with their teacher's favorite morning drink! :) It's definitely a challenging and some of my more "Type A" personalities had a difficult time manipulating such a difficult medium. All in all I think I will try it again next year. Some pointers.... With younger ages, be very explicit about mixtures and water to coffee proportions. Emphasize that they will NOT be able to easily paint details so it is best to paint the picture from a distant view- leave tiny details out! I gave each student a spoon and choices of paint brushes, small and wide. Try it yourself first- I had the kids start with their darkest parts first and fade to light. Kids who ignored this tip had a really hard time. Here are a few samples of what my kids came up with! It's been a while since my last post. I figured summer would give me plenty of time to work on all of the projects I've been itching to get done. Somehow, the summer slipped by and school is once again around the corner. My latest photoshop endevour has been making posters for my room. I'm not always a fan of the stuff found in teacher stores and when I saw that Staples wa having a pretty amazing deal on poster printing I snuggled up with my computer and with a little help from photoshop, got to work! Here is my latest. I'm happy with the out come. Can't wait to send them to print!! With or without owls? Edible Science- one of my favorite things! Of course, never attempt to eat or taste an actual science experiment- this is a cell model- made of cookies and sweets! We will be modeling a bacteria cell.. Before we begin, let’s look at the parts of the cell! Parts of a bacterial cell: The cell capsule lets some things in and keeps other things out. It includes a cell wall and plasma membrane. This layer protects the bacterial cell and is often associated with pathogenic bacteria because it serves as a barrier against phagocytosis by white blood cells. The cytoplasm is the liquid material inside the cell where the functions for cell growth, metabolism, and replication are carried out. The ribosomes make proteins. Ribosomes give the cytoplasm of bacteria a granular appearance in electron micrographs. Though smaller than the ribosomes in eukaryotic cells, these inclusions have a similar function in translating the genetic message in messenger RNA into the production of proteins. Flagella—The purpose of flagella (sing., flagellum) is to move the cell around. Flagella are long appendages which rotate by means of a "motor" located just under the cytoplasmic membrane. Bacteria may have one, few, or many flagella in different positions on the cell. Pili are hair-like structures on the surface of a cell that connect the bacterium to another of its species and build a bridge between the cytoplasm of either cell so that plasmids can be exchanged. Nucleoid--DNA in the bacterial cell is generally confined to this central region. Though it isn't bound by a membrane, it is visibly distinct (by transmission microscopy) from the rest of the cell interior. Plasmids—Along with chromosomal DNA, most bacteria also contain small independent pieces of DNA called plasmids that often encode for traits that are advantageous but not essential to their bacterial host. Ingredients:
Instructions for building a cell model: 1. Your sugar cookie is the cell capsule. Lay it flat on the plate. 2. Cover the top of the cookie with frosting. This is the cytoplasm! 3. Add a twizzler bite. This is the nucleoid (DNA). 4. Cover with a few pieces of M&Ms. They are the plasmids. 5. Attach the flagella by placing a gummy worm on the edge of the cell. 6. Add pili by sprinkling shredded coconut around the edges of the cookie. 7. Add the ribosomes or chocolate chips throughout the cell. I am sure there is an easier way- but I know Photoshop too well to switch to new software! On this nice summer night, I decided to play around a little bit and came up with some fun new Scholar Dollars. :)
This is a fun resource excellent for display during a California Gold Rush unit! Click the picture to link to free download. :) Below is an older version used in my classroom a few years ago. I have since updated the font and added a frame :)
With summer school finally finished, I finally get a break! A break that I will most likely spend hiking with my dog, cleaning my house, and perfecting the art of Photoshop and Adobe Illustrator! Once I figure Illustrator out I will post some tips- I see a lot of people using PowerPoint to create and edit resources but that has so many limits as far as unleashing your creative side goes!
Wish me luck with my new venture! I spent some time yesterday creating a new banner for the site on Photoshop- my husband insists Illustrator is easier to use so I am excited to dive in! |
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"The best teachers are those who show you where to look, but don't tell you what to see." - Alexandra K. Trenfor |