A Week in 1st Grade

Now that I am home from school for the summer, I will be volunteering in several elementary school classes in Williamsburg. This week I spent most of my time helping in a first grade class.



The first graders are doing a big writing project where each student creates his/her own book to read to their parents during an Author's Tea at the beginning of June. This week, I helped the students finish writing their stories and then typed the stories on the computer as the students read them aloud to me. I also worked with each student to help them create an "About the Author" page for the back of their book by filling in the blanks in a paragraph listing where they go to school, who they live with, their favorite part of school (which was usually recess or math), what they like to do outside out school, their favorite color, and their favorite thing to write about. After working on this project all week, I have now finished typing all 17 stories and About the Author pages and the books are ready for the kids to start illustrating them next week. It is a very time-consuming process, but I think the books will look very nice when they are finished and will be a great way for students to share some of their writing with their friends and families.




In addition to making their books, the main topics that the 1st graders were learning about this week were money and economics. In math, the first graders have been learning about money and in social studies, they have been studying economics. So we did a lot of activities related to coins and money this week. For social studies, we read several good books related to money and economics, including The Go-Around Dollar by Barbara Johnston Adams, Tight Times by Barbara Hazen, The Rag Coat by Lauren Mills, and A Chair for my Mother by Vera William. The students learned the difference between goods - something that you can make or grow and that someone can take home with them after they buy it - and services - something that you do for someone - and we discussed examples of both goods and services in each of the stories that I read to them. We also used several graphic organizers to help the students review what they had learned. After reading Tight Times and The Rag Coat, we created a "double bubble chart" as a class to compare and contrast the 2 stories. At the end of the unit, each student made a circle chart listing things they had learned about money and then wrote 7 sentences starting with the prompt "We have been learning about money..." When they went to computer as their center class on Wednesday, the students used Kidspiration to make a tree chart with columns of pictures showing needs, wants, goods, and services.

In math on Tuesday and Wednesday, the students used money manipulatives to help them complete several worksheets about counting coins. On Thursday, they played the game "Race to a Quarter" with a partner, and then on Friday, the students rotated to 8 fun money stations to review what they had learned about counting coins. The students really enjoyed the money station activities and by the end of the weekend, everyone seemed to have a pretty good understanding of how to count pennies, nickels, and dimes as well as what money can be used for. Click here for instructions for the "Race to a Quarter" game. You can find additional money activities, including a money PowerPoint with interactives games on my class website.



Yesterday, the students also made an extremely cute Mother's Day card . The card was shaped like a purse and their moms can open up the top of the purse to see the note that they wrote inside. The teacher had already cut the purses out of several different colors of construction paper and then the students used sparkly pom-poms, foam stickers, and gems to decorate their card. I will definitely consider using this idea with my students in the future. Here is a link to a similar project, although the one the kids made at school was much simpler.

Webquest

I just finished making my first webquest, titled "Let's Make a Zoo". Click here to go to my webquest. My lesson plan and all student handouts are located on the Teacher's page of the webquest.

A webquest is a computer-based learning activity in which students use specified websites, pictures, and videos on the internet as a resource to help them complete an activity or project. For more information, here is a link to an article about webquests.

My webquest is designed for 1st graders and is about animals. It goes with VA science SOL 1.5, which states that students will understand that animals have life needs (including food and a suitable place to live) and can be classified according to certain characteristics, such as body covering, body shape, method of movement, and where they live. The final goal is for students to create a class zoo. To complete this webquest, students will work with a partner to create an exhibit for 1 of the animals in our class zoo. Each pair of students will research their animal using the links provided in the webquest and record the information they learn in their "Zookeeper Journals". Then they will create both a visual and a written description for their exhibit. Students can choose from several project choices for each part. My webquest is meant to be used at the end of a science unit on animals. I think this would be a fun and engaging way for students to apply what they have learned about animals and I hope to be able to use it with my future students!

Webquest Animal Videos

The following videos are from TeacherTube.com:

"All about Giraffes" video

"African Elephants" video




"Tigers" video

"Meet the Gorilla" video

(from TorontoZoo.com)

Jamestown iPhoto

Here is my first iPhoto Presentation. It's also on YouTube if you want to watch it on a larger screen. It is about Jamestown and the English settlers' voyage from England to America. It is meant to be used as part of an introductory lesson at the beginning of a 4th grade unit on Jamestown. The information included in my iPhoto presentation correlates with Virginia SOLs VS3a-c. While the video itself does not contain all of this content, I would use it as an introduction to get students interested in the lesson and given them a visual to reference during the rest of the unit on Jamestown. The information students could learn from this 1.5 minute slideshow include the reasons why the Jamestown settlers came to America, a general idea of where Jamestown is located, and an introduction to the concept of the Virginia Company. After showing the slideshow, I would teach each of these concepts in more detail.

One idea for how to use this slideshow in an introductory lesson would be to show the slideshow and then have the class create a KWL chart listing information that they know about Jamestown(from the iPhoto presentation and from previous knowledge), questions of what they want to know more about (for example, what was the Virginia Company?), and then later in the unit, things that they have learned. This would encourage students to think about what they have just seen in the slideshow and make connections to the bigger picture of English settlement at Jamestown. It would also give the teacher an idea of what students did or did not understand from the iPhoto presentation and create a good transition from the iPhoto presentation to the rest of the lesson.

For the music in my iPhoto presentation, I used the song "The Virginia Company" from Disney's Pocahontas:

In sixteen hundred seven
We sail the open sea
For glory, God, and gold
And the Virginia Company.

For the New World is like heaven
And we'll all be rich and free
Or so we have been told
By the Virginia Company...

Here is the list of references for the pictures and music in my presentation (I meant to put it at the end of my iPhoto presentation but didn't remember until after I exported it and then there is no way to add another slide, so I'll just put it here instead):

References

Bermuda history [Virginia Company picture]. (2007). Retrieved March 21, 2010, from http://www.bermuda-island.net/INTRODUCTION/History.php

Brits at their best [3 ships picture]. (n.d.). Retrieved March 21, 2010, from http://www.britsattheirbest.com/freedom/f_time_17th_century_1600.htm

Free US states clipart [Outline of Virginia]. (n.d.). Retrieved March 9, 2010, from http://www.cksinfo.com/geography/usstates/page3.html

Image galleries. (2007). Discovering Jamestown [Godspeed picture]. Retrieved March 21, 2010, from Jamestown-Yorktown Foundation website: http://www.whro.org/jamestown2007/imagegalleries/English/album/gallery.html

Jamestown Settlement [3 ships picture]. (n.d.). Retrieved March 21, 2010, from Jamestown-Yorktown Foundation website: http://www.historyisfun.org/Jamestown-Settlement.htm

Map of the journey to Virginia at Jamestown Settlement. (n.d.). Retrieved March 21, 2010, from http://www.flickr.com/photos/edcabic/3908506648/

The Susan Constant on flickr. (n.d.). Retrieved March 21, 2010, from Creative Commons website: http://www.flickr.com/photos/_cck_/3347068339/

Tripadvisor.com [Discovery picture]. (n.d.). Retrieved March 21, 2010, from http://media-cdn.tripadvisor.com/media/photo-s/01/50/ae/20/jamestown-ship-discovery.jpg

YouTube: Pocahontas soundtrack - Virginia Company [Music]. (2009). Retrieved March 29, 2010, from http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fcLK-nPc7-w

What Makes a Good Teacher?

What makes a good teacher? A kind, caring, and patient personality? A desire to make a difference in the lives of his/her students? The ability to motivate students and present content in a way that is fun and engaging and will make students eager to learn? Being an expert at content knowledge? A combination of some or all of the above? And can people learn how to be effective teachers, or is teaching a natural skill or instinct that people either have or don't have?

A few days ago, I read the article Can Good Teaching Be Learned from the March 2010 NY Times Magazine. This article addresses several current issues related to education, including some of the characteristics that make an effective teacher and how school systems can "create" better teachers. Click here to view this article on nytimes.com (the article has a different name online, but it is the exact same article as in the magazine). As the article points out, individual teachers can make a difference in the lives of their students. I certainly believe that, and that is one of the main reasons that I want to be a teacher. According to the article, researchers have actually proven the significant impact that individual teachers have on students' learning; numerous studies about which factors most affect and improve student learning have shown that

"Every factor under a school's control produced just a tiny impact, except for one: which teacher the student had been assigned to."

So if we know that the quality of a child's teacher influences how much they learn, then the question becomes what can school systems do to get better teachers? One aspect of teaching that is emphasized in the article as a characteristic of good teachers is classroom management. As the article explains and as we have discussed in my classroom management class this semester, a teacher cannot effectively teach a lesson (no matter how good that lesson is) if the he/she does not have control of the class:

"Students can't learn unless the teacher succeeds in capturing their attention and getting them to follow instructions."

I have also seen the importance of good classroom management while I have been observing and helping in different elementary school classes this year. As mentioned in the article positive reinforcement, modeling, and giving clear step-by-step instructions, all seem to be very effective, especially in early elementary grades. In each class where I have observed, the teachers have had different systems and strategies for managing their classroom and the classroom management systems varied depending on the personality of the teacher as well as the needs of the students in the class. I don't think that there is really any one best way or that one way will necessarily work for all teachers or with all classes, but some ideas that seemed to work well and that I would like to incorporate into my future classrooms include:

• Commenting on what a certain student(s) is doing well in order to encourage everyone else to do the same - for example "I like the way Sally and Bob are sitting quietly...". I have noticed that this technique can be very effective in getting a class of 5 or 6 year-olds to pay attention and listen to their teacher or to me.



• Class reward systems for good behavior - here are 2 examples that I really liked:
  
  1. Awarding points to each table when students do something good, such as everyone at that table working quietly on an assignment or being the first table to clean up and all sit down quietly. The teacher used tally marks to keep track of each table's points on the board and then the table with the most points at the end of the day/week received a sticker and got to have the class Woody doll sit at the table for the next day.
  
  
  2. Class marble jar - whenever the class as a whole did something good, the teacher added a handful of marbles to the jar and then when the jar is full, the class gets to vote on a special treat.

• A "talking signal" that is made like a traffic light and is used to tell students how loudly they are allowed to talk at any given time (the picture below is from Mrs. Nelson's Class web page, but I have also seen this idea used in one of the kindergarten classes that I volunteer in on Tuesdays and Thursdays)

My Podcasting Experience and Educational Benefits of Podcasting

Today I finished making my first podcast. The process was very time consuming and somewhat frustrating, but now that I am finally done, I am happy with the final product and I think it might be something that I will use in with my classes in the future. My podcast is about George Washington and while watching, kids will travel into the past and visit the time when George Washington lived. The "time machine" makes a total of 4 stops: 1732 - the year when Washington was born, 1740 - George Washington's childhood, 1776 - the beginning of the war against England, and 1789 - the year Washington became President. In correlation with VA social studies SOLs K.1a, 1.2, and 2.11, my podcast emphasizes George Washington's role as an important leader for helping the Americans win their freedom from England and then helping to create the new nation and explains that this is why he is often called the "Father of Our Country". The podcast also defines several vocabulary words, including past, colony, and hero, and would be a fun way for kids to review a unit on George Washington or the colonial/Revolutionary War era.

Overall, the podcasting experience was not as hard as I thought it would be. It was definitely very time consuming, but I think the process will go quite a bit faster the next time I do it now that I know what I am doing. The biggest challenge I had while creating this podcast was finding access to a Mac computer to use Garage Band (the software program our class used for making the podcasts). Another issue was the click, click, click sound that my uncle has informed me is the metronome sound. I originally had no idea what that even was, but I have now figured out that the way to prevent this sound from being part of all voice recordings in the podcast is to hold down the "Apple" key and the "U" key to toggle whether or not the metronome is turned on BEFORE you begin recording. Once the recordings have been done with that sound turned on, however, there does not seem to be any way to get rid of it. And unfortunately, because of my limited access to the Mac computers, re-recording the entire podcast with the metronome turned off was not an option. So, my podcast has a little clicking sound as "background music", but for the future (and for any reader's information too) I have learned how to avoid this from happening again by making sure that the metronome is turned off before starting to record. The final challenge came when I exported my podcast to iTunes last night and discovered that it was twice as long as I thought it was. Since our assignment was to make a podcast that was 3-5 minutes long and my podcast was now 6 minutes, I decided to try to shorten it. In the process of doing this, I also figured out how to "delete and move" a section from the middle of the podcast so that I would not then have to drag each individual part to the left - and that discovery saved me a lot of valuable time.

I think I probably will create more podcasts in the future. They are certainly a great tool to be able to use in the classroom and since they include both pictures and sound recordings, they are a good way to reinforce concepts for both visual and auditory learners. I think it would also be fun for my students to make their own podcasts as well. When I was searching online to get ideas for my podcast, most of the podcasts that I found had been created by elementary school students - and some of them were really good too! For example, here are links to a podcast about butterfly life cycles made by 1st graders and to Radio WillowWeb, which contains over 30 podcasts created by 1st through 5th grade students at Willowdale Elementary School. As we have discussed in my technology class, elementary school students would be excited to be able to record their own work and then post it on the class web page or blog. This would also be a good opportunity for parents to see what their kids are doing in class. Having students create podcasts at the end of a unit would be a great way for the teacher to assess what they have learned about that topic. By the time they finished making their podcasts, the students would also have a good understanding of whatever subject their podcast is about.

"If you lived with George Washington" Podcast

Here is my first podcast. It is about George Washington and is intended to be used in teaching VA social studies SOLs K.1a, K.2, and 1.2. Click here to listen to my podcast!