Teaching and Learning
Year Three
Return to Blended Learning/Station Rotation
What are you going to do to help you be the most successful with stations this year?
I have always enjoyed using station rotation in my classroom. The students tend to be engaged and enjoy the time working with me, their classmates, or independently. In order to be more successful this year with station rotation I am going to consistently review norms, have the schedule posted for students to see, and have set locations where each station will happen. I will also introduce stations early in the year and practice with non-academic content so students can understand the process and the norms.
What routines and procedures will you be introducing to your students to continue to ensure safety?
In order to ensure safety in my classroom while doing station rotation, I will have my students physical distance by working with someone near them in a collaborative station. I will also have students stay at their desks for independent and technology stations. When students are working with me, we will gather in the hall, spaced out. I will sit in the door way so I can see all students. I will also implement cleaning and disinfecting procedures. These procedures and expectations will help my students to remain safe in my class.
Holistic Assessment and Student Conferencing
The structure and emphasis of Blended Learning leads to student ownership of learning. Along with teaching students the skills and strategies to use while learning a new concept, I also encourage them to take ownership of their learning. I encourage this agency by using holistic assessment along with student conferencing. With these two tools, students are aware of their successes and struggles and are able to set goals to help advance their learning. I used this tool to help guide my student conferences. I first reflected on areas of celebration and areas of improvement for each student. I then went over their IXL diagnostic data and related it to concepts learned in class and students were able to set goals to keep progressing on IXL and in class.
Collaborative Staff Culture
What is great about our staff culture… The staff at St. Catherine’s have grown in trust with each other. Since this trust has been established, teachers have been willing to collaborate with each other and provide feedback to one another. A few times throughout this school year, teachers have taken the time to observe a different teacher. After the observation, the observing teacher provided three positive takeaways and three positive praises. The teachers are eager to learn from each other and have gotten comfortable with questions and constructive feedback. The staff has also reached a point where they are comfortable asking for help.
How would we like to make it even better… We would like to have more time together has a staff to share struggles, concerns, and great ideas. We would also like more time to be in each other’s classrooms learning from each other.
Blended Learning: Literacy
Being a math teacher, it was a great learning experience for the students to see that reading skills are just as important in math. Attached is a lesson plan that focuses on analyzing word problems. Students had many opportunities to practice analyzing a variety of word problems and then create a flowchart showing their thinking while analyzing the word problem of their choice.
Blended Learning: Math
I have attached the lesson plan for a Blended Learning math lesson that I completed with my 6th grade students. Students started the lesson by providing them a metacognition question where students were provided with the answer and they had to write a question. Students were then divided into homogenous groups based off of a previous math exit ticket to complete station rotations. Students worked with the teacher to review order of operations at varying levels. As the collaborative station, students worked together to find the mistake using order of operations. At the technology station students completed a 15 question Quizizz and then complete IXL.
Blended Learning: Inquiry and Storytelling
This year we celebrated Pi Day as a school. Students were tasked with memorizing as many digits of Pi as they could. The school created a color coded chain representing each digit of Pi. Classes read stories and completed different activities related to Pi. In Junior High, the 6th, 7th, and 8th grade students listened to the story Sir Cumference and the Dragon of Pi. After reading the story, students measured the circumference and the diameter of circular objects, divided them, and realized that each answer was very close to Pi. Students then completed an art project creating a city skyline using the digits of Pi. Each building height was determined by the next digit in Pi. The students enjoyed using the story as a starting activity before they were able to explore Pi.
Global Citizenship
It is important for student to recognize that the world extends beyond their family, school, and town. I want to promote global citizenship in my classroom by helping my students to be aware of current events and current statistics. I want my students to be able to identify a problem and actively create a solution. I would like my students to be able to present this to the school and together be a solution. One idea I had was to look at the amount of food produced in the world and the amount of people who go without food and how this problem could be addressed.
