You are to take the spelling pre-test for Unit 28.
Directions
1. Open to table of contents in Spiral Notebook- and fill in entry: Date, Spelling Unit 28, Page #
2. Turn to Blank Page and Create a Proper Heading for Assignment- 10/21/2013- Spelling Unit 28- Commonly Confused Words
3. Number the Page 1-20 (do not skip lines)
4. Watch the video and write down the 20 spelling words
You do not need to correct it! Just take the pre-test
Collaboration and Discussion are hot topics in the classroom. Students need to be able to work together in order to discuss ideas in order to develop a deeper understanding of the topic. But do the students Actively Listen to Each Other?
Recently my classes took part in an Active Listening Activity in order to discover what it takes to be an active listener.
Students worked in teams of 4. Each student on a team picked a number 1 through 4. Once numbers were given, students completed a task given.
Oh Those 1’s
All students who were 1’s needed to think about a topic they knew a lot about. The other three students on the team were told to not listen- have side conversations, read a book, turn your body away from the speaker. Student one tried to talk but became frustrated that no one wanted to listen. How Rude!
Take Two’s
The 2’s had to think about a topic they knew a lot about. But this time the other students needed to bombard the speaker with questions- whether on topic or not. Student two couldn’t even get the topic out because the questions over took the conversation. FRUSTRATION!
Third Time a Charm-Maybe
The 3’s- same task, think of a topic. The other students in the group were to go off on a tangent about the topic. In other words, talk about how the topic relates to them instead of the speaker. Student three got to introduce the topic but no air time. Hey Listen to ME!
Fabulous Fours
Same procedure-pick a topic. But this time, all students would actively listen and participate. The 4’s could actually discuss their topic and get appropriate responses from their audience! Yay!
Students realized a lot about what it takes to be an active listener. First, students noticed how loud the room was during the first three tasks and by the fourth one- the classroom environment was calm and the discussion was at a lower volume. Secondly, students drew some conclusions.
Some Conclusions Drawn about Active Listening
We look forward to being Active Listeners throughout the year!
As you know our school has gone Google for Education. This means students have an email address and ability to access Google Drive. In Google Drive, there is Google Docs. What is Google Docs? It is like any word processing program. Students can create documents, spreadsheets, forms, and power points. What is the selling point for Google Apps? Students can access their work from anywhere and so can I- as long as they share it with me. Also Google Docs is a way to go paperless and no more lost papers. Google Docs is web based so students can instantly share their work with me. Students do not need to remember to save their work- it automatically saves. NO MORE PROGRAM NOT RESPONDING, and students losing what they have worked on because it didn’t save. YAY!!!!
I love the fact students can easily share their work with me! I can comment on their progress and even chat about what needs improvement. This does not need to happen during the school day. I am able to virtually conference with the students from home at any time.
Here is an example from a students paper- and one of many comments:
What you may notice in the picture of the student’s writing is words highlighted in yellow. Every time something is highlighted in yellow, I have made a comment about the student’s work. Students can also send me comments about their work.
One student asked where else she could add dialogue effectively to her piece and if the dialogue she had added is effective. These are questions that may not be addressed during class, but because we are able to conference after class using Google Docs comments, her specific questions can be answered right away.
Sometimes in a busy day there is not enough time to provide feedback to every student. This is just another way to provide feedback to students in a timely fashion.
This is just one of the many ways we will be utilizing Google Docs throughout the year!
A note to my students: Rough draft to Memorable Moment needs to be typed using Google Docs and shared with me!
In order to review for the pronoun assessment on Thursday, please watch the short video and complete the Google Form that follows. Remember to gain access to the form, you must log in using your Bethel ID.
Click on the link and complete this activity: Subjective/Objective Pronoun Practice 1
Happy Learning!
We have been very busy these past few weeks. We are in the middle of our first unit of study- Foundations: Moving Beyond Childhood. Students are exploring the essential question, How does an author effectively convey the journey from childhood to adulthood? In reading, we have been working on annotating a piece of text, closely reading a text, learning how to take two column notes, exploring word choice in order to determine author’s tone, and of course keeping up with Independent Reading.
Students are expected to read 80 minutes a week (20 minutes a night Monday -Thursday). If students are reading 20 minutes a night, they should be reading about 50 pages a week. The average novel is 200-300 pages- students should be almost done with at least their first novel by now! Yay!! Speaking of reading here are the superstar readers from each of my blocks in terms of the amount of time spent reading.
Block 1: All students read a total of 2177 minutes
Danielle: 5 hours of reading for the week.
Chrys: 2 hours and 40 minutes
Tyler: 2 hours and 38 minutes
Block 2: All students read a total of 1771 minutes
Matt: 3 hours and 45 minutes of reading for the week.
Nicolette: 2 hours
Kiara: 1 hour and 33 minutes
Block 5: All students read a total of 2766 minutes
Shivani: 10+ hours of reading for the week.
Ankur: 4 hours and 40 minutes
Sarah: 2 hours 42 minutes
Congratulations to all the students for keeping up with their reading!
Please watch the following video. Remember to take notes in your spiral notebook. If you forgot your spiral notebook at school, take the notes on a separate sheet of paper.
Remember you can stop, pause, or rewind the video if you missed a word or I was speaking too fast.