The Teacher’s Survival Kit for Lesson Planning! Tips & 1000s of Free Lesson Plans Posted by Shelly Terrell on Saturday, August 18th 2012 Goal 16: Plan An Engaging Lesson of The 30 Goals Challenge for Educators I cannot teach anybody anything, I can only make them think. – Socrates Lesson planning is stressful and time-consuming, but is important in giving us an action plan for the entire school year. A Few Tips … When planning a lesson, I think we need to keep objectives in mind but there are other factors that make up a great lesson. G- group dynamic R- relevance to learners’ lives and needs E-emergent language and ideas focus A- attentiveness T- thoughtfulness To this list I would add flexibility. Templates Some of us will need a framework from which to build our lessons. Structured Templates: Another idea: Map our your lesson plan in a mindmap More Lesson Planning Tips: 1000s of Free Lesson Plans Here are a few places to find free lesson plans to teach English in any subject or to any age level! Lesson Plan Sites for Other Subject Areas Bookmarked Resources Important News
Flipped Classes: Dispelling Myths and Sharing What Works At the ISTE 2012 conference this week, Converge magazine caught up with a proponent of the flipped classroom model to talk about what the flipped class is and isn't. Science teacher Brian Bennett has been working on flipping his classroom for three years, first in South Korea and now at William Henry Harrison High School in Evansville, Ind. Keep reading to find out what he has to say. For those who don't know what a flipped classroom is, how would you define it? We did the panel today [Tuesday, June 26], and that was one of the questions. But also tagged onto what I'm doing — I want schools to evolve, I want classrooms to evolve where they've got flexible learning time. So our core idea is the same — how can we take that class time and bring it back in, and then what are we going to do with it? Explain exactly what the myths are and what a flipped class really looks like. Myth No. 1 is that all content should be through video. I get better questions from kids. Find a buddy to work with.
The Flipped Classroom: The Full Picture for Tinkering and Maker Education If you have been following my blog series on The Flipped Classroom: The Full Picture, you know that I am using this opportunity, given all the press on flipped classroom, to discuss a model of teaching and learning based on experiential education. It is a model in which authentic, often hands-on, experiences and student interests drive the learning process, and the videos, as they are being proposed in the flipped classroom discourse, support the learning rather than being central or at the core of learning. The idea of experience being core to learning has been discussed by Dale Dougherty, the publisher of Make Magazine, in the context of Maker Education: I see the power of engaging kids in science and technology through the practices of making and hands-on experiences, through tinkering and taking things apart. Schools seem to have forgotten that students learn best when they are engaged; in fact, the biggest problem in schools is boredom. Experiential Engagement: The Activity
Mr. Vasicek's Classroom Music Playlist After reading my post "Music to Manage Your Classroom," some of you wanted to know some good tunes to play in your classroom. Grab your iTunes gift card and get read After reading my post "Music to Manage Your Classroom," some of you wanted to know some good tunes to play in your classroom. Grab your iTunes gift card and get ready to download some of the songs I use regularly in my classroom. Enjoy! Photo courtesy of Rinjith Krishnan. Come-In Songs — Bouncy songs to start the day off right. "Walking on Sunshine" by Katrina and the Waves "Come on Over" by Shania Twain "Best Years of Our Lives" by Baha Men "Brown Eyed Girl" by Van Morrison "Build Me Up Buttercup" by The Foundations "Who's Ready to Party?" Morning Kickoff — These songs provide a short, interactive way to start the day as soon as that bell rings. The Muppet Show theme song Friends theme song Happy Days TV theme song Batman TV theme song "I Like That" by Houston (This is for a slightly older crowd. End of the Day Dance Favorites
15 Schools Using Flipped Classrooms Right Now Classroom time is then used for answering student questions, helping with homework, and other activities that help students apply what they’ve learned. While there are some obvious drawbacks to this method, more and more teachers are trying it out. Many have found it to be quite successful in improving student grades and comprehension, though many caution it’s not right for every teacher or every classroom. Whether you love the idea or think it’s crazy, it’s definitely worth learning more about. Highland Village Elementary School This innovative school district is trying a lot of new things when it comes to helping young people learn. This article was written by the folks over at OnlineCollege.org. If you’re wondering what a Flipped Classroom entails, look no further than this fantastic new infographic from Knewton .
The Flipped Classroom Model: A Full Picture Due to Khan Academy’s popularity, the idea of the flipped classroom has gained press and credibility within education circles. Briefly, the Flipped Classroom as described by Jonathan Martin is: Flip your instruction so that students watch and listen to your lectures… for homework, and then use your precious class-time for what previously, often, was done in homework: tackling difficult problems, working in groups, researching, collaborating, crafting and creating. Classrooms become laboratories or studios, and yet content delivery is preserved. Flip your instruction so that students watch and listen to your lectures… for homework, and then use your precious class-time for what previously, often, was done in homework: tackling difficult problems, working in groups, researching, collaborating, crafting and creating. Classrooms become laboratories or studios, and yet content delivery is preserved ( The Flipped Classroom Model Summary Bridge-It
SOLO Taxonomy by Tait Coles on Prezi Flipping Out in Fifth Grade! FlippedPD There are many challenges facing educators today when it comes to integrating technology into their curriculum. One challenge is time – it’s hard to find time during the day to work on learning and implementing new technologies. With Flipped Professional Development, the Technology Integration Specialists work with building principals to create blocks of time during the school day each month for small groups of teachers to meet in a workshop setting. This workshop time is vital as it allows for collaboration between teachers and professional coaching from the Technology Integration Specialists. Another challenge is depth. In a traditional model of professional development, teachers may have initial excitement about a new technology tool but are left alone when the time comes to use that new tool in their classroom. With Flipped Professional Development, however, the process is “flipped”. Kristin works with a 5th grade team during a Flipped PD workshop.
Using Twitter in School: 4 Ways Students and Teachers Can Connect With the World September 27, 2012 by Scott Sterling The Internet provides a wealth of resources for teachers to use to facilitate student engagement. One of the most versatile is using Twitter in schools. Contrary to popular belief, Twitter is a lot more than celebrities plugging their latest projects. Learn from subject matter experts Do some research and find subject matter experts that your students would be interested in hearing from. Search #hashtags for news events Some of the best journalism during the Arab Spring was coming from citizen journalists on the ground, using Twitter and other social networks to get their message out. Start a backchannel conversation A backchannel uses Twitter to post targeted messages to a group, like a class. Extend the learning outside of class A lot of a student’s learning happens outside the classroom, whether you use the flipped classroom approach or simply assign outside reading to your students. For further reading: Related reading:
FlippedLearning - EduVision youwillflip [licensed for non-commercial use only] / FrontPage You'll Flip Over This! How the Flipped Classroom can Support Student Learning (Originally created and presented by Rebecca Narron & Kate Kanach, HCPS ITRTs, at ISTE 2012) Rebecca Narron ~ ITRT & Online Learning Developer, rnarron@hcps.us Justin Roerink ~ Principal, THCTT, jroerink@hcps.us Participants will learn how to utilize home-based e-learning in order to create opportunities for meaningful 21st century classroom engagement. The Flipped Classroom Concept How It Can Support Student Learning F2F classroom time ~ less give, more doCollaboration, Critical Thinking, Problem SolvingProject-Based LearningWork beyond the classroom Secondary: Language Arts Homework: Read this site and diagram the answers to the two sentences at the bottom of the webpage.Take notes on one of the following: PowerPoint Screencast 1 Screencast 2 Screencast 3 Basics of Sentence Diagramming Part 1 or 2 Classwork: Students take part in a Jigsaw activity. Artifacts: Science Math Watch Act 1 of Mr.