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Decorating Your Classroom: Five Items Every Teacher Must Have

admin — Sat, 01 Oct 2011 00:00:00 +0000

1. Storage: Every teacher knows storage is a must! Organize art supplies, activity centers, and anything else causing clutter in your classroom in colorful, labeled storage bins. This is a practical way to bring a pop of color into the classroom. Get creative with the labels for even more dcor.

2. Educational Posters: Hanging posters around the room is a great way to keep your kids learning. Make sure these posters are relevant to the curriculum and depict cultural diversity. For example, use pictures of historical figures, flow charts, and geographical maps.

3. Artwork: Using your student-s artwork as decorations is an inexpensive and fun way for them to personalize their classroom.

4. Bulletin Board: Every teacher needs a bulletin board. It should be in an area of the classroom that is easily visible to all students. An ideal place would be at the front of the classroom next to the whiteboard. Post important dates or reminders on the board and add decorations. If you have seasonal decorations you would like to use in your classroom this would be a good place, because bulletin boards are easily changeable.

5. Pictures: take pictures of your students in class, on field trips or on the playground and post them around the room or in frames. It is important that your students feel like the classroom belongs to them too!

Five Ways To Improve Reading Comprehension

admin — Tue, 27 Sep 2011 00:00:00 +0000

One way to improve reading skills is to add word games to your lessons. Word searches, crossword puzzles, and word games can give you better understanding of words, increase your vocabulary, and provide entertainment to readers. Games such as Scrabble, Boggle, and Apples to Apples, are perfect examples of comprehension games.
Another tip is to choose new books that will challenge your mind. Set new and more difficult goals each time you are finished with a book. By choosing longer, higher advanced reading books each time one is finished, you will gradually increase knowledge of all reading levels.
Set aside at least 15 minutes each day to read aloud with your children or students. By having them read aloud with others, they are able to hear the words instead of just seeing them. Reading aloud with a group allows the child to go slower to better process what is being read.
Take notes and talk about the book throughout and after reading it. Taking notes on parts the child thinks is interesting, and by talking about the book will give a better understanding of the theme. Discussing parts of the book and answering questions that may linger will also improve their comprehension level.
Finally, allow your children to visit the library frequently so that they may browse through various types of books. Allow them to choose books to read aloud as a group and books when they have spare time. By allowing them to make a decision on what to read sometimes, they will find reading more interactive and enjoyable.

Bring History Alive: Interactive Exercises And Lessons

admin — Mon, 26 Sep 2011 00:00:00 +0000

How can you bring history alive in your classroom? One way is to visit a local historical site: a museum, a battlefield, a historical building, a farm, or other geographic site. Go to an historical re-enactment. If you are limited to the classroom however, here are some suggestions to make history come alive.

Do your own re-enactment of important historical events. If you are studying the Constitutional Convention of 1787, have the students each play a representative to the convention. Have the students prepare their speeches, learn the basic philosophies and political realities of their representative. Have a debate. Make sure the students stick to the positions of their respective representatives. After the debate, have a class discussion on their experience and how they view the various perspectives of the different representatives, including their own. They can then write an essay on their experience.

If you are studying a political campaign, have the students re-enact it. Let’s use the campaign of 1860 as an example. Include the opinions of Lincoln, Douglas, Breckinridge, and Bell. Then divide the class into supporters and opponents of the various candidates. Have a debate, and moderate to ensure the students stick to historical realities. Have students write an essay on the experience.

Tips On How To Grade A Paper

admin — Tue, 20 Sep 2011 00:00:00 +0000

Assigning papers for students to do is great, but figuring out how you are going to fairly grade those papers is not always so easy. There are many different methods that people have taken over the years to try to grade papers turned in by students. When they do this, they are trying out different things that they cannot be sure will work. If the methods do work, then that is great, but if they do not, then it is just unfair to the students.

One tip to grade papers fairly is obviously to grade all of them in the same manner. The method that you use on the first paper is the one that you should be using on all of them. If you are not using the same method, then you are simply causing confusion that does not need to be present.

A second tip is to try not to be too strict on grammar. Although this kind of thing is important, it is even more important in the modern world that students are able to convey important ideas and complex thoughts in a simple and straightforward way. If your students are doing this, then they have all that they need to know about writing a paper for the time being.