Smart Learning: I have been working on my first sequence. I have been using the book Prairie Fires in order to cover some Social, Language Arts, and Health Outcomes. My main focus has been working with the first three boxes on the coaching card (who, what is happening, and feelings). I want the students to become very familiar with these terms and concepts. We have been modelling and practicing a lot through this first sequence. We are also working on making powerful predictions, sharing, and partner talk.
Inquiry Project: I am currently building toward a larger project with smaller projects. We have been thinking about pumpkins in grade one. We have been learning about life cycles and the needs of plants. On Friday we made a 3-D pumpkin that shows the stages of a pumpkin's life cycle. Yesterday, we were able to make the connection that a life cycle is a pattern. We also thought about other patterns in nature such as day and night. I am hoping that students will begin to see more and more complex patterns as we continue thinking along these lines.
There is a pumpkin in our room. We are going to use our senses to explore different aspects of the pumpkin. Although we do not have a specific end task product, we are working towards it through our modeled exploration in this first math science project.
Gender Based Differentiation: This goal has been my most challenging to implement of the three. I really want to explore more active ways for male learners to engage in meeting outcomes, but I need to find ways to balance classroom management with these goals. We brainstormed a number of good ideas in our Professional Learning Team time last week. I need to continue to try these. I also need to find authentic measures of engagement. I have decided to stick with performance measures as my main method of data (how many letter sounds has the child mastered correlated with the methods of instruction used). Enjoyment and visible engagement will be things that I monitor as well.
How are you doing with your professional goals? Willing to share?
Learning together we all excel :).
Happy Learning,
Terri
Thanks for your post Terri. I think the gender based differentiation is very interesting and I wonder how much of the "hidden curriculum" can be uncovered when looking into this topic.
ReplyDeleteHow am I doing with my professional goals? I am focusing on creating authentic tasks and for data collection, I have given a student survey to see if the task was "authentic" to them. I really liked reading the responses as it has given me another lens to view the learning.