I just got back from my first KEEN conference- fabulous!! For those of you non-Kansas dwellers, KEEN = KS Exemplary Educator Network. Not only did my 2011 class of NBCT's have a great recognition dinner, but the presenters, discussions, and learning sessions were great! First thing to do: WORD WALLS!
When I signed up for that session I was thinking of sight words and Eric Carle's Hungry Caterpillar unit I did years ago with my first graders. How wrong I was. A group of NBCT's and Horizon award winning teachers from a high school in Salina showed how they used word walls with their high schoolers. There are so many things you can do with words on construction paper and one of the best things is that it's so CHEAP to do!
Today (Saturday) I got right up to school and generated a list of vocabulary words we have been discussing with our newspaper project in my reading classes. I put them up in their own zone and didn't label them in any way. Monday I'm going to have the kids figure out what the title of the display should be and to categorize and connect the words in different ways. This word zone will stay up throughout the period when we're doing our newspaper projects and we'll keep adding to it as we focus on new vocabulary terms and concepts. Great stuff! I'll toss a picture in later and share some more of the great ideas I got from KEEN.
Just one teacher, trying to make fifth grade fun as my students and I learn from each other. Feel free to learn and laugh with (and at) us!
No comments:
Post a Comment