Working together

Today I completed my Inquiry and Cooperative lesson! Check out the entrance of our medieval town!!

Today was a little more challenging than my direct lesson plan. The students were much more excited and engaged due to the type of lesson. I used a website called bouncy balls as a method to control students volume. The website picks up the volume in the class which controls the bouncing of the balls. Setting a limit on how high the balls can bounce will create a volume limit for the class. I think this is a great website but it must be implemented continuously for students to respect it.

For my Inquiry Lesson I introduced the students to Miss. Medieval. I created Miss Medieval on Voki. Voki is an amazing tool that allows you to create a virtual speaking person. I had the Voki introduce the problem to the class. The library has lost all of its information on medieval times and we must find it all! The students were asked to go on a scavenger hunt and find items that belong in medieval times. Students were asked to write a letter to Miss Medieval to inform her of what was found. Here are some samples of the students letters!

For the cooperative lesson plan everyone became merchants! The merchants had to partner up as a group of four to create a market that would sell the most goods. Here are some examples of the students market signs!

The students were very creative when making their signs and loved the experience of how markets really worked!

Merchants, Markets and Mud

Today we completed our first direct instruction lesson! During our last class we talked about medieval times while we did our ice breaker activity. All the students came up with such amazing ideas of what it would look like to live during this time. Students drew themselves, what their house would look like and many other things! To check out these pictures view my blog titled, "Our first field experience". I showed the students some pictures of medieval times and asked them to compare and contrast their pictures. The students were very engaged and were ready to learn.

I introduced a word cloud to the students. Click the link to view my word cloud. I am a big fan of using tagul. Tagul allows you to create a word collage and create it to form any picture. I chose to make my word collage a castle to fit the theme of medieval times. It is a good method to introduce a topic. I asked the students to point out words they recognized as well as words they didn't recognize. This allowed me to pre-assess students prior knowledge and identify gaps in their knowledge.

I created red, yellow and green signs to check for students understanding. The red flag means that the students need help and we need to review the material, the yellow flag means we need to slow down and the students need some assistance, and the green flag means they understand the material. Through out the lesson I would pause and ask students to raise their green yellow or red flags signaling to me their level of understanding.

At the end of the lesson students collaboratively worked in groups to complete a matching activity. I created two posters, one with vocabulary words and one with the definitions. In groups students formed a definition for their vocabulary words and matched the words and definitions on another poster.

On the way out students filled out an exit ticket. If the students felt confident in what they learned today they had to write down two facts that they learned. If they felt okay about the topics they learned, they had to write one fact they learned and one question. If they were still unsure about the topics they learned today, they had to write down two questions they still had. On the way out they stuck the post-it on the emoji board on the door and matched it with the appropriate emoji face. Any remaining questions the students placed in our wonder box.

Our first field experience

Tuesday we began our first field experience!

As an ice breaker activity we had the students draw a picture of what they think it would look like if they lived in medieval times. Some students drew themselves, castles, knights and horses. Every picture was different and depicted different visions each equally creative as the next. Here are some examples of pictures the students created!

On the back of these pictures we had the students write one thing they know about medieval times and one thing they want to learn. The answers were very thought out and the questions were very creative. Here are some of the responses I received!

During this time we played two truths and one lie. The game is a great and fun way to get to know each other. You have to think of two truths and one believable lie about yourself, and everyone else must guess the lie. It's a really funny game and gives you the opportunity to learn mutual interests. The students had a great time and we all learned so much about each other. I can't wait to begin teaching on Tuesday!

Icebreaker

Ice breakers are SO important to introduce a class. In order to get to know everyone we all created "digital me" projects. This project served more than one purpose. Along with learning things about people, you also learn what you have in common with others, you learn many different digital applications and what/how they can be used and you have the opportunity to practice speaking in front of a class.

Check out my digital me project! I created my project on Tagul. Tagul is an awesome easy to use website. Tagul is a website that allows you to create a word collage. All you have to do is type in the words and choose the shape or picture that you would like the words to appear in. This is great to use as an introduction to a lesson and test of prior knowledge. The teacher can ask the students if they recognize or know any of the words displayed in the word collage. This will assist in testing the students of their prior knowledge. Tagul is also great to introduce yourself to the class.

In my Tagul I wrote my name, descriptive words that match my personality and words of things I am. Here are a few examples of what i wrote; I am kind, dependable, a teacher, a daughter, a sister, a traveler and a learner. One of the most important words I wrote in my word cloud is "autism". My brother was diagnosed with Autism when he was three, ten years ago. This diagnosis has drastically effected my life in ways I couldn't have imagined. My brother has been my inspiration and has taught me more than I could ever teach him.

I chose my word cloud to be shaped as a sun over the ocean because of my love for traveling. I have traveled to 12 different countries and 7 different states in the past two years. I love seeing different places and trying different things.