It’s that time of year: bake holiday cookies, shop for holiday gifts, wish for the arrival of holiday break, and frantically review for exams.
With only four days between holiday break and our first exam day, most teachers will soon be starting to review, if they haven’t started already. A lot of teachers make review a regular part of assessment. Ms. Byrne puts questions from past units on tests and quizzes. Mr. Hill has been giving mini-quizzes to help him determine what his students need to review and to hold his classes responsible for all information taught throughout the semester.
If you plan on putting together some kind of in-class review activity, let me know; I would be glad to help. I can help you create interactive lessons on the Smart Board, or get you started with CPS clickers. I can even help you figure out what to review to best prepare your students for their exams.
Please don’t hesitate to ask me to create something FOR you or teach something WITH you.

I am spending my third consecutive day in the auditorium of St. James Church learning about Thinking Maps. Actually, I am being trained to be a trainer, which means I have one more strategy I’m begging you to try.

So who’s ready?

First, let me say this: I doubt 120 high school teachers are going to jump at the chance to sit through hours of training. I know us better than that. I’ve got a different proposal—read on. Keep reading »

For a short week, a simple idea. I stole this one from Tracey Moore, who stole if from someone else.

After you fill out your seating charts, laminate them. Even better, buy a laminate sleeve for each seating chart and put a sheet of cardboard inside behind the seating chart. You can write on the laminate with wet erase markers, making it easy to record data during a class session and wipe it away later. Here are a few of Ms. Moore’s uses, and a couple suggestions of my own, for the strategy:

• Record absences and check in/checkout times.
• Make marks for class participation (times you called on a student or times a student responded correctly).
  Record discipline infractions, warnings delivered, or even observations of positive behavior (on-task performance, raising hands rather than calling out, listening attentively).
• Record homework and class work completion.

Obviously, you don’t want to write extensive notes on these sheets, and you will have to transfer the data elsewhere. You’ll also have to clean them daily or weekly. And you’ll want to use them consistently, but I imagine if they become a part of your routine, they will keep you organized and help you record and recall important information about daily happenings in your class.

“Expert performers…are nearly always made, not born.”

Natural Talent
In their book Superfreakonomics, Steven D. Levitt and Stephen J. Dubner tackle a vast array of intriguing topics, from the economics of prostitution to the algorithms that identify terrorists. Citing Dr. K. Anders Ericson, they write, “The trait we call natural talent is vastly overrated.” What determines success, according to Ericson, is deliberate practice.

Deliberate practice has three key components: setting specific goals, obtaining immediate feedback, concentrating as much on technique as on outcome.

Deliberate Practice
What does this mean for teachers? Keep reading »

Out of Time

It can be difficult—sometimes impossible—to find time to learn and try new instructional strategies and technology. When you aren’t in the classroom, you are preparing lessons, filling out paper work, dealing with discipline, monitoring hallways, attending meetings and grading papers. Let’s face it; sometimes it would be easier if someone just did some of the work for you.

That’s where I come in. Keep reading »

When we talk about effective instructional strategies, we talk about cooperative learning, simulations, graphic organizers. We talk about projects and Socratic seminars and problem-based learning. But on Pitt County’s list of 28 strategies for effective instruction, you won’t find the word lecture anywhere.

In Will Wiberg’s African American History class last week I was reminded just how effective a good lecture can be. Keep reading »

A big part of my training for this Instructional Coach job is technology-based. I can’t say any of the training sessions have made me an expert, but they have introduced me to some of the finer points of some pretty cool programs. A number of our teachers already use of range of software to aid their instruction. The trouble we often have as classroom teachers is finding time between attending IEP meetings, filling out PEPs, and grading stacks of papers to explore and implement these programs. I hope that’s where I can help. Keep reading »

One Tool Short
In the middle of a geometry lesson, Marie Lewis showed her students an angle bisecting two parallel lines. Before she even asked them, she knew they wouldn’t be able to calculate the angle, because they didn’t have the tool they needed.

Then she introduced the tool, an auxiliary line. Bingo. Keep reading »

Thanks for checking out the icblog. I hope you find its contents useful. 

A Teaching Phenomenon
A couple weeks ago I observed Mr. Dameron’s standard Algerbra I class, where I saw something practically surreal. The students reviewed a quiz and then moved on to study basic algebraic equations. Mr. Dameron helped students contrast expressions with equations, gave them notes—with Dameron Definitions—and guided them through solving some equations.

That all seems pretty normal to me. Here’s the phenomenon: in that 30 minute span, Mr. Dameron called on—he seldom took volunteers—26 of over 30 students, and EVERY student he called on provided a correct answer.  Keep reading »