Graduation & Retirement

 

Well I have been doing this blog since 2012 and I hope this has been of some use to you.  This year my daughter is graduating high school and I am retiring.  In fact today both of us move on to another chapter in our life.  I will decide that if I will continue with my blog in September.  You will have to stay tuned to find out.  Thanks so much for letting me do this.

How To Transform A Difficult Class

 

If you have been teaching for any length of time, which could be your first year, you have had a difficult class to handle.  Here is an article that might help.  To see it click here.

Students at KCI, good luck on your exams next week.  I might put out a couple posts for the end of the year.  Graduating students, I want to wish you the best as you move forward.  You have gone through more than any other graduating class has in 100 years.  My daughter is graduating with you (at a different school) and I see it everyday.  If you have made it through these tough times, believe me the rest should be a piece of cake.  Peace.

Concept Mapping: a Powerful Tool for Building Actionable Knowledge

 

According to Marek Dudas, "Concept mapping is a way of representing knowledge or ideas as concepts and relationships between them. A concept in the map is anything we want to talk about, i.e., any real-world object, an abstract term, an event, or even a fact. Concepts are usually represented by text in rectangles and relationships as oriented links between the rectangles, with arrows showing the reading direction. Visually, concept maps look like mind maps".  You can read his article by clicking here.  If you would like some sites that offer mapping click here or here or here.

“MONITORING TWO SETTINGS AT ONCE”: NOTES ON ALLISON DUNGEY’S HYBRID LESSON FROM JASMINE LANE

 

My board has either had in person or remote learning but some boards have had the hybrid model which brings with it many different considerations for the teacher.  In this article we see a short video of Allison Dungey's class and how she handles this hybrid model.  After that Jasmine Lane critiques her "performance".  To see the article click here.

5 Teaching practices to keep from remote learning

 

Here is another article from our friends at Ditch That Textbook.  Think about this question, "What part of pandemic-era teaching will you keep?"  This article looks at all the good teaching practices that have come from having to learn some new things the last 1.5 years.  To see the article click here.

Timeline JS

 

If you are in need of making a timeline for a project, this is the website to go to.  I have posted about this before (check the search box in the top right corner or click here)  In my previous post I had a video on how to create the timeline using this website.  Today I am posting a how to video by Richard Byrne.

To go to Timline JS click here.

Primary vs Secondary Sources

 

If you are teaching a history or social studies course that talks about primary and secondary sources the following video from the Gale Family Library explains it well.  

20 teacher questions to ask over the summer

 

Here is another article getting teachers ready for the end of year.  They are some questions for you to reflect back over the year or just about your teaching habits (good and bad).  To see the article click here.

How online simulations help students develop historical empathy

 

From the article Mary Berkery has "a particular interest in engaging experiences that incorporate social-emotional learning and help students develop historical empathy. The aim is for them to not just understand events, but the perspectives of those who lived through them and made the decisions that shaped the past and the present."  To see the article click here.

5 End-of-the-Year Activities

 

As the school year winds down you might want to read this article to give you some ideas on what activities you can do with your students to finish the year off.  To read the article click here.

How to Make Learning Stick

 Eric Scheniger writes in his blog A Principal's Reflection an article about How To Make Learning Stick.  To see the article click here.

The NY Times June Vocabulary Challenge

 

Middle and high school students are invited to write a 50-word story drawing from the list of 19 vocabulary words published in May, which you can find below. We look forward to reading your entries. Winning submissions will be added to this article at the end of June.  All entries are due by June 15.  The words are as follows:

You can see the article in the NY Times by clicking here.

Giving Student Feedback: 20 Tips To Do It Right

 

Following yesterdays article from informEd I read another article on their site.  Even though this article was penned by Laura Reynolds in 2013 it is a very good article for teachers to read. Even without the pandemic, appropriate feedback is very important to our students.  With the pandemic it is crucial.  To see the article click here.

10 Tips for Effective Communication, Online and Offline

 

According to Saga Briggs, "It might seem like good communication strategies are timeless, but in actual fact they are constantly evolving. In an increasingly globalized world, not to mention rapidly shifting virtual landscape, what qualified as effective five or ten years ago–even last year–may not longer be relevant. Here are ten of our tips for crafting good communication in 2021."  To see her strategies click here.

Revitalising Rubrics

 

Welcome to June.  If you use rubrics in your formative and or summative evaluations you might want to read the article by Ryan Campbell and Christian Bokhove by clicking here.