WordQ

    

WordQ

    Today, for one of our literacy centers we had our students working with an amazing program called WordQ. WordQ is a digital writing tool that integrates word prediction, spoken feedback and speech recognition in order to help students with the writing process. It uses word prediction to assist and support writers by preventing, identifying and fixing their own mistakes. As a student types, WordQ predicts the word that may come next, the student sees different words in a list and can select the word they feel is appropriate. Following their selection, the program will read back the sentence in order for the student to determine choice accuracy. Here is a quick breakdown of WordQ capabilities and what we use it for in our classroom:

• ·       Predicts words as you type
• ·       Reads predicted words in order to improve choice accuracy
• ·       Predicts the next grammatically correct word automatically
• ·       Re-reads sentences as they are typed for word flow and meaning
• ·       Re-reads and highlights completed work for editing and proofreading
• ·       Reads digital text on your computer

A screen shot of beginner word selection list:

    WordQ has the ability to adapt to different levels of need. Vocabulary lists can be limited for beginners and advanced for those who are more proficient at writing. In our Grade 3 class, many students are English language learners and still learning to become great writers. For this grade, we use the beginner setting which has a limited vocabulary list with choices they will recognize and be able to select. Once they have selected the word, WordQ reads the sentence back to them in order to confirm their selection. 

    This is only an exploration of the most basic WordQ program. There are many other additions that have more advanced capabilities. For the purpose of our classroom however, we use the basic program with Microsoft Word. We have noticed a tremendous difference not only in our student’s confidence with writing but also their enjoyment of it. This program helps them edit their work as well as learn more about tenses, abbreviations and grammar. There are many other resources available on WordQ's website as well as a number of tutorial videos. This program is very user friendly; anyone can learn it quickly and efficiently. Definitely a classroom resource every teacher and student should have access to. 

http://www.goqsoftware.com/resources/videos/

http://www.goqsoftware.com/en/

Teach Kids News

Teach Kids News!

    Today, I discovered a great new website that can be very well incorporated into the Daily 5; read to self, read to someone, listen to reading centers. The website is called Teach Kids News. Teach Kids News publishes up to date real life stories in kid friendly language. Grade specific articles are also available as well as specific subject area stories. After reading an article either to themselves, someone else or just listening to others, students can write about what they learn in their journal or discuss it among each other. Another idea is for students in one group to read the article and then leave comments on post it notes for the next group. This will allow the teacher to see who is writing thick or thin questions or see students who are posting superficial comments, or meaty comments. A great way to gather data and make assessments about students. 

    This website can also be used as a great start up activity for the week and incorporated into work on writing as well as word work Daily 5 or literacy centers. Depending on the age group, this could also lead into a writing activity where students become newspaper reporters and write their own article.

    In our Grade 3 class we decided we would incorporate Teach Kids News into our work on writing center. Students created wanted ads to be published in the newspaper based on characters from fairy tales we have been reading in class. Our fairy tale unit is coming to an end so we thought this was a unique way to culminate some of the stories we have heard. Here are some samples of our work: 

    Teach Kids News is relevant not only because there are so many ways to incorporate it into the curriculum, but also due to the fact that it allows students to become acquainted with what’s happening in their community and the world.

www.teachkidsnews.com

Anchor Charts

Anchor Charts

    Despite my love for technology, one thing I will never give up making in the classroom are hand written anchor charts. Anchor charts are so important because they make thinking visible. In our grade 1 class, we have various relevant anchor charts around the room. Not only do anchor charts build literacy around the classroom, teachers and students make them together by recording content, strategies, processes, cues and guidelines during the actual learning process. By posting them around the room on various subject boards, current learning is accessible to students and teachers are able to reference them to make connections as new learning happens. 

    The grade 1’s are learning about inferencing and schema right now. After today’s read aloud I created, with the students, two a new anchor charts for their classroom. During my lesson the students were very engaged as I was asking them questions and allowing them to provide input and examples as I was writing.  When the students were asked to go back to their desk and work as a group to fill in their own chart based on the one we created, they were able to reference our chart and use it as a tool when they expanded on ideas or answered questions. A teacher from another room even came in and complimented me on my chart – asking me to come in as a guest teachers and make one for her Grade 1/2 class also, I was flattered. 

    After explaining schema we decided it would be a good idea to tie it into making inferences for the students activity. So we created another anchor chart for them to be able to reference during their group activity. We had the students go back to their group gave them each a picture and asked them to follow the formula from the anchor chart to create an answer. The group activity worked out really well, there were very few questions asked which allowed us to go around to each group and observe student learning. 

Tangram Geometry Center

Tangram Fun! 

    One of todays math centers uses one of my favourite classroom resources; technology. The students are finishing up a geometry unit in math and have had practice comparing and classifying two and three dimension shapes as well as sorting them by their properties. This SMART Board activity uses 7 different geometric shapes to make fun pictures and is available free online. This is only one of many free learning games available on www.pbskids.org. In this center there is always one student at the SMART Board, while the others are waiting they too create the picture using live tangrams and discuss the each shapes properties. Students love this activity and it is a fun culminating task for a units end. It is also another way students create real life objects from shapes, recognize transformations and identify angles and use shapes.  

Here are some more great free websites for Primary Math games that can be used on the smart board:

www.abcya.com

www.coolmathforkids.com

www.learningmathforkids.com/math_games

www.coolmath-games.com

www.kidsnumbers.com

www.kidsnumbers.com

Our students on the SMART Board:

E for Edmodo!

   Today I learned about Edmodo. Edmodo is an interactive portal for students and teachers to connect. Teachers can post assignments for students and parents to view; which not only keeps them updated with classroom expectations it also informs parents of important dates. Students are also able to interact with one and other via a safe and secure chat room; which teachers and parents can view and monitor. 

    Parents can create a login and follow their child as well as receive notifications, assignments and notes from their childs teacher. Teachers can act as mediators, allowing them to delete or create new student blogging forums. Marks can also be logged, organized and sent to students and or parents by the teacher, making it almost like a virtual mark book. Students can ask both private and open questions to their teacher who responds through Edmodo. 

    Students and parents love this because it allows them to follow their child's progress as well as maintain great communication with teachers. 

  
    This is a screen shot of a teacher's Edmodo explaining an upcoming assignment. This teacher also uses Edmodo for its chat forums, communication with parents, posting assignments, sending marks and giving students descriptive feedback. I have also added some screen shots from Edmodo's website which shows some other features it offers. Great way to keep lines of communication open and clear with both students and parents.  

visit http://www.edmodo.com/ for even more info. 

   

The Daily 5: 

In York Region, teachers use what is called the Daily 5. The Daily 5 is a language structure that helps students develop the daily habits of reading, writing and working with others. It is made up of:

•           Read to Self (where students practice reading a variety of books to him/herself and sometimes write a journal entry about it)
•           Read to Someone (reading to someone else to practice their oral reading and listening skills)
•           Listen to Reading (listen to stories which provides a good model of phrased and fluent reading)
•         Working on Writing (a variety of activities to build writing skills) 
•      Word Work (a variety of activities to build phonetic awareness and spelling skills).

<--Daily 5 posters in our class

After much time is spent modeling and practicing each piece of the Daily 5, the students have the skills required to work independently through the language activities, while the teacher can be engaged in guided reading or conferencing with students. The students work their way through each center throughout the week and are responsible for logging in a journal. This program is definitely something all teachers should consider when they are planning.

I am posting about this not only because I think it is a great program but also because I wanted to highlight a game form one of this weeks centers. The game is called Silly Sentences; there are two editions but in Grade 3 we are using the junior edition. The object is for students to work their way around the board and depending on which square they land on they have to create sentences using 3, 4, 5, or 6 letter words. Our students use the white boards to build their sentences with each letter from the word – they can also work together for the more challenging words. This game allows students to work on their awareness of spelling as well as the ability to build proper sentences, that sometimes end up as very silly! 

DAY 100...

    This week in Grade 1, our class celebrated the 100th day of learning. To students in Grade 1, who are still learning to count to 100, this day can be both exciting and overwhelming. Knowing this day was coming, daily countdowns were done using adding and subtracting as a group during math time. From this, students develop the ability to count something that occurs in the real world (days of the week) as well as confidence in counting. The majority of the days curriculum activities were based upon this special day.

    
    One activity in particular had students working on connecting, representing and communicating basic presentations of simple math using concrete materials they brought in from home. Students brought in 100 items from home (fruit loops, smarties, straws, buttons) and were asked to create posters. Some students grouped items in 10s, others in 50s. Walking around it was easy to see which students were effective at communicating thinking visually through the poster, as well as in writing using proper mathematical language.

    This is an activity that I would definitely recommend for a grade 1 classroom. The students loved bringing in their own items and had fun displaying them for others to see all while learning at the same time! 

I KNOW we are 100 days smarter!

Once upon a time...

   Once upon a time there was an aspiring teacher. She decided in order to share her experiences and learning she would start a blog in order to share what she discovers with others. Hopefully from this blog people will learn more about her as a teacher and see what other educators are doing in their classroom. The end...for now.