education

Brain Break Websites!

As the standardized tests creeps closer I have been adding more independent reading passages into the school day. While I understand that test strategies are not the most interesting thing in the world, it is a necessity. I have found over the last few days that throwing in a brain break about every 45 minutes has really improved my students attention and added some motivation.

Our favorite website is GoNoodle! Seriously, it’s awesome and free to sign up! You can’t beat that! It has math and reading practice built into dance moves and songs. I put on the Word Jam vocabulary practice every morning.

Another favorite is just finding YouTube videos of Just Dance. We love the Super Mario song!

Next time you see your students starting to zone out give GoNoodle a try! They’ll love it and you can get them engaged again!

Christmas Around the World Project

For the past few years I’ve done the Christmas Around the World project where I had students draw a country, research it, and write a paper. Last year I decided to try something different.

I made a Facebook post asking for anyone living in a different country to send a letter to my students explaining holiday traditions in their country. I’m still overwhelmed with the response that we got. We received videos, letters, goodie boxes, Christmas cards, and emails from South Africa, Australia, New Zealand, Scotland, Korea, Japan, Switzerland, Germany, Lithuania, Switzerland, and England. This was definitely one of those shining moments that make you realize there are still wonderful people all around!

We had biscuits and Christmas Crackers to open from London. Oh how I wish I would have caught the reactions on video when the firecrackers (Christmas crackers) started exploding. We had cookies from Australia, and we even got to watch a video of a Christmas parade in Switzerland. I have never seen students so excited over an assignment. I lost count how many times a day I heard, ¨Do we have any mail? Can I go check your box?¨

I’m introducing my new third grade class to this project tomorrow. I can’t wait to see where we’ll go this year.

Literacy Websites

¨Children who aren’t reading at grade level by the end of third grade are four times as likely to drop out of high school,¨ Donald J. Hernandez, Double Jeopardy: How Third-Grade Reading Skills and Poverty Influence High School Graduation. The Annie E. Casey Foundation; Center

As a third grade teacher that statistic is worrisome to say the least. It can be challenging to motivate and engage students with drastically different backgrounds, experiences, abilities, and personalities. I have spent the past couple months exploring some literacy websites to add to my classroom.

www.sciencea-z.com is my personal favorite. The multilevel readers are wonderful and the students love the videos.

www.frontrow.com is free and the multilevel articles range in topics. I like to assign social studies topics and find articles on individual reading levels.

www.readtheory.com is free and has assessments to help you identify reading levels and monitor growth.

www.newsela.com The news articles are relevant to what is going on and catches their attention. I am still in the 30 day trial, but if any more MineCraft articles pop up, it would be well worth the money.

www.gonoodle.com is awesome for a quick brain break or concept review. The videos get the children up and active. I love the vocabulary games.

Most of these websites can be accessed at home. Hopefully at least one of these tools will catch their attention and help them grow as readers.