Videos

We've been trying a new potential curriculum for Writers Workshop called Writing City. It's pretty nifty. They have three ways teachers can teach the lesson: teach it themselves with no technology (there's a lesson plan with the lesson chunked and a potential script to follow), teach it themselves with an interactive slide presentation (like on a smartboard), and have students watch a video that takes them through the slides/teaches the lesson.

One of my students had said she learns best if there's a video teaching the topic, so this week that's how I've been testing these lessons. The reader goes a little slow, but they're pretty good. A few of the boys are not as enthralled. One said, "Miss H, I like the way you teach things better." Aww! That made my heart feel good. Other people have also expressed that they're not fans of the videos, so tomorrow we'll mix it up and I'll try one of the other teaching options.

Food Fear Factor went well today, although it seemed to go faster than normal. But that's kind of the way this year's class is. We had kale smoothies (bananas, strawberries, and orange juice also mixed in), coconut water, palmellos (I need to buy some of those!), radichios (cooked with bacon and onions), and parsnips (taste like carrots!) were some of the more memorable items. All together there were 16 things for my kiddos to try, three in each color group with one extra bonus in red (craisins). As an incentive, I gave out marbles for those who were daring enough to try all of them. All together our class earned 56 marbles today and earned an all-class prize. It seems like the majority wants to pick a new seating arrangement. So we officially vote tomorrow on whether that's the class pick or not. Ugh, I hate making seating charts, especially with my kids this year. So many of them are volatile when seated next to certain people. We'll see what happens...