There's still the halting awkwardness of getting systems set up for class -- organizing notebooks, finding where to turn things in, repeating expectations often -- while trying to learn everyone's names and beginning to shift into content.
Here's what was on the docket today:
SS
-Finish scavenger hunt & review to ensure everyone knows where to turn things in, collect graded assignments, etc.
-Set up notebooks
-What makes a good story? An activity to brainstorm what you love about the stories that you love, in whatever form they may appear -- book, story, tv show, song, video game, blog, etc.E9A
-Partner Introductions
-Scavenger Hunt & Check out books
-20 Questions with pages 1-4 of The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Nighttime
SC 11A
-Finish scavenger hunt & review
-Introduce the idea of skimming the text
-The Young Man and the Sea web quest to build background knowledge
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Success?
-Notebook set up felt awkward in Short Stories. I think maybe I was a bit too impatient and didn't quite give students the time that they needed to get everything done. I also should have had them list out their favorite stories before I had them staple in their notes on Thinking Maps.
+I'm excited for the brainstorming activity, though. Students had 5 minutes to all the stories that they love, in whatever form that they love. Using a bubble map, they'll choose 3 to describe what they love about each story, and then in groups, they'll use a tree map to categorize commonalities. I like that on day two, students can talk about what they like in a story -- it starts the idea of reading on a positive note and engages them because they're talking about things they love.
-YM&S web quest needs to be modified. I bet I can find more visual information and less text-heavy websites to use than what I have had in the past. It's just too text heavy for Els, even with walking them through the idea of skimming. I had reduced the workload from last year to this year, but still, it seems too much. Also, the skill of skimming is something I'd like to scaffold more.
+Partner introductions went well in each class. I like that they had to introduce someone else and say something about that person. I feel like all of my classes learned well.
-I have some enthusiastic students who are getting each other off task when given work time. I need to do more expectation reinforcement with them and also make sure that when I create the seating chart, they're not sitting together. It's a cluster in the same spot of the room in two of my hours. I think it's throwing the pacing of the lessons off because they're taking longer than they should.
+I had a student who was very quiet and reserved yesterday. Today he seemed to be about the same, so during partner introductions, I helped get him introduced to some people I saw that had similar interests -- some boys who feel particularly "with-it" and friendly. I think that was a good connection for him.
