Globe Trotting!

The Global Schoolhouse is a website that I would find useful in my classroom. This website was created by former teachers in an effort to increase communication on a global bases. The website offers activities for elementary through high school age students. It contains political information, virtual field trips, and science connections. In our curriculum students are asked to make text to world connections in their readings. This website is an excellent model for students in making that connection. However, my favorite area was the area of special needs students performing. This would be a good source for confidence building with my students. The website also offers a section where software can be purchased by teachers, administrators, etc. Overall, this website would allow my students to discover different and exciting new places, obtain background knowledge, make world connections and even play games to improve thier knowledge.

Run, kid, run!

Run, kid, run!
Originally uploaded by Gianni D.

It's raining

Do you know what that means?

The website I added to my delicious account was a vocabulary website. I liked this site because it offered different lesson plans that could be used to develop vocabulary skills for students. The site covered grade levels K- 12th grade. The skills included spelling, predicting, retelling which would be very useful in the primary grades. Some of the sites even had memory games for student to play.Some of the websites were interactive, internet connected, cooperative group oriented etc. The links were also rated from one star to five stars. This site would be beneficial in the classroom setting so that instruction could be diffentiated for students. The activities ranged from very easy to challenging which would help motivate slower paced students because they would be successful and motivate higher achievers to improve their skills.

Teaching each other

The EFL classroom 2.0 was an excellent blog site. Their motto "when one teaches, two learn" describes this site perfectly. The site is divided into two sections, the main page and the site map. The main page provide several options for teachers. These include a chat room, a forum which contains lesson plans, teacher question and answers, blog posts etc. All of this information would be extremely useful when working with ESOL students. The teachers respond from all parts of the country. The teachers teach grades K-12. The site map serves as a network of information and where to obtain information. The information includes video sites, listening sites, speaking sites and everything in between! I really loved this site and I think it would be useful for all that work with ESL students

Have you loved on someone today?

I chose to read a from the Mysterious Teaching Blog. Underneath this blog was a blog about how parents show or think they show their children that they love them. The author indicated that today's students often rely on teachers to get hugs because parents feel that theyshow love by buying things, believing them over teachers or other adults. By the same token they send their children to school without breakfast, without proper clothing and sick. The writer felt that parents in some cases didn't care. I disagree with her in that respect because some parents are trying so hard to put food on the table, clothes on their back and make them feel like they are like all of the other kids in the neighborhood. However, regardless of why children are asking for a hug, we all feel the need to be loved and needed. So,in the correct circumstance, it's okay to provide a hug to students.