http://dietdew24oz.wordpress.com/2008/08/03/umm-studying-book-review/

I’m thrilled to find such a positive review of my daughter’s book, “Umm Studying? What’s That?” online!

Solutions: What’s a Paraprofessional to do?”

I just came across a well written blog article, Tasks for Paraprofessionals: Expectations for Instructional Aids in the Classroom .  The benefit to reading this article is that it helps sort out what paraprofessionals can do to support teachers and students in the classroom.

The ways a paraprofessional might assist in the classroom are as individual as the students they are responsible for, the classrooms paraprofessionals work in, and the grade level in which paraprofessionals teach. In my book, “Paraprofessionals And Teachers Working Together” are checklists filled with options for the general education teacher, the special education teacher, and the paraprofessional to consider when defining paraprofessional roles in the classroom. Use these checklists as a tool to negotiate the working relationship in the classroom before the paraprofessional starts “on the job”.

Also, you might be interested in my Audio Presentation, “Increasing the Effectiveness of Paraprofessionals and Classroom Teachers Working Together” available at www.ber.org.

The Value of Coaching and Experience in the Learning Process

From Susan’s booklet, “Martial Arts and the Awakening of a Public School Teacher”
Copyright 1995 by Susan Fitzell

“How are skills learned?  By experience.  How, then, are they best taught?  By coaching.  I, the teacher, can tell you rules for writing — grammar, forms of felicitous phrasing, types of argument.  I can show you examples of good and bad writing, and with the aide of an overhead projector, I can demonstrate for you how to analyze a piece of work.  However, until you write and I criticize your writing, your expository skills and the thinking behind them lie latent.”
–Theodore R. Sizer, Horace’s Compromise

I had an experience just this week, that drove this point home. I have been training in the martial arts for almost three years. For the past year, I have been studying Kickboxing along with a formal style of Kung fu.  I have been learning the skills, and the rules, necessary to effectively defend myself.  In the academic world, this would be similar to learning grammar rules, dissecting sentences, and practicing penmanship. The pieces are studied and practiced. Individual skills are tested. Form is learned. I am told and shown what works, how it works and why it works, just as academic teachers “tell” their students how to write. However, I have seldom Read the rest of this entry »

From Susan’s booklet, “Martial Arts and the Awakening of a Public School Teacher

Copyright 1995 by Susan Fitzell

Last Wednesday I was hurt during my self-defense class. The instructor was having us practice throws. I don’t like being thrown. I don’t trust the inexperience of the “throwers,” nor do I trust my ability to consistently fall correctly. It’s part of the class, however, so I do it. I don’t know how it happened, but when the young person “threw me” (with a shoulder throw), my head whipped around and hit the floor, hard. Read the rest of this entry »

Create Computer Tutorials

Record What You See On Your Screen

Wikki Stix

Creative Learning Fun

Wikki Stix

Acrylic hand-knitting yarn, coated with a microcrystalline wax makes for simple, no mess learning tools. They can serve as interactive concrete examples to your abstract lesson plans. Demonstrate, for instance, the function/structure of a cell; or have your students fill in states/countries on a map of the world.

“These flexible, wax covered yarn strands might be the most interesting new teaching tool to come along in decades.” – Science and Children Magazine (National Science Teachers Assn.)

Youthful energy is a wonderful thing but during a lesson, students drumming along Read the rest of this entry »

This is a color coded visual version of the “Order of Operations” Mnemonic, “Please, excuse my dear aunt Sally for looking too rough”

Create Your Own Posters

Wonderful Displays

Designing your own posters is a great way to fill your classroom space with a personalized feel. Everywhere your students look, there could be hanging reminders of past lessons, or posters foreshadowing what’s to come, or simply to Read the rest of this entry »

Individual White Board Erasers

Free Alternatives

The Body of An Essay

Visual Demonstration

1. The Brain – the intro: like the brain, the intro “controls” the body of the essay (especially point out ‘thesis’)

2. The Heart – body paragraph: at the “heart” of the essay are the body paragraphs.

3. The Feet – conclusion: like your feet, Read the rest of this entry »