Ben arrived in September with a huge grin on his face. He was ready for grade 1! Ben was articulate and knowledgeable, an engaged learner. December rolled around and Ben had acquired a few sight words. He wanted to read, was excited to read, yet had along way to go.
Last year, during a panel discussion at an ETFO provincial conference, a colleague, Jason Johnston, said this about the Chicago Fire Department: “It spends approximately 80 percent of its entire budget each year on fire prevention.
Right To Play has created a new curriculum called Learning to Play, Playing to Learn, which combines playing, learning, and laughing to make Canadian children active, build character, and create engaged global citizens. The resource is available on the website righttoplay.com.
As an anthropology graduate I have always enjoyed learning not only about other cultures but about my own as well. I was keenly interested in finding a way to pass that curiosity on to my own students in a way that engaged them in significant discussions about racism, tolerance, and identity.
The grade 6 students settle down as the lesson begins. A few scan the room, intrigued by the novel presence of three teachers and one administrator, clipboards in their hands. I begin the lesson; the topic is note taking and summarizing from informational text.
“Teachers do not learn best from outside experts or by attending conferences or implementing ’programs’ installed by outsiders. Teachers learn best from other teachers, in settings where they literally teach each other the art of teaching.”1
As a classroom teacher, I was encouraged to use the “before-during-after” model in planning my reading lessons. Now as a resource consultant, I promote this model in math instruction also.
This activity was born out of our desire – the Grade 4 teacher and mine– to create a partnership that will blend drama and research skills, writing skills and a love of literature, art appreciation and their social studies unit on medieval times.
As a primary teacher and former literacy teacher on special assignment, I know the importance of making connections in reading – text to text, text to self and text to world. We need to find ways to engage learners, using multiple intelligences.
Literacy has become a priority in Ontario schools: uninterrupted literacy blocks are now part of the daily timetable in many primary and junior classrooms.