Outgrow your own best teaching – today!
Poems of the Week
Week of 9/29/20 Theme = Identity
- “Here Are My Eyes”
- great for kindergarten
- use as shared reading
- create a copycat poem using this template as shared writing
- “Me” by Walter de la Mare
- teach similes
- create a copycat poem using this template
- “Majestic” by Kwame Alexander (from his must-purchase book, Out of Wonder)
- inspired by Maya Angelou’s poems, so read her work also
- teach similes and metaphors
- create a copycat poem using this template
- “Just Me” by Margaret Hillert
- consider beginning this work with “This Is Me” from The Greatest Showman
- consider starting with Identity Webs
- end this identity work by creating “I Am” poems
- read aloud the phenomenal picture book, I Am Every Good Thing (borrow it from me!)–it’s a giant “I Am” poem!
- revisit “I Am” poems throughout the year by writing them from the perspectives of book characters, historical figures, geometric figures, etc.
Week of 9/14/20 Theme = School
- “Ready” by Amy Ludwig VanDerwater
- brainstorm all the things we missed about being in school and have students craft copycat poems using this template
- “To a No.2 Pencil on May 1, 2020” by Kimiko Hahn
- choose a favorite back-to-school supply and brainstorm sensory details using this graphic organizer (OR make a simple version in your writer’s notebook!) to craft your poem
Summer Reading Launch Units
I created end-of-year reading units to launch summer reading. The goal of each unit, one for primary grades and the other for intermediate, is to set up students on a path to do their best summer reading and included a summer reading info session for families and personalized follow-up over the summer.
Digitial Bitmoji Library PD
Possibly the most fun PD I’ve ever led!
Online Book Club Resources
When I first learned we might be starting quaranteaching, I immediately suggested online book clubs. Later, I gathered my favorite online book club resources to my faux Padlet.
Word Wizard
Vocabulary instruction is my new mission in Longmeadow, so I created this example of how to do vocabulary instruction remotely.
“History in the Making” Journals
I first heard about pandemic journals on Twitter, and I knew right away that I wanted as many students as possible to experience them, so I created this PD for my staff.
Reading Marathons
Reading Marathons are a fun way to teach and support stamina.
My first High Quality Teacher Share (HQTS) in Longmeadow was Making Literacy Toolkits. Every session ran like a workshop, where I did a brief minilesson on the kind of tool they could make or shared resource they could lean on, and the rest of the session was their tinker time. Info from every session was shared on this Padlet.
