Give Students the Study Skills They Need

Teaching Students HOW TO STUDY

As we move closer and closer to the end of December and closer to midterm and final exams, it's a good time to review study skills with students. In high school teachers often think that when they say to go home and study or tell students to use free time to study that the students will know what to do.  The problem is that most students have never actually been taught HOW TO STUDY.  Part of our job as teachers is to give students the skills they need to study.

A great little Google Add-On that students and teachers can use for studying vocabulary is the Flippity add-on.  The Flippity add-on has a lot of different features, but today I'm going to talk about the flashcard feature.

The Flippity Add-On creates flashcards in much the same way that Quizlet does, however, if you are a Google School District like we are, Flippity is nice because it does not use an external website. Students & teachers can create their vocab right in a Google Spreadsheet and convert them into study cards. When they are done the vocab stays stored in Google Drive, which is much better for organization purposes.

Check out my video below for instructions!

Collaboration & Engagement in a High School Classroom is Possible

Many teachers say that they don't allow their high school students to collaborate because the kids "don't stay on task" or "get too loud." What's the problem with this? Without collaboration there is less learning going on.

When students collaborate they are using social skills and learning to self-manage. More importantly, they thinking critically about the topic. Students cannot discuss something if they don't know anything about it.

How can our students be expected to become 21st-century learners if we don't allow them to interact with each other?

If students are truly engaged, they will stay on task and they will interact with the content. There are a lot of great tools out there to help teachers keep students engaged as well.  I really like Quizlet Live. It's similar to Kahoot in that the teacher projects questions and students answer on their device, but it incorporates the collaborative element.

Students are grouped. Each student in the group may not have the same answers on his or her computer though. They have to discuss together and then decide as a team. Even if the reward is a sticker, kids get INTO IT! They love the competition and the pride of knowing their team won.  And surprise...! They might also learn something.

Check out Quizlet Live and start collaborating in your classroom.

Google Highlight Tool Focuses Student Annotations

More and more our students are being asked to read text and take standardized tests online. Yet they don't have the skills they need to do it.  

Using the Google Add-On Highlight Tool and the Google Doc comment feature, students can easily annotate text.  

Teaching annotation of texts is vital to their academic success. I absolutely love the article "Strategic Annotation" from Dr. Natalie Saaris at Actively learn. In it she discusses why teaching students to annotate is so important.  

Using Dr. Saaris' guidelines and Google's Highlight Tool add-on, students can begin to focus their reading and become better, more active readers.  

See my video below for more info.

Kahoot Thanksgiving Edition - Learning Can Be Fun in High School Too!

High School kids need to have fun while learning too!  These days I feel like we have WAY TOO MUCH TESTING and way too little fun. No pep rallys, no parties, nothing to take away from learning time, and I do understand that school should be about learning, but we need to remember that learning can be fun too.

I have always loved a good Kahoot for learning and for fun!!! And high school students are NOTORIOUS for getting WAY too involved in them. They love them.  If you've never tried one, try one of these - just in time for Thanksgiving - and you'll see that it's a great tool for getting kids actively involved in their learning. There are tons of grade levels and subject areas already made - or make your own. Get kids up, learning, and having fun.

Perusall GRADES FOR YOU! What more could a classroom teacher want? ... Don't Answer That...

Are you doing more work than your students?

Students should be the ones doing the work, not the teachers, right? What you need, what all teachers need, is a program that grades for you.

What more could a teacher want?

Problems that Teachers Face:

• Students are not engaging deeply with texts and content.
• Teachers are working harder than students.
• Students are not reading and comprehending texts.
• We are living in a TEST focused world.
• Teachers need students actively engaged and ready for EOCs and benchmark testing.
• There are massive amounts of grading with HUGE class loads and TONS of extra paperwork and meetings.

What is Perusall? It is a program that allows students to collaborate and annotate PDF texts. It then GRADES FOR YOU! ... Wait... What?!? 


How Perusall Can Help...

• Works in ANY content area.
• Points based for accountability.
• Builds literacy skills.
• Students are actively engaged.
• Teaches appropriate annotation for TDA and EOC type assessments.
• Large texts can be broken up into smaller sections.
• Provides an opportunity to collaborate and construct understanding with peers.
• Provides teacher ability to respond and collaborate quickly with students.
• Comments are automatically scored!!!

Please view my presentation HERE.

Setting Up Courses in Perusall

What collaboration & annotation look like in Perusall

Pear Deck Blog - Teacher, Know Thyself is a Wonderful Reminder of the Importance of Self-Care

Pear Deck is probably one of the BEST teacher tools out there, and not only are they making tools and resources for our classrooms, they are also worried about the teachers in those classrooms. This article is a great reminder to teachers to take time for and care for themselves. If we don't, we can't take care of our students.

Read "Teacher, Know Thyself" from the Pear Deck Blog for a Friday morning pick me up. 

Kudos @PearDeck!

Veteran's Day Resources - 2018

Discovery Education Veteran's Day Resources for teaching students!

LOVE, LOVE, LOVE Discovery Education's Veteran's Day resources, including this POWERFUL 4-minute video entitled: Life After WWII. This video calls to mind other films such as Band of Brothers or Saving Private Ryan and viewing it will explain immediately to your high school students why these men and women are often called The Greatest Generation.

Discovery Education is a paid resource. (So a BIG thank you to my district Richland 2 for getting us this awesome site!) There are great videos, strategies, and lesson plans ready for the taking! I highly recommend it!

If you can't access it, there are many other resources like this Teacher Vision page that have ready-made plans and videos for all grade levels (even high school)!

The Multitasking Myth - How to Get Students to REALLY Learn Content

Around my school, I am known as the "Chromebook Lady," and more and more, because of my technology role, I'm being asked by teachers and administrators to share my thoughts on the excessive use of technology.

Now, as much as I love using appropriate technology in class, I often see students using technology when they probably shouldn't be.  Often times, students claim that listening to music "helps them focus" or that they are great at multi-tasking. But are they really?

A few years ago I saw this video from @Epipheo on what the internet is really doing to our brains. I think it's a great reminder that technology just for the sake of technology is not always best.

Free Writing Resource for Your Secondary Classroom

Live Version of this JPEG HERE.

Coming up with prompts and a structure in which students write is sometimes difficult to manage. I love this resource from Write the World. It applies to so many content areas! It looks like there's lots of other great prompts as well.

Even if you don't use the site for student writing, you can still get great ideas and prompts! Check it out!

Why Do We Vote on a Tuesday in November?

Click HERE for the Live Version.

I've always wondered why we vote on a Tuesday in November. I bet your students do too! Here are some fabulous history and ELA articles that include questions and vocabulary.

Peak their interest and start their learning journey!

Welcome to November

As a former English teacher and a girl who grew up in New England, I'm always thinking of Anne of Green Gables around this time of year. My principal - the fabulous @JTemoney sent us a video today that reminded me again of Anne with an E. With Halloween gone and the holiday season quickly upon us, we all have so much to be thankful for. And even though it's the first day of November and so much stress comes with this time of year, I am SO GLAD that we live in a world where there are Octobers.

Check out this sweet "Welcome to November" video from ECardCorner, share it with your students today, and remind them that we have so, so much to be thankful for.