November 5, 2008 at 9:23 pm (Classroom Management, English Language Learners, Lessons, Strategies, Teachers)
Tags: 6th grade, 9 square, active engagement, Ancient Egypt, authentic conversation, brain based teaching strategies, effective structures, effective teaching strategies, ELA, ELL, ELL Activities, ESL, ESL Activities, ESOL, exit cards, foldable, group projects, group work, Instructional Strategies, interaction, SLA, Social Studies, stations, structures, TESOL
I had the opportunity to team teach a lesson in a 6th grade Social Studies class today. The teacher and I decided to use stations for the structure. The material was not new (ancient Egypt) so we didn’t have to worry about presenting new information. We wanted to give the students the opportunity to “play” with the content and review what they knew.
We developed three different station activities with four actual stations. One of the activities was longer and needed a little more time to complete.
The activities were a 9 square game, decoding hieroglyphs, and creating a foldable using Egyptian cartoons. Each group would have about 11 minutes to complete a station based on the amount of time in the class.
9 square answer key and student copy
Student attempt at answering 9 square puzzle.
Decoding Hieroglyphs
Creating foldable for Egyptian cartoons.
When the students came into the classroom, I had four steps written on the board. The teacher wanted them to copy down the lesson objective and I wanted them to get out a blank sheet of paper. I learned a couple of new brain based strategies at the NMSA conference this past week. One of them that struck me was that we can hold about 10 things in our short term memory at a time. The speaker (Dr. Kagan) suggested that instead of a warm-up we have students write down everything that is going on in their brain when they first come into class (all the things that are bothering them, what they just learned, what they need to do after school, what they need to remember, ect). Sort of clear out the short term memory. I explained to the students why we were doing this and how I would not want the paper. I gave them one minute to write, but had to extend it as they kept making their list for over two minutes. I was amazed about how serious they took this activity. When they finished, I began explaining the stations and they seemed more focused. I will definitely use this activity again. I am thinking about having my students do this every day before class.
I then began explaining the various stations. When I am explaining various activities, I explicitly state what they will and will not do. I show them the actual materials that they will use to complete the activities. I make sure that I have an example for them to follow at each station. I then took them out to their table in the pod area.
Pod area set up for stations
They immediately began working. We made sure that we checked in with each station at the beginning of each rotation to make sure that they understood exactly what they needed to do. The level of engaged conversation was really incredible. The 9 square game was by far the most difficult activity, but students also had to work hard to find the information from the cartoons and decode the hieroglyphs. Out of two classes and almost 50 students, I had one student in one class that was not engaged. It turned out he just didn’t understand exactly what he needed to do and hadn’t asked another group member or a teacher.
Students working in stations.
Another view
At the end of the class period, I had students return to the classroom and write one thing they learned and one question that they still had on the back of their foldable and turn it in. This was an exit card and a way for us to assess what they knew and what they were still struggling with. The foldable can also be used as a review for an assessment.
As an additional exit ticket, I asked each student as they left to tell me one thing they learned.
Overall, we were really pleased with the activity. The students were engaged in meaningful dialog about the topic and were focused for the entire 45 minutes. This activity just reminded me how much I like stations. There is a lot of prep work, but when that is finished, you just facilitate during class periods. It is a great way to teach.
Leave a Comment
October 23, 2008 at 10:30 pm (English Language Learners, Resources, Strategies, Teachers)
Tags: Building Background Activities, ELD, ELL, ESL, ESOL, Newspapers in Classrooms, Non-Fiction Text, SLA, TESOL, Text Features
I recently stayed at a Double Tree Hotel that provided a copy of the U.S.A. Today every morning to guests. I had previously read this newspaper, but it had been several years since I had seen a copy. I couldn’t believe what I had been missing. I immediately had so many ideas for skills that I could use the newspaper to teach my classes.
I began on Wednesday. I got four copies of the same newspaper (back issues) and separated them into the four sections (news, sports, life, and money).
Newspaper Sections
Newspapers setup and ready to be used.
I decided that my students needed basic exposure to the newspaper and the structure used to convey the information. I decided that a great place to start was text features. This is such an important concept to help students find information in non-fiction text, and they don’t always get explicit instruction in it, and I know that they need it.
I decided that I would first start with a “brain dump”.
Instructions students had to follow.
I had them write “text features” at the top of a blank page. I then asked them to write everything they knew about text features on that page. I walked around the classroom while students were working. I noticed that no one had any information written down. I realized that they probably did know something about text features, but that they weren’t aware of what they were. I then picked up a text book and visually showed them some of the text features. As soon as I did that, I got a couple of “Ah’s” from various students. I then asked them what some of the text features I had shown them were. They started listing some and explained how they could be used. After that, I asked them again to write down everything that they knew and the pencils started flying.
Text Features
After a couple of minutes, I asked for them to share additional information that they had written. I then asked about other places that text features are used, and several students did say a newspaper. I showed them the newspaper that we were going to use to look for text features. I knew that my 6th grade students had been studying frequency charts, so I decided that we would create a frequency chart for text features. I gave each of them a small piece of paper and had them copy down various text features and the four sections of the newspaper.
Text Features Frequency Chart
After they finished making the chart, they were told which section to begin working on.
Students working on charts.
They had approximately seven minutes to find as many of the text features as they could in that section. They used tallies to record their information.
Searching for text features
If they had questions, they could ask other members of their group. If their group members didn’t know, they could ask me. It went really well and I was able to explain so many different types of text features and how they were used in real life.
My next activity will be to have them return to their original “brain dump” and write all of the new information that they learned about text features. They will then analyze the data that they collected- looking for trends, explanations in the numbers, and commonalities that they see across sections.
Leave a Comment
