Between a bought with a cold and new units to set up at work, I’ve gotten behind in my posting, and for this I apologize. Lot’s of interesting things are taking place.

Self-Control Unit for upper grade

I will come back to this unit over time between other units.  The latest thing I was doing with students was having them explore frustration. I showed them some YouTube videos dealing with frustration that were short and sweet, and have them comment about times they feel frustrated, and what it felt like. Probably bracketing Winter Break, I will ask students to look back at what they came up with for dealing with self-control, and tying it more directly to the times that most challenge that self-control so they can apply the tools when they are most needed. It’s still my feeling that a low-tolerance for frustration is the root of a lot of low-performance, and low self-esteem issues for kids academically. I’m also trying to use it at home with my son.

New units

All the grades are moving onto their second Language Arts units. Since my work with students is tied to those unit themes, I needed new unit plans. I’m liking using the Understanding by Design (UbD) unit planner I learned about from Chris Lehmann. I think I’m still not using them optimally, but I feel like we are getting to the big picture ideas, which was my goal.

Second Grade on Kindness is very similar to the Friendship unit for third grade that just finished. If I am doing this again next year, I will focus on how kindness sounds (tone of voice, word choice) more with second, and dealing with differences and conflict in friendship more with third, because they are getting too similar now.
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Third Grade on City Wildlife at the request of one teacher will have a new focus on human interactions with the environment, and how we can leave a lighter footprint. I’ve also been asked to have the kids work on one paragraph writing, which is earlier than I’ve done writing with the kids in teh past, but this is a good thing I think. I’m starting them on keyboarding with Dance Mat Typing to get some pre-requisite skills.
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Page for kids

Fourth Graders on Dollars and Sense is focusing on media and consumer education. They will also be doing some work with Junior Achievement, so some basic business knowledge will also be part of this.
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Blog entries for kids

Fifth Grade on Astronomy will focus on heliocentrism and understanding the scale, and order of the Universe (e.g. stars are not out there with the Sun, and planets, but much farther away outside our solar system).
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Blog entries for kids

Sixth Grade on Ancient Civilization has the kids focusing on the Nile and it’s importance to the development of civilization. Their teachers will also have students doing research reports. I had the two teacher split how they want to do this. One is having them develop a question to answer, the other is having them compare/contrast two civilizations.

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Blog entries for kids