Learn Create Inspire
Sharing successes and challenges through teaching while becoming a (hopefully) published author.
Self Talk Art: 54 Things Wrong with Gwendolyn Rogers
Positive self talk art inspired by 54 Things Wrong with Gwendolyn Rogers. This blog post is about our class discussion of ‘should-ing’ on yourself and the positive self talk art we made after the discussion. It was a community building activity that has become a powerful display of the good our classmates see in us—and the good we see in ourselves!
Self Talk & Emotions: Three activities to explore 54 Things Wrong with Gwendolyn Rogers
Using literature to unpack self talk and build class community is powerful. Three more activities to do with 54 Things Wrong with Gwendolyn Rogers. I also share a few ideas for how I design lessons linked to books I am reading. Making a novel do double or triple duty in the intermediate classroom makes engagement with the text even deeper.
Be an Archaeologist: Active Learning in Social Studies
Help students become archaeologists through active learning. This is the first lesson in my mini archaeology unit and it is always a hit. The kids explore sample bags from a dig site to try to learn about a family/culture that living in Surrey in the past. This post walks through the lesson, the follow-up activity, and how to set up your own dig. Have fun making social studies hands-on!
54 Things Wrong With…how kids have been talked about!
I introduced the book 54 Things Wrong with Gwendolyn Rogers by Caela Carter today. This book is amazing and hard. It is one of the Surrey School Book of the Year Nominees for 2022/23.
The activity I did to introduce the book broke my heart. I learned so much about how kids see themselves as well as how they think adults see them. This post reflects on the lesson and my learning.
Activities for September (and a new math game)
Looking for ideas to start the year? Let me help! This post provides links to ideas I shared last year to help start your year. It includes community building activities and books that work well! I have also included how to play a game I ALWAYS teach in September that is loved—The Nasty Place Value Game!
Introducing Bruce, My Anxiety Monster
I have anxiety and I will no longer let shame keep me from talking about it. This post is a deeply personal reflection on my anxiety monster, whom I recently named Bruce, and what I am doing to help myself. This post is an effort to bring visibility to mental health challenges and to take back power in my own life. I am not my anxiety and I will not let it control me anymore.
Social Justice Symposium: The Stations and Logistics (Ideas to share your own learning!)
The Social Justice Symposium is done and I am exhausted! In this post I run down some of the logistics running a day of sharing learning with the school community. The learning was deep and it represented many different learning opportunities. I am so grateful for my class and all of the people who helped us succeed.
Social Justice Symposium: Social Justice Quilt
The Social Justice Quilt is a collaborative piece of artwork that explores the big learning my class had during our Social Justice Symposium unit. To explore the power of instillations, my class learned about The Witness Blanket created by Carey Newman. I also share my gratitude for a teacher friend who helped me with this unit…and so many others!
Social Justice Symposium: Intersectionality in Literature
Intersectionality is an important topic to explore when talking about social justice. It is complex, but breaking it down and modelling intersectionality can help kids understand our complex world. I modelled intersectionality with two texts: One Plastic Bag and a nonfiction piece about Red Dress Day (May 5th) in Canada before setting the students out to explore the concepts in literature. It was powerful for kids to discover the patterns of oppression.
Social Justice Symposium: Creating and Learning about PSAs
We spent one intense week making TWO PSAs: one visual and one video. The kids learned all about public service announcements and used what they had learned about social justice topics to make PSAs for a student audience. We also made a Kahoot! to test our knowledge after watching and reading all of the PSAs.
Math Games: Multiples and Factors (And some math menus for fun)
This post explains two new math games about factoring and multiples as well as three math menus to help with formative assessment. Handouts are included to help you use this in your classroom easily. This is a VERY short post for me that was a request from one of my colleagues.
Banned Books: Exploring Representation in Literature
Kids literatures is being banned at an alarming rate, which limits access to diversity and #ownvoice authors. This post explores a banned books lesson that I designed for my class. It moves from input to co-creation to transformation in the understanding of book banning with my class. I also reflect on personal experiences in diversity in literature and questions you can ask yourself about literature you have used in your own classroom.
The Shame of Being Fat: grappling with my body image is important for me (and my family…and my students)
This is a deeply personal article about living in a fat phobic society. I talk about my personal (and continuing) journey towards acceptance. I also talk about implications for the classroom and what we can do to normalize all body types.
Storytelling Part 5: Storytelling Festival and Assessment
In Part 5 of the Storytelling Series, I talk about the storytelling festival and assessment.
Storytelling Part 4: Becoming a Storyteller
In Part 4 of the storytelling series, I talk about the lessons that helped my kids build their stage presence and add details to their stories. These were fun hands-on lessons filled with laughter.
Found Poetry: Success for All
April is National Poetry Month, what will you do? Here is an example of found poetry created with student generated language from the last six chapter of Number the Stars by Lois Lowry. This post also includes tips for painting in a portable without water and ideas for why this lesson was successful.
Storytelling Part 3: Teaching Kids How to Understand Their Stories
In Part Three of the storytelling series, you will learn how my kids started to unpack their stories and recognize the five anchor points they would use to tell their stories.
Storytelling Part 2: Early Lessons/Background
Part 2 in the storytelling unit series. This blog post outlines the lessons we used to understand different storytelling types. These lessons were the foundation that helped kids start to see the power of oral storytelling.
Exploring and Responding the Hard Things: Talking About Ukraine
This post explores how I used loose parts, an interactive lecture, and art to help my students start to understand the invasion of Ukraine. It is filled with examples of what I did and provides a few other activities that could be done to support your teaching. My little students with big hearts want everyone to know that they will welcome any Ukrainian people who come to our school and hope the conflict ends peacefully. This is cross-curricular and hands-on.
Gender Stereotypes and Pink Shirt Day
Today was Pink Shirt Day. In my class, we used it as a day to explore gender stereotypes and bullying. My short lesson went astray and became an entire morning of powerful discussions and deep learning. This post outlines the lesson and can be used as a template to have a discussion about gender stereotypes with students. It is filled with student quotes and reflections…and adorable accidental posters.