Learn Create Inspire
Sharing successes and challenges through teaching while becoming a (hopefully) published author.
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.
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.
Planning for a Functional Closure? Want to know what it is? Let me help!
Are you planning for a functional closure…or wondering what a functional closure is? This blog post will explain what I know so far and provide some support to educators. I share some of my favourite digital resources and what I am sending home next week so that my students are prepared. We can do this if we support each other!
A Message to the Teachers and Students in Quebec: Loose Parts and Poetry to Unpack Ideas
Bill 21 is a racist law in Quebec. Today my class read The Proudest Blue by Ibtihaj Muhammad and used loose parts to craft messages of support for the teacher removed from her classroom in Quebec for wearing a hijab as well as her students. We used these messages to build a poem of support that we hope will get to this educator as well as all of the other educators in Quebec fighting overt institutionalized racism.
Using loose parts is a powerful way to explore challenging topics and it worked well for this lesson. I have included the poem, photos, and lesson information in this post.
Picture Books Part 7: Activities Inspired by Anchor Texts
Do you like to use picture books to explore identity/core Competencies? This post will give you two activities you can use after reading Count of Me by Migeul Tanco or I Am Every Good Thing by Derrick Barnes. Both activities are hands-on and one involves loose parts/creating a class book using Book Creator.