Desiree blogs about issues of interest to elementary educators. Her passion is reading and all skills relevant to being able to read a book. Resources from the page can be found in her storefront on the Teachers Pay Teachers Marketplace.
If you would like me to review other books for kids please leave a comment. It must be useful to either teachers or parents of children age 4 to grade 2.
If you choose not to click over to Wikipedia (and I don't blame you, the information isn't always reliable), here's a few key points:
1. "To create a professional learning community, focus on learning rather than on teaching, work collaboratively, and hold yourself accountable for results."
2. It's"a shared vision or running a school in which everyone can make a contribution, and staff are encouraged to collectively undertake activities and reflection in order to constantly improve their students’ performance."
3.From SEDL: "the teachers in a school and its administrators continuously seek and share learning and then act on what they learn. The goal of their actions is to enhance their effectiveness as professionals so that students benefit."
4. Alberta Education: "The indispensable foundation is to focus on learning, not teaching."
5. Professionally Speaking: where teachers and administrators take an active, reflective, collaborative, learning-oriented and growth-promoting approach to the mysteries and challenges of teaching and learning. PLC has come to mean schools where the entire staff is involved in data-based decision making about student needs, where they define school goals and directions to meet those needs and engage in ongoing study, discussion, testing and reflection to change their practice.
FIVE ATTRIBUTES OF A PLC
supportive and shared leadership,
collective creativity,
shared values and vision,
supportive conditions, and
shared personal practice.
I'd heard of PLC's before, but I didn't really get what it meant. I couldn't grasp the concept from the subject matter it was presented in, and thought it meant all circle where you interact with other teachers. I supposed how I interact with all of you by commenting on your blogs, and replying to your comments on mine are part of my learning process, but they are not actually a PLC, because we will not be meeting and discussing outcomes and looking for solutions together, officially at least. I hope that wherever I end up teaching next year I get to be part of a collaborative process like a PLC. I think it will have a deeper impact on my teaching than being TOLD to do something. Just like our students, I can be stubborn, and if I have some choice in the design, I am more likely to participate. Has your school tried to implement this way of teaching and learning yet?
If you would like me to review other books for kids please leave a comment. It must be useful to either teachers or parents of children age 4 to grade 2. Want to find awesome resources for your Early Childhood Education classroom? Visit Reading With Mrs. D on Teachers Pay Teachers Facebook Twitter Pinterest
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If you're following me on Facebook, you've probably already seen these, but hop on over to my Facebook page to see many more ready to share on your Personal Facebook pages, or wherever, I'm not picky!
Here a a couple, but click through to see the entire collection on Facebook:
Or
If I haven't created a card that matches your preferred school title, please leave a comment here or on Facebook, and I will make one for you ASAP. Please Enjoy!
If you would like me to review other books for kids please leave a comment. It must be useful to either teachers or parents of children age 4 to grade 2.
SIFT is supposed to help plan for school and student success. The website is pretty vague on giving an introduction to get you interested, but registration is free, and you can access past webinars for free, and there are a few free (actually more than a few, check it out, so much reading to do, where do I start?) resources available once you join. They also offer free resources through their twitter page.
After reading a few of the Free resources so I get a better handle on this subject, I've come to the realization that this has A TON to do with PLC's. Actually I see nothing to do with SIFT on the webpage, and a lot about PLC's.
What is a PLC? It is an ongoing, continuing, repeating collaborative process throughout your year/teaching experience, where you work with other teachers to look for solutions, implement ideas/programs/initiatives, and then report on results. After each report you continue these consultations with your group and look for new solutions and implement further changes. Each time, your teaching should get better, and learning will increase.
On the subject of learning, one of the papers I read which I downloaded from their twitter says that school should be focused on the learning, not on the teaching. If you really think about it, there's a huge difference between the two, which is why it is important to participate in your PLC, because it will help you find solutions to ongoing learning difficulties.
I have SO much more reading to do on this subject, but it's really starting to make sense to me.
If you would like me to review other books for kids please leave a comment. It must be useful to either teachers or parents of children age 4 to grade 2.
I don't know about you, but since I'm not settled on a place to work next year, not even what province, I have a lot of preparing to do with each new application.
For my criminal record check I have to go to my local police station or apply online. And it has to include a vulnerable sector check because I'll be working with children. Online is done through mybackcheck, thankfully the link for doing it for Halifax allows you to do the whole thing.
For $50!
I remember paying a lot less than that every other time I've requested a check. But they have you by the balls, so to speak, because you can't get a teaching job without being cleared of offences, at least not in Canada.
Plus, if something comes up and you have the same name, birthday or gender, they require you to go to police headquarters and get your fingerprints done electronically, which will cost you (me), an additional $25. Gee Whiz!
Some of the jobs I've seen advertised specifically request an RCMP check, but for now I'm just going to be providing this one. If they request the RCMP check, I'll get it then, but this is a national search so it should be good enough. I hope.
I think I should have done this sooner, but last time I got one done the RCMP did it, and it was finished (including Vulnerable section) while I waited.
I filled out my online application this week, and was told that once my information was verified, it would only take about 3 days before the results are dropped in my online account. That's SO much better than the more than 2 weeks you're expected to wait for doing it in person. I wonder if that is by design to encourage folks to do it online and save the officers at the front desk some time?
In any case I was unable to verify my ID at the end of the application, because I got one or more of the questions wrong about me. Can you imagine? lol.
So they provided a list of Post Offices to go to to get a form I had to download stamped by the worker there who would verify my ID and scan the form immediately.
So my fingers are crossed that I'll have my criminal record check with vulnerable sector check in my digital hands by weeks end, but since it's Easter weekend, I figure I won't see it until Tuesday at the earliest.
Does your board/School require Criminal Record Checks? What is your experience with them?
If you would like me to review other books for kids please leave a comment. It must be useful to either teachers or parents of children age 4 to grade 2.
It's not a new behaviour management program, but it's new to me.
I haven't been trained in it, but I have done some reading about it in the last 48 hours.
I applied to a job in a school which is apart of Manitoba's pilot program for the implementation of this, and as such, I decided it would be good to become familiar with it in case I get offered an interview and they ask a question about my familiarity with the program.
Here's a basic run down for my fellow PAX newbies, like myself.
1. PAX is Latin for Peace.
2. PAX is a game students play in class starting from day one until the last day of classes.
3. It is based on 40 years of research.
4. It was designed by a teacher, not "experts" who've never set foot inside a classroom.
5. It involves a harmonica.
6. Students work in teams.
7. The sign for quiet is the two fingered peace sign (or originally victory in Europe)
8. Bad behaviour is called a Spleen.
9. Unlike Whole Brain teaching, students are only playing the game for a short time each day, but good behaviour is shown to continue/be more common throughout the day than without a similar program.
10. Students start the year playing the game for a few minutes several times a day, maybe 3 days of the week, hopefully 5 days a week.
11. During regular class time, students compete against each other to show the best behaviour. They need to stay on task for the assigned period of time, and if their group succeeds with a minimum of spleens, they get a prize.
12. Grandma's Wacky Prizes: If they win a prize, they get one of these. ten seconds of a wacky activity. Make silly noises, giggles, hop around the room, tap your pencil on the desk, etc.
13. Can bank prizes for a larger prize such as a popcorn party, pyjama day etc.
14. Set timer, and at the end of ten seconds, the teacher plays the harmonica to signal the class to regain control.
15. Tootles are the opposite of a tattle. Thanks students for the positive things they are doing.
If you would like me to review other books for kids please leave a comment. It must be useful to either teachers or parents of children age 4 to grade 2.
I'm a little Scared, I just started a Facebook page for my blog. A lot of my teacher friends don't blog, and most don't even read them, so I wanted a safe place to share ideas along the same lines as here on Reading With Mrs. D.
I hope you'll join me there!
If you follow me on Facebook, I'll do the same to you, if you leave me a note there.
Hopefully in time I'll figure out how to add those fancy Facebook buttons on my blog, but not tonight. Sweet dreams!
If you would like me to review other books for kids please leave a comment. It must be useful to either teachers or parents of children age 4 to grade 2.
If you would like me to review other books for kids please leave a comment. It must be useful to either teachers or parents of children age 4 to grade 2.
Do your students ever make trouble for you when you're on field trips?
Do you feel the need to make sure there's a chaperone sittting in the back of the bus?
If you would like me to review other books for kids please leave a comment. It must be useful to either teachers or parents of children age 4 to grade 2.
So I've officially begun looking for a teaching job for 2013. I sent off one application so far, to Flin Flon Manitoba, and am considering reapplying to the reserve I previously taught on for two years.
But I am also focusing my search on Alberta instead on Manitoba because my husband has a branch of his company there, and he could easily transfer.
I wish we could stay in Nova Scotia, but there are fewer than None jobs here for teachers. It's getting depressing.
So I've started doing research into the schools and communities I see advertised for next year, and have my fingers crossed.
I worry what type of questions I'll be asked, and how to answer them, and how long an answer to give.
If you would like me to review other books for kids please leave a comment. It must be useful to either teachers or parents of children age 4 to grade 2.
If you would like me to review other books for kids please leave a comment. It must be useful to either teachers or parents of children age 4 to grade 2.
