Category: Higher Level Thinking

Behavior Management, Behavior Plan, Classroom Organization, Education, Higher Level Thinking

These are a few of my favorite things….

Kristine Barberio

I can hear Julie Andrews singing now! Sometimes it is just fun to take a moment and list some of our favorite tools, gadgets, or tricks to use as a teacher. I have listed my TOP 10 List here (David Letterman here I go). I just realized both of these references may be waaaayyyy too old for many teachers (I forget I am now the elder stateswoman of the bunch). Anyways, here are things I absolutely LOVE as a teacher. After I am done – share a comment on the site or social media of YOUR favorite things.

  1. Nearpod – This is an interactive powerpoint website which allows you to either use existing presentations or create your own. These are aligned with Google Slides if you want. The students log in and during any type of direct instruction ALL students can provide their feedback keeping engagement high. It has a free teacher account that gives you access to lots of free pre-made nearpods on pretty much ANYTHING and allows you to upload slide presentations to create your own.
  2. Storyworks by Scholastic – Hands down the BEST 3-5 reading resource for the price. This monthly magazine comes with an online version of all resources INCLUDING THE ENTIRE BACK ISSUE CATALOG. The magazine covers multiple genres of reading every month AND gives a ton of lesson plans, discussion questions, close reading, and activities for students on great skills, strategies, and covering a lot of social studies, science, and current event issues. The magazine aligns with Google Classroom and with a single click of a button it will upload your classes and/or post to your classes. Ask your school to cover the cost, do a donor’s choose, ask parents to donate, or use any classroom funds given (PTO, annual budget, etc.) to access this resource.
  3. Actively Learn – This online reading website has a TON of reading materials for every grade level, lexile level, and subject. The site aligns with Google Classroom and with a single click of a button it will upload your classes and/or post to your classes. You can search for items by subject, skill, lexile level, strategy, etc. They offer a free teacher version that has really innovative resources complete with teacher’s guide and additional resources for every article.
  4. Readworks – This FREE reading website allows you to create classes and assign students reading passages with quizzes, vocabulary, read aloud, and ESL support. It has a wide range of resources in multiple genres. You can individualize assignments based on student’s needs or assign whole class. It automatically grades all multiple choice, tracks students scores over a quarter (great for intervention data), and makes grading open ended responses super easy. It has a newer feature called “Article A Day” which has a note taking component for students. It also has content on almost every science and social studies standard.
  5. Read Write Think – If you are looking for really high level, well designed lessons on reading and writing standards, this website has a ton of super easy to follow lesson plans complete with resources. It is challenging and encourages higher level thinking in innovative ways.
  6. Document Camera for Read Aloud – It is great to bring students to the carpet for read aloud. However, in older elementary (3-5) it can be challenging to get them to the carpet and to sit comfortably during a longer read aloud. It also is hard to have students do work WHILE you read (note taking, close reading marking the text, plot arcs, etc.) from the carpet. I discovered that reading aloud while showing the book/text on the document camera (if it is not an online resource obviously), is super effective to allow every student to fully see both text and illustrations, stay comfortable, and do interactive work while I read.
  7. Easy Grader – As previously stated…I am a dinosaur now! STILL, there is NO tool better to have sitting next to you while grading a stack of work than the easy grader. I know there are a million online calculators, score keepers, whatchamacalits, but every new teacher that I have lent my good ol’ easy grader to LOVES IT!
  8. Behavior Plan and Tracking Tool – This item has been tweaked, modified, and used in many different ways over the last several years. However, when used correctly, this consistently yields results that make real changes in student behavior, parent support and involvement, and helps to move students in a new direction. https://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/Student-Behavior-Motivation-Educator-Plan-4800920 https://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/Student-Behavior-Intervention-Plan-4800875
  9. Glitter Focus Jar – I like to have a plan in place for students who may need to learn calming or cooling down skills. I have a color picture, step by step plan I use frequently (in the plan above). I will often have a cool down corner if I have a higher need student with a variety of items designed to allow for calming. BUT, the one must have is the glitter focus jar. I first saw this used in a self-contained classroom with some of the finest educators I had ever seen. With profoundly challenged students, the glitter jar was a sure fire way to cool, calm, and relax. For myself, my teacher friends, and even the occasional parent in a meeting – this jar calms you down. I challenge anybody to look at the jar and not feel themselves relaxing! There are tons of “recipes” to make them on the internet. Check out this great article with 6 ways to make them from Preschool Inspirations. I highly recommend a plastic bottle, not glass for the obvious reasons. https://preschoolinspirations.com/6-ways-to-make-a-calm-down-jar/
  10. Coffee, Soda, and Food – I have shared many recipes here, lots of pictures of coffee cups, and expressed my love of sharing food with my team. https://authenticteaching.blog/2019/08/06/banana-bread-bribery/ I just don’t think we could make it through the day without coffee, sodas, and some delicious, sometimes nutritious food item!

Your turn! What is on your top 10 list? Post here in the comments or on any of our social media sites!

#Classroom Community, Child Development, Education, Guided Reading, Higher Level Thinking, MTSS, Reading, Small Group Novel Study

A link in a chain

Kristine Barberio

Being a teacher is truly one of the most essential roles in a child’s development. As they move from childhood to adulthood, a series of significant and necessary changes must happen for them to become healthy, functioning adults. Our job is to be a link in the chain towards this development of higher level thinking and functioning. Parents, siblings, family members, community members, and other caring adults have a role to play in this chain but teachers must recognize their role and act on it.

The human brain is a pretty amazing thing. As we develop and learn, the brain changes, grows, and alters with us. I love to tell my students about “growing synapses”. First, because it makes me sound really smart, but more importantly it encourages them to understand the growth mindset causes ACTUAL GROWTH. In the human brain, small neural pathways form as we learn new things. These pathways carry the electrical impulses throughout the brain that give the world around us meaning. When we learn something new, new synapses are formed connecting new information to existing in our brains. This is why if you learn a new word, suddenly you see it everywhere. The word was always all around you – but you literally had no pathway for the word to connect to meaning. Once you learn it, “POP”, a synapse is born causing a link between new information and what you already knew. Try it…the word canoodling is a verb that means hugging and kissing with someone. Bet you see the word canoodling now in lots of places! 🙂

So, how can you be a link in the chain of development for a child? Here are some important things to keep in mind as you work towards this:

  1. Recognize the importance of words – A pivotal study was done that examined the number of words between poverty, middle class, and upper middle class homes spoken to children by the age of 5. The gap between children living in poverty and upper middle class homes was nearly 30 million words. This article links this study to the growth mindset. It is a must read! https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2010/03/the-32-million-word-gap/36856/ In your classroom, value words. Read to them all the time, talk to them all the time, expose them to words all the time! Make the development of language essential in your classroom. Here is Authentic Teaching’s vocabulary contract on Teachers Pay Teachers which supports the use of vocabulary in context. https://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/Vocabulary-Contract-4956632
  2. Don’t let fluency stop you from developing thinking skills – Fluency in reading and writing is an essential step in developing the foundation skills kids need. However, we must explicitly teach our kids to develop their thinking WHILE teaching fluency.
  • I love guided reading groups for this purpose. Guided reading allows students to talk about their thinking in a safe place where there are no right or wrong answers. Check out Authentic Teaching TPT for details. https://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/Small-Group-Novel-Study-Guided-Reading-4836948
  • I also find ways around the fluency by using read aloud for non-assessment activities allowing students to access text and demonstrate their THINKING without fluency in the way. Readworks, Storyworks, ActivelyLearn, RAZ kids, and Newsela all have read aloud features to support students.
  • Voice typing which is free on most platforms allows students to demonstrate their written thinking skills without their writing fluency stopping them.
  • I sometimes have really low and reluctant writers record themselves in a video of their story (Flipgrid is an amazing tool to support this) to get their ideas out. Then, we work to move the story from the video to the page by listening, pausing, and writing each sentence.

3. Explicitly teach higher level thinking – Inferencing and Drawing Conclusion reading skills are the most challenging and essential skills in developing great readers. However, we rarely teach these skills explicitly. Both need to be taught the way we teach a math skill like adding fractions with uncommon denominators – in steps that build on each other. However, we rarely teach the steps to students. Check out these resources on Authentic Teaching TPT on both skills broken down: https://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/Drawing-Conclusions-Flow-chart-4956576 https://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/Introduction-to-Inferencing-4956564

4. Be aware of the impact of childhood trauma on learning – Brain development is altered by adverse childhood experiences (ACE). It literally CHANGES a child’s brain. Our students that have experienced this childhood trauma learn differently, need different supports, and literally REQUIRE US TO PROVIDE SAFETY, STABILITY, AND FOSTER RESILIENCE. This is an incredibly challenging prospect, but can literally save a child’s life. I was absolutely floored by this article and corresponding study from the CDC/Kaiser Permanente. I encourage you to carefully read this article and study to impact your students who experience trauma. It happens in all socioeconomic groups, in all commmunities, and we must be aware of its devastating impacts on brain development. https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2015/03/02/387007941/take-the-ace-quiz-and-learn-what-it-does-and-doesnt-mean

5. Develop the social skills and behaviors required for their age – Understanding social cues and having the skills to navigate appropriately in the age group they are in is ESSENTIAL for a child. As a teacher, we must create a classroom that has high expectations of behavior in all areas: academic behaviors, emotional behaviors, social behaviors, and personal behaviors. Some students require explicit instruction on these skills to help them develop the self control to demonstrate these behaviors. If we do not teach the appropriate skills and behaviors to our children, we stop them from being able to function in the world. Stop and consider what the student who demonstrates the most appropriate age level behaviors in your classroom does in all areas. Now, start intentionally teaching ALL students in your class how to achieve these behaviors. Just like our academic instruction, we have to differentiate for some students and find alternate ways to help them on this growth.

Being a link in a chain of development is a daunting task. As a teacher, we can often lose sight of the pivotal role we have in our student’s lives. A friend of mine worked for years in high poverty schools. Each year at the end of the year, he would write a letter to each student in his class telling them what he hoped for them, admired in them, and what he celebrated in their growth during the year. He would frame these and give them to his students. Over the years, many students have found him on social media and shared the letters that they kept. They thanked him for being an essential link in the chain of their lives, helping them build resilience to overcome adversity, and for linking the broken parts of their lives with his teaching. We can all strive towards this kind of impact in a child’s life….THAT IS THE REASON WE SHOULD TEACH! Be a link in a chain for every child in your class…somebody’s development depends on it!