Welcome to K-3 Teacher Resources Tips & Updates Newsletter No. 9
March 2008
view online Contents....
*Welcome
*Monthly Teaching Tips Winner - 'Ladder of Success'
*Teachers Zone
*Teaching Tip - Language Experience Approach
*New Resources
*Resources Coming Soon *Welcome..
A warm welcome to everyone. Yes, yes, yes, I know, I am late again. I aim to get the Newsletter out on the last Friday of the month, I'm thinking that I should change my aim to the second last Friday of the month, then it might be on time. Oh well, flexibility it the key so they say!!! March has been busy, with a fantastic start to all of our teaching ideas and Teachers Zone contributions - thank you to those who have contributed - I love reviewing your ideas - I learn so much. One of our goals from the start has been to be involved with a Charity in some way. We have almost decided on donating $1 for each teaching idea or Teachers Zone contribution reviewed and published. We are still deciding on which Charity - we would love to be involved with building schools or buying educational resources in some way. We are looking closely at 'Save the Children - Rewrite the Future Program. We would love some feedback on this - please contact us if you know of any other Educational Charities we could also consider or any thoughts you have on the above 'Save the Children' program. Membership upgrade or renewal Contact Me with more suggestions and ideas Member Login Page- Free Members, and Full Access Members
*Monthly Winner - Teaching Tips Contribution.. Congratulations to Sue, Australia who has won a free year of Membership to our Site. Thank you Sue for submitting your wonderful 'Ladder of Success' Idea. You can view this winning idea here. Please help our Teaching Community and be in the running to have your Great Teaching Idea in our next Newsletter, as well as your next Year's Membership for Free. SUBMIT YOUR GREAT TEACHING IDEAS/ PICTURES/ HERE - TAKE A LOOK! Thanks
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*Exciting New Concept -'K-3 Teachers Zone' Thank You to following Members who have started us off with some terrific introductory submissions. We look forward to hearing more about your Teaching Journeys. Also, it is great for our 'Zonees' to receive feedback, so please drop in a comment in the box after reading their submissions to encourage them. But, we would love YOU to become a 'Zonee' and share your teaching journey with us all - pictures of your classroom set up, what you are doing in your classroom, what has worked, what has not worked - it all goes towards helping our Teaching Community and it's fun to participate. We have hundreds of teachers from all over the world visit our site everyday and view our Teachers (your) submissions. Join Us Today at the Teachers Zone
*Teaching Tip Time... Language Experience Approach... The language experience approach is a great way to bring together reading and writing and add variety to language lessons. At the beginning of each term we would have a class discussion where I would find out and list of the children's interests. This ranged from sports to meccano, to dinosaurs and everything in between. Over time, you can also detect the individual children's interests naturally. Each week (we used to do this on Friday for language time and more - sometimes the whole day depending on the activity) I would program an activity incorporating the interests of the children. For example, if a child was particularly interested in building meccano, we might plan a 'building' morning where children use all sorts of things to build a form of transport. Sometimes, something interesting would happen during the week, and I would use this opportunity to work the language experience approach. Once the 'experience' is coming to an end, we would discuss, brainstorm, laugh, share, and write down words to do with the experience - I quite often used the who, what , when, where, why, and feelings framework here. I then had special A3 sized cardex which we often used for language experience. The bottom third was folded under and top two thirds was used for the children to illustrate their experience in some form - we used to make a big deal out of using black felt pen for the children to outline their illustrations and then colour them in - this was always a big hit as it was the only time they were allowed to use black felt and we has 'special' black 'grown up' pens just for this time. Depending on the ages of the children - parents and I would then go around to each child as they are illustrating and do a 'mini conference'. Each child would dictate a sentence about their experience and picture and the adult would write it on the bottom third flap and ask the child to read it back to them. Once this was finished, we might do some circling of letter blend or words - basically some 'word play'. The best time after all this was the 'sharing circle' time afterwards. Each child then got to hold up their picture and read their sentence to the class. This was such a wonderful time. Then of course, all of the pictures were made into a class book about that experience and put in our Library for silent reading time and free reading time. They were always favourites and by the end of the year we had tons of them. I still get excited about this process now (once a teacher always a teacher!) and it works so well. Hope this helps...Cheers Donna
*New Resource Additions to Membership Site... Theme Word Sets ** Gardening  
Concept Books ** What is Short, What is Tall?
** Twinkle Twinkle Little Star
** My Teddy
** My Favourite / Favorite    
Nursery Rhymes Poems and Songs ** Little Miss Muffet
** Baa Baa Black Sheep   
  
Alphabet Printables Resources ** Printable Alphabet Tiles 
...and More Teaching Resources ** Yes/No Reading Games Cards - Nursery Rhymes Theme  
Primary School Maths Resources ** Updated our Math Shapes Cards
*Resources Coming Soon.... Alphabet Resources - phonic blends letter tiles Themes - 'Space', ' Weather' , 'Transport' Nursery Rhymes - 'Simple Simon' Concept Books - 'What is Heavy?', 'What is Light?' 'Thank You Mum' Attribute Mats
Till next time - Take Care..... Donna PS ****(DON'T FORGET WITH ALL OF OUR PRINTABLES YOU CAN PRINT THEM ANY SIZE USING THE PAGE ADJUSTMENTS ON YOUR PRINTER - THIS PROVIDES SO MUCH SCOPE FOR SO MANY USES OF ALL OUR PRINTABLES - make them smaller and black and white - ideal for individual student copies as well.)**** Membership upgrade or renewal Contact Me Membership Pages / Login Page
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