Welcome to my Seventh Grade Home Away from Home

Welcome to my home away from home. I think many teachers feel this way. Are you like me in that even when you are not in your classroom, you are thinking "teacher" thoughts? It drives my sweet husband crazy when all he wants is a little of my time and I am thinking of Whole Brain Teaching and ways to better implement it into my classroom.

So here is my classroom door. Idea stolen from a freebie on teacherspayteachers. It says, "When you enter this classroom..." and then there are many descriptions. For example: You are a learner. You are a writer. Get the idea? All it took was bulletin board paper (free), printer paper (free), glue stick (free), masking tape (free) and finally clear contact paper from Wal-mart (cheap). Can you tell that I like free? My husband sure does also. I have received a lot of compliments from the door and so far no destruction, so students must like it also. I plan to change it out monthly. Next month I will feature the Genius Paragraph.

To the left on the door are copies of two pieces of student work with teacher commentary. I wanted students to know early that I would be looking at their work and showing off exceptional pieces. Also, it quickly lets administration know that teaching is going on. The big push this year is writing, so already I have evidence of student writing posted.

Are word walls big at your school? When we first began word walls, and I googled for more information all I could find was elementary information. Initially my word wall was for looks only. There was not much interaction.  I simply had the words randomly written on my dry erase board. We were given last year in our "Welcome Back" bags a box of 80 CD covers. Really? What can I do with those?  Probably the idea hit in the middle of the night (Most of my good ideas do.). Using a cardboard box from the school (free), I covered the flatten box with bulletin board paper (yep, free). Used double sided tape from the media center (free, I have good connection) and just taped the empty CD covers up. I cut up a plethora of squares from construction paper (free) at the beginning of the year. All I have to do is write the word and definition on the construction paper and slide it into the CD plastic holder. Ohhhh...did have to buy the boarder (Dollar Store).

This year I used the same CD covers and pasted them outside on every other locker. Students went out into the hallway and copied the word/ definition into the ISN. Every 40 seconds I had them move to another word. Perfect behavior from the group of seventh graders, even when another class came walking down the hall. I didn't have to wait for the slower writing or slower working students to finish. A couple of years ago I would have given this assignment in worksheet form and walked around the classroom begging for the students to remain on task and to finish up. Can you imagine all students only taking 40 seconds (really less) to write a word and its definition? Friday, when we were working on our essays, I even had a few students ask to go to the Word Wall to revisit the words.

I stole an idea for my Super Improvers Wall and am eager to get it up. I hope this week to find the time to create it.

I continue to struggle with getting students to buy in 100% to the Scoreboard. I think this week I will have a daily reward. Last week I discovered a cool video from YouTube about the coordination conjunctions that one of my classes was able to watch since we were extended by 45 minutes! They asked, and I played, to see it over and over. So I could reward the winning class this week daily by playing the video and allowing them to dance. Honestly, I don't think they learned much from the video. They just liked the music.

I love working with the genius ladder. You will see more of that later. It is a great tool for application/evidence of differentiation.