I’m a week into my job teaching with the home school co-op and I discovered (not really to my surprise) that I have a LOT to learn about working with middle school kids (especially since my classes are a combination of 5th-8th grade). I knew that it would be a […]
I start teaching at the home school co-op Tuesday. That means I barely have any time left to get back into teaching mode after being out of it for a year and a half. Some of it is easy, like the lesson planning, paperwork type prep, and organization. […]
One of my biggest fears going into teaching was that I would catch a student cheating on a test or plagiarizing an assignment. I have been extremely fortunate that I have only encountered 2 blatant acts of plagiarism total and about 1 instance of cheating per semester. Kids […]
Summer is winding down, so that means we’re fitting in as many last minute family outings as possible. There’s a super cute little town about 20 minutes from where we live right on the water. It’s full of mom and pop eateries, independent shops, festivals, and parks. First […]
It’s incredible how much you learn in just a few weeks of being in the classroom. Not to knock my certification program, but there are just some things you can’t learn from a book, and there are some things that my professors couldn’t discuss due to time restrictions. […]
One thing I try to impress on my students is that things aren’t always what they seem or what you expect. Things change over time and that’s one reason why studying history from written, visual, and spoken records is so important. What object A or place B was […]
Every history teacher has their favorite time period to study personally, topic to teach professionally, and topics they need or want to learn more about. World War 2 and the Holocaust have always been my favorites. I love Ancient Rome too, but WW2 and the Holocaust squeak by […]
Head over to Student Savvy at 3pm PDT today to read my guest post on making history come alive for students! I recreate trench warfare for my students every year and I modified my original post for this great opportunity. Plus, Student Savvy is an awesome blogger and […]
Last week I wrote about how I sometimes play hangman and 2 truths and 1 lie to get my students engaged in the day’s lesson (click HERE to read that post). Today I have two other methods to share with you (both are Pinterest inspired). 1) I write the answer to […]
Getting students engaged and excited at the start of the class becomes more of a challenge as the year goes on. Every year (and sometimes semester) I have to come up with new ways of hooking the kids into the lesson, or giving them warm-ups, so that they […]
