Setting up your Classroom Space

Are you starting to think about your classroom space? Take a look at this video that was produced by "Ontario Elementary Social Studies Teachers Association (OESSTA) in association with "Ontario Association of Junior Educators" (OAJE). You can view the video series on the OESSTA website.

What does your classroom look like?

Please share your questions, thoughts and comments!

An Approach to Inquiry - Video Series

We developed a series of videos about the inquiry approach that was produced by "Ontario Elementary Social Studies Teachers Association (OESSTA) in association with "Ontario Association of Junior Educators" (OAJE).

The following video "How Can I Start to Plan For Inquiry?" explains our process for creating an inquiry-based classroom.

You can check out the entire video series on the OESSTA website under the video tab.
There are 8 chapters:

1. Introduction - An Approach to Inquiry
2. Why an Inquiry Approach?
3. How can I start to plan for inquiry?
4. What might teaching and learning look like?
5. When to move beyond a two-week exploration?
6. How does this process allow for the assessment?
7. What is the value of working in groups?
8. What do you consider in setting up your classroom space? 

What process/structure do you use to start an inquiry?

What does you inquiry-based classroom look like?

Please share!  

Students Join Twitter Chat!

Check out the archived discussion from an #ontsshg chat with Rashmee Karnad-Jani (@Ms_Karnad) and her students. It's about Critical Thinking and students with Individual Education Plans (IEP).

Stay tuned because Rashmee and her grade 8 students will be blogging about their experience here!

Knowledge Building

On June 4th, we had a twitter chat about 'Knowledge Building' with Heidi Siwak @heidisiwak, the guest facilitator. She asked us to look at the 12 Principals listed at http://learnteachlead.ca/wp-content/uploads/2014/11/Knowledge-Building-12-Principles1.pdf
You can see the archived discussion on the link below.
https://storify.com/Robitaille2011/knowledge-building

It's All About The...Relationships We Build!

Pete's brilliant idea of starting the year by having his students build go-karts; allowed kids to move freely around the classroom, gave them skills to work together, to problem solve and to feel like they were still on summer holiday! In the meantime, they were reading, writing "how-to" manuals, learning about simple machines, learning about measurement and the list goes on! They were motivated, felt safe to explore and learned the importance of collaboration. They were building relationships that would help them grow throughout the school year.

In this grade 4/5 classroom, students are engaged and motivated to do work not only because it's an energized workshop environment, but because their teacher builds a safe and inclusive classroom.  Pete takes time to get to know his students, he builds a positive relationship and by providing a hands on activities, he is able to observe the abilities and potential of each and every student.  It's rare to see Pete sitting at his desk, instead he is sitting with students, listening in on groups or conferring with individuals.  The relationships he builds in his classroom creates a positive climate where students feel like valued members and it promotes curiosity and interest.

How do you promote positive relationships in your classroom? 

How do you create a positive classroom environment?

Please share!

It's All About The....

...relationships we build in our classrooms!

It's important for teachers to create an environment that fosters a sense of community, where all students feel included, appreciated and where ideas are treated with respect.

One way to do that is to start the year with an amazing project/inquiry. In this grade 4/5 classroom students had the opportunity to build go-karts! This classroom turned into a workshop and let the students know that learning in this inquiry-based classroom would be different. Students responded immediately and couldn't wait to come to school everyday. Building go-karts in September helped to motivate and engage the students and it helped to build a community of learners.  They quickly learned how to listen to each other, collaborate, problem solve and become critical thinkers. 

Classroom workshop!

More pictures and stories here!

Dinosaur Exploration

This kindergarten class had a choice to make! Will they be learning about planets or dinosaurs?

The majority of the kindergarten students decided that they wanted to learn about Dinosaurs. The next step of learning for students was to build their background knowledge. What do they know? What questions do they have? 

Their teachers provided lots of books, showed pictures, showed video clips,  read informational texts, provided fun learning activities that included mapping skills and following directions. The students were able to discover and learn about the life cycle of dinosaurs!

Discovery Table

Follow directions

The students had to follow these dinosaur prints to find a dinosaur's nest and her eggs!

The Nest!

Once they found the eggs, the students had to take them to the water table to learn about melting ice and to discover what was inside the egg!

Melting Eggs

This kindergarten classroom was buzzing with excitement, interest and curiosity.

What has sparked your interest and curiosity lately?