How Are You Anchoring Learning For Students?

We all know students do best when they have a touchstone or link to material especially when the content is abstract or difficult. We all know the standards are high and the content is tough but how are we helping children have an anchor to learning.

Anchor charts and word walls are very powerful if:

*Students help create them.

*Students and teachers use them regularly.

*They are meaningful to the students.

This leads me to thinking....

*Do I use signals or gestures to help embed the content?

Do I have portable academic word walls?

*Are kids referencing these anchors?

*Do I hear academic talk about these anchors?

*Are my tools kid friendly -- from organization to content as well as visually?

I saw some great examples last week in a Science class where her word wall was broken into subjects. There were also reference tools for the students desks. They were a really useful tool.

Leaves me to thinking.... Am I anchoring learning enough to support my students?

Absolutely Amazing!!!

Yesterday, I had the privilege to drop by a friend's classroom. I left in complete amazement and with excitement. She teaches 4th Grade Writing. We all know that is a hard job with our new standards. They were all working in workshop very diligently with independence. They are just learning about writing expository papers. There were 8 kids working in pairs about the same topic with a specific purpose such as similes, sensory language, experience, etc.... The partners brought their index cards back and were to assemble them into a paragraph. Talk about powerful and meaningful hands on revising and editing!!! It was amazing to watch and listen !! This activity was tough but made kids think. They had to talk to each other to find a way to merge these four cards into a sensible and cohesive paragraph. Watching them it was obvious that they gained more from this type of mini lesson than go work on your first expository paper. "

It makes me be reflective....

*Do I make writing hands on enough?

*How can I make my mini lessons more powerful?

*Do I have enough academic talk going on in writing?

*Am I using strategies in writing that require higher order thinking and are out of the box?

A huge thank you to my friend for inspiring me and for inspiring your crew of writer's!! I loved every single minute .