{"id":1589,"date":"2014-10-23T19:56:36","date_gmt":"2014-10-24T00:56:36","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.kristendembroski.com\/?p=1589"},"modified":"2014-10-23T19:56:36","modified_gmt":"2014-10-24T00:56:36","slug":"high-five-for-friday-10-24-14","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.kristendembroski.com\/?p=1589","title":{"rendered":"High Five For Friday! 10-24-14"},"content":{"rendered":"

Week 8 is a thing of the past, wahoo! I’m excited that we are launching rockets outside this afternoon for science class. I hope to have pictures up next week!<\/p>\n

\"New<\/a><\/p>\n

1. New Seats<\/span><\/strong> – “New Seats Day” is a middle schooler’s most hated or favorite day ever, depending on how everything shakes out. I give my students new seats every 2 weeks. We do a lot of partner talk and small group discussions, so I like to keep things fresh and interesting by always getting new partner arrangements. As I told my students on the first day, it doesn’t matter whether you love your seat or hate your seat – it WILL change in 10 days. My seating policy has not only cut down on the excessive complaining and repeated requests (more like begging), but it has really been a benefit to student learning and discussion. Fortunately, I have a computer program (Infinite Campus) that randomly generates new seating charts, which really makes things easier on me. Since it’s random, I also don’t have to put any thought into it, and I always reserve the right to ‘rearrange’ if things just aren’t working (or comply with IEP requests for preferential seating).<\/p>\n

\"Common<\/a><\/p>\n

2. Common Core Flip Book<\/span> <\/strong>– I purchased this flip book<\/a> online. It’s really fantastic! Yes, I do realize that the CCSS are all available for free online, but having this resource at my fingertips has been very handy. I would recommend it!<\/p>\n

\"breakup-letter3-wbp87l\"<\/a><\/p>\n

3. Breakup Letter<\/span> <\/strong>– We are finally up to the Declaration of Independence with my Social Studies class. As a warm-up at the beginning of class, I read them this note<\/a> that I said I ‘found’ yesterday in my classroom. My class is pretty bright, and they knew something was up. I asked them why I might be reading it, and they eventually\u00a0deduced that it was from the American Colonies to Great Britain. We did a close reading of two key sentences, and I asked them which historic events it could be referring to. Neat activity!<\/p>\n

\"Standards<\/a><\/p>\n

4. Standards Based Grading Scale<\/span><\/strong> – I’ve been researching and drafting a Standards Based Grading Scale that we could adopt as an entire school. This is my draft so far. A good friend encouraged me to add the 2.5, since so many students seem to fall in that chasm between apprentice and master – I agree. I’m going to try it out for a while and see how it works. I like the language a lot better than “Advanced, Proficient, Basic, Minimal,” which often doesn’t mean much to students. This language is borrowed from history, literary lore, role-playing games, and video-gaming, which hits closer to home for my students.<\/p>\n

\"Pumpkin<\/a><\/p>\n

5.\u00a0Annual Pumpkin Carving<\/span><\/strong> – For the past 4 or so years, we have made it an annual event to carve pumpkins with very dear friends of ours. We find cool patterns online, print them out for free, and have a blast making a mess. Mine is Jack Skellington on the right \ud83d\ude42 Evil smile! Do you recognize Toothless from ‘How to Train Your Dragon’ and the Hitchhiking ghost from the Haunted Mansion at Disneyworld?<\/p>\n

How was your week? I hope you are making the most of October, as it is coming to a close quickly! Enjoy the weather, food, and creature comforts of fall!<\/p>\n

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