Notebooking, Teaching, and Technology

The walls of our school are notoriously hard to get things to stick to. I have tried everything short of a glue gun (which we can't use because the walls are not a high gloss and the glue will take the paint off). Finally I came across this great 3M painters tape for hard to stick surfaces (it is easily identifiable by its green color). I have not had a problem since. I've tried other painters tape (the blue 3M and Duck brand) but they don't have the sticking power of this green tape. Most of the teachers at our school use this tape exclusively now to hang things on their wall and showcase student work in the hall. In fact, I ran out and had to run to the store today after school to get some because my left over blue tape was just not working (hence the post). If you are looking for a good tape for school walls I would highly recommend it (cost with tax is $9.30 a roll).

I attended an excellent workshop on 6+1 writing traits and during it the instructor (Ruth Culham) introduced writing RAFTS. Here is a good online definition of what RAFTS are: R.A.F.T.S. are writing prompts that challenge students to assume a Role before writing, to write for an imaginary Audience, to write using a given Format, to write about a certain Topic, and to write with a certain Strong Verb in mind as he/she writes. As I was looking through the book the instructor had for RAFTS in the content area (see book above which can be purchased through Scholastic ) I was taken by the list of formats at the end of the book. While I am sure I should have been playing closer attention to the speaker (who really was excellent) I kept thinking how these formats can be used as right hand assignments for notebooks (from a ships log to a licence plate). Even the RAFT suggestions were great for science and could easily be used as a right hand assignment (great for getting those writing standard...

I really really really like this idea and think it will work well with the notebooks. This book was recommended by a friend of mine (she has the social studies menu book) and I promptly bought the science book. The premise is that students are given a menu option of things to do to demonstrate (at different levels) their understanding of what they learned in a unit. Each activity is given a different point value and students have to accrue a certain amount of points by picking and choosing off a menu, bingo board (pictured above), etc. The book is fairly new to me so I am looking through it and plan to try one of the "menus" (modified to fit our standards) at the end of the year (we have state testing coming up three weeks after we return from spring break so it will be after that). This way I can iron out the kinks and see how it would work within a unit. I thought some other teachers might want to investigate the book before my "experiment", which I will definite...

I know I have mentioned the author Dinah Zike before but here are three of my favorite books by her. I use ideas from these books constantly in the classroom. They are well worth the money I spent on them. I currently have my fingers crossed that I get a NEA grant I applied for to attend her "foldables" workshop in Texas this summer (too expensive on my own and remains listed under my dream professional development list). Currently I am on spring break and I grabbed these three off my school bookshelf to take home and see what will jump out at me as I plan for the end of the year. I have spoken to pre-service teachers at our local university and I always bring them with me and recommend them as "must haves" on any teachers bookshelf (she also has other books but obviously I am focused on science...I know after bringing them to school the fourth grade social studies teachers purchased her social studies book).

I apologize for not writing more. Unfortunately we suspended science for a couple of weeks in our classroom, at the end of a unit, in order to practice for our state writing exam, which students took yesterday. I am happy to write that we are back to science and started our unit on light, electricity and magnets. Students worked on their title page yesterday and will finish up today on our modified schedule after the second part of the state test is given. Today's post is about inexpensive glue. As a notebooker I have gone through TONS of glue, so much in fact that I joined Elmer's Glue Crew for recycling glue bottles - and extended it school wide. I tend to buy glue when it goes on sale at the beginning of the year and generally have 4 bottles in my supply bins for each table grouping (I have five table groupings). I was hoping that would last the entire year but sadly it has not. I ran out of school money in our classroom budget and was faced with buying glue refill at Stap...

I use a lot of Dinah Zike foldables in my science notebooks (pictures coming soon). I highly recommend purchasing her books. I used the elementary science book above and used it a lot in the elementary school and middle school (I have the middle/high school science book as well...which is currently on loan to my son's high school biology teacher). My social studies teacher uses Dinah's social studies books as well. My favorite books are: Dinah Zike's Big Book of Books Dinah Zike's Book of Classroom Organization Dinah Zike's Big Book of Elementary Science Dinah Zike's Big Book of Middle and High School Science All the books can be purchased online at http://www.dinah.com/ She recently developed a notebooking book (which of course I purchased). I got a lot of great ideas from that book as well. I am anxiously awaiting the publication of her vocabulary book for 3rd grade and up.