School 2 Home Learning Connection

Letter to my Class Families this year:

"Why I'm Not Doing Homework This Year -

My intention is to make sure there is enough time in our students' days for family time and activities and I want to balance that with time for reading and some real world math and writing.

I'd like students to focus mainly on reading everyday so they have a comfortable, calm space at home to enjoy reading. For the other areas of math and writing I will share options for exploration. This will give parents an idea of the areas we are working on in class. If something comes up at home that is a better "real life" experience with math or writing, I'd love for your student to have that time and opportunity instead. (Here is one article that discusses thoughts on student choice and time spent on homework. Link here)

There are links to a form on the side for your student to share what he or she is working on. If he or she is working on an online file, have them put the link to the url in the form so I can access it. (Here is a link to make a copy of my form.)

If family time and extracurricular time prevents students from getting to these activities, I understand. We will be working hard everyday in class and I think students should have time for other things in their lives too.

Class Dojo points will be earned for sharing things they are learning and trying challenges. If your student is pursuing an area of interest that they would like to share, have them tell me about it in the comment section of the form and I'd love to give them Challenge Accepted points and share in their interest.
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However, if your student decides not to use their time wisely in class, then completing that class work might be required and I'll let you know.

Basically, what I'm saying is anything beyond the reading is optional, but I will acknowledge and support their practice and extra interests. There will be projects that may require some work at home throughout the year."

Each week I will post the topics we are learning in class and ideas for games and exploration if the students would like some resources. We also often have topics that come in discussion that we'd like to know more about. We'll be coming up with an "I Wonder" board to post topics and things we discover on those topics. 

iHelp - Class Jobs

Last year I changed up my job board and set enough jobs so everyone has something to do to support our classroom. Here is my updated job board for 2016-2017:

Originally, I put the icons on library pockets and used craft sticks to choose jobs. That worked quite well. However, this year, I decided I'm going to print this out poster sized and use mini magnets with kids' names or numbers.

I also have a slides file that I will print in preview mode 4 to a page and laminate so students have their job descriptions. 

Feel free to make a copy of any of the files and edit for your use. 

Drive folder with resources

Note:
Icons in this set are from http://www.iconarchive.com/
License: CC Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivate 4.0
Class Dojo icon is from https://www.classdojo.com/resources/ free decoration pack
Go Noodle Icon is from https://www.gonoodle.com/share art share pack
No commercial use allowed

First Day of School Forms

We all have information we really need to get that first day of school to help everything run smoothly. Primary teachers especially, like to have lunch and dismissal info at the very beginning of the day. But the reality is, with 30 or more kids and families all coming in at the same time, you may miss someone. They might not see the form, the sign up list, or whatever it is you have out. Then you need to somehow make contact on the busiest of all days, the first day of school.

I decided to put my Google Geekiness into this and try to lessen the need for me to interrogate make contact with every single person. Using a Google form means many of my families can get me this info prior to school starting (we don't have "Meet the Teacher" events at our school.) And if they missed the link that I will put up on the class list, and on my website, I will have it on the front door both with the link and a QR code. Then I can concentrate on greeting my new kids and families and calming the criers helping everyone feel welcome.

Google Forms are awesome for this task. I created this one with just the info I needed to get through the day - student and parent name, quick contact info, lunch info and dismissal info. I'll save all of the "How can I help your child be more successful this year" questions for a follow up form. 

Here is what it looks like when accessed from a smart phone:

Creating a Google Form is very easy if you haven't tried it before. Here is the Google Forms Tutorial:  https://support.google.com/drive/answer/87809?hl=en

Then, if you want to make it into a QR code, go to a QR creating site like http://www.qrstuff.com/, add the link to the Live Form, and save your QR code. It's that simple.

Edited to add: Of course I will print out several forms for those who do not have internet access or a smart phone. Google Forms has upgraded recently to make printing out the created form just as easy so you don't have to create the form twice.