Post #6

I mentioned this in the discussion, but my teacher uses clothes pins and a bar that lets the students know where they are for the day. When they are on time with their projects or are on task, they can "clip up" to the "Keep it up" bar, and when they do something wrong, like continuous talking or misbehaving, they "clip down" to "Think About It". I really like this idea because it lets the students continuously know what the teacher thinks about them. It's constant confirmation of their actions. This idea was also in the videos on this topic. This lets me know that teachers have tried it, and it is consistent in results.

Another idea that my teacher does, that was not in the presentations is she has small paper Pokeballs on the back board and they have a goal for the whole year to all of the 50+ Pokeballs on the "Excellent Job!!" side of the board. How they do that is every person in the class has to turn an assignment in on time, and they have to do things for each other and the teacher. They are so close! They have 2 months left in school, and they have maybe 6 Pokeballs left. They are doing awesome and are helping each other out of habit now! It's awesome!

Post #5

I believe the most important role a teacher can play is being a good example. The language the teacher uses and how they treat the students is very important. I stated this in my graphic organizer and I placed it as the last card because it is the most important. I remember in Elementary school I had a teacher that I was really afraid of because she never had a good attitude and was always on someone about something. In turn, I treated my classmates the same way. Then it started transferring to how I treated my family and my mom would not have that. That was a rough year of school for me.

In turn I have also had teachers who were absolutely fantastic and were able to have a positive attitude all the time. They were willing to listen to all of our crazy stories and be interested in them. Those teachers have showed me how to treat people. Every time a friend or a child talks about something that I don't really share interest in, I have learned to still find interest in it because it is important to them. The teachers set the example for the students in the classroom and it either set it up for a great year or a horrible year.

Post #4

How does the teacher manage assignments?

She assigns math homework on Monday's. They pull out the assigned homework from their math book, attach a sign off sheet that asks parents to sign the sheet when they have checked their students work and then they turn it in every Friday. The students know the schedule and are prepared on Friday's to turn them in. Some students don't have their parents sign the paper so she sends the assignment back to get the parent signature. They are in 2nd grade so she doesn't really put a dead line on it, but if they don't get the homework turned in it affects their grade at the end of the year.

She doesn't have send home homework like the math assignments in the other subjects. She starts a "paper" of things that they learned about an animal or a topic of choice. They are starting on the 5 paragraph format. They are really little paragraphs, but it starts them on the writing path and they work on this is class. She does set a deadline on these, but again she is a little bit lenient. The students get really excited and creative when it comes to these assignments. It makes me laugh every time!

This teacher always tries her hardest to make sure that her students don't fall too far behind, but there is only so much you can do. She follows the guidelines of "No Child Left Behind" but after a certain point it is up to the students and their parents to keep them caught up in the material.