With all that, I didn't have a ton of time to really reflect on my teaching. Nonetheless, I did make some changes this year. Here's my list:
- Room set-up: Last year I had students grab a chair of their choice and move it to their assigned seat. This set-up and tear-down took way too much time and there were kids who picked the comfortable seats every day so that they could veg out. This year, I moved the comfy chairs to a reading nook that is only used during FVR time and my "normal" chairs are always in a horseshoe. Every hour, I take the notebooks for that hour and set them on the chairs so that there is a new seating chart every day. I can't remember who I stole that idea from, but I read it in a blog, I'm sure.
- So far, I think this is working very well. I don't have to take so much time at the end of class having them "clean up" and the kids seem more engaged sitting in a more traditional chair. Plus, the comfortable chairs in the reading nooks seem to get kids more excited about FVR time!
- Better use of notebooks: last year I started with composition notebooks for each student, thinking that they would be able to easily keep everything in one place. With a disorganized teacher, that became absolute mayhem as there were papers shoved everywhere. So this year, I decided to follow my dear friend Elicia's techniques to create a better organized notebook.
- So far, so much better! Kids' things are on a specific page and it should be easy for them to find and use in the future.
- Starting with special person: I decided to mix special person with "regular" stories and units so that I can get started more quickly. Last year and the years before, special person was taking until October to get through and the kids were getting bored with it.
- I think this is working well, but we are only one week in so far, so I'll have to re-evaluate in a month or so.
How about you guys? What did you change this year and how is it going?
