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9 thoughts on “Necessity to Resonate”
That is why it’s important at the beginning of the year to do several one word images so that you have a little gallery of characters before you do your first story so that you can pick one that really resonate with the class also so that your first story is a success. It sets the tone for the rest of the year.
Can we sticky beginning the year activities such as OWI, mini-stories etc…?
I can try. Are you talking about the strategies in the Big CI Book or here on the PLC?
Any activities really. I heard via CI LiftOff that “Circling with Balls” is now Card Talk. What other activities are people on the PLC doing?
I’m doing card talk but I do actually have the sports balls. My idea is to have a “reprensentative” from each sports team in the class. I’ve been going to thrift stores to get an assortment. He/she can KEEP the ball while they are in class but they lose it for ever if they 1) Break any class rule which results in them signing the DBL 2) Let anyone else play with it 3) Throw it.
One girl in the class plays tennis so I cut a mouth on the tennis ball (I have tennis balls on the bottom of my chairs so I have a lot) and put eyes and colored brown hair on it. I treated it like an OWI, but it was visible. We then discovered that the ball is named “Wilson” because it says that on the ball.
I think straight up surveying is a good beginning of year activity – even for older Ss. So say you start off with favorite snack or ice cream flavor – you can create a table or bar graph (pie chart?)in real time. If the kids are antsy you can have them (individually) fill in the table template as it builds, though I never do that cuz my young’ns can’t listen attentively AND write.
So with the ice cream – say you have a google image of an ice cream shop menu/board with pics or names of flavors. You kinda ask casually how many like this or that flavor, then you launch into a more ‘scientific’ survey, asking e/student in turn what s/he likes. Perhaps after a few weeks (if you wait on this survey and do others here and there, earlier in the year) you can comment, “Mint Chip? A SeƱora Jones le encanta Mint Chip.” (or some such tidbit about what ice cream your colleague loves). Surveying colleagues and then sharing results with the kids is also fabulously entertaining. Ss like to know which teams, foods, TV shows and video games, etc. their teachers prefer…Surveying can deploy rapid fire “massed reps” for Hi Freq verbs such as likes (+ to eat, drink, go, etc…) , prefers, wants, goes, has, is…
Last year I took the class list and copied it into a table. To the right of the student name was their Spanish first name. Then there was a 3rd empty column. This was a survey template for surveys that popped up throughout the year. Where did you go on vacation? What pet do you have or want? Who wakes you up in the morning? Favorite beverage? The question is the header for the 3rd column and I project the survey onto the screen, and fill it in real time.
Afterwards, we can count, sort and comment; it’s a visual we’ve created together.
That’s pretty cool. I have not tried surveys at all really. So why not?
Surveys can be very extemporaneous and can lead the class – and float on for a while or if the energy’s not there, then move on. You can use for current events, school events, pop culture, processing info on or comparing your OWIs, etc…
Another thing that worked well this week- Circling with balls, take that into a mini-situation, then use the “7 step story process like is used for OWI to get a reading.