Anyway, I wanted to share some amazing resources with you that are transforming my classroom.
If you shop at TpT you probably already know about this one, but I get give a shout out anyway. Let me just say - OMG! This little grammar gem is transforming my classroom!!! It has got to be one of the best all time purchases I ever made for my students. Not only do I love it, my team now wants copies of it! I've offered to purchase them additional licenses so that we can all use it together. That's how powerful this little book is! If you don't have this one for your kids yet and you use Interactive Notebooks, it's worth its weight in gold.
2. NewsELA.com FREE
If you are in need of non-fiction text for your students this is an amazing find. It's all current events that is written for students to read. Each news article is written at multiple lexile levels so kids with various reading abilities can all access the same content! Some of the article even come with short videos for the kids to watch. The catch is that you will need to sign up (of course for free) and to stay within perimeters of the copyright, each student in your class will also need to sign up. Personally, I am not embedding an article a week for my students to read which will be part of their ISNs. Next week I will show you how I am using it in my ISN.
3.TeacherTube.com FREE
I stumbled across this wonderful tool a couple of years ago and find that I turn to it more and more. This site is flagged in its metatags as educational and is often accessible even if your district blocks YouTube and similar video streaming sites. There's a LOT of great resources here for you to explore. One of my favorite is the Preposition Song, which is sung to the tune of Yankee Doodle. Is it common core? ABSOLUTELY! Kids are expected to view multimedia content and critique it as well as make presentation! The possibilities are truly endless here.
4. AchieveTheCore.org FREE
If you are wondering how to make it all happen and connect content areas, then Achiever the Core may be a solution. Since I teach ELA & History, I'm forever looking for ways to bridge between both curriculum. There's some wonderful lessons here and ideas for how to teach thematically. It does take a bit of poking around, but it's worth the time when you find a really great lesson. Many of the resources are American History, which is wonderful! I found an excellent lesson on annotating the constitution that I will be using for Constitution Day next month.
Okay, so this one isn't exactly Common Core, but I wanted to share it anyway.
So, this is a treasure I had heard other teachers share about but bypassed until just this week. It's a behavior management and data tracking tool that allows teachers to capture and generate data on behavior that teachers can easily be shared with parents and administrators. Absolutely no data entry or calculations required on your part. Just touch or click and move on. All you need is a computer or tablet and an internet connection. It's super easy and engaging for the students. My kids love it and I'm noticing that it's helping with student motivation. I plan to pull the easy to find reports for IEP meetings and to set parents up to check on their students. COOL and FREE!
Okay, so there you have some great tools to investigate. I hope you check them out and make use of them this year. Look out for my post next week for more information on NewsELA.
Cori
I LOVE everything Erin creates, and I finally bought my first interactive notebook from her this year (for 2-3 since I work with lower readers in 3-5). NewsELA is also amazing. Have you ever checked out readworks.org? You'd love it!
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