Coach Turner teaches a math class in Hickory at a middle school. I had prepared myself for the usual seminar in which the speaker comes in and throws out various different ways (that every grade level uses) to deal with classroom management. What I got however, was completely different. Coach Turner came packed full of ideas and activities to use within the classroom. Not only did he come with ideas for Middle School, but each of the activities he showed us, and had us participate in, are activities that can be modified to fit any grade level. He has just had a lot of success in doing these activities with his middle schoolers.
Each of his activities created a sense of competition between teams of students. This, of course, creates an engaging learning environment. Though I don't remember the names of the activities, I do remember the general gist, my favorite activity being one in which a question would be asked, in our case, it was a completely off the wall question, in a classroom, it could be one pertaining to the unit that a student is learning, and each student takes turns going around their team circle answering the question with as many facts as they can in a set amount of time. In another, he turned the "letter game" into a classroom activity, the game in which you come up with, for example, as many animals as you can that begin with the letter "A."
Many of the ideas he presented were fun little ice breakers that can easily be transformed into a learning game for the classroom and as ridiculous as it may sound, I had never thought of the way to use many of these in the classroom as a learning tool instead of a getting to know you tool. While he does all of this, sometimes he says that he keeps them as ridiculous, fun activities, because sometimes students just need a break in the class.
I agree with Brandi when she says that she hopes she can implement a lot of his strategies into my own classroom! I feel that Middle Grades students will LOVE activities such as these and I cannot wait to give them a try. This was such an incredible seminar!Statistics: Posted by Jena Scarboro — Sat Dec 12, 2009 12:50 am
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