Ninja Notes

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How to Host Your Own Book Debates and Battles

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Inspire a love of reading and encourage your students to choose new books by using book debates. We've outlined the process to use this in your upper elementary classroom today based on the format for Canada Reads. Come take a look.

If you live in Canada, you might have heard of Canada Reads. Canada Reads is an annual “battle of the books” competition organized and broadcast by the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC). We have enjoyed the event for years and thought about how much fun it would be to do the same style of book debates in our classroom. Students love a good battle. Come learn about how it went and how you can host your own book debates.

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Are You Still Wasting Time With Brain Breaks?

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Are brain breaks taking up too much time in your lessons and interrupting learning? You're probably using them incorrectly. Come read this post to help put the best practices for brain breaks into your classroom.

Do you find that brain breaks are disrupting your learning and working time? Do students seem more stimulated after a brain break? Is it difficult to get them calmed back down? Maybe you’ve been using brain breaks wrong? Stop wasting your learning time with brain breaks by managing them differently.

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Easy Ways to Show Appreciation to Your School Support Staff

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There are so many people in schools that work hard to make it a special place. Find ways to thank volunteers, bus drivers, support staff, custodians, educational assistants or anyone else who makes your school a special place in this blog post chock full of of easy and inexpesive ways to show your appreciation.

Hey, fellow teachers! We all know our schools wouldn’t run nearly as smoothly without the incredible support staff who keep everything ticking. Educational assistants, custodians, office staff, librarians, volunteers – they’re the unsung heroes who make our jobs easier and our schools brighter. Let’s show them some love! Meaningful appreciation doesn’t have to break the bank or eat up all your prep time. Come check out some of the ways we’re saying thank you to the people who help make our jobs easier.

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Simple Meet the Teacher Ideas

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Are you looking for ideas to your school's Meet the Teacher Night? The last thing you need is more things added to your to-do list, so we've taken care of it for you. Come find these easy to prep and quick ways to get your classroom ready without much extra effort.

Meet the Teacher Night is a valuable opportunity for teachers and school staff to connect with students and families, establish rapport, and set the tone for a successful school year. Traditionally, our Meet the Teacher Nights are held after about two weeks of school. This usually means students have settled into the classroom a bit. Come learn some of the easy ways we organize our night where families meet the teacher.

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13 Ways to Deal With Behaviours Without Taking Away Recess

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Stop taking away recess from your students who need it the most. There are better ways to deal with behaviours and help students learn to behave postively without getting into the vicious cycle. Come read the whole post the help you deal with classroom management and save you time in the long run.

Fortunately, we have worked at schools with administrations who also don’t believe in taking away recess from students who act out in class. Sometimes, it feels like our hands are tied when it comes to dealing with student behaviour, but we have a few strategies that go beyond “building a relationship” to help get you through it. Come read our ideas so you don’t have to take away recess.

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Get Great Anchor Charts Without Making Great Anchor Charts

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Anchor charts are an excellent way to help students reference information as they are learning, but they don't need to be complicated or even pretty. Come learn how we make great anchor charts without any effort.

We make all our anchor charts with our students as we learn each lesson. It helps them connect to the information, and all of the language on the chart comes from the kids, but let’s face it: They are ugly. We’ve admired beautiful anchor charts online, and while we would love to decorate our classroom with those types of works of art, we believe that our students should be part of making them.

Come learn some of the ways we include our students when making anchor charts.

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