Ninja Notes

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Classroom Tips

Books For and About Powerful Women

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Show students some amazing books for Women's History Month. We use these books all year to show students how important studying women's history is. Come check out our book list and some of the reasons these books are so important.

Each year in Canada, we celebrate Women’s History Month in October. This is in line with the International Day of the Girl and observing the anniversary of the Person’s Case, which took place in Canada on October 18, 1929. Women’s History Month was officially declared in 1992 by the Canadian government to celebrate the achievements of Canadian women.

In the United States, Australia, and the United Kingdom, Women’s History Month is observed in March. This is because many important women’s rights events happen during March in the United States. It took until 1987 for the American government to make it an official observance. International Women’s Day is in March as well.

It doesn’t matter when the month is. Women’s history should be taught as part of your overall history plan. Young girls and boys need to see women represented in all types of jobs and occupations. They all need to be taught that gender does not reflect how a person should be treated, paid, or ruled by laws.

That is why we try to have books that represent women and girls to the students in our classroom.

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Amazing Activities Students Can Do Instead of Homework

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Are you looking for activities your students can do at home instead of homework? We don't assign homework in our upper elementary classroom. Instead, we assign activities and it's been a big hit. Come find out what you activities you can do instead of homework.

We don’t assign formal homework to our students. It’s actually a district policy, but we also don’t believe that homework serves any real purpose other than causing frustration at home and making work for students. Instead, we assign a list of activities students can do at home instead of homework. We get WAY more engagement and everyone loves it.

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Hilarious Stories You’ll Love: Overheard in My Classroom

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Are you looking for a light laugh to help you through your teacher tired days? We've collected some of our best overheard in my classroom quotes to tell you the stories behind the quotes. Come have a laugh and remember why you became a teacher (for the hilarious teacher stories of course).

Years ago we started keeping a journal of all the funny little things that happen in our classroom. This was a suggestion by one of our cooperating teachers when we were students teaching. Writing down little stories that happen at school each day has been one way to relive the sweetest moments of each school year.

Come read some of our favourites stories from our Overheard in My Classroom series.

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11 Differences Between Canadian and American Schools

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Teachers in Canada and the United States have many things in common, but while Canadians often see American schools on television and in movies, the reverse is not often true. There are many differences so let's take a look at some of them.

While it might seem like schools around the world are similar, education is viewed very differently. Canada and the US are commonly lumped together as being the same, but there are many fundamental differences in schools in each country. Let’s take a look at some of the differences between Canadian and American schools.

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How to Assess French as a Second Language

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If you're teaching French as a Second language, it can be a challenge marking or grading progress. We made a list of all the ways to assess French (but many are general assessment strategies) that will definitely help you out. Come take a read to see how to assess FSL lessons.

Many French teachers struggle with how to assess French in their upper elementary classes. This is especially challenging for teachers who aren’t feeling confident with their own French skills.

Assessing French is the same as assessing many other subjects that are taught in school, but the degree of progress can vary greatly between students. Here are some of the ways we assess French in our classroom.

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Inexpensive and Easy to Make Mother’s Day Ideas

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Are you looking for easy to make and inexpensive projects for Mother's Day (or Father's Day or Grandparents Day or basically anyone appreciation day)? As upper elementary teachers, this event usually gets overlooked so we came up with a list of some tried and true gifts we made over the years. Come see if one of them will work for your class this year.

Mother’s Day tends to sneak up on us every year, so this year, we’ve made an effort to show some of the best Mother’s Day ideas we’ve created over the years. It’s funny how we always know when Mother’s Day will be, but it’s in that rush near the end of the school year, so it tends to be something we can do quickly and fairly inexpensively.

While we’ve called this post “mother’s day,” we are very careful to include all types of parent roles throughout the year. It is important to know who is in your classroom and know if there are parents, guardians or even foster parents. Have these conversations early.

So, what types of projects do we do for any parent or guardian appreciation do we create? Read on.

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