Hands down, this is the biggest question we get asked on a regular basis when working with teachers in the classroom. In fact, this is a question we ask ourselves daily. What will the other students be doing while I meet with my Guided Reading groups?
First of all, before you can make your time with your Guided Reading groups count, you need to establish the routines in your classroom. If you don’t have your classroom management down pat, your small group instruction time will be constantly interrupted and your students won’t progress. Nothing good will come from everyone being frustrated.
[Read more…] about Help! What Do the Other Kids Do During Guided Reading?
Flexible seating is all the rage, but we’ve been using the philosophy in our classroom for years. While it would be nice to have a variety of seating options, we know it’s not always possible, but you can still have seating options without spending a dime.
How do we create a classroom community where all students feel they are equal and belong? It turns out we’ve had more combined grade classes that straight grade classes since we began teaching, so we can’t imagine teaching any other way. First of all, we call it a combined class rather than a split class. It’s the first thing we do with parents because our combined classes are not like the old ‘split’ classes.
