Ninja Notes

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Poetry

How to Teach Poetry All Year Long

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Instead of teaching poetry in a unit, have you ever considered sprinkling poetry throughout the school year? It's a great way to show students that poetry is all around us. Come learn about some of the ways we include poetry in our language arts lessons throughout the year.

Many teachers add a poetry unit to their Language Arts programming, but what if you teach poetry throughout the school year? It’s not as hard as it sounds and you don’t even have to be a poetry expert.

Poetry is a beautiful and expressive form of literature that allows students to explore language, imagery, and emotions in creative ways. Many students enjoy poetry because it’s short and the rhyming is catchy. Come learn some of the ways we teach poetry throughout the school year.

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How to Include Different Types of Writing in Your Classroom

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Are you looking for ways to include the different types of writing in your classroom each day? Come see how we do it in our upper elementary classroom.

Over the years we’ve attended hundreds of hours of professional development for teaching students to write. Our school has tried out resources from Ruth Guthrie and the 6+ Traits of Writing, Barbara Mariconda and Empowering Writers and even Lucy Calkins and her Writers’ Workshop model. None of these were perfect. Some students did well with some of the lessons and some students didn’t see a lot of growth in their writing. Some students learned to follow a formula but struggled with being creative. How do you include different types of writing in your daily writing?

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9 Easy Valentine’s Day Ideas for Upper Elementary

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Valentine's Day in upper elementary isn't quite the same as the little kids or the older ones. It's this weird time in a kid's life where they are too old to care about paper cards but also want to be included in getting paper cards. They are just starting to have crushes but the maturity level is all over the place. We've spent a lot of time watching our Valentine's Day ideas flop. Come read some of our students' approved Valentine's Day ideas.

Valentine’s Day in upper elementary isn’t quite the same as the little kids or the older ones. It’s this weird time in a kid’s life when they are too old to care about paper cards but also want to be included in getting paper cards. They are just starting to have crushes but their maturity level is all over the place. We’ve spent a lot of time watching our Valentine’s Day ideas flop. But not anymore!

Over the years, we’ve watched students in our Grade 4 and Grade 5 classes to see how they respond to different activities for Valentine’s Day and we’ve settled on focusing on friendship and kindness. Some of these activities can be done any time of year because they are not specific to Valentine’s Day. These are the best Valentine’s Day ideas that were approved by our students.

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How to Take Your History Lessons Off Life Support

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If your history lessons are dropping flat we have just what you need to take your history lessons off life support. Get strategies you can use for any history lesson in your upper elementary classroom.

If you’ve ever thought your history lessons were boring, then truthfully, you had the wrong teacher. Teaching history can be exciting and interesting.

My love of Canadian history came from my favourite teacher of all time, Mr. Perrin. He was a tough teacher who expected the best from everyone, but he had a way of bringing history alive. You felt like you were in the trenches of World War 1 or at the table of a family living through The Great Depression. I underestimated the impact this love of history would have on my life.

Each time I step into my classroom and stand up in front of my students to tell them about some historic event, I still see Mr. Perrin jumping from side to side, role-playing both the French and the Germans in battle. This love of history was so apparent I can’t help but pass this enthusiasm along to my students.

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How to Celebrate Poem in Your Pocket Day

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Are you looking for ways to celebrate a love of poetry with your upper elementary students? Try taking part in Poem in Your Pocket Day as part of National Poetry Month. This can be done any time of year and is a great activity to explore poetry throughout your school. Come read the whole post to get ideas how you can celebrate poetry.

We’re hosting a “Poem in Your Pocket” day as a celebration of completing our poetry unit in Language Arts. It coincides with the National Poem In Your Pocket Day held each year in April. It’s coming up soon! You can join us this year even if you haven’t taught poetry in your classroom yet!

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