Teaching about the Holocaust

This week we observed the USHMM National Days of Remembrance, so to honor the victims of the Holocaust and formally introduce our final unit of the year, I showed a presentation to give background knowledge of World War II and the Road to Genocide. At the end of the presentation, I instructed students to head to Edmodo, where I had uploaded lists of victims from http://www.yadvashem.org/ . Students were instructed two pick two (or more) people from the list and put each of their names on a candle. Here's a free download of the template I used. Then, students put their candles out on the bulletin board in the hallway. The result was breathtaking, and I just wanted to share!

Do you observe the Days of Remembrance with your students?

Bulletin Boards for 8th Grade

I'll admit it...bulletin boards are NOT my strong suit. I leave them up for WAY too long, and I hate putting them up, even if I feel like I have a good idea. I guess that is the secondary teacher in me :)

That being said, I did do a few bulletin boards this year, with the help of my Silhouette Cameo!


At the beginning of the year we focused on genre and previewing text, so I had students create frayer models for various book hooks:

During NaNoWriMo this year, I created a "Countdown" bulletin board to keep them motivated and track their progress as a group. They especially liked "Now Panic and Freak Out"

 Every 4th quarter we do a unit on the Holocaust, reading Night by Elie Wiesel, and "The Diary of Anne Frank". I usually only do one bulletin board...the same one I have been doing since I student taught in 2007!

This year I decided to also cover ALL THREE of my whiteboards at the back, which means I have to cool it on writing on my only remaining board :)

So these show a timeline of the events of World War II across the top, and examples of Propaganda (primary source documents!). We will do an analysis on political cartoons, propaganda, and poems from the book I Never Saw Another Butterfly. I am going to be uploading my unit plan on Teachers Pay Teachers soon, it is gargantuan, and will be my first major upload! I may give it away as a freebie in a giveaway soon, so stay tuned!

Monday Update! New Classroom Layout

So I promised to post some pics, and I thought I'd upload a whole bunch from what we've done this year! Today I'm going to focus on my classroom layout changes. I currently have them in groups for Lit. Circles, even though I am usually NOT a fan of small groups. First, my clean desk area. Usually, I have papers piled up everywhere, even underneath my desk, so I am feeling great! :)

Classroom Layout

So I started out my year with my room looking like this...

It was great in theory...but the students kept kicking the bookcases, and they quickly fell apart. To see more detailed pics, click here and here :)

So, I rearranged a bit, and I am really happy with the results!

This table houses the ISN master copies, my suggestion box, CICO box, and lost and found underneath. To the right is my "Golden Recommendation Shelf" with new and recommended books for kids to read during SSR.

I cleared out the area underneath my whiteboard, just so I could have more space for students to walk...

The surviving bookcases were moved to the middle, and now house my classroom library!

I moved both black bookcases to the other wall, and made it a space for housing novel studies

I wedged my Pinterest Bench in between, which made for a cozy reading area. In the middle the students have displayed artwork, so I call it my "Fridge"

This is the only bookcase that hasn't changed, my reference area :)

How does your classroom change throughout the year?

Virtual and Paperless Classrooms?

Hi everyone! I have been so absorbed with my classes the year that I have no time at all to blog, but it has been a great year!

Recently, I have been devoting the majority of my time to Edmodo, and getting my students comfortable and situated with it. I'm sure you are all familiar with Edmodo, but if not, it is basically a virtual classroom environment, and it looks like Facebook. I hear, "Should we log out of Facebook?" many times a day when we use Edmodo in the classroom. Students can earn badges (which they love!), and I post polls, discussion questions, and sometimes useless trivia.

Once students were comfortable with the idea of posting, we moved on to having them "Turn-In" assignments through Edmodo. This ended up going so well that I had 125+ Argumentative Papers assigned, done on computers, and uploaded to Edmodo. What does that mean? No paper used, no big bags for me to drag home and grade, and no more "My Printer Broke!" excuses :) Also- I have a lot of students who frequent Edmodo when they are home sick, and can find out what they missed, or participate "virtually" during class!

Now, I also had to check out the laptops and completely hog them for a few weeks, but I let our LMC director know that if anyone complained, I would gladly relinquish them from my clutches... lol!

Since this experiment has been going so well I decided to take the leap, doing Lit. Circles completely ONLINE! This means the students have a Google Doc where they determine their Reading Schedule, Role Schedule, and they post their Role Responses via Edmodo. I created a tutorial if you are interested in trying this out!

Tutorial for Role Responses

To start with, I created small groups on Edmodo and added each student to the group, that way they didn't have to see everyone else's responses.

Our first Lit. Circle is Monday, so I will update you on how it goes! I'll also post the pic of my newly cleaned off desk, it feels so good to be CLUTTER FREE!

Other things I use Edmodo for:

• Shared Inquiry (Socratic) Discussion Responses
• Cooperative Grouping Assignments
• Exit Slips
• Homework Help
• Bellringers "Do Now" Prompts
• Writing and Journal Prompts
• Linking to our Class Calendar
• Uploading files for handouts (in case students lose theirs!)
• Positive Reinforcement (Badges)
• Incentives for Homework Passes
• Extracurriculars (I created an Edmodo group for our musical group to do announcements)
• Connecting with other teachers!

Do you use Edmodo?? 

I'll be linking up with Eberopolis for The Paperless Challenge Linky! :)

The First Post since August!!

Oh my gosh, everyone, I can't can believe I haven't blogged since August! It has been one heck of a school year, and I have had to give up certain "fun" hobbies in order to stay afloat. I hope everyone had a great first half of the school year! I wanted to share really quick one of the reasons I have been MIA for so long, and that is my 7th Grade Interactive Student Notebook! It was all consuming, but honestly, the BEST teaching strategy I have ever used in my classroom. My students loved it too!

Happy New Year Everyone!

2 Days Down!

So I started back at school yesterday, and it was really awesome!!

Now that school is back in full swing I doubt I will be posting as much, but I'm going to try and stay on top of it. Look for a post this weekend about the activities I did in my class this week, as well as information on RIGOR, which was my favorite new term that I learned at the PLC conference.

Anyone else gone back to school? How is it going so far?? Tomorrow is Friday, have a GREAT rest of the week!