This is the curriculum described in my post, here.
Metropolitan State College of Denver
- Click on the “Parents” link for age specific ideas!
I have been reading Nurtureshock by Po Bronson and Ashley Merriman and I HIGHLY recommend it to parents and educators. I just finished reading Chapter 8, and I thought I’d jot down some of my impressions.
The chapter focuses on a Preschool and Kindergarten program called Tools of the Mind. The author describes the program, explains its benefits, and finally (in a much too short conclusion) explains how you can apply elements of the program to parenting and educational settings.
Tools of the Mind employs strategies such as a “play hour.” This sounds very similar to “center time” in most preschool or kindergarten rooms, but the difference is in the childrens’ play plans. Before the play hour begins, the students write down their play plan. Younger children scribble or draw their play plan, while older children write as much as possible. Then, for the next 45 minutes, the children STICK TO IT.
Other strategies include encouraging “private speak” by modeling it out loud. As the students practice writing a letter with the teacher, they describe their pencil strokes out loud. Gradually, they whisper what they’re doing, and eventually, they no longer speak out loud – it has become “private speak.” This is something that adults do regularly (think through things in their heads) but kids do not all do this.
One of my favorite components is that the teachers show the children how to evaluate their own (and others’) work. The teacher will write four versions of the same letter on the board and ask kids to pick the “best.” Kids “grade” each other’s penmanship by circling the best example of each letter.
And the program is WILDLY successful – increasing students’ executive function, vocabulary, IQ, abstract and symbolic thinking, concentration, cognitive control and self-regulation.
So what can teachers and parents take from this?
- Have children write a plan for how they will spend their time, and make them stick to it. This could be during studyhall, an afternoon at home, a visit to the library, or anywhere.
- Encourage children to use “private speech” when learning to do something. “Start at the top and draw a line down.” or “Cross the laces, and put this one underneath.”
- Instead of pointing out specific mistakes, be more general. “There is a mistake in the second paragraph.” “Something you just read didn’t make sense.”
- Have students evaluate their own work.
Any other ideas?
I’m posting this because I want to link up to Metamorphosis Monday over at Between Naps on the Porch and Make Your Monday at Twice Remembered.
When my husband and I were still in college, one of his co-workers got remarried and offered us some of her furniture. We scored several freebies, and this is one them.
When we got it, it looked like this:
complete with a burn hole in the top.
I had it in my apartment for a year, storing books. (And I heard that it was a real PITA to carry up the stairs to my unit.)
And when we finally got married and bought our teeny tiny house, we put it in the dining room.
But after several months, I knew we needed it for storage, and the transformation began.
I’m sorry I didn’t take pictures of the whole process. Basically, I sanded it with steel wool, then primed and painted it white. I wanted to add some interest to the doors, so I added these fabric panels. Bart helped with that project. We screwed cup holders to the top and bottom of each door, and cut dowels to fit. I made the panels (didn’t finish the seems or anything) and VOILA! My panels were made from a light weight “decorator’s” fabric and they were 1 1/2 times the width of the windows.
But the white felt really stark to me, so a few months later, I distressed the edges using my palm sander, and then coated the entire thing with Valspar glaze. I wiped the glaze on with an old sock, then used a spray bottle of water and more old socks to wipe it off until it looked perfectly shabby.
Finally, I put three coats of water based poly on it. I found that the glaze moved a bit with the poly because they were both water based, but because the glaze comes off with water (even after letting it cure a bit) I felt that it needed a topcoat.
I don’t think anyone will confuse it for an expensive piece of furniture, but I think it looks pretty good (especially since it was FREE!)
Here it is in our little Ames house.
And at Christmas time in our “new” house. (Ignore the cabinets next to it. They belong in the new bathroom someday.)
I’ve made several other “curtains” for it, including an adorable black and white toile set, but these are made from cardboard and wrapping paper! I love that this piece is so versatile and easy to change!
Hope you enjoyed my transformation! Check out others at Between Naps on the Porch and Make Your Monday at Twice Remembered!
Edited to Add: I went ahead and linked up here, too! Frugalicious Friday and at Infarrantly Creative.
When my husband and I were still in college, one of his co-workers got remarried and offered us some of her furniture. We scored several freebies, and this is one them.
When we got it, it looked like this:
complete with a burn hole in the top.
I had it in my apartment for a year, storing books. (And I heard that it was a real PITA to carry up the stairs to my unit.)
And when we finally got married and bought our teeny tiny house, we put it in the dining room.
But after several months, I knew we needed it for storage, and the transformation began.
I’m sorry I didn’t take pictures of the whole process. Basically, I sanded it with steel wool, then primed and painted it white. I wanted to add some interest to the doors, so I added these fabric panels. Bart helped with that project. We screwed cup holders to the top and bottom of each door, and cut dowels to fit. I made the panels (didn’t finish the seems or anything) and VOILA! My panels were made from a light weight “decorator’s” fabric and they were 1 1/2 times the width of the windows.
But the white felt really stark to me, so a few months later, I distressed the edges using my palm sander, and then coated the entire thing with Valspar glaze. I wiped the glaze on with an old sock, then used a spray bottle of water and more old socks to wipe it off until it looked perfectly shabby.
Finally, I put three coats of water based poly on it. I found that the glaze moved a bit with the poly because they were both water based, but because the glaze comes off with water (even after letting it cure a bit) I felt that it needed a topcoat.
I don’t think anyone will confuse it for an expensive piece of furniture, but I think it looks pretty good (especially since it was FREE!)
Here it is in our little Ames house.
And at Christmas time in our “new” house. (Ignore the cabinets next to it. They belong in the new bathroom someday.)
I’ve made several other “curtains” for it, including an adorable black and white toile set, but these are made from cardboard and wrapping paper! I love that this piece is so versatile and easy to change!Hope you enjoyed my transformation! Check out others at Between Naps on the Porch and Make Your Monday at Twice Remembered!
Edited to Add: I went ahead and linked up here, too! Frugalicious Friday and at Infarrantly Creative.
Many different times in my life, when I have been stressed out, I focus on decorating. It’s like I push aside the important things in my life and stress about the way my house looks instead. I think it’s a coping mechanism.
Anyway, this past week, I was SUPER busy with Creative Memories get togethers (which went AWESOMELY, thank you very much) and I was worried about giving my “final answer” to my superintendent regarding my job for next year.
So what did I do? I perused decorating blogs, visited my old friends at HGTV message boards, and rearranged my living room.
I've been reading The Happiest Toddler on the Block off and on for a few weeks now. One of the strategies that Dr. Karp suggests is the "Fast Food Rule." Here's how it works: if someone is upset, let them speak first, repeat back their feelings, and they say your piece. It's similar to the employee at the fast food drive through. You order, they repeat your order, THEN they tell you the total price.
So this FFR is meant for toddlers, but I have found that it works well on my husband (shhh...don't tell him!) and now my students!
Here is a typical conversation with one of my students.
Student (in a whiny voice): Ugh. This is hard. I don't want to do it.
Mrs. O (in a stern voice): Well, you have to, so get to work.
But here's how today's conversation went when I used the FFR.
Student (in a whiny voice): Ugh. This is hard. I don't want to do it.
Mrs. O (in an understanding voice): I know it seems hard right now. But I will help you through it and by the end of the assignment, it won't be so hard.
Student (staring at me like I'm an alien before hesitantly answering): Okay.
How easy was that!?!?! And then, the student sat and worked quietly for 40 minutes. FORTY minutes! That's 10 times as long as he normally works quietly!!! I did help with a few problems, but I never had to redirect his attention or deal with any other complaints!
(I have mixed results using it with Adam - he's VERY strong-willed and not easily distracted. So he calms down while I agree with him and then as soon as I try to get him to do whatever it is he won't do, he cries, screams, or kicks again. I think I need to read more of the book, or keep practicing!)
So this FFR is meant for toddlers, but I have found that it works well on my husband (shhh...don't tell him!) and now my students!
Here is a typical conversation with one of my students.
Student (in a whiny voice): Ugh. This is hard. I don't want to do it.
Mrs. O (in a stern voice): Well, you have to, so get to work.
But here's how today's conversation went when I used the FFR.
Student (in a whiny voice): Ugh. This is hard. I don't want to do it.
Mrs. O (in an understanding voice): I know it seems hard right now. But I will help you through it and by the end of the assignment, it won't be so hard.
Student (staring at me like I'm an alien before hesitantly answering): Okay.
How easy was that!?!?! And then, the student sat and worked quietly for 40 minutes. FORTY minutes! That's 10 times as long as he normally works quietly!!! I did help with a few problems, but I never had to redirect his attention or deal with any other complaints!
(I have mixed results using it with Adam - he's VERY strong-willed and not easily distracted. So he calms down while I agree with him and then as soon as I try to get him to do whatever it is he won't do, he cries, screams, or kicks again. I think I need to read more of the book, or keep practicing!)
I'm in the middle of a big decision that could affect my life quite a bit. I am trying to decide whether to stay in my current teaching position or take a part time position.
I like my current position as a 4th-6th grade Title I teacher. I love working with small groups of kids and I get to work with many different kids throughout the day. I love teaching reading, and although I didn't think I would like it, I like teaching math more and more everyday. Of course there are times when I am frustrated - mostly when I am having a hard time getting a concept across to my students, or when I am dealing with scheduling woes.
However, I have been thinking for awhile now that working part time would help me balance life and work a little better. The teacher in me will always want to teach, and I would miss my "kids" if I stayed home full time, but as my home life gets more hectic with kids and farmer and farm, I need more time there to keep from feeling like I'm stretched too thinly.
So I feel like a part time position would be the perfect home/work time balance. But I'm still apprehensive about taking a part time position for several reasons, and I'm afraid to commit to a decision I'm not sure about. I plan on making the decision within a couple of days after more prayer, reflection, and discussions with my husband.
I like my current position as a 4th-6th grade Title I teacher. I love working with small groups of kids and I get to work with many different kids throughout the day. I love teaching reading, and although I didn't think I would like it, I like teaching math more and more everyday. Of course there are times when I am frustrated - mostly when I am having a hard time getting a concept across to my students, or when I am dealing with scheduling woes.
However, I have been thinking for awhile now that working part time would help me balance life and work a little better. The teacher in me will always want to teach, and I would miss my "kids" if I stayed home full time, but as my home life gets more hectic with kids and farmer and farm, I need more time there to keep from feeling like I'm stretched too thinly.
So I feel like a part time position would be the perfect home/work time balance. But I'm still apprehensive about taking a part time position for several reasons, and I'm afraid to commit to a decision I'm not sure about. I plan on making the decision within a couple of days after more prayer, reflection, and discussions with my husband.
Ugh. I'm already behind on here! I had good intentions, but then I got (re)addicted to scrapbooking!
Anyway - Bart got his first flock of turkeys last Friday. But the action really started Thursday.
Thursday - The birds need to be kept at a toasty 85 degrees. And normally, they like to take 24 hours to heat up the building and adjust the stoves to the right temp. So, Bart, Noel (Circle Hill) and William (Circle Hill's best employee) came out to fire up the stoves and make sure the building was all ready for the poults. And the stoves didn't work. Well, some of them worked, but some didn't. Some of them were losing juice up the cable that suspended them, and the cables were melting the pulleys. Cool, huh? So - frantic calls to the electricians and manufacturer ensued. The electricians came and by afternoon, had determined that they wired a few stoves wrong, which screwed up the rest of them, too. So...some frantic re-wiring took place, Noel declared he was going home to drink a bottle of wine, and we all hoped for the best.
Friday - We unloaded poults at 7 AM. Bart went out there at about 5:30 to finish getting ready, and his dad came out to help, too. William, his wife Beth, and Noel were also there. Adam usually wakes up between 6 and 6:30, so I thought we'd have plenty of time to get out there. But, at 6:52, he finally woke up. I looked at the clock, sat up, and said, "Holy ****! The turkeys are coming!" I nursed him for about 20 seconds, grabbed some crackers, and we took off. Just as we came outside, the semi was pulling in the driveway.
So I changed his diaper as he sat in the stroller, and watched/helped them unload. The turkeys come in crates that hold 100. The crates are divided into fourths, so there are 25 in each section. Dave (Bart's dad) and William stacked crates on the bucked of the skid steer, and Bart backed it down the length of the building. We (mostly Noel and Beth) unloaded the crates and put the turkeys in the rings. Then we stacked up the crates while the other three went back to the front of the building to get another load.
All in all, it took about an hour to unload 20,000 birds.
The rest of the day went pretty smoothly. I went and got doughnuts for our crew (note to self - provide breakfast next time) and Bart spent most of the day outside with his little birdies, adjusting stoves and so on.
It was a hot day - getting up to about 95 degrees. Then, in the evening, a cold front came through, and the temp dropped quickly. Bart came inside from about 8:30 to 10:30, and sometime in that 2 hour time span, the turkeys decided to huddle. Our theory is that the temp drop screwed up the temp in the building, they got cold, and piled together to stay warm.
So we (mostly Bart, but I took my turn, too) spent the next two days trying to break them of this habit. They were piling up in the corner and suffocating each other. We knew it was warm enough, so it must have just been a habit for them by that point. Bart walked around the building, scraping the cardboard and shushing them away. He would go out there for an hour or so, and then take a 30 minute break, all day long. Finally, Sunday, things got a lot better and Bart got a little rest.
So far, we've lost more birds than we'd hoped to. But they (Noel and William) say that's "New Building Syndrom." There are always some kinks to work out. And now we have some room for improvement with our next flock!
I'm making a book that explains the whole turkey farm. Here are some pages.
Anyway - Bart got his first flock of turkeys last Friday. But the action really started Thursday.
Thursday - The birds need to be kept at a toasty 85 degrees. And normally, they like to take 24 hours to heat up the building and adjust the stoves to the right temp. So, Bart, Noel (Circle Hill) and William (Circle Hill's best employee) came out to fire up the stoves and make sure the building was all ready for the poults. And the stoves didn't work. Well, some of them worked, but some didn't. Some of them were losing juice up the cable that suspended them, and the cables were melting the pulleys. Cool, huh? So - frantic calls to the electricians and manufacturer ensued. The electricians came and by afternoon, had determined that they wired a few stoves wrong, which screwed up the rest of them, too. So...some frantic re-wiring took place, Noel declared he was going home to drink a bottle of wine, and we all hoped for the best.
Friday - We unloaded poults at 7 AM. Bart went out there at about 5:30 to finish getting ready, and his dad came out to help, too. William, his wife Beth, and Noel were also there. Adam usually wakes up between 6 and 6:30, so I thought we'd have plenty of time to get out there. But, at 6:52, he finally woke up. I looked at the clock, sat up, and said, "Holy ****! The turkeys are coming!" I nursed him for about 20 seconds, grabbed some crackers, and we took off. Just as we came outside, the semi was pulling in the driveway.
So I changed his diaper as he sat in the stroller, and watched/helped them unload. The turkeys come in crates that hold 100. The crates are divided into fourths, so there are 25 in each section. Dave (Bart's dad) and William stacked crates on the bucked of the skid steer, and Bart backed it down the length of the building. We (mostly Noel and Beth) unloaded the crates and put the turkeys in the rings. Then we stacked up the crates while the other three went back to the front of the building to get another load.
All in all, it took about an hour to unload 20,000 birds.
The rest of the day went pretty smoothly. I went and got doughnuts for our crew (note to self - provide breakfast next time) and Bart spent most of the day outside with his little birdies, adjusting stoves and so on.
It was a hot day - getting up to about 95 degrees. Then, in the evening, a cold front came through, and the temp dropped quickly. Bart came inside from about 8:30 to 10:30, and sometime in that 2 hour time span, the turkeys decided to huddle. Our theory is that the temp drop screwed up the temp in the building, they got cold, and piled together to stay warm.
So we (mostly Bart, but I took my turn, too) spent the next two days trying to break them of this habit. They were piling up in the corner and suffocating each other. We knew it was warm enough, so it must have just been a habit for them by that point. Bart walked around the building, scraping the cardboard and shushing them away. He would go out there for an hour or so, and then take a 30 minute break, all day long. Finally, Sunday, things got a lot better and Bart got a little rest.
So far, we've lost more birds than we'd hoped to. But they (Noel and William) say that's "New Building Syndrom." There are always some kinks to work out. And now we have some room for improvement with our next flock!
I'm making a book that explains the whole turkey farm. Here are some pages.
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