WBT Adjectives 1st Grade

Here it is!!! My WBT video of adjectives. I am still a working progress so it's not perfect but I think everything went pretty well! We need to work on interrupting and that's okay! We will get there! I am proud to say that I am officially the first graduate of the WBT 1st grade mentor program!! It's been a long year and a lot of hard work has finally paid off. I am looking forward to continuing my journey as a Whole Brain Teacher!

5 Step Lesson Plan-Adjectives

It's been a while since I've posted but I am happy to share my 5 step lesson plan for adjectives. Yesterday I had my final WBT video over adjectives. As soon as my WBT mentor approves, I will post my video. Here's the lesson for now!

Date:­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­ April 8, 2014

Lesson:  Adjectives

Review:  Review what a noun is and a complete sentence.

Class! Yes!	Hands and eyes	State the Questions? Q:  What is an adjective?  Today we are going to learn what an adjective is!  Tell your neighbor how excited you are to learn about what an adjective is!	Teach/OK
Class a doodle! Yes a doodle!	Hands and eyes	An adjective describes a noun. Gesture:  Act like your petting a fluffy dog.  Tell the class you’re petting a fluffy dog.	Teach/OK
Good golly! Miss Molly!	Hands and eyes	Now we learned that an adjective is a word that describes a noun. Some examples of a noun might be large, grey and friendly. The word elephant is a noun. These adjectives can describe the elephant. Large, grey and friendly elephant. Now that we know adjectives are words that describe a noun and I’ve given you an example, talk to your neighbor about words that can describe this bear. (Show a picture of a bear). (Walk around listening and praising students).	Teach/OK
Class, oh class! Yes, oh yes!	Hands and eyes	Great job smarties! Now we know adjectives are words that describe nouns! We came up with examples of adjectives for a bear. Now let’s come up with adjectives for a flower. When I say teach, talk to your neighbor about adjectives for this flower. (Show a pic of a flower). (Walk around listening and praising students).	Teach/OK
Claaaaasss! Yeeeeees!	Hands and eyes	Awesome possum! You all are becoming adjective experts! We have thought of adjectives for a bear and flower. Let’s think of adjectives that describe….me… your teacher! (Stand in one place so the class can look at you while thinking of adjectives).	Teach/OK
GO! Warriors!	Hands and eyes	Evaluate Yes/No It’s super important to know that adjectives are words that describe a noun. I am going to say some words. Some may be nouns and some may be adjectives! If it’s an adjective say, YES! If it’s a noun, say, NO WAY! Say these words: car, pretty, bear, amazing, red, teacher, large, book, desk, small, brown, chair, loud
Oh classity class! Oh Yessity Yes!	Hands and eyes	QT Test Good job! Say QT!! Now it’s time for the QT test. Cover your eyes. Show me a thumbs up if I say an adjective. Show me a thumbs down if it’s not an adjective. Say these words: black, computer, quiet, fluffy, dog, star, bright, door, sweet
I am talking! We are listening!	Hands and eyes	Critical Thinking---Sentence Frames Good job! Now it’s time to use an adjective in a sentence. I will give you a noun. Give me an adjective to describe that noun and use it in a sentence. Ice cream is the noun. (Call on different kids). I am so proud of you smarties for knowing what an adjective is! We are going to write adjectives next to the pictures. Be creative! Think of awesome adjectives! Go adjective experts!

The Genius Ladder

I've always had a difficult time getting my class to write more than one sentence or even a few words.  Well not this year! I've been using the Genius Ladder for oral writing and writing notebook time. My smarties absolutely love this! The first couple of weeks we started out making the genius paragraph orally. I would first call on a student to give me a Blah sentence. For example, The dog. Then, I would have another student make the Blah sentence Spicy, The large white dog. The next student would make an Extender sentence which was, The large white dog was jumping on the trampoline. I know... it's funny. They are an imaginative class! We then talked about adding two more sentences to make a Genius Paragraph and summing it up with a Genius sentence. So here's what my class came up with the first time we tried the Genius Ladder. The large white dog was jumping on the trampoline. He stopped and saw a cat walking by. He started to chase the cat down the road. The cat ran to the park and the large white dog chased him all the way there. They played and decided to jump on the trampoline after the park. Ok, it's a silly story but I'm wanting my kids to know how to expand and wrap up a paragraph with a Genius sentence. We are still working on it but I can already tell we are on the right track to becoming Genius writers!

Super Improver Wall

Wow! We are starting our second week of school. I have 16 boys and 8 girls! I'm so happy I've fully implemented WBT this year. It's helped to get their attention and the rules have been a success so far. However, with 16 boys I definitely need to keep them up and moving. We are doing a lot of brain breaks which has helped but with our second week starting I feel it's time to implement the Super Improver Wall. I know it's going to help my most challenging students with behavior and staying on task. As I explain this tomorrow I hope they will be as excited as I am! They each will have their own goals to work for. As they earn ten mini stars onto their colored star, they'll move up a level. Their overall goal is to become a legend in my class. I already know I'm going to have some legends and I am looking forward to encouraging my students to work hard. This is all new to me too so here's to improving along with my students!

Emotional Roller Coaster

Well, teachers reported back today for my district. It's always an exciting feeling but sad that summer is over and it's time to get back into the groove. This will be an exciting year for me as a teacher because I'm fully implementing Whole Brain Teaching. I've been working all summer reading, writing and preparing for the upcoming school year. I have to admit, I am nervous. I want to make sure I implement WBT effectively. I'm blessed to have an amazing mentor, Farrah Shipley, to encourage and guide me. I hope to one day mentor other teachers in WBT! So, I'm excited about this new teaching adventure officially starting next Monday!

Next Monday will not only be exciting but a tearful day as my 4 year old, Landon, will start PreK. It's amazing to me how fast kids grow. It was just yesterday I was holding him in the hospital with his older brother, Ethan, looking down at him with excitement. It will be a tearful day as I walk my baby into PreK with his Batman backpack proudly worn. He's ready but I'm still trying to hold on to my baby! I'll then head upstairs to walk my 3rd grade son, Ethan, into his class. He'll probably tell me to go he's got this. He feels pretty cool to be upstairs with the big kids now.

Anyway for me it's been an emotional roller coaster with school starting again. The excitement of  new students. The tears of my babies growing up. The excitement of starting WBT. The tears of waking up so early again! But most of all the excitement of teaching which is my passion. Building new relationships with students and families that hopefully last a lifetime.

Masters

I've heard more info on the Masters in Teaching with emphasis on Whole Brain Teaching. It would consist of 11 courses, 33 units, over 20 months but the cost would be, after government grants, $2,500. The additional feature on the table is the requirement that teachers spend 2 weeks in Louisiana, during one summer, for intensive, face to face training. Apartments on campus would rent for approximately $80 per week according to the WBT status on Facebook.  I've been searching for a way to get my masters and I really want to pursue this! I am not sure how I sign up but want to immediately. It would only be $2,500 and that's awesome!! This is a huge opportunity to expand my teaching and learn from great teachers. 
I am just going to put it in God's hands and put my trust in Him!

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