Have you used Google Classroom before? While the interface may not be user friendly for organizing assignments, the ability to assign interactive assignments through Google Slides is a game changer with digital learning. This post will share a brief overview of how to assign Google Slide activities via Google Classroom with a free downloadable guide you can use as a ... Read More
How to Assign Google Forms to Your Students
As we move more to online learning, teachers are having to post work online for their students. For many teachers, that means assigning work on Google Classroom. For other teachers, that means emailing work to students or their parents or posting work on their websites or other learning platforms for students to download. One easy-to-use option for teachers to use no ... Read More
Tips for Home Learning | Remote & Distant Learning Tips
Home learning/distance learning/remote learning (or whatever your school is calling it) is definitely new territory for most (if not all) of us. Here are some tips and strategies that I think will help make this process more effective for you, your students, and your parents. Some of these apply to digital learning but many are applicable with printable work as ... Read More
Plant Cell Model with Noodles
Any time that you can make science hands-on, your students will be usually be much more engaged and retention will be higher. One way to do this is to make models. This post will shares a fun way to make plant cell models using pasta noodles. Want to see a post about making an edible animal cell (with fruit)? Click here! Plant Cell Model Materials Here are some ... Read More
Edible Animal Cells
Plant and animal cells are two science skills/concepts that don't really lend themselves to experiments. But, they are perfect for having students make models to represent the science. This post will share one way to make an edible animal cell model. Edible Animal Cell Materials/Ingredients Here are some suggested ingredients/materials. Feel free to substitute these ... Read More
Teaching Text Structure (And What To Do When Students Struggle)
Text structure is a very powerful reading skill that can really help students make sense of and analyze informational text. This post shares tips for teaching text structure, including pre-requisite skills, all the different text structure skills, and strategies for when students struggle. What is Text Structure? Text structure refers to how the details and ... Read More
Free Digital Distance Learning Activities for 4th and 5th Grade
While the country prepares to keep our families and communities safe, teachers are also continuing with teaching and learning through digital distance learning opportunities and packets for our students. On this post, I will share some free distance learning resources for 4th and 5th graders that are printable (and some now include digital versions). Writing Choice ... Read More
Free Text Structure Activities
Text structure is one of those reading skills that is really powerful for helping students understand texts and even become stronger informational writers. But it is not always an easy skill for our students to master (and especially at the rigor required). This post will share a few free text structure activities and resources to help you teach this tricky but important ... Read More
Teaching Point of View (And What To Do When Students Struggle)
Teaching point of view and perspective is another tricky reading skill for 4th and 5th grade readers. On this post, I will share tips to help you teach point of view to your students, including what skills students need before instruction on point of view, all of the different point of view subskills that really increase the rigor, and strategies that you can do when ... Read More
Free Point of View Activities
Point of view is a tricky skill for our students. A lot of the skills we teach in 4th and 5th grade are new to our students and this is one of them. So, that makes it challenging to get some of our students to understand it quickly and then move to the deeper levels required. This post will share a few point of view activities that will hopefully give you a few more tools ... Read More
Tips for Teaching Theme (And What To Do When Students Struggle)
Teaching 4th and 5th grade reading is not easy! The standards begin to get really tricky and the gap between what the students should be able to do in reading and what they can do can be pretty wide. One of the those standards that is tricky is theme. On this post, I will share some tips to help you teach theme to your 4th and 5th graders, including what students should ... Read More
Free Theme Activities
One of the best ways to measure if a student has truly mastered reading skills is if they can apply that reading skill over and over to new texts (including texts of their choosing). And the tricky skill of determining the theme of a story is no different. In order for students to truly master this skill, they need to be able to apply it consistently to new texts they ... Read More
