Sunday, March 24, 2013

Educational Resources

I am compiling a list of educational resources including reading worksheets, math worksheets, graphic organizers, and educational parent resources on my website. Many of you have asked me for my suggestions so I hope that you will find them useful☺. Please visit http://www.beachcitiestutoring.com/ and go to the “Resources” tab.

Educational Games/Activities!

Educational games are a great way to make learning fun and allow your children to use technology in a useful way! I have added a page of great educational games on my website. Hope you enjoy:)!
Here are just a few, but please visit our website at http://www.beachcitiestutoring.com/ to view more great educational activity/game sites.

http://www.brainpop.com/
http://www.pbskids.org/
http://www.funbrain.com/

Sunday, March 17, 2013

Sustained Silent Reading and Fluency


 Is sustained silent reading effective for kids, their reading fluency, and their grade levels?  

             In my opinion, sustained silent reading can be effective to improve fluency depending on the grade level and comfort level of the reader. For students in the primary grade level, I think SSR can be effective as practice when used alongside other programs, in which students read aloud and are timed (i.e. Read Naturally), but it is not necessarily effective alone as young students often are not decoding every word accurately and are not able to monitor their own fluency. They are also not necessarily mature enough to select material at their appropriate reading level that could help build their fluency. I think they do need to read silently as this is an important skill that they will need for their future academic career but as far as improving fluency, I am not convinced this is effective alone.

            For middle and high school students, I think SSR can be more effective at improving their fluency, again based on how advanced a reader they are. Often when students are supposed to be silent reading, they may be just staring at the page or depending on how low a reader they are they may not be able to decode all the words. I think silent reading gives students the opportunity to be able to choose reading material that interests them and improve their reading skills through the act of practice, but in my opinion it is hard to conclude if a correlation exists between SSR and increased reading fluency.


Please visit http://www.beachcitiestutoring.com for more informational blogs and tutoring information.

Why is it important to integrate literature across all subject areas to make it more meaningful to students?


               I have had students who ask me "Why are we reading this?" They feel as if literature does not relate to their real lives and therefore are less motivated to pay attention and to give their full effort. I think it is our job as teacher to try to connect literature to students' lives. I also like the idea of allowing students to have some choice in the literature that we read. I may give two or three choices about a specific theme and then have literature circles so students can discuss their reading using guided discussion questions. I believe thematic units also help us to incorporate and connect culturally diverse literature because students can see that across cultures, people face similar challenges and experiences. I agree that thematic units can be a lot of work for the teacher, but on a positive note they can increase teacher collaboration among teachers of different subject matters. In conclusion, I think if we make literature more meaningful to students, they are more likely to become lifelong readers and encourage reading in their future children.


Please visit http://www.beachcitiestutoring.com for more informational blogs and tutoring information.

Differentiating Instruction

            According to Tomlinson, “Teachers are expected to stimulate thought, show examples and counterexamples, ask probing questions, set up authentic applications, play devil’s advocate, check for understanding, and require explanation and justification.  In a differentiated classroom, teachers use multiple approaches and support systems in these important roles to ensure understanding of a full range of learners “(Tomlinson, p. 109). Therefore, differentiation is beneficial to students because it allows them to access and understand the material, and it is beneficial to teachers because it allows them to reach all learners and vary their instruction. Differentiation helps teachers grow as professionals because they are always have to learn new modes of instruction as well as to modify their lessons to meet the needs of different types of learners.
            As a special education teacher, I have always had to differentiate instruction and I know that even in a general education classroom students learn in different ways (ie visual, auditory, kinesthetic) and at different paces. In an English classroom, I differentiate instruction by using a variety of whole class, small group, and independent activities. When creating small groups, I consider the different types of learners so that each member has different strengths and weaknesses and can therefore help each other.
            In addition, I provide graphic organizers during reading, writing, and lecture activities to support visual learners. I always read aloud directions even if they are written on the board to support auditory learners. I use a variety of independent and read aloud in class to support different types of learners.
           When creating assignments, I try to give students a choice in how to prove that they understood a topic. For example, for a literature project I may allow students to choose whether they deliver a speech, write a creative play, write an essay, or create a diorama that manifests their understanding of the story. This allows different types of learners to show their understanding of the materials in a way that is enjoyable to them. Finally, I respect student differences and try to incorporate literature from many different cultures to expose my students to a variety of cultures from around the world.

Please visit http://www.beachcitiestutoring.com for more informational blogs and tutoring information.

Tomlinson, C. A., & McTighe, J. (2006). Moving Forward to Integrate UBD and DI. Integrating Differentiated Instruction & Understanding by Design: Connecting Content and Kids.

Friday, March 1, 2013

Creating Educational Webquests for Children/Teens

I recently found a great website called http://www.zunal.com that allows you to create your own webquest on any topic. This is a great way for your child or to teen to participate in some discovery learning that incorporates technology. It is educational but also a lot of fun! You can even have your middle school or high school students create their own webquests. It is free. I created a webquest on censorship 9th through 12th grade students for a class that I am taking. Please check it out at
http://zunal.com/webquest.php?w=184090


Please visit http://www.beachcitiestutoring.com for more informational blogs and tutoring information.

How Can We Reduce the Fear of Writing?


I agree that most students fear writing. However, I have found lots of practice, using graphic organizers for prewriting, and individual mini-conferences with each student while the others are working independently or in small groups helps tremendously. I also believe in giving students a choice of essay topic as if they enjoy what they are writing about they are more motivated. Whether it involves a novel, a persausive topic, or research topic, providing students with a choice allows them to feel more in control and not as overwhelmed.

Before we talk about editing, I cannot stress the importance of pre-writing! I tutor tons of students of all ages and you would be suprised at how many either were never taught how to prewrite (concept maps, brainstorming, outlining etc) or were taught but still have no idea how to use this tool. Pre-writing allows students to focus on the topic and also to structure their writing so that it progresses logicially. No matter what the grade level from elmentary to high school, pre-writing is extremely effective and necessary. In addition, once students complete their pre-writing they gain confidence that the actual essay writing comes a lot easier.

Finally, to address the individual min conferences, I am pretty detailed in my annotating of mistakes but not only do I acknowledge the mistakes, I also offer examples of how to fix them or rewrite the sentence. At the end of every student's paper I bullet point the strengths and weaknesses of the essay. This helps the students see what they did well and what the need to improve on. Unfortunately, if you don't conference with students, many will just look at the grade and never look at the essay again. All my experience has been been in the middle and high school RSP English department so my classes have been a lot smaller than the average English class. It is too bad that not all students can have such small classes as I know conferencing and grading takes an exorbitant amount of time.


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Referral Incentive!

Beach Cities Tutoring would like to touch the community just as we have helped your student!  We  would like to offer a coupon for $20 off for any client who refers a new client. The new client must book at least one session for the existing client to earn the reward! Please mention this blog to receive your coupon.


Please visit http://www.beachcitiestutoring.com for more informational blogs and tutoring information.