Bookmaking

Spent a satisfying morning learning/reviewing bookmaking skills in a class taught by one of my cohorts, M (who's also responsible for teaching me how to blog!)

We learned/created a simple folder book

An accordion book

A 4 page/one sheet 'hot dog' booklet

A step book

'Who am I?" book

Palm Tree book

You can see the step-by-step instructions of most of these at makingbooks.com. All are designs from artist Susan Kapuscinski Gaylord. This is such a great way to combine literacy/vocabulary activities with artmaking!

Vocabulary Games & Closure Ideas

As a staff, we received a new book to develop the vocabulary of our students through games. The book is called Vocabulary Games for the Classroom by Lindsay Carleton and Robert J. Marzano.

So the MAP teachers (Music and Band, Art and PE) brainstormed during one of our collaboration meetings to come up with a vocabulary game from the many listed in the book that we could put to use in our classroom right away.

Jo (traveling art teacher) and I came up with question cards that are used at the end of our classes to review new vocabulary about materials, concepts or techniques.

We write out the Q's on index cards & keep them handy for the end of class.

You know my obsession with color sorting so each grade level has its own color for the cards.

When the table group has cleaned up their space, is quiet & waiting to be called to line up, their group gets a question from me. Answer correctly - line up! Answer incorrectly - wait for your next question AFTER every other table gets a question. So far, the kids are really into it - kinda like a mini-jeopardy game...

As the project develops, more questions/vocab words will be added. I'm hoping that over time, students will become more familiar with the new vocabulary which should lead to more frequent correct usage.