Week 2 Blog: June 8, 2016

Tonight we talked a lot about working with words and writing. One thing in particular that we looked at was something called a word wall.  A word wall is simply a collection of words that are displayed in large visible letters somewhere in the classroom.  It is designed to help students learn new words before, during and after a lesson.  We were asked to find tips and other ideas on how to use a word wall in the classroom.  The website I used to find information was reading rockets.org, this website provided me with information on why we use word walls, and how we use them. I found it to be quite interesting.  http://www.readingrockets.org/strategies/word_walls
  Many of my classmates shared some fun and creative ideas on how to use word walls in the classroom, and I found some ideas to be beneficial to me as a future educator.  One example in particular was, placing the words for the word wall on the ceiling tiles.  Now, I'm not sure if the school district would allow that, but if so this is a great way to make use of your classroom space! Other ways to make learning new words is to play games with them and use chants, snap, sing, etc, Have fun with it!  One classmate mentioned guessing games, by having students write the word on someone's back and the other student guess what they are writing.  My favorite idea though, is the flashlight game, and musical chair game that were mentioned in class. I can see myself using these and other games when introducing new words to the class. I find that when students are engaged in games and songs while learning new information, the information sticks better with them in short, and long-term memory.  My sixth grade teacher taught us the Scientific Method in a song, and to this day, I will still "sing" the scientific method when I am listing the steps or working through a problem.