Do you need more sleep?  By Friday morning, is getting an afternoon nap your priority for the afternoon?  What percentage of teachers do you think are sleep-deprived?  According to an article in Your Total Health, almost a quarter of all teachers say their teaching is hampered by lack of sleep.  The study concluded that about 43% of [...]

I hate throwing anything away.  All of my friends and colleagues know that.  That’s why cleaning my basement is taking forever.   It’s hard because I love my teacher stuff.  Those cardboard circles will become faces … or clocks … or planets.  And all the leftover goodie bag toys will make great BINGO game prizes. [...]

When you read forensics, do you think debate or crime solving?  Thinking of the latter, Who Dunnit? defines forensic science as “the study of objects that relate to a crime.”  Kids can go to the Who Dunnit? website and learn about the skills needed for crime solving, more specifically fingerprinting, teeth impressions, powders and foot to [...]

With the renewed energy of a new day, I decided to look for grouping cards that don’t need to be mailed from Australia.  Science Kit of Boreal’ Laboratories has a set of 30 that group students in grades 7-9 and reinforce science facts at the same time.  I love the inexpensive ones from Really Good [...]

When I was teaching Spanish, I tried a zillion different ways to put students in groups – counting off, drawing names, creating groups of mixed ability ahead of time, all girls, all boys, month of birth, …  I wish I had known about the Bellmetrics Grouping Cards.  Unfortunately they are made in Australia, although they [...]

Experienced teachers have many ways of getting students’ attention.  Raising your hand for silence is probably used more often that anything else, but there are many other things you can do.  You might try a new attention grabber from this list written by Leah Davies. M.Ed.  I once tried #19, which is to use the [...]