Project Based Learning...put simply

A project based learning approach to teaching is something that is being talked about more and more these days (for good reason).  In order for everybody to get on the same page and look at the big picture, this 3-minute Common Craft video gives us a great introduction behind the philosophy of teaching this way.  Critical thinking, collaboration, and communication are the important skills that we want to challenge our students to practice in order to become engaged in the learning process.  We are at a turning point in the world of education, and being able to facilitate classroom learning in this style is the future.  Click on the link below to watch the video.

http://www.commoncraft.com/video/project-based-learning

I'm Gonna Be The President

Flocabulary is a website that specializes in using hip-hop as a tool to learn content.  They have certain free music videos that are free to view, including "The Week in Rap", which is a summary of the major news stories every week.  Among the current videos that are available to view for free is "The Presidential Election".  This song and video walk through the process of how a candidate becomes the President of the United States.  Use it as a way to summarize the process, or have students list the steps of the presidential election that are discussed in the song.  Either way, the song will probably get stuck in your head.

What is The Electoral College?

With the election coming up, Common Craft has posted this video: The Electoral College in Plain English.  If you are not familiar with the in Plain English series of videos - it presents topics in a very easy to understand format for learners.  This is a great introduction for students to the Electoral College.  The embed code is available if you wanted to embed it into your own website.

Sneak that grammar in

Grammar is the component of language arts that seems to get the least amount of time allowed for study.  In understanding this, I would highly recommend that you check out Road to Grammar.  It is a website that has pre-built quizzes on grammar topics that work great on the SMARTBoard.  You can easily review some grammar concepts everyday by taking a view minutes during writing class to discuss and take a quick quiz. 
There is a also a Road to Grammar Jr. portion for primary students.  In addition to the quizzes, there are also some games that would be great SMARTBoard center activities. Check it out!