All About Ms. Goad, Teacher

There are a lot of posts on the internet about interactive bulletin boards and their benefits. What I find is they are used in a variety of ways and for different purposes. However, most of them seem to be for interacting with your students within the classroom.

I already interact with my students daily with our “check-in” questions on the front board. Each day they come into the room, read a question, and respond to the posted possible answers. The questions vary depending on what I need or want to know...favorite animals, what a word means, how much time they need to finish a project, who wants to help with something, opinions about a current event, whether the Oilers will make the playoffs (ok, that one hurt my heart), etc. Question topics can be light, funny, serious, useful and so on. I get to know my kids that way. I get to know how they are feeling. I get to know how they think their learning is going. So I didn’t need an interactive bulletin board in my classroom. 

As teachers we work SO hard to get student work to the quality that we are all proud for it to be displayed in the hallways. But how often do projects, besides art pieces, really get recognized? And not just on parent nights. It started with a Science project that I would normally have done in my room, however bulletin board space in the classroom is some prime real estate (lucky to have so many white boards but it’s a trade-off). So I decided to display it on our hallway bulletin board. The project was watching factory vs bakery bread mold. That right there should draw some attention to what’s going on in Room 12! As our students were making predictions in their duotangs, Educational Assistant extraordinaire, Mrs. A, gave the idea to let other students in the school make predictions. Especially if they are seeing the experiment unfold! 

So our Hallway Interactive Bulletin Boards were born this year! Besides students making their Science predictions through votes with stickers, we’ve also displayed our Love of Reading survey results and asked for students to post titles of favourite books. We most recently did some opinion writing on children and Smartphones that has drawn a LOT of attention!

Not only are students in different grades standing around the bulletin board or in the hallway providing their input, but they are talking about stuff! They are having discussions, sharing ideas/opinions, asking questions. There is a buzz.

Best of all, however, is that people...students, teachers, parents...are stopping to read and look at my students’ work. It makes my students SO proud of themselves and creates a greater desire to put their absolute best work out in the hallway. It makes me so proud of them as learners!

One of my proudest contributions during my time at Baturyn School is bringing this reading program to our Division II students. I learned about this competition from a teacher colleague at our nearby junior high school. At the time, the other grade 4 teacher and I had been discussing frustrations with the lack of home reading our students were doing and I thought this might be something motivating even at the elementary level. I learned everything I could about the program so I could plan how it might successful at our school. Our principal supported the idea, as did the majority of our Division II staff.

At the end our our first year, our approximate 140 Division II students read close to 260 books during the school year. Not only could we see motivation in students to read the U-Decide titles, we saw increased motivation in students to seek out other quality titles in the library.

We are now in our 2nd year and, although we made a few changes to the program from our first year, we are still seeing the same success and have the pleasure of seeing many of our students excited about reading, being recognized and talking about reading!

2017 marks the 3rd year that both my Gr 4 Phys. Ed classes have held the “Grade 4 Fitness Fair” for our school’s division 1 classes. During our lessons on active living and physical fitness, the students have this opportunity to show what they have learned about safely exercising to build a strong heart and body. We focus on simple exercises that can be done quickly and easily with no equipment and in limited space, so students can find ways to work activity into their everyday schedules.

The Grade 4 students work in a group to plan, practice and instruct their exercise routine to visiting K-Gr 3 classes. This leadership opportunity allows students to share what they know, highlight presentation skills and make connections with others in the school community. Many of my current Grade 4s remember participating as Gr 2 or 3 students and have been so excited for it to be their turn to put on the Fitness Fair.

This is a new project in Science that sort of took a life of it’s own. Looking at the learning objectives around waste reduction, product packaging and human generated waste, I thought what a great way to make it real and relevant by challenging the students to plan lunches that have little to no waste. Hey, why don’t we analyze any lunch waste we do create...mark it down. Hold on, let’s sort it and see what type we create the most of...and the ideas kept building and building to include custodians leaving garbage bins until the bag was full, figuring out what waste should go where, learning about graphs in math so we can graph our results in different ways, writing reflections about they problem and our learning and, finally, presenting our project, its results and how we can make a difference with one small change, at our school assembly in a couple weeks. Oh, and to challenge other classes to try their own Litter-less Lunch challenge. It has been the biggest and most glorious of project snowballs. I am so proud of the energy they brought to this project, and, more importantly, the energy they have taken home with them as both students and parents report on the small changes they are making in their homes.

Having primarily taught in Leader in Me schools, it is way of thinking that comes automatically into much of what I do with students both inside and outside the classroom. In order to give students an opportunity to see themselves as leaders, I have lead many student groups. They have done a lot of great work for both the school community and the community in general. I have lead a Running Club, Citizenship Leaders, Environmental Leaders, as well as other community-related initiatives.

For 3 years I have been able to participate in Inquiring Minds Site Schools such as City Hall School (twice) and Farm School. These opportunities do so much more than connect our class to an outside learning environment. They connect the students to their community and to authentic learning tasks. Usually that involves seeing life through a completely new lens.

This change in perspective lends itself naturally to inquiry. And inquiry naturally helps us develop as learners. Inquiry-based and/or project-based learning has always interested me. I have done some very beginner PD in these areas but have not independently delved into the depth of how to implement this approach successfully.

Above: City Hall School - Edmonton History Walk - learning about the Famous Five; Reflection on our last day at City Hall School; Visiting the Mayor’s Office

Below: Farm School - Getting to know Farmer Gilbert, our host for Farm School; Asking questions about the challenges of farming.

My Teaching Philosophy and Approach.

My approach to education can be best described as “active mind, active body”. I strive to look for ways to make learning hands-on and relevant to the “big picture” outcomes, and relate it, whenever possible, to our real world.

Over the past couple of years, I have increased my focus on collaborative style learning. I specifically model and teach aspects of successful group work. Students are capable of learning so much from each other and working to each other’s strengths and supporting each other where they need.

I have furthered my collaborative approach to include active learning, both cognitively and physically. I support students to think beyond the facts, see beyond the problem, and reach beyond their sight lines.

In efforts to find ways to promote student collaboration, I began to consider, research, and plan an alternative seating classroom. I truly believe that structured, confined seating options can limit student progress. Many students benefit from natural and non-disruptive movement to increase oxygen to the brain to increase focus and retention.