Engaging Young Adolescents

The article below has some useful information that may guide you in motivating and engaging our students.    This link to the Middle School Journal has additional ideas and resources that you may find useful.

Books That Hook Middle-School Students on Subject Matter

            In this helpful Middle School Journal article, Kent State University professor William Bintz suggests that certain books – he calls them “way-in” books – can grab students’ interest and engagement in topics that might seem boring. “They are tools for exploration,” he says, “a way to inquire – an opportunity to pose questions, arouse curiosities, and pursue anomalies about topics of unexpected interest that hopefully will capture their imagination.” Way-in books aren’t a substitute for actual content instruction, but they can create a far better learning climate if used skillfully.

Bintz has specific suggestions for middle-school teachers in all content areas. Here are excerpts from his selection:

English language arts

Inference:

-   The Incredible Book Eating Boy (Jeffers, 2006)

-   Beneath the Surface (Crew, 2005)

-   The Watertower (Crew, 1999)

-   The Collector of Moments (Buchholz, 1997)

-   The Invention of Hugo (Selznick, 2007)

Persuasive arguments:

-   Earrings (Voist, 1993)

-   I Wanna Iguana (Orlof, 2004)

-   Detective LaRue: Letters From the Investigation (Teague, 2004)

-   The Perfect Pet (Palatini, 2003)

-   Dear Mrs. LaRue: Letters from Obedience School (Teague, 2002)

Social studies

Culture and cultural diversity:

-   The Hello, Goodbye Window (Norton, 2005)

-   First Day in Grapes (Perez, 2002)

-   The Pot That Juan Built (Andrews-Coebel, 2002)

-   Uptown (Collier, 2004)

-   Amelia’s Road (Altman, 1993)

Individuals, groups, and institutions:

-   Benjamin Banneker: Pioneering Scientist (Wadsworth, 2003)

-   Molly Bannaky (McGill, 1999)

-   Immigrant Kids (Freedman, 1980)

Mathematics

Patterns, relations, and functions:

-   The Warlord’s Puppeteer (Pilgard, 2003)

-   Patterns in Peru (Neuschwander, 2007)

-   Sir Cumference and the Sword in the Cone (Neuschwander, 2003)

-   If You Hopped Like a Frog (Schwartz, 1999)

-   Spaghetti and Meatballs for All (Burns, 1997)

Geometric shapes:

-   The Greedy Triangle (Burns, 1994)

-   Mummy Math (Neuschwander, 2005)

-   What’s Your Angle, Pythagoras? A Math Adventure (Ellis, 2004)

-   Sir Cumference and the Great Knight of Angleland (Neuschwander, 2001)

-   Sir Cumference and the Dragon of Pi (Neuschwander, 1999)

-   Sir Cumference and the First Round Table (Neuschwander, 1997)

-   The Librarian Who Measured the Earth (Lasky, 1997)

-   The Fly on the Ceiling (Glass, 1998)

Numbers and operations:

-   Beanstalk: Measure of a Giant (McCallum, 2006)

-   If Dogs Were Dinosaurs (Schwartz, 2005)

-   Polar Bear Math (Nagda and Bickel, 2004)

-   The Warlord’s Puppeteers (Pilgard, 2003)

-   A Place for Zero (Lopresti, 2003)

-   One Riddle, One Answer (Thompson, 2001)

-   Inchworm and a Half (Pinczes, 2001)

Measurement:

-   How Tall, How Short, How Far Away (Adler, 2000)

-   Greater Estimations (Goldstone, 2008)

-   Great Estimations (Goldstone, 2006)

-   Measuring Penny (Leedy, 2000)

-   How Big Is a Foot? (Myller, 1991)

Science

Experimental and observational inquiry:

-   Gregor Mendel: The Friar Who Grew Peas (Bardoe, 2006)

-   What’s the Matter in Mr. Whiskers’ Room? (Ross, 2007)

-   Science Verse (Scieszka and Smith, 2004)

-   Mr. Archimedes’ Bath (Allen, 1998)

-   June 29, 1999 (Weisner, 1995)

Observational inquiry and the scientific method:

-   Snowflake Bentley (Martin, 1998)

-   Rachel: The Story of Rachel Carson (Erhlich, 2008)

-   Galileo’s Journal (Pettenati, 2006)

-   The Tarantula Scientist (Montgomery, 2004)

-   The Man Who Made Time Travel (Lasky, 2003)

-   Leonardo: Beautiful Dreamer (Byrd, 2003)

Physics and Chemistry:

-   A Drop of Water (Wick, 1997)

-   Where Does Electricity Come From? (Mayes, 2006)

-   Forces Make Things Move (Bradley, 205)

-   The Island That Moved (Hooper, 2004)

-   How Do You Lift a Lion? (Wells, 1996)

-   Why Can’t You Unscramble an Egg? (Cobb, 1990)

-   Why Doesn’t the Earth Fall Up? (Cobb, 1988)

Living systems and life sciences:

-   The Way We Work (Macaulay, 2008)

-   Alive: The Living, Breathing Human Body Book (DK Publishing, 2007)

-   What a Family! (Isadora, 2006)

-   Have a Nice DNA (Balkwill, 2002)

-   Amazing Schemes Within Your Genes (Balkwill, 1993)

-   The Facts of Life: A Drop of Blood (Showers, 1989)

Earth and space science:

-   Arctic Lights, Arctic Nights (Miller, 2003)

-   The Incredible Water Show (Frasier, 2004)

-   Mountain Dance (Locker, 2001)

-   On the Same Day in March (Singer, 2000)

-   Cloud Dance (Locker, 2000)

“‘Way-In’ Books Encourage Exploration in Middle Grades Classrooms” by William Bintz in Middle School Journal, January 2011 (Vol. 42, #3, p. 34-45), available for purchase at

http://www.nmsa.org/Publications/MiddleSchoolJournal/Articles/January2011/tabid/2309/Default.aspx

Bintz can be reached at wpbintz@gmail.com

Self Exploration

It is time to begin thinking about our Spring CBU Plans.  The SRT Theme is Exploration.  Each grade level team is responsible for figuring out how they will incorporate Exploration into their units over the course of this semester while creating a display that showcases how this theme was integrated across the curriculum.

One idea that I would suggest is Self-Exploration.  Adolescent males are trying to understand themselves.  We are trying to teach them how to make and achieve short and long-term goals that will help them reach their dreams and become productive responsible members of society.  Concepts related to this include:  Career Exploration; Being a Male (Man); Being a Global Citizen; Generational Patterns and Family Traits / Characteristics; Interests, Goals, and Dream.  With that idea, I would also suggest creating a Career Section in your class.  Everyday for 30 days a new career related to your content area can be introduced and discussed in class.  This idea allows for students to see opportunities for themselves in your content, thus making the lessons more relevant.

I look forward to your thoughts about these suggestions.

What Does Differentiation Look Like?

Here is a link to a site that describes differentiated instruction.  Let me know if there is anything here that helps you.

http://www.primary-education-oasis.com/differentiated-instruction.html

Weekly Bulletin Quotes

Mr. Shelton listed the following strategies and quotes in this week's bulletin. I wanted to highlight them here. Let me know if they have any special meaning for you.

Strategies for Teaching Boys and Girls, Secondary Level, p. 66
 
Motivating Black Males to Achieve in School and in Life-One of the first steps toward becoming a great, inspiring teacher is to concentrate on building strong relationships with your students while simultaneously making learning fun (Kunjufu, 2002).  As obvious and rudimentary as it may sound, your students must actually like you, you must show that you like them.  Students should be able to sense how you feel about them through your words and your actions.  Many of them simply want someone to listen to their concerns and offer suggestions.  
 
Always imitate the behavior of the winners when you lost.
 
Anger makes you smaller, while forgiveness forces you to grow beyond what you were.
 
Don’t try to fix the students, fix ourselves first.  The good teacher makes the poor student good and the good student superior.  When our students fail, we, as teachers, too, have failed.

​Marva Collins

Have a great week.