Miss Art of Teaching

With the permission of my talented friend who made me a journal from scratch, I changed the front and back cover of the journal to suit my personality. I think I am falling in love with scrapbooking. I love the DIY factor. I simply used watered down PVA glue to attach the designs onto the journal. I changed the journal cover while my Year 7 students were quietly working on their self-portraits mixed media artwork. I love how my 4 x Year 7 classes have dramatically changed from being 'noisy' to now working quietly. They can monitor their voices due to the 'NOISE' signs that I made. I also have a student who is the 'shh-sha'. The shh-sha reminds students of the correct voice level if it is louder than usual. The NOISE sign works by flipping each letter (starting from E).  When letters are flipped, there are minutes written on the other side (E= 1 min, S = 2 min, I = 4 mins, S = 8 mins and E = 16 mins). The class needs to remain quiet for the entire duration. ...

I truly believe that decorating my room has made an impact to my students' learning. This year is my first year investing the time to decorate. They can tell that I care about my classroom and as a result respect the place more. It also helps with my classroom management and has made me a more organised teacher. Students don't often get to see high school rooms decorated so I think it is good for them to see a classroom that has been decorated for them and for myself. I have been squeezing in time during the morning to decorate my room. I have covered my ugly pin boards with blue tissue paper to match the teacher's desk. My classroom is really old, and all the pin boards have been tagged with a black whiteboard marker.  After work today, I popped into Kmart, Dollar stores and Daiso in hope to find something nice to decorate my classroom. Kmart seems to be the place to go and I purchased all my decorations from the one destination. I plan to have the decor...