Mrs. Vanderford's Education Blog

Morning fellow teacher friends! Below I have provided a first impression short analysis on a few teaching resources I have not heard of or worked with in the past. Flip Quiz allows users to create Jeopardy-like games to review concepts with students. I like finding new programs like Flip Quiz to make review and quizzes more engaging and enjoyable. Having more than one in our toolbox will keep us from being repetitive with our students and exposes them to a variety of sources. Flubaroo allows teachers to quickly grade assignments when using multiple-choice method. It's an add-on for spreadsheets such as Excel. If using spreadsheet to input student data this can be a great source. If schools require a different grading system this program may not be the best due to it requiring an extra step in transferring scores. This add-on also gives us statistics such as the average score, the percent of students who got each question correct/incorrect. Students names will be in red font i...

https://web.seesaw.me/  IOS, Android, Kindle, Chromebook and Web Apps friendly. What is Seesaw?  An Instagram for your classroom, building the bridge to communication between teacher, students, and families.   Seesaw is a student driven digital portfolio application that allows students to take pictures, draw, record videos/ voice overs, take notes, share links/files, and blog. Students are able to upload their work for teacher and families to see and comment.  Families will now have a glimpse of what goes on in the classroom versus their child coming home and shrugging off the question, “Johnny, how was school today? What did you learn?” What else can Seesaw do?  Seesaw is user friendly and allows for each individual to have their own profile. Seesaw can be a great resource to show progress during parent conferences and collecting work samples.  Seesaw can send out messages to all students or all families. When and/o...

My Teaching Philosophy I believe providing a safe supportive classroom environment will promote students to feel valued, included, and empowered. In doing so I will lead by example and provide guidelines for them to do the same, with their peers. I will start the school year with a social contract where students have the opportunity to contribute to our classroom rules. This can be done by asking students: how should you treat your classmates, how should classmates treat you, how do you want your teacher to treat you, and how should we all treat each other when there is conflict? A social contract allows students to find meaning behind classroom rules and expectations and through experience are more willing to follow. To assist students in following classroom rules and expectations I'd love to set up a positive behavior system where students are rewarded for their hard work.  I believe all students are capable learners with the right instructional methods and strategies. In ...