Mrs. Shirk and Mr. Cirelli have been able to enhance their
classroom instruction through the support of the
DonorsChoose Program.
Mrs. Shirk describes the impact of the reading materials
in her classroom:
The enhancement to my classroom through the opportunity of
the Donors Choose grant has been tremendous. Within the past years, I
have had the opportunity to provide my students with an atmosphere and the
resources to propagate the facilitation of reading in our classroom and
throughout their lives. Last year, students were inspired to see
the zebra motif transform our classroom into a reading sanctuary.
Students can regularly be seen immersing themselves in a good book and a
comfortable beanbag chair thanks to the generosity of donors who support the
love of reading.
Through the Donors Choose grant, I have been provided with
the necessary resources to facilitate Literature Circles in my classroom.
Literature Circles, as developed by Harvey Daniels, delivers a scaffolded
approach to literature for struggling or emerging readers. To the
untrained eye, this at first glance may seem to be just a book club; however,
it is actually a very structured approach to understanding, appreciating, and
discussing literature on an intellectual level.
The inception of Literature Circles into our classroom has
been met with rave reviews. Students’ overall AR scores and STAR reading levels
have drastically improved demonstrating the success of this pedagogical
approach to reading. Students’ own feedback suggests the positive power of
this approach as they have stated, "I understand the book that I'm reading
so much more.” "Lit Circles are fun!"
As the incorporation of Literature Circles continues within
my classroom so will the want of new multiple copy texts. Please join
those who have already supported our classroom on Donors Choose and look for
more projects to come. Check out our
classroom projects- http://www.donorschoose.org/Michelle.Shirk
Mr. Cirelli describes the impact of the iPad in his
classroom:
My room is now outfitted with an iPad Mini, the presence of
which has already enhanced student learning and will continue to do so for some
time. I Immediately, I began to plot how this new resource could be used in my
Economics classes. With the help of a few apps, I have been able to use the
iPad as a way to display presentations to students through an overhead
projector. I have also been able to use it for hands on lessons. As you can see
in the photos uploaded to my project page, I have used the iPad to teach my
students about Supply, Demand, and Equilibrium. In the photo examples, students
gathered after a lesson on demand shifts and worked together to produce demand
curves. These curves were drawn directly on the iPad! The students love it.
They enjoy it even more when I use my wireless connection to broadcast the
image from my iPad to the overhead projector, thus making for a larger and a
more interactive experience. Moreover, I have used the iPad in conjunction with
applications that allow me to track student participation, which can be
displayed to the students so that they may receive real-time feedback. This has
also been invaluable for students and has actually increased participation!
Finally, I am in the process of developing ways to implement the iPad
effectively in my US History courses. I see it being most useful when dealing
with primary sources. The plan is to utilize the iPad so that students will be
able to identify aspects of a primary source and display this to the class
either in an intimate group setting or to the entire class when I stream the
iPad. This will allow for real-time, collaborative-based, learning. As you can
see, the potential for the iPad seems almost limitless.
The importance of this project cannot be understated. The
addition of an iPad to my classroom has boosted my teaching by opening up new
horizons that may have otherwise been closed. I have been inspired to find new
ways to use the iPad so that my students can benefit to the highest degree. My
quest to do so has enhanced student learning as they, too, have been further
drawn into the learning process through the lure of technology. We as educators
must embrace technology and use it to our advantage. Though we may have grown up
in a world before email, this is all our students know. To be able to teach
them concepts through mediums with which they relate has benefited not only
them, but has made me a better teacher in the process.
