Strategy Notebook Math 1.

Strategy Name Baseball Diamond Source Jenna Capps- 3rd grade mentor teacher Type of Strategy This strategy is designed to help keep students organized when solving reasonableness problems. Procedure First you instruct your students to look for key words such as, number TO number, or What Makes Sense. Then you draw a diamond. You but the to in the middle of the diamond and the each of the numbers on the sides on the left and right corners of the diamond. You put the number you are multiplying by at the top. Have the students multiply down the sides of the diamond. At the bottom you should have your scale of numbers to look for. It should look something like this.

Student Thought Process This strategy helps keep students organized and remember to do all the steps necessary to find the correct answer. This strategy should also help students to think about the important information that they should look for as they read the word problem.

Reflect/Extend I think this strategy is perfect for third grade but could also be used for 4 th grade as a review.
2. UPS Strategy U is for understand the problem, P is for plan, S is for solve, and the check mark is to check your answer.

3. DMSBS which explains the steps for division. D is for divide, M is for multiply, S is for subtract, B is for bring down, S is for start over. 4. Draw a picture to help solve a problem. 5. EGPT & EGTA for division and multiplication. This pneumonic helps students identify what function they will need to use when solving a word problem.

Science 1. Strategy Name Food Chain Source I saw this strategy demonstration at the science museum in Frisco (fieldtrip with first grade). I also found this strategy in Environmental Science Activities (1991) by Alpha Publishing Company when completing my science notebook for IS 352. Type of Strategy This is a game designed to help students realize the interconnectedness of organisms within a habitat. Procedure Assign students a different animal or plant from the food chain or the sun. Ask students what is the source of energy or what helps things grow. They should answer with the sun. Give the person who has the sun a loose end of a ball of string. Ask which living thing needs the sun to produce food. They should answer with one of the plants.

Whoever has the plant will grab on to the string as well. Then ask which animal would eat this plant, and that person will also grab the string and so on until all the students are holding the string. Ask the students what would happen if a certain animal disappeared (or died out). Cut the string to demonstrate the point. Explain how ecosystems are connected and organisms rely on each other to survive. Student Thought Process Students will get to see that all aspects of a habitat influence one another. It is a visual representation of a somewhat abstract concept. This would be a good strategy to tie in with the importance of taking care of our environment. This would incorporate Application and Evaluation in the Blooms Taxonomy as students consider how organisms rely upon one another for survival as well as consider how a negative impact on one organism would affect the whole environment. Reflect/Extend This is a great strategy for 1st grade through 3rd grade. This activity could be combined with another activity I saw at the Frisco center, which is habitat jenga. Basically, the jenga blocks are labeled with different organisms found in a particular habitat. The organisms that are lower on the food chain go lower in the jenga tower. Students slowly remove blocks one by one until the structure collapses. This activity demonstrates that if enough organisms are affected then an entire habitat can no longer sustain itself. This would be a perfect time to talk about types of things that negatively impact habitats and things that can support life in a habitat. 2. Circle Map is a graphic organizer used to help determine what background knowledge students already have and what they might need to learn on a certain topic. This would be a good pre-teaching strategy to use when introducing a new science concept. The topic goes in the innermost concentric circle. Inside the larger circle students or teacher writes what they know about that topic or questions about what they might want to learn. Outside the circle are where you write references or how you know that information. This activity is best done in a group discussion setting. It can also be helpful to keep original circle map and revisit it after the unit has been covered and fill in the new information students have learned with a new color so that students can see their growth. 3. I Have, Who Has? or Looping this is an activity with cards where students have to listen and match terms with definitions. 4. Create a Song or Poster is a valuable strategy to have children demonstrate what they have learned from a unit of study. It requires children to apply knowledge in a creative by giving students a choice of the activity it would appeal to visual and auditory learners.

5. Experiment are what I believe to be the most valuable strategy to teach science. It is hands on and children will be responsible for recording observations and data. Each experiment will look different based on the specific topic you are studying. I will use my science notebooks from IS 351 and IS 352 to help spark ideas as I teach. Social Studies 1. Strategy Name Simulation Source Tracey Hawes (one of my middle school teachers) and Pinterest Type of Strategy This is an activity designed to help children understand all the facets surrounding an event or concept. Students Procedure A teacher will provide background information related to an event in history, how a system of government works, or some other social studies concept. Then the teacher will assign different roles to students where they will have to act out the event or topic. This can occur in a single class period or over an extended period of time. It would also be good for older students to journal about what they learned from the experience. Student Thought Process This strategy is designed to help students walk in the shoes of others or consider what they would do if they were in different circumstances. I think this would help them internalize significant aspects of history or other social studies topics. I think it would also help them be able to relate some of these topics to everyday life and understand why they are important to study.

Reflect/Extend I think that this strategy would be particularly helpful for older elementary students and up who have the ability to consider concepts from multiple perspectives. I remember doing an activity like this in middle school. We were studying early American history and the differences between slavery and indentured servant hood. We had done some reading in our history books and had some class discussions related to it. Then our teacher assigned one week for us to create a contract with our parents and be an indentured servant for a week. Then the next week we had to be act like a slave with our parents as the master. After both weeks we wrote a report on what we learned from the assignment. It was challenging but I did get a lot out of it. It is extremely important that the teacher takes time to consider the age appropriateness of the simulation activity.

2. Continents Song by Dr. Striker! This is a visual, kinesthetic, and auditory activity that helps students remember the continents and where they are in relation to one another.
3. Yo, Sacramento! (And All Those Other State Capitals You Don't Know) by Will Cleveland and Mark Alvarez is a clever book filled with mnemonics to help you remember your states and capitals. It would be fun to use this when going over a unit on the states. I used this growing up and I believe the book is also filled with interesting facts about each state.

4. Create a map is a great social studies activity for younger grades. After explaining the basics of a map, key, and compass rose children can apply their knowledge by mapping a location they are extremely familiar with. A good follow up activity would be for the teacher to create a treasure hunt on campus where students have to follow a route that the teacher gives them on a campus map.

5. Class Store or Township is a fun way to help children understand the basics of economics. Each student should be responsible for making and selling items. Having students record how much money it takes to make the items and how much they earned by selling items is also beneficial.

Reading 1. Strategy Name The Terminator Source Krista Redmond- Professor for RDG 350 Type of Strategy This strategy is designed to support vocabulary development particularly by looking at context clues.
Procedure This is a strategy to build vocabulary and knowing how to use context clues to help identify or understand a word. This is a game that the teacher has to prepare in advance. The teacher can take several words from a book that she is having the children read. Then she will display one word at a time by itself. The children have to guess the meaning of the word (either write down their answer or raise their hand and share the answer). Also, have the children think about what other words they know that are similar (using root words is a very helpful strategy). Then the teacher will give them a sentence from the book that contains that word. The children will evaluate if they still believe that their definition is correct and why. Finally

the teacher will give the dictionary definition of the word. This can be presented in a fun way on a PowerPoint presentation like Ms. Redmonds Robot Terminator format.

Student Thought Process This strategy helps students gain the skill of learning new vocabulary through context clues. The goal is to develop a lifelong skill as they read more and more challenging literature to grow in their vocabulary development.

Reflect/Extend This strategy is particularly helpful in late elementary grades and up. I think it would be best accompanied with instruction on root words, prefixes, and affixes to provide the appropriate background knowledge for this activity. 2. Readers Theatre to help with fluency and it can also be integrated with drama or the arts. 3. Robot Reading Cards this is where the teacher models good reading and bad reading so that students can differentiate between how they should read and how they shouldnt. 4. Readers Response Journal is designed to help readers reflect on what they have read. There is a lot of flexibility with this strategy. Teachers can provide prompting questions or allow students to write about anything related to the reading. This can also be used for any grade level (young students can draw pictures if they are not yet able to write much). Teachers can also make this interactive by reading and commenting on each journal entry students make. 5. Add, Zoom, Flashback, Squeeze Reading Strategy on Pinterest

Extra Strategies:

Writing
1.

Narrative Writing Graphic Organizer: It is a thinking map with five squares in a column on the left side of a page and lines on the right side for writing text. In the first box students draw a man inside of a house and a question mark on the outside of the house. This question is to help the children remember that they need to include where they were, who they were with, and what they were doing, or why when they are writing a story. Th ere is room remaining within this box for the kids to draw pictures to help brainstorm the story. In the next three boxes she writes First, Then, and After that to get the children to think about putting their story in sequential order. And in the final box students draw a smiley face, a frown face, and a straight face. This is to remind the kids to say something about how that event made them feel in their conclusion. Once the kids draw pictures or key words in their boxes then they can use the lined spaces to the right to write a rough draft of their story. I think that this is a very clever strategy that could serve as a visual reminder to kids who are learning about the process of writing.

2.

Adding Details to Writing Graphic Organizer: This is an extention to the graphic organizer above. Have the students draw a text bubble, a cloud, a heart and a camera around the four corners of each of the five boxes. This is to remind the kids that when adding details you can think about adding something that somebody said, something that you thought about what happened, how it made you feel or more details about what you saw.

Review Strategies: 1. Using a cube to roll and ask students to name an attribute of whatever is face up when the cube lands. 2. Using definition and attribute cards to play the memory game with concepts you wan to review. Classroom management: 1. Keep a basket of sharpened pencils ready for students to use. If their pencil breaks then they can pick up a pencil from the basket. This keeps students from being a distraction to others. And it also keeps kids from having an excuse to get up and avoid the work that they need to be doing. I think this is something I would like to establish in my classroom. I just need to make sure that I stay organized and sharpen a bunch of pencils at the end of the day to be ready for the next day.