21 Ideas for Teaching Vocabulary

I’m sharing 21 ideas for teaching vocabulary. You may not be able to use all of them, but I hope you can find some ideas that will work well for you! I’ve shared books about vocabulary instruction, as well as the theory and techniques. This post is a lot more practical. We’re

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Strategies for teaching vocabulary - the books

Strategies for Teaching Vocabulary: The Books

Strategies for Teaching Vocabulary Strategies for teaching vocabulary are a critical part of every teacher’s toolkit, yet searching for them is a little bit of an Alice in Wonderland experience – down the rabbit hole you go. Responding to a question I got in an email (shout out to blog post

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How_to_get_students_to_pay_attention_to_their_work

How to get students to pay attention to their work

One of the most difficult things for teachers working with high ability students is to get them to pay attention to the work they’re doing. Many extremely able students get lower grades than they otherwise would because they fail to pay attention to the little details. You know what I

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boy on motorcycle

Early Finishers: 9 Ideas for Students

Students who are early finishers can struggle with boredom, frustration, and staying, you know, nice. This is because they sit and wait. Lather, rinse, repeat. Last week I wrote about best practices for teachers with regard to early finishers, and today I’m focusing on the students (just in case their

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Announcing the Gifted Guild

A Guild is Born What would happen if Ian Byrd of Byrdseed and Lisa Van Gemert of GiftedGuru got a crazy idea to make the world a better place for gifted kids by making it a better place for educators of the gifted and then…made it happen? World, meet the Gifted

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Early finishers - great ideas for teachers

Early Finishers: Ideas for Teachers

Best Practices for Early Finishers Early finishers can challenge even the best and most experienced teachers. Many of us have had the experience of barely getting the work passed out to everyone before the first Fast Finisher is waving her completed assignment in the air. Really? You’re done already? In addition

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HOmework Help - The Homework Plan and Checklist

Homework Help: Using the Homework Plan and Checklist

Homework Help is a Checklist Away Homework causes stress in homes across the country. Probably the world, really. I wrote some tips for avoiding the homework battle recently, and one of tips I suggested was to use a homework checklist. I looked around and couldn’t find any that I loved,

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Reading Challenges

  Why a reading challenge? Reading challenges are so much fun! I love participating in them because they so often introduce me to new books I would not otherwise have read. I’ve gathered a list of some reading challenges you may like to try out in your classrooms or families

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11 steps for ending the homework battle

11 Tips for Ending the Homework Battle

Ending The Homework Battle What do you do when your child won’t do schoolwork without an epic battle every.single.day? What happens if you throw gifted in the mix, just for fun? Motivation is a tricky thing, and every child is different, but here are 11 ideas for how to get kids

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Free printable Christmas bookmarks

Free Printable Christmas Bookmarks

I’m sharing a set of free printable Christmas bookmarks I made with all of you because if you’re like me, you’re giving some books as gifts this holiday season. I’m sharing some book recommendations, too! About the Bookmarks I designed these Christmas bookmarks in color and in black and white

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