Review: Say the Time
Posted on 03. May, 2010 by Guest Author in All Posts, Clean-up and Transition, Tech Stuff, Tools and Miscellaneous
Submitted by: Jessica Andrighetti, elementary art teacher from Houston, Texas.
Product Title: Say the Time (PC-only computer program, see Mac alternative below)
Grade Levels: Kindergarten-12th grade
Product Review: I am an elementary art teacher, and I know that schedules are hard to keep. In my classroom, we have fifty-five minute classes, and when you take away clean up time, that doesn’t leave us with nearly enough time to get our work done. I also realized when I was helping students, that sometimes the time got away from me. So I searched online for some kind of timer. What I found was Say the Time. It is an amazing program that can set reminders to go off every day.
I have set a reminder for when it is clean-up time for each class, and I have it repeat every week day. Whenever the bell rings, the students know it it time to clean up. This gets everyone going very quickly, and always on time! The program costs about $30.00, but that is a one time fee. There are no subscriptions or any other costs. Just recently, I have added another timer that tells students when they need to be in line and ready to walk out the door. Just today, I had a fourth grade class that was cleaned up and in line in less than one minute! It has worked wonders and given me back my class time. Another added bonus: You can set it to “Say the time” whenever you want it to (I have it set for every 15 minutes) which helps the younger students with elapsed time!
Please note: Say the Time works on PC only. If you are a Mac user, we found a similar product called “Timer 7.0” (click “download page” for free version)
Bucket Rating (5 out of 5 – Love! Need it! Gotta have it now!):
(5) Love it! Need it! Gotta have it now!
Whole Brain Teaching
Posted on 01. Oct, 2009 by Guest Author in All Posts, Challenging Students, Clean-up and Transition, Clssrm Mgmt, Educators in Art, Off-task Behavior, Positive Reinforcement
The following is a guest post written by Katie Jarvis. She has been teaching art for nine years and currently teaches at Cameron Elementary in Alexandria, Virginia.
At the beginning of every year, art teacher’s everywhere make up a “rules poster” to review with students on the first day of classes. Throughout the year I would find that the students would claim to forget or not know the rules. While researching art room rules last year I came across a teacher on Youtube, Chris Biffle, a college professor who taught what he called Whole Brain Teaching.
How does it work? At the beginning of every class the students and I recite the art room rules. The rules have hand motions and each week we change the style in which we say them- squeaky voice, deep voice, sad, happy, fast, cowboy, etc. The kids love it! In fact if I try to skip over doing the rules even my 6th graders complain.
I created a video to illustrate how I teach these rules on the first day of art. Trouble viewing video below? Click here.
There is also a scoreboard to help with classroom management. I mark “smiley faces” and ”sad faces” on the board as the class earns them (see monkeys in image on left). When the class earns a smile they get to cheer. When the class earns a sad face everyone groans. The points are tallied at the end of each class and a gold paintbrush is awarded for more smiles than frowns, a silver paintbrush for an equal number of smiles and frowns, or no brush for more frowns than smiles. Four paintbrushes earn the class a free art day. Each silver brush is worth 1/2 a gold brush (2 silvers = 1 gold)
The most effective tool I’ve learned from Whole Brain Teaching is getting the students attention. When I say “Class” they say “Yes!” I vary the way I say class to keep them on their toes. For example if I say “Classsity, Class” they respond “Yessity, yes!”
Whole Brain Teaching involves lots of hand gestures and verbal responses from students to keep them engaged and entertained. Using WBT creates a “peaceful classroom full of orderly fun”. Students have more fun following my rules, since I switched to Whole Brain Teaching, rather than ignoring them.
Review: Busy Beetles and Batty Lizards
Posted on 31. Mar, 2009 by Guest Author in All Posts, Art Games, Cool+Creative, Reviews
Submitted by: Susan Tiemstra, elementary art teacher from Clarendon Hills, Illinois
Art Game Title: Busy Beetles and Batty Lizards
Grade Level(s): K – 5
Category: Art Production, Citizenship, Teaching Resource
Product Review: Busy Beetles and Batty Lizards are puzzles that integrate the subject of mathematical tessellation and art, as pattern, color and a connection to the art of M.C. Escher. Each puzzle comes with suggested patterns that can challenge students, however, there are endless ways these puzzles can be created either individually, in groups or as a whole class! These puzzles are a great after finishing art projects, keeps their minds engaged, and provides an opportunity to improve leadership and citizenship skills whether you have 5 minutes or more. I own several of each of the Busy Beetles and Batty Lizards, and my students from kindergarten through 5th grade never get tired of creating with them!
Bucket Rating (out of 5):
(5) Love it! Need it! Gotta have it now!
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