The goal of Genius Hour was to get students more engaged in the learning process and to help instill the idea of lifelong learning. Students were asked to brainstorm what their passion was. Students then had to develop an inquiry question related to their passion. Then they had to decide how they would like to show what they learned. Then, students spent time researching about their projects. They were given one hour each Friday to work on their projects. It was an exciting project that students looked forward to working on each week! Because these projects were quite large, they did not all finish at the same time. As students complete their projects, they were able to present what they did to the class.

Goal: To learn language connected to love, relationships and self

Explore the vast library of humanities lesson plans and teacher guides by subject, theme, and grade level. Find lessons on American Heroes, Art and Culture, History and Social Studies, Literature and Language Arts.
Grade Range K-12.

This site offers games, activities and resources in the following categories:
GAMES
MATH
LANG. ARTS
HISTORY
USA
GEOGRAPHY
SCIENCE
PEOPLE
HOLIDAYS

This site offers lots of free resources for pre-k and elementary school students, plus links to other great sites that support children's love of learning.

The resources below include rubrics for assessing communication skills as well as student exemplars organized into writing continuums.

his short video will give you a brief explanation of how I run my Daily 5 rotations and how my rotations are set up on my Daily 5 Rotations board.

Beverly Cleary tells the story of a family on a rainy Sunday in a household full of bad moods. Ramonas father suggests they all go out to dinner. While out, an old man pays for their dinner because he believes they are a nice family and he misses his own family.

Looking for public speaking tips? Learn five ways to help ensure your next speech is a success.

The five tips are:
1. Know your subject and your speech;
2. Know your audience and your space;
3. Never apologize;
4. Imagine yourself giving a great speech; and
5. Focus on your message, not on yourself.

This portal is offered as a free resource to help facilitate online reading instruction and learning during this challenging time of school closures due to the Coronavirus outbreak.

These resources were available as of September 8th, 2020. If you try to access them later and they are not available, please let melissa.lander@sunwestsd.ca know.

There are two areas of the site, one for Students and one for Instructors. Materials are organized by our Phonics Scope and Sequence, and can be quickly navigated using the Menu at the top of the page.

In this tall tale story, deadbeat Shorty Long has to avoid the people to whom he owes money. He tries to trick Widow Macrae out of $4.50, but actually created more problems for himself.

A little boy loses his neighbors dog inside the mysterious garden of Abdul Gasazi, who tells the boy that he has turned the dog into a duck. But when the boy returns home he finds the dog waiting for him on the porch. Gasazi was playing a trick on the boy - or was he?

There are a number of ways to use Genius Hour in the classroom. There are many web resources to view and access to help guide you along your Genius Hour path as well. I accessed Facebook as well and joined several groups that discussed ways to implement Genius Hour. As this was my first time trying this out with the students, there are a few things that I would adjust for next time, but here is my version!
In this project, students were allowed to choose a topic that interested them to create a large scale project on. Students were able to choose to do these projects on their own or in partners/groups. They filled out a proposal and then we met and discussed what they would be working on and what their products would look like.
Every day 4, I gave students one period (56 minutes) to work on their Genius Hour creations. Students were asked to create outlines of their projects and journal entries stating their progress. The final product could be their choice but they would be presented to the class in some way.
When beginning the project, we went over the Creativity Process and discussed the way that student would follow and use this process. We followed each step of the process as we went through the journey and discussed.
Students would receive marks on their overall project as well as their presentation. As well, they completed a self-assessment afterwards.

In this story Gertrude Ederle overcomes obstacles, both physical and social, in order to prevail at her lifelong dream of being the first women to swim the English Channel.

This lesson provides teachers with support for using text-dependent questions and Common Core literacy strategies to help students derive big ideas and key understandings while developing vocabulary using the biographic text, Gloria Estefan. Along with her worldwide musical fame, Gloria Estefan also experienced tragedy, but continued to help others in unfortunate situations. Gloriaĺĺs success has allowed her to receive multiple honors and awards for her selfless work leading to her being referred to as "a star with a heart."

ŕThe Go-Around DollarĚŇ is a selection that combines two genres: realistic fiction and expository text. It provides an entertaining look at the journey of a dollar as it passes through the hands of various characters.

This strategy engages readers to look for a specific point that “speaks” to them. “Golden Lines” are Powerful quotes that automatically provide interesting discussion material.
Why
Many student find it much easier to select something the author said than to come up with their own reactions. Therefore, Golden Lines are an easy and effective strategy for student to determine important ideas, make connections, and visualize during reading.