I am a teacher, blogger, and teacher trainer with more than 30 years of experience in education. I like to explore new possibilities to engage learners and enhance their learning experiences. I am the author of the blog, Learning and Leading in the 21st Century http://aysinalp.edublogs.org / where I share my reflections and insights on learning and technology.
I am a teacher, blogger, and teacher trainer with more than 30 years of experience in education. I like to explore new possibilities to engage learners and enhance their learning experiences. I am the author of the blog, Learning and Leading in the 21st Century http://aysinalp.edublogs.org / where I share my reflections and insights on learning and technology.
The activities in this pack have been designed to improve students’ confidence in writing, to enhance collaboration, critical and creative thinking skills, and to encourage independent thinking skills. Your students will have great fun while completing the activities in this pack.
As a warm-up activity, students will be directed to a website where they will watch five short videos on different superheroes and do the gap-filling task about each video. They will then:
• Complete a diagram,
• Make a word cloud,
• Write their own definition of a superhero,
• Create their own superhero by using an avatar and write a descriptive paragraph about it,
• Fill in a Venn diagram and write a compare-contrast paragraph,
• Write a journal/blog entry based on a quote,
• Work collaboratively to create a step-by-step “How to...” guide.
The pack includes a PowerPoint, a rubric, self and peer assessment forms on writing a compare-contrast paragraph. It also includes a video for the students to watch before they start doing their final project. This project requires group work so that the students can improve collaboration skills. The pack includes a brief guide on how to collaborate effectively and why collaboration is an effective skill. There is also a teamwork rubric that evaluates each student’s performance as an effective team member.
Since each group will prepare their projects in different formats, there is not a rubric for the guidebook. Instead, the students have been given links that will help them prepare their own rubric after they choose their medium for presentation and plan the project. If you think it is too hard for your students, you can prepare a rubric with them together in class to help them get involved in the learning process instead of giving them one prepared by you.
Each activity in this pack is connected with the next one and they all prepare the students to complete the last activity, which is a collaborative project. This project requires the students to use tech in the classroom as they are asked to prepare a digital guidebook. Several links for the tools are available in the pack and the students are asked to choose the best medium to deliver their message in order to improve their digital fluency skills. One device per group will be enough to complete this project. If your students don’t have or aren’t allowed to use devices in the classroom, they can do the project with pen and paper.
The warm-up activity, preparing a word cloud and creating an avatar for their superheroes also require the use of tech in the classroom and the students have been given the links for these activities, too. If your students don’t have or aren’t allowed to use devices in the classroom, they can do these with pen and paper as well or alternatively, you can assign them to do these tasks at home and bring them to school the next day.
This is a fun beginning of the year activity to get to know your students and help them to readjust to the school system by doing a relaxing, fun activity. It is suitable for both virtual and face-to face learning. Including music in the activity will spice up your lesson while allowing your students to be creative. It will also allow them to reflect on their lives and share the turning points in their lives with the whole class and with you, which will help to you build positive relationships with them and build a positive classroom community. I posted the Power Point version here, and you can find the links for Google Slides versions in the Teachers Guide. Enjoy:)
Please visit my shop at https://www.tes.com/teaching-resources/shop/aysinalp58 to see more resources.
Here is a complete unit based on a real life character to enhance your students’ viewing, listening, speaking and presentation skills while teaching them about global issues. The questions in the tasks are differentiated addressing both low order and higher order thinking skills and all the tasks have been designed to enhance your students’ critical and creative thinking skills. With one click, you can add or delete tasks/questions based on your students’ abilities or interests. Alternatively, you can assign different tasks to different groups of students to differentiate learning, and have them share their work with the rest of the class at the end of each task.
There are creative lessons that your students will enjoy doing in this bundle, all of which are differentiated. You can use them both for virtual or face-to-face learning.
Great print and teach vocabulary and writing practice for students based on the awesome video, The Present, which ran on over 180 short film festivals and won more than 50 awards. The activities include writing a summary, a tweet, a journal entry, a film review with a rubric, creating a word cloud, colour-coding parts of speech in a text, and filling in a vocabulary journal. The pack also includes some questions to enhance critical thinking skills and links that will help students write their film review. Suitable for ESL students as well.
This 33-page cross-curricular pack is ideal for the teachers who want to prepare their students for the requirements and the challenges of the century that we live in. The activities cover all the 21st Century skills such as critical thinking, creativity, collaboration, effective communication, and problem-solving skills.
After the warm-up activities, students watch an ecological rock opera on extinction and answer questions about it. They then
• write a journal entry on how the lyrics relate to the problem in the story and how they give a powerful message,
• write the lyrics of a new song for the rock opera, design a comic strip to convey the message of their song,
• create a video about an animal facing extinction or an animation on environmental issues,
• write a letter to one of the world leaders about environmental issues,
• prepare a 10-minute Ted talk style speech on environmental problems and their solutions for them using the information they have learned,
• conduct a school-wide project on an environmental issue of their own choice.
All the activities are guided and students are given several resources to choose from to make a video or animation, to write the lyrics, to design a comic strip, to give an effective speech, and to prepare an effective presentation.
Most of the activities require group work so that the students can improve collaboration skills. The pack includes a brief guide on how to collaborate effectively and why collaboration is an effective skill. There is also a teamwork rubric that evaluates each student’s performance as an effective team member. There is a rubric for each activity, self and peer evaluation forms, a reflection activity, and a learning journal for the students to fill in.
Improve your students’ grammar and skills with this fun and engaging bundle. This bundle is ideal for all ESL and ELL students and includes many grammar worksheets as well as reading and writing activities for mixed ability classes. It also includes texts and activities that will help you teach global literacy to your ESL and ELL learners.
Great print and teach vocabulary and writing practice for students based on the awesome video, The Present, which ran on over 180 short film festivals and won more than 50 awards. The activities include writing a summary, a tweet, a journal entry, a film review with a rubric, creating a word cloud, color-coding parts of speech, and filling in a vocabulary journal. The pack also includes some questions to enhance critical thinking skills and links that will help students write their film review. Suitable for ELL and ESL students as well.
This fun pack contains back to school activities that you can use while teaching virtually or face to face during the first weeks of school so that you can get to know your students better and build positive relationships with them.
This 33-page cross-curricular pack is ideal for the teachers who want to prepare their students for the requirements and the challenges of the century that we live in. The activities cover all the 21st Century skills such as critical thinking, creativity, collaboration, effective communication, and problem-solving skills.
After the warm-up activities, students watch an ecological rock opera on extinction and answer questions about it. They then
• write a journal entry on how the lyrics relate to the problem in the story and how they give a powerful message,
• write the lyrics of a new song for the rock opera, design a comic strip to convey the message of their song,
• create a video about an animal facing extinction or an animation on environmental issues,
• write a letter to one of the world leaders about environmental issues,
• prepare a 10-minute Ted talk style speech on environmental problems and their solutions for them using the information they have learned,
• conduct a school-wide project on an environmental issue of their own choice.
All the activities are guided and students are given several resources to choose from to make a video or animation, to write the lyrics, to design a comic strip, to give an effective speech, and to prepare an effective presentation.
Most of the activities require group work so that the students can improve collaboration skills. The pack includes a brief guide on how to collaborate effectively and why collaboration is an effective skill. There is also a teamwork rubric that evaluates each student’s performance as an effective team member. There is a rubric for each activity, self and peer evaluation forms, a reflection activity, and a learning journal for the students to fill in.
Here is a great resource for the refugee week. It includes texts, videos, games, graphic organizers, reflection forms, a creative writing activity and a project. There are two rubrics: one for the creative writing activity and another one for the project. You can use it either as a distance learning resource or in the classroom. I have added Word and PDF versions so that you can make changes in it if you want. I also gave the link to the Google document that you can share with your students at the top of the Word and PDF versions.
This resource can be used with learners at all ages including ESL and ELL . It includes two videos and a lyrics listening and gap filling activity. The writing activities will enhance both critical thinking and language skills of the learners. The journal writing activity is great for character education and teaching values. There is also a Google slides version with more detailed activities.
Improve your students’ reading and writing skills with this fun and engaging bundle. The activities in the bundle are ideal for mixed ability classes and many of them are differentiated.
This 22-page interactive pack includes information, different activities, links to several websites about bullying and cyber-bullying, and ways to cope with them. At the end of the pack there is a project that you can do as whole school / grade level or as a class. The activities are differentiated and suitable for all types of learners from grades 3-6.
Do you want to go global and raise awareness on the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals by bringing together a range of innovative ideas for teaching creatively and addressing these key issues? Here is a free resource for you to teach global literacy in your classroom! This 24-page pack will help you teach your students Global Goals for Sustainable Development published by the UN in 2016 to raise their awareness on global issues with a focus on Global Warming. The activities in the pack will enable you to differentiate learning. You can do the inquiry project at the end of the pack together with a partner school to increase student engagement.
Do you want to go global and raise awareness on the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals by bringing together a range of innovative ideas for teaching creatively and addressing these key issues? Here is a free resource for you to teach global literacy in your classroom! This 24-page pack will help you teach your students Global Goals for Sustainable Development published by the UN in 2016 to raise their awareness on global issues with a focus on Global Warming. The activities in the pack will enable you to differentiate learning. You can do the inquiry project at the end of the pack together with a partner school to increase student engagement.
Here is a free resource for you to teach global literacy in your classroom creatively addressing the key issues. This 48-page pack will help you teach your students Global Goals for Sustainable Development published by the UN in 2016 to raise their awareness on global issues with a focus on Global Citizenship, Diversity, Freedom, Poverty, Hunger, and Environmental Issues. While learning many things about global issues and becoming a global citizen, the students will analyze a poem, read two non-fiction texts by Jane Goodall and Nelson Mandela and do the activities about them, write a bio-poem and a biography, an essay and a journal entry, analyze a cartoon and design their own, and prepare a presentation. The activities in the pack will enable you to differentiate learning naturally.
You can share this presentation on Covid-19 with your students by using the PowerPoint in the attachment or the Google slides in this link. https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1BULlRRE_Ee6pEXbvARkcwZnumIEbk3biR6f1gltEKIY/edit?usp=sharing Your students can write can write into the slides version and send it back to you if you post it as an assignment in Google Classroom and choose ‘Make a copy for each student.’