Changes

My ELL I class has grown significantly in the last couple of weeks, but all of the new students have a decent level of English so that's good, but, nonetheless, it does change the dynamics of the class and I have to readjust how I manage the class. The Read 180 program is freezing a lot when my students use it, so I probably won't use it for another week. Rocky, our computer strategist has almost got Rosetta Stone up and running on my computers, but again I will need to figure out exactly how to use it so that will take at least another week. Technology is great when it works, but getting it up and running is a lot of work. In the end it will be worth it. I am experimenting with podcasting and video. I haven't involved my students yet, but I think it will be very easy to have my students use moviemaker and also podcasts (if they don't get blocked by the district). I'm not that impressed with podcasts yet, but I still haven't explored them that much either. They just seem a little boring.

Group Work

I have put my 4th/5th period class into groups based on their reading levels and grades and set up a competition between the groups along with giving them group roles and participation points as a group as well as individuals. Every day I give each group a report card based on five areas: Cooperative, On-Task, Attentive, Prepared, Efficient. Their group roles are as follows: supplies person, clean-up, helper, and task-master. So far, it is going beautifully. My students like the competition and they are behaving and working much better. I track their totals on a chart with stars so they can see how they are doing against the other groups. I have also broken up my beginning level class into two groups for 1st and 2nd period which is really working well for my slower students. They get work at their pace and level and have gotten a lot more practice speaking. My more advanced students are not slowed down by the slower students and they also get a lot more practice, too. I've gotten 4 new students over the past two weeks, but luckily they all have a decent level of English. They are actually coming into my beginner class at just the right time.