Advancing the Vision - Paint Lick Rockstars

...and now for our tour of some Paint Lick Rockstars!  Here are just a few examples of the wonderful teaching I was able to show off to Mr. Fentress. 

Ms. Brumfield communicating her learning targets to students  

This practice could be considered a no-brainer--post your learning target for the lesson and read it to your students--not hard, right?  Every classroom at Paint Lick has targets posted, but many of us forget to share/communicate them with students at least at the onset of a lesson.  I understand with everything a teacher is trying to juggle throughout the day, this practice can be tough to remember, but I implore you to make it a habit.  Ms. Brumfield has.  She is so good at sharing her targets at the beginning of her lessons. 

Here's a little snippet of her teaching too...Her communication with students is so clear and you can see how her target matches her activity perfectly:

Why is it important to share your targets with students?  The research is clear.  Students need to know what they are shooting for if they are to hit the target.  They need to know the objective of the lesson.  Communicating the target to students provides the foundation for self-reflection and feedback on that target which yield HUGE gains in student achievement.  Don't believe me?  Read more about it here. 

Here you see Ms. Coleman rocking it out in math too!  Check out how she models, uses manipulatives, and how she has set up her class to maximize learning.  She is using a small group approach to allow her to work very closely with her students while the others practice on their own.  You can tell that she had worked very hard to set clear expectations about behavior in independent stations.  It's amazing how well students are working after just 2 weeks of school. 

I promise you, EVERY SINGLE CLASSROOM we went into made me proud and so thankful I get to be a such an incredible school.  Mr. Fentress also got to see the emphasis we put on vocabulary instruction here.  Building students vocabulary is so so so important--especially for those coming from disadvantaged backgrounds.  For more on that read here.

Check out all these examples of students practicing vocabulary:

We really do have much to be proud of.  Thank you all for building such a strong foundation for our children!