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25 Professional Development Books for Teachers

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Really Good Teachers never stop learning and these 25 professional development books for teachers are a great place to start!

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Christmas Around the World Activities and a FREEBIE!

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Education to the Core: Holidays/Christmas Around the World Unit and FREEBIE!!!

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Helping kids learn about the world can be an exciting adventure for both adults and kids. When I teach about the chateaux of the Loire Valley in France or ancient Mayan sites in Mexico, I'm always looking for kid-friendly resources that can provide accurate information and engaging authentic pictures that hold the attention of little ones.

Virtual Field Trips

Since my field trip budget is pretty limited, I especially love websites that offer virtual tours and live webcams to show kids what it REALLY looks like in another world location. Many famous museums such as the Louvre offer 360 degree tours of their collections. The Eiffel Tower site shows a panoramic birds-eye view of Paris-with the city taking center stage rather than the traditional image of the Tower itself dominating the horizon. Engaging images help kids relate to the new culture and make comparisons with their own. The Google Art Project also gives virtual field trips to prominent art museums around the world.

Live web cams are another great cultural resource. When teaching about Neuschwanstein Castle in Germany, I asked the class if they wanted to see a live picture of the castle. When we connected to the Neuschwanstein Castle webcam site, they wondered why it appeared to be nighttime. Wasn't it only 3pm? The webcam illustrated the 6 hour time difference better than I could ever have explained it with words!

We have also found web cams of the storks roosting on roof tops in Rust, Austria, and have shared our own local webcams of Niagara Falls with our pen-pal classrooms in other countries to give them an idea of our region.

Organizing Teacher Resources

With all these cool resources, how do you keep track of them and retrieve them when needed?

One tool I discovered is a free site called Symbaloo. Since I teach multiple languages each year, having a system to organize cultural resources helps me save time and energy-which I'll certainly need when teaching little ones! Symbaloo allows a user to bookmark websites in color-coded tiles and organize them for later reference. Similar to Pinterest, each tile links to a web page. On my Symbaloo mix, I have color-coded tiles for each language I teach so I can identify at a glance the most appropriate resources for any given lesson.

Feel free to check out my Symbaloo page on world cultures and suggest any of your favorite resources!
Kennedy Schultz is a French teacher and the founder of Exploraworld, a program that introduces languages and cultures to kids ages 5-11, including French, Spanish, Italian, Mandarin, and German!

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Virtual Field Trips: Using the Internet to Transport Kids Around the World

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Helping kids learn about the world can be an exciting adventure for both adults and kids. When I teach about the chateaux of the Loire Valley in France or ancient Mayan sites in Mexico, I'm always looking for kid-friendly resources that can provide accurate information and engaging authentic pictures that hold the attention of little ones.

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Corkboard Connections: Creating the Tallest Cup Tower: A STEM Challenge

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Corkboard Connections: What Makes a Parent Love a Teacher

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Mystery bags for exploring sense of touch! Love this idea for understand science and how to make observations. Perfect for teaching adjectives too!

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Music in the Classroom-Ways to incorporate music into your classroom to support the learning environment.

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8 Incredible Books for Teachers | Teach 4 the Heart

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We are so excited to be taking part in the second annual School's Out blog hop. Bloggers are sharing their top 10 learning activities to keep your child's mind active this summer. We are sharing our Top 10 Ways to Encourage Creative Thinking.

Why is creative thinking important?

Creative thinking skills help develop intrinsic motivation and help your child become a life long learner. Children should be given the opportunity to seek out new experiences and experiment with new ideas (with adult supervision and support). They should be taught to ask questions and investigate to help develop critical thinking and problem solving skills.

What can I do to help my child?

1. "How else could we do this...?" , "What would happen if..." , "What might we add or change"?, "What should we do next"? Ask open ended questions. Ask questions that require more than a yes or no answer. Click here to read our popular post on "10 Questions to Ask Your Child About their Art".

2. Offer Choices. Help your child learn to be independent by making their own decisions. Be sure you are okay with either choice your are offering but allow your child to chose and make the final decision.

3. Incorporate creativity. Try incorporating creativity into every day experiences. For example, if you are going out to eat at a resturant take along some paper and crayons and draw together as a family. Have one person start a drawing and the next person must add to it.

4. Dramatic play. Allow time for dramatic or imaginative play. Have your child act like their favorite animal. Try adding an emotion to the animal like a happy cat or sad turtle to change it up.

5. Be an Inventor. Turn a household object into something else. Ask your child "what else could this be used as"? Challenge your child to create new and unusual or uncoventional uses for the object.

6. Allow Mistakes. Use mistakes as opporuntities to learn rather than view them as something unsuccessful.

7. Play Music. Use your bodies to create a rhythm and make up a dance to go with the rhythm.

8. Read Poetry. Change up your reading habits but mixing in poetry during reading time. Stop part way through reading the poem and ask your child what they think happens next.

9. Draw more. Drawing is one of the first ways a child communicates their feelings before learning to read or write. Ask your child to tell a story that goes along with their drawing or give it a creative title.

10. Stretch their knowledge. Support your child's interests. Take what they love a step further. Look up new books at the local library or use online resources to gain new knowledge. Be sure to use positive comments and open ended questions to stretch their thinking.

These are a few ways you can help develop your child's creative thinking or problem solving skills.

What would you add to this list?

For more information on developing creative thinking skills check out these other posts,

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Top 10 Ways to Encourage Creative Thinking - Kids STEAM Lab

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We are so excited to be taking part in the second annual School's Out blog hop. Bloggers are sharing their top 10 learning activities to keep your child's mind active this summer. We are sharing our Top 10 Ways to Encourage Creative Thinking.

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give what you can, take what you need...
from our friends at James River High School, Richmond, Va.
February 14, 2012

I've been meeting with some kids from the Leadership Center at James River High. I was introduced to them by their Ethics teacher Mr. Couillard, affectionately called Mr. C.

I thought I was going to share my story, inspire a bit, blah, blah, blah....but the universe pulled this HUGE switcheroo on me.

I was stunned by these kids, their heart, their intentions, their focus on kindness and change...So when I got their list of plans for a You Are Loveable campaign at their school, I think my heart just melted. The Junior class took this original idea and ran so far with it with so much soul and creativity, I was blown away.

A bunch of guys giving girls lame pick up lines to make them smile

Somebody to LOVE by Queen playing on the intercom

A post-it kindness blast in the school parking lot

Sidewalks chalked with messages of love

I have looked at the list all week, with this silly grin on my face, imagining the kindness descending on that school in a big, big way.

But then today... Mr C. sent me the picture above of the bulletin boards filled with messages- Give What You Can, Take What You Need...and I started to cry a little...realizing this is the heart of kindness, I have something to give and I need to take something too.

I thought of all the sweet things planned for today- the You Are Loveable messages all over, the Cotton Candy Kindness later this afternoon...those are my Give What You Can sort of things...and then there are the Take What You Need things swirling...I don't think I've taken it and I need it today.

Today I need:

Peace while I wait to find out if a big opportunity is going to happen to carry this message so much further (it feels sort of bleak at the moment, your good thoughts would be appreciated)

Community to gather and stand in some more complicated kindness- like the kind where you have to navigate different needs and still stand in what you believe in- in this case, it's a skate park and finding the sweet middle place of compromise where everyone is valued and heard

Protection for a tender heart and clarity to see this work and this life for all its beauty- the comparison gremlin is knocking at the door of my soul hard right now.

SO on this day of love, please Give What You Can and Take What You Need in the comments...it can be our virtual bulletin board today inspired by Mr. C and the kids.

And just imagine all those high school kids kindness bombing their school, and people finding a message reminding them we are all loveable, and some grown kid eating pink fluffy candy goodness in the park...and know that kindness changes everything.

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give what you can, take what you need...

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from our friends at James River High School, Richmond, Va. I've been meeting with some kids from the Leadership Center at James River High. I was introduced to them by their Ethics teacher Mr. Couillard, affectionately called Mr. C. I thought I was going to share my story, inspire a bit, blah, blah, blah....but the...

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15 Awesome Classroom Ideas For Teachers

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Community Post: 15 Awesome Classroom Ideas For Teachers

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Teach About Graphs in the Most Delicious Way | Community Post: 15 Awesome Classroom Ideas For Teachers

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Community Post: 15 Awesome Classroom Ideas For Teachers

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Ice Breakers | 15 Awesome Classroom Ideas For Teachers. Need for first week back!!

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More bulletin boards---I love bulletin boards :0)

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"Dive into good book" Summer/spring display. Could do it over the bulletin board with book covers on the board behind the falling "rain"

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10 ways to calm a class after lunch or recess

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Strategies for calming your class after an exciting break like an assembly, lunch, or recess