Motivating Students in Ms. Ortiz's Class by Gina Ortiz https://padlet.com/ortig21/3w87cd05lqxaebz9 Photos from the classroom of a millennial that was, like, obsessed with Ms. Frizzle growing up. en-us 2024-07-04 13:51:34 UTC 2024-07-07 11:55:36 UTC hello@padlet.com Giving students opportunities to collaborate with others motivates and engages them. ortig21 https://padlet.com/ortig21/3w87cd05lqxaebz9/wish/3045403163 2024-07-04 13:56:19 UTC https://padlet.com/ortig21/3w87cd05lqxaebz9/wish/3045403163 Giving them opportunities to use higher level tools during enrichment/extension opportunities. This also works as an intervention tactic, especially in science and math. ortig21 https://padlet.com/ortig21/3w87cd05lqxaebz9/wish/3045403449 2024-07-04 13:56:48 UTC https://padlet.com/ortig21/3w87cd05lqxaebz9/wish/3045403449 Offering students time in the library to do a "book tasting" based on material that we are covering in class. This requires partnership with our media center specialist, but it is a highly effective way to motivate students and get them excited about math and science. During the book tastings, the students have to tell the others in their group about the book they picked at why. This was during our life science units at the end of the year. ortig21 https://padlet.com/ortig21/3w87cd05lqxaebz9/wish/3045403519 2024-07-04 13:56:57 UTC https://padlet.com/ortig21/3w87cd05lqxaebz9/wish/3045403519 Opportunities to teach/mentor younger students. Here, one of my 5th Graders is tutoring one of our 4th Graders on place value and exponents. My students are highly motivated by opportunities to do this! They love being helpers and seeing that their skills are valued. ortig21 https://padlet.com/ortig21/3w87cd05lqxaebz9/wish/3045403668 2024-07-04 13:57:14 UTC https://padlet.com/ortig21/3w87cd05lqxaebz9/wish/3045403668 Offering opportunities to work with other classes. Many labs this year were done in partnership with another 5th grade class. Students were highly motivated and engaged when we were all together, even though there were 40+ kids in the room. They enjoyed the opportunities to collaborate with different peers and work with other teachers. We also did this with 4th grade classes, where the 5th graders took on more of a mentorship role during the activity. ortig21 https://padlet.com/ortig21/3w87cd05lqxaebz9/wish/3045404937 2024-07-04 13:59:16 UTC https://padlet.com/ortig21/3w87cd05lqxaebz9/wish/3045404937 Let them get messy! Letting students explore during hands on activities, such as this activity where we made terrariums to model the water cycle, motivated many of my students to determine how to enhance their model. Many of them figured out on their own that they could trim their plants and leave the cut up bits on the top of the soil to decompose and act as fertilizer. ortig21 https://padlet.com/ortig21/3w87cd05lqxaebz9/wish/3045405477 2024-07-04 14:00:19 UTC https://padlet.com/ortig21/3w87cd05lqxaebz9/wish/3045405477 Giving them opportunities to teach and collaborate with their peers. Here, I have students working together to organize different food webs. The students were paired by need/skill level. ortig21 https://padlet.com/ortig21/3w87cd05lqxaebz9/wish/3045405867 2024-07-04 14:00:52 UTC https://padlet.com/ortig21/3w87cd05lqxaebz9/wish/3045405867 Celebrating their accomplishments. During the year, I send photos home to parents celebrating my students and their class efforts. At the end of the year, I printed those photos and put them up in the classroom. ortig21 https://padlet.com/ortig21/3w87cd05lqxaebz9/wish/3045416274 2024-07-04 14:18:24 UTC https://padlet.com/ortig21/3w87cd05lqxaebz9/wish/3045416274 Offer community building opportunities. My kids LOVED to dance this year, and The Macarena was their favorite! They were motivated to embrace and encourage each other during scheduled and unscheduled dance breaks, allowing all students to feel safe and free to be their most authentic selves. ortig21 https://padlet.com/ortig21/3w87cd05lqxaebz9/wish/3045426991 2024-07-04 14:36:07 UTC https://padlet.com/ortig21/3w87cd05lqxaebz9/wish/3045426991