I worked in a school that grouped 3 grade levels together (4, 5 & 6) & it was amazing! It allowed me to give up the notion of what students "should" be able to do, & simply teach them where they were at. #sunchat - ThreadSky

carlameyrink.bsky.social • 55 days ago

I worked in a school that grouped 3 grade levels together (4, 5 & 6) & it was amazing! It allowed me to give up the notion of what students "should" be able to do, & simply teach them where they were at.
#sunchat

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alisonstonebio.bsky.social•55 days ago

I think there is some research that mixed aged groups can be very beneficial socially. I think the challenge is making sure that the older kids are appropriately challenged and that the younger ones aren’t overwhelmed or having the older ones do the work for them #sunchat

carlameyrink.bsky.social•55 days ago

It takes training to do it well, but also, our classes were a max of 20 kids & on average 16 kids. Large class sizes make it much, much harder.
#sunchat

susankotch.bsky.social•55 days ago

We are pushing 30+ kids in an ICR class, mix of special ed and gen ed, and it can get bogged down with all of the differentiating, grouping, etc. Teaching today is not easy, mostly due to the parameters put on the teachers due to funding. Not sure where this is going. #sunchat

thethinkingproject.bsky.social•55 days ago

What are the most effective ways you differentiate and does partner work help? #sunchat

susankotch.bsky.social•55 days ago

Since our focus is writing this year, we differentiate in many ways. Students who need more assistance are given tools to help them, such as organizers, articles for citing (insteading of finding them on their own), and maybe even less paragraphs. Focus is on structure, not quantity. #sunchat

mrspazltms.bsky.social•55 days ago

I do this in science with taking textbook materials and making it more manageable for my ELL and Wilson readers... I level the playing field but they need to reach the bar! #sunchat

carlameyrink.bsky.social•55 days ago

This is where self-paced learning journeys are incredibly helpfull. Ss who are able to work independently work on their own or in groups, freeing the teacher up to work with Ss who need extra help. In this blog post Ss talk about why they love it.
#sunchat
https://teachingexperiment.com/2022/04/how-to-use-learning-journeys-to-facilitate-student-led-learning/

susankotch.bsky.social•55 days ago

You know my thoughts on this from twitter chats - we need to abolish "grade levels" and let the kids group naturally by ability, regardless of age. If they are in a lower grade, but are excelling, they should be moved forward. Removing the "grade" would allow this to happen. No barrier. #sunchat

mrspazltms.bsky.social•55 days ago

"Grade levels" always never say right with me even as a kid. I think we can take those barriers away and be able to really deep dive into student achievement... #sunchat

carlameyrink.bsky.social•55 days ago

I wish we could take it a step further and get rid of siloed supjects as well. Our Ss learn so much more when they do cross-curricular projects. The transfer of concepts = deeper learning.
#sunchat

thethinkingproject.bsky.social•55 days ago

When I taught one year the science teacher and I did a cross curricular project on lithium mining. I taught social studies and we shared kids. It was awesome! #sunchat

mrspazltms.bsky.social•55 days ago

I love this, when we were in "groups" I was able to do this but now I don't share the same students as many of my colleagues or they are on different topics due to pacing and student needs. #sunchat

thethinkingproject.bsky.social•55 days ago

It really opened my eyes to the benefits of cross curricular work, and the relevance of it for students and me. We were dealing w/a real world issue from the lens of science and social studies #sunchat

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