| | Publisher: Jossey-Bass | Publication: 2002, English | ISBN: 9780787965839 | Pages: 320 |
Standards,” “Learning Assessments,” “Academic Intervention Services,” and “Competency
Evaluation.” Yes, the new standards are probably necessary for some students for a number
of reasons. Yes, students who are not performing up to a specific standard should be given
remediation. Few would argue against either. Yet, through all of these assessments and
evaluations, many teachers confess that the joy of teaching, the “fun in the classroom,” has
been slowly disappearing. Instead, pressure and stress for both you and your students have
appeared. How often have you heard, or even said it yourself, “There is little time for
anything other than preparing my students for all these assessments!”? In a nutshell, we
need to make learning fun again—both for ourselves as teachers and, more importantly, for
our kids as learners.
Plain and simple: Students love fun activities. Because of the many and varied skills
that we are asked to teach our students each day, the classroom is an ideal place to
incorporate fun activities to introduce and review the various language arts skills including
grammar, mechanics, word development, vocabulary, research, critical thinking, and creative
writing, to name just a few.
Fun involvement—what a wonderful way to achieve classroom goals and improve
language arts skills at the same time! Will our students’ test scores suffer because we include
some games and other enjoyable and worthwhile activities in our curriculum? No! Studies
support the fact that students retain more when they are actively involved or have “hands
on” in the learning process. Through such activities, students will certainly absorb more
information as they learn, review, and retain concepts in your classroom. Plus, they will be
enjoying themselves at the same time! What a great combination!
The 181 entertaining activities in English Brainstormers! will make your students’ time in
the classroom informative, enjoyable, and entertaining. Students will look forward to these
creative, ready-to-use, classroom-tested activities. These learning activities can function as
introductions, reinforcements, or homework assignments. They can be used as individual,
group, or whole-class activities. Many of these activities will serve as time-fillers or extracredit
assignments. Formatted as crosswords, word finds, riddles, magic squares, word
generators, jumbles, and more, these learning activities will motivate your students to think
more astutely and want to do their best in the process. | |
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