Author: TCR Staff

Teacher Resources, Teaching Tips

8 Test-Taking Tips for Multiple-Choice Questions

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Test Taking Tips Teacher Created Resources

Some multiple-choice questions are straightforward and easy. Some questions, however, stump even the most prepared student. In cases like that, students have to make an educated guess. An educated guess is a guess that uses what students know to help guide their attempt. Students select a particular answer because they’ve thought about the format of the question, the word choice, the other possible answers, and the language of what’s being asked. By making an educated guess, students increase their chance of guessing correctly. Share these test-taking tips with students before their next multiple-choice test:

  1. Read the directions. It’s crucial. You may assume you know what is being asked, but sometimes directions can be tricky when you least expect them to be.
  2. Read the questions before you read the passage. Doing this allows you to read the text through a more educated and focused lens. For example, if you know that you will be asked to identify the main idea, you can be on the lookout for that head of time.
  3. Don’t skip a question. Instead, try to make an educated guess. That starts with crossing off the ones you definitely know are not the correct answer. For instance, if you have four possible answers (A, B, C, D) and you can cross off two of them immediately, you’ve doubled your chances of guessing correctly. If you don’t cross off any obvious ones, you would only have a 25% chance of guessing right. However, if you cross off two, you now have a 50% chance.
  4. Read carefully for words like always, never, not, except, and every. Words like these are there to make you stumble. They make the question very specific. Sometimes the answers can be right some of the time, but if a word like always or every is in the question, the answer must be right all of the time.
  5. After reading a question, try to come up with the answer first in your head before looking at the possible answers. That way, you will be less likely to bubble or click something you aren’t sure about.
  6. In questions with an “All of the above” answer, think of it this way: if you can identify at least two that are correct, then “All of the above” is probably the correct answer.
  7. In questions with a “None of the above” answer, this of it this way: if you can identify at least two that are not correct, then “None of the above” is probably the correct answer.
  8. Don’t keep changing your answer. Unless you are sure you made a mistake, usually the first answer you chose is the right one.

Find more tips and practice passages in Nonfiction Reading Comprehension for the Common Core

Teacher Resources, Teaching Tips

4 Tips on Encouraging Healthy Habits for Kids

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Healthy Habits Pledge_Teacher Created Resources

Incorporating fun physical outdoor games and indoor classroom exercises are great ways for teachers to encourage students to establish healthy habits. The National Health Education Standards & Common Core State Standards aim to support a whole-child approach to education-one that that ensures that each student is healthy, safe, engaged, supported, and challenged in their learning. Here are a few tips for establishing healthy habits in the classroom.

 

  1. Share the Healthy Habits Pledge above with students and discuss each line. Challenge students to learn the pledge and share it with family members. The goal here is to inspire the whole family to focus on good nutrition and support healthy habits. Post the pledge in the classroom and review it from time to time as students gain more insights into personal health.
  2. Introduce daily exercise to your students. Use physical activities to start the day and/or to transition from one activity to another. Throw in an extra exercise on tough days, or use more than one when weather conditions inhibit outdoor activity. These short, physical exercise breaks are a positive way to settle students for their day’s work.  And don’t forget breathing exercises! They can be done at any time of day and can help refocus or calm students as needed.
  3. Gather and display reference materials for the classroom on topics of nutrition, fitness, and overall health. Resources might include library or trade books, magazines, posters, and kid-friendly materials printed from government websites.  If appropriate, save links to relevant websites in a dedicated folder on classroom computers.
  4. Encourage students to start collecting packaging and nutritional labels from food products. Explain that they will be learning to read them and using them for comparisons. Establish an area in the classroom where these can be stores or displayed.

For free sample pages, classroom exercises, and ideas see Healthy Habits for Healthy Kids.

 

 

Classroom Activities, Lesson Plans, Teacher Resources

Spring Craft: Egg Carton Caterpillar

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Caterpillar TCR-Art for All Seasons

This spring craft offers kids so much room for imagination and learning. This is a great craft to bring a butterfly life cycle lesson to life! This project requires some recycled egg cartons so this would also be a perfect classroom craft for earth day to demonstrate recycling and reusing materials for new projects.

Materials:

-Cardboard Egg Cartons
-Scissors
-Green Paint
-Paintbrushes
-Markers
-Pipe Cleaners
-Tape (optional)
-Wiggly eyes (optional)

Let’s Do It!

  1. Cut off the top of the egg carton, and cut the bottom half into two strips to make two caterpillars.
  2. Place the egg carton strips upside down so the hollow of the cups cannot be seen. Paint them green, then allow the paint to dry.
  3. Once dry, use markers to add details, such as the eyes, nose, and mouth, or glue on wiggly eyes.
  4. Cut two pipe cleaners into thirds. Insert one piece of pipe cleaner on the side of each cup to create the caterpillar’s legs.
  5. Cut two pipe cleaners into thirds. Insert one piece of pipe cleaner on the side of each cup to create the caterpillar’s legs.
  6. Inside each egg cup, bend down the ends of the pipe cleaners. Tape can be used to secure the antennae and legs.

Our little crafters loved the caterpillars so much they immediately took them to the trees so their caterpillars could eat leaves!

TCR Caterpillar-Art for All Seasons

Butterfly Life Cycle Idea: 

TCR Caterpillar

Have the students make butterfly wings out of construction paper and hold on to these for later. Keep the caterpillars in the trees. The next day, before the students come to class, add the butterfly wings to their caterpillars and put each caterpillar in a brown bag, like a chrysalis.  Hang them up in the trees and when they notice them, tell them we will have to wait and see what “those bags” could be.  The following morning, tear open the bags and have the caterpillars hanging half in and half outside the chrysalises, drying their butterfly wings.

More Ideas

-Add more personality to your caterpillars by using plastic wiggly eyes or construction paper for clothes and shoes.

-Other insects can be made from single sections of an egg carton. Try making ladybugs, painted black with red spots, or spiders, painted black with eight pipe cleaner legs.

-Obtain a copy of The Very Hungry Caterpillar by Eric Carle (Putnam, 1969) and A Guide for Using The Very Hungry Caterpillar in the Classroom and try some of the creative writing activities and pocket chart patterns.

Teacher Resources, Teaching Tips

Reading Strategies for ELL (English Language Learners)

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Reading Strategies for ELL/ESL

As teachers receive more and more ESL/ELLs (English Language Learners) into their classrooms, it’s important that they learn to integrate them with the rest of their student population. The following reading strategies will help you with the process. Comprehensible instruction and opportunities for verbal interaction will motivate students to engage in learning and actively participate in classroom activities.

Here are some great reading strategies from this IGCSE English tutor to help ELLs be more comfortable with reading.

Echo Reading

Use this strategy to help struggling readers with fluency, pronunciation, intonation, vocabulary, and reading comprehension. The teacher (or other native English speaker) reads the text first, using proper intonation and a good pace. Students follow along silently and then “echo”, or imitate, the first reader.

Echo reading helps ELL students
– Improve sight reading and speaking skills.
– Build confidence in their pronunciations.
– Remember important concepts.

Ways to Use Echo Reading: During chants, jingles, songs, poetry, and short stories.

Tips for Teaching this Strategy:
– Use gestures to show students which text to read.
– Have students who are native English speakers lead the reading; it’s helpful for ELLs to hear voices similar to their own.
– Adjust the length of the text being read to meet the needs of your students. (e.g., for Emerging ELLs, the first reader should read one line of text; for Developing ELLs (and higher levels), the first reader can read several lines of text.)

Sample Activity:
Hold a hand to an ear to demonstrate the idea of hearing an echo. Explain that bats use echoes and different tones to locate food sources and other important information. Vary the pitch (higher or lower) while reading to encourage students to practice different intonations when they echo read.

Directed Reading-Thinking Activity (DRTA)

Use this strategy to model how to make and confirm predictions. Here are the steps to DRTA:
1) Choose a text. Preselect stopping points where students can pause while reading.
2) Preview keywords or pictures. Ask questions to guide students’ thinking.
3) Have students make predictions about what they will read.
4) Stop at set points so students can check predictions, revise them, and make new predictions.
5) Ask questions to help students match their predictions to the reading.
6) Discuss what has been read before reading the next section.

Examples: Use objects or pictures to preview a text and make predictions; ask questions about keywords and vocabulary; focus on characters and what they might do.

Tips for Teaching this ELL Strategy:
– Use as a whole-class or small-group activity.
– Remind students to use what they already know to make predictions.

Sample Activity:
Have students look at pictures in a book to predict what a story or text might be about. Have them write one or two questions they have about the story. Review the students’ questions to determine where to stop and discuss the story. Read the selection as a class, pausing as planned. Call on the students who wrote questions related to that part of the story, and conduct discussion about the reading thus far.

For more strategies on teaching ESL/ELLs, see Strategies to Use with Your English Language Learners