Four Corners

Happy Saturday, y'all!

My goal today is to get this house nice and clean, but I'm here bloggin' instead! Please don't tell my hubby! ;)

I wanted to share with you all today a FUN game that my students enjoyed playing this year!  It is based on the rainy day recess game, "4 Corners."  One day during a regular play of this game, I thought- DUH!!!  **And that is how this game was created!

What you do is label each corner, A, B, C, and D.

You ask the students a question and then they move to the corner that they believe is the right answer.  The easiest way to do this, so you don't have to repeat yourself 100 times, is to create a slide show and project it on your Promethean Board (or whatever "smart" board you have), so that students can read them, too.

After a few minutes you make sure that ALL the students are in a corner and then you can use this time to discuss the incorrect answers.  Students that are in those corners will have a seat.  The students that were in the correct corner get to answer another question!!

Rules:
No running
No pushing
No moving to a different corner once I call "time."

Pros:
Interactive review game!!!
Use your state standardized testing questions (GA takes the CRCT, so I would create questions that are similar to those that could be found on a test, or used old ones found from the web)
Students have fun!  On rainy days my students ALWAYS wanted to play this 4 corners instead of the regular way.

Cons:
In each class the students have decided that one kid is "the smart kid" and they started following them around!  To stop this, I threw in trick questions.  I also would say, "Are y'all sure about that" and create the look of confusion on their faces!

Adaptations:
I changed up our 4 corners game in several different ways this year...
When we were studying the classification system (kingdom, phylum, class, order, genus, and species) I found two other open spots to create "6" corners.
When we were studying different historical figures, I would label each "4" corner with a name of a person we were learning about.  I would read different facts about a person and they would have to find the correct person!
Our all time favorite was for CRCT studying and I posted four different wars that we discussed in Social Studies.  I would read facts about the weapons, the reasons for the war, the places it was fought, etc.

How do you think you could use this game in your classroom?
*Can't wait to see those answers in the comments below!!

School's Out For The Summer!!

I survived my first year of teaching, can you believe that?

I never knew that teaching was so difficult, but so rewarding! I have so MANY plans for the summer that I am sitting here on my SECOND day of summer break with NOTHING accomplished!

I did want to share with my fellow blog buddies that use a Promethean Board within their classroom something WAY cool!! On Wednesday our county had a Professional Learning Day that teachers could sign up for several different classes to learn new skills. One of the classes I went to was on the Promethean Board, which focused on the Promethean Planet website. We also got to visit the Promethean Bus, which was SUPER!

The other part of the class, about the website, was taught by Andrew Ryff who helps with the development of the Promethean Planet website. He went over some things I already knew, such as downloading flip charts and sorting through the files. However, I never clicked anywhere else on the site. So if you're like me- check out the Teacher Feature, which can be found under professional development or click here http://www.prometheanplanet.com/en-us/professional-development/teacher-feature/ a teacher is featured (forgot how often) with a bio, recording of using the Promethean board and then the flip chart she/he created! It is awesome to see others using the board, and how they utilize it!! The featured teacher at the moment is the 12th grade English teacher!!

Also, there are groups that you can join and even create to collaborate with your school, district, or whomever you wish. A group that Andrew created was called Activities in a Flash, which features flash activities that can be downloaded and used on your board! He welcomes all uses to join, you just have to request. So PLEASE go join this group under the community tab and user groups, or click here http://community.prometheanplanet.com/en/user_groups/flash-activities/default.aspx

After taking a look at this group I have found SEVERAL things that I can use for fun and games, but for classroom management too! For instance, a traffic light that you can just click to change the color. I plan to utilize this for my noise control next year. A score keeper to keep up with group points! A group spinner to select groups, a random number generator to select students for special privileges, and even a stopwatch to time students during clean up.

So I guess technically I have started planning and I haven't wasted two days completely, right?