A Bunch of Great Teachers

No, I am not talking about the teachers at Indian Trail (although we are the best at what we do!) I am talking about the students in my room...they are great teachers to each other.

We had been doing our folktale unit, focusing on Tall Tales, when I decided to have the kids do a Jigsaw.

A Jigsaw is a learning strategy where a group of people learn a concept or activity and then bring it back to the original group, kinda like a jigsaw puzzle.

The students read a text about a specific tall tale: Slue Foot Sue, Johnny Appleseed, Pecos Bill, or John Henry and then completed a graphic organizer. They then discussed the important details of the stories and what they wanted to present. Finally, they went back to their original groups and taught the others what they had learned. We did a quick assessment to see how much knowledge they learned from each other.

One of the things we did when it was over was to discuss what went well and what was hard. They liked being able to teach others and to show others what they had learned. What they didn't like is that not everyone paid attention and some students were talking (just like real life, huh?!?) 

They got some time in the shoes of a teacher and to see what an impact you could have....
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