Teacher's Curriculum Institute

“Game” doesn’t have to be a bad word in classrooms. Well executed, purposeful games can be an active way for students to process information. Games can also help students retain and recall information because, if done thoughtfuly, they can engage several multiple intelligences.
Here are 8 games that you can use in virtually any subject area [...]

Nothing generates more discussion and questions than the Interactive Student Notebook. Teachers are eager for tips on how to grade them and have a life, how to create engaging assignments, and how to manage them. Here are our top tips that we shared in our webinar, The Best Ideas for Managing and Evaluating the Interactive [...]

One nifty way that teachers can customize their TCI Presentations is by adding images. This short video will show you how.
But wait! There’s more! You’ll also get  Great Places to Find Images, our handout that’s chock full of links to super duper image sites that provide free, interesting, and useful images for teachers.

Impossibly, my oldest daughter will begin middle school next year.
We are fortunate to live in a Bay Area community not unlike Lake Wobegon where all the children are high achieving (and schools are great, parents are involved, etc). All three of our middle schools offer a Laptop Program. Enrolled students use their laptops in their [...]

We’re full of creative ideas for the Interactive Student Notebook this month. There are so many ways you can encourage students to take notes graphically and to process information. One of my favorite processing assignments is to have students write a eulogy. The eulogy could be for a person, like Susan B. Anthony or Abraham [...]

Teachers love to talk about the Interactive Student Notebook. In my experience, nothing generates more conversation than the simple question, “How do you grade the notebook?”
So we thought that having a PureGenius contest on the Interactive Student Notebook would be a perfect way to kick off 2011. Teachers can enter their ideas for a chance [...]

You’re a genius. We know it. You know it. Now let the world know.
Today we’re launching our PureGenius contest and asking teachers to submit their great ideas for ways to bring engaging technology classrooms without breaking the bank.
Submissions that receive the most votes will receive a $100 prize and be entered into our grand prize drawing [...]

The Visual Discovery strategy is the most popular and, I would guess, most implemented of TCI’s strategies in classrooms nationwide. The relatively low risk of the strategy makes it easy for new teachers or teachers new to TCI to try.
In a nutshell, you project a few powerful images, ask carefully sequenced questions that allow students [...]

My colleague Dawn shared great ideas and tips on how teachers can make back to school night successful. My experience with back to school night is as a parent. In fact, I went to my daughters’ back to school night on Tuesday so my experience is fresh.
What I appreciate as a parent

Questionnaire on day one   [...]

 
When I saw this Dilbert in Sunday’s paper, I chuckled thinking about TCI strategies that put students into groups and pairs. Done without purpose or haphazardly, putting students into groups is ineffective. Give them roles, a purpose, and juicy content, and students can soar working with others. After all, Cohen’s theory of cooperative interaction leading [...]