Teacher's Curriculum Institute

I guess the fact-checking department budget at an unnamed publisher (which has like six names) is a little thin. While some might think they are the first to offer text to speech software for online social studies books, a little digging would have unearthed that TCI has had such a feature for three years running. [...]

MLK Day Lesson on Scribd Download this lesson now by clicking here:  MLK Day Lesson
In this free lesson from TCI, students watch/listen to Dr. King’s “I Have a Dream” speech and answer questions. In a Social Studies Skill Builder, students are assigned an excerpt from the speech. Pairs work together to find an image to showcase [...]

Scarcity?  Opportunity Cost?  Goods and Services?  Natural and capital resources?  Teaching financial literacy to elementary students is a “Where do I begin?” situation.  It’s a vocabulary nightmare, but I found a way to make it less painful for me and the students.  I use literature to help me discuss these terms – the students love [...]

Getting back in the middle school classroom is like putting on a favorite pair of jeans to me.  It’s comfortable and I know it fits me just right.  Yesterday gave me a wonderful opportunity to teach at Hopewell Junior School and 7th grade teacher Tracey Parks’ class.  Tracey had just finished teaching our lesson from History Alive! [...]

This was a companion to the discussions webinar on 10/19/2011.  In this four page handout we spell out the five design criteria needed for rich discussions.  On the second page teachers will find a sample list of “rules” for civil discussion that can be distributed or posted during classroom discussions.  We introduce two additional spin-offs [...]

“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 [...]

Dawn Smith and I had a chance to talk about what type of notebooks we like as teachers.  Hear 0ur coffee talk on whether consumables or having students create their own interactive student notebooks (ISN) is the better way to go.  The best part is, there is no one answer.  TCI gives you the tools [...]

I made the following interactive timeline for those attending the webinar on Wednesday, Sept. 7th (3:30 – 4:30 PST) on Getting Started with the ISN.  This interactive timeline was super-easy to make using the website, http://timetoast.com.  The site is free and allows you/students to create interactive timelines that can be viewed as linear or as [...]

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.

 
Constitution Day Lesson

September 17th is Constitution Day. Celebrate the day with your upper elementary students by analyzing the preamble through song, a word cloud, and discussion. Students even write a letter to the editor using a newspaper clip tool via the web.
This lesson was written by Brian Thomas and uses proven hands-on strategies by www.teachtci.com. [...]