The Blog
Teaching Persuasive Writing
Kids are natural persuaders. In our classroom, we often engage in silly debates (is water wet?) and sometimes my students voice their opinion about things going on at school (this lunch is gross!). Every elementary student has a special talent…
Emergency Sub Plans and Guest Teacher Tips
Raise your hand if you have ever dreaded taking a day off because you’d have to create sub plans. My hand is definitely up! While sickness or meeting or appointments are unavoidable, I used to struggle to take a day…
November Read Alouds for Upper Elementary
With each season and holiday, I frequently include new books to explore different seasonal topics. For our November read alouds, we read several books about gratitude, family, and – of course – turkey! Here are some of my favorite November…
Amazing Math Videos
I previously shared a post with my favorite reading skill videos, so now I’m back with amazing math videos to use for introducing and reinforcing math concepts. I asked teachers in our FREE Inspired In Upper Elementary Facebook group for…
Integrating Authentic Texts into Your Curriculum
As the textbook and curriculum industry has grown, contrived texts have become more and more common in the classroom. While contrived texts have their purpose, experts say that authentic texts are essential to creating strong readers. In this post, I’ll…
Ways to Support Students’ Emotional Needs in the Classroom
In today’s classroom, teachers are not only teaching rigorous academic standards, preparing for crucial state-wide assessments, and meeting astronomical administrative requirements, but we are now climbing another mountain that has only recently begun to be addressed… students’ emotional needs, specifically…
How To Use Reader’s Theater Scripts in Your Upper Elementary Classroom
When I first heard about reader’s theater, I thought surely that was something for a drama class. Over the years though, I have really come to enjoy it and seen many benefits by using it in our classroom. One of…
3 Parts to an Effective Classroom Morning Routine
Having a solid classroom morning routine in place can help you start every day in your classroom on the right foot. A morning routine is more than just getting students ready for the day, it’s about building connections, handling housekeeping…
Fall Read Alouds and Literacy Activities for Upper Elementary
I love using seasonal books and activities as a way to keep things fresh in the classroom! Here are some of my favorite fall read alouds, along with different fall literacy activities that are all great for upper elementary. I…
The Complete Guide to Place Value Lessons
I always start the year with teaching place value, whether I’m teaching 2nd, 3rd, 4th, or 5th grade! I compiled a ton of ideas, an introductory lesson, essential skills, book list, freebies and more into one gigantic (and FREE!) PDF Guide to…
Tips for Increasing Student Engagement and Motivation
I’ll never forget my first year teaching (for a lot of reasons!). I was fretting over my first formal observation when someone joked about them all being dog and pony shows anyway. I didn’t really understand what she was saying…
Differentiating and Meeting the Needs of Gifted Learners
We often have meetings and professional development about helping struggling learners, but I’ve found that it’s rare to talk about differentiation for gifted learners. While helping our struggling learners is extremely important, providing differentiated opportunities for our gifted students can…
