School is soon set to start! This means another year of walking, listening, and learning with The Walking Classroom! We know you have plenty of preparing to do in these last few weeks, so we are here to help. We have several ways to support you in your implementation of our program, starting with our Teacher’s Guide and other existing adopter resources!
Tackle the Teacher Guide
The Teacher’s Guide is an invaluable resource, providing complete lesson plans for each podcast, including a synopsis, standards addressed, objectives, procedure, discussion questions, and comprehension quiz! The guide itself begins with useful Program Management tips and incorporates a series of lessons to introduce your students to The Walking Classroom.
Whether you are new to The Walking Classroom or a veteran adopter, these introductory lessons are helpful to review. Taking a few extra minutes of class time at the beginning of the year to establish routines and review expectations will ensure smooth sailing!
In addition, the Appendix provides some FAQ’s, background material on the program, podcast listings, and more. If you are not currently using the Teacher Guide, you are missing out!
Sharing a class set among several teachers and looking for an alternative to the print version of the binder? Check out the (especially environmentally friendly!) electronic version of the guide.
Be Watching the Blog
We began this blog not just to provide folks with relevant resources, information, and ideas, but also so that program adopters could share their own insights and experiences with The Walking Classroom. Your active participation is encouraged and very much appreciated. Feel free to contribute your comments on blog posts or share your story. We look forward to hearing from you!
. . . and Take Advantage of those Adopter Resources!
This time last year, we kicked off the school year by introducing some new resources for our program adopters. If you haven’t explored these yet, they’re definitely worth a look!
Slide Decks
The slide decks contain supplemental information for each of the units within Program 4, Program 5, and STEM. Complete with a podcast summary, key terms, and discussion questions, the slide decks make it a breeze to introduce those podcast topics!
Looking for ways to support different learning styles or to differentiate instruction? Not only are the slide decks great resources to enhance the experience for your visual learners pre-walk and post-walk, they also help support ELL students!
› See a sample slide deck for our Idioms podcast!
Electronic Quizzes
Trying to minimize potential paper piles? No problem! All of the podcasts’ comprehension quizzes are also available via Google Forms.
Students complete quizzes online where their answers are recorded, then teachers view student responses live or have students complete the quiz and then grade it using Flubaroo, a free add-on!
› View a sample electronic quiz!
Supplemental Videos
In addition to the slide decks and electronic quizzes, we have also compiled a list of suggested videos for each program to provide a brief, visual follow-up to your walk. Note: Having recently made some changes to this list, we are in the process of updating the information on the adopter resources page, and hope to complete this by the first week of September.
Webinars on the Way
Finally, in a further effort to support our adopters, we are busily working on additional adopter resources, including professional development opportunities in the form of a series of webinars on the topics below.
- Reaching All Learners
- Extending the Lesson
- Creating Your Own Podcast
- Building a Unit with TWC
- Planning a Year of Podcasts
We will let you know when each becomes available!
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