Mrs. Turner Teaches

Hi all, I'm Tiffany (aka Ms. Tiffany to my students, Momma to my daughter and 'babe' to my husband). I work in Early Childhood Special Ed and LOVE IT. I've been an Instructional Aide for the past 5 years and the plan is to continue on to become an Early Childhood SPED teacher. My daughter, Lila is our sweet rainbow baby and is almost 2 years old (still can't believe it!). I've been married, going on 4 years but my husband and I have been together for the past 9 years. We have a Golden doodle, named Daisy, who is our other child. Lately, I've spent most of my time hanging with my mini-me because of #'Rona. I enjoy being outside, I love to sing & dance, and my favorite past time is eating. Here are my two truths and a lie: 1. My paternal Grandfather was a clown. Not only was he a clown, but he was also a magician. His name was Professor Zappo. 2. My maternal Grandmother wrote a series of Children's books. They were called 'Adventures o...

You all did a great job presenting tonight! All of your lesson plans made me want to go back and change some things on mine before I am finished with them all. Rebekah: I loved the title of your lesson plan. It was so well thought out and if I was a sub I would know EXACTLY what to do. Your attention to detail is awesome and going to be so helpful when you have a class of your own. What a fun lesson to eat S'mores! Karen: While I didn't hear you the best (darn highway noise!) I really liked the idea of using a popular song for a lesson on figurative language. Using Katy Perry is a plus in my book because I love her. Marley: I love your lesson on cloud formation and the water cycle. High pressure=Happy Weather is something that I will have to remember for myself! Angela: Dot to Dot worksheets are so much fun! We use those now with my early childhood SPED students who are pre-kinders. Many of them have OT so fine motor (like writing with a pencil) is so hard. We practic...

Jacob: I liked your lesson on figurative language. The handout is great and honestly I had fun doing it myself! I love that you will have them have a discussion at the end of the lesson. It helps those students who may have not understood the differences between figurative language. It also gets students thinking of different ideas than what they may have interpreted it.  Allison: I liked your idea of retelling the story with pictures. I like how you let the students know what you did last time so they can recall and use that information to help with the picture retelling. I would be able to modify this lesson for my early childhood SPED students very easily.  Miranda: What a fun lesson for Math! I have always been afraid of anything that has to do with math and this lesson would be fun. I like how you applied counting coins to real life experience for the students. I love that you used food because everyone eats. Scott: I liked your lesson on history. I am as...

This week we listened to lesson plans. I, along with four other classmates presented a lesson on our unit. The first lesson I heard about was Andrew's lesson for 7th grade History. I really like history (although I didn't when I was in school!) and I enjoyed learning about this lesson. Reading a letter to a person of the past and then writing one is such a great idea. There are so many cool things you could talk about and ask about. I was even picturing who I would write to. This is a great lesson, Andrew! Jessica spoke about 2nd grade math. I was and am still horrible at Math but this sounds like a fun activity. The way that you set up continuously going over place values and counting days throughout the year will really get them to understand this concept. I wish I would have had this lesson when I was in school. Ali's lesson was about Recycling.  It was great how you had a song because after last night I realized how much songs are important in lessons. Plus at t...

Ever since I can remember I have wanted to be a teacher. While life happened and I detoured for a while, the love of teaching has never left me. I always imagined I would be an elementary school teacher and LOVED school when I was a kid. Life passed by and led me to my current job as an Early Childhood SPED, which I didn't know if I would enjoy. I was intimidated but I honestly love what I do and who I work with. Creating lesson plans for my students now is a piece of cake because I know their abilities. Now that I am currently back in school, creating a unit and lesson plans for typical developing kindergartners is SO different. It is going to be a bit of a learning curve for myself but I am trying hard to create something I could truly adapt and use in my classroom now. I have always have a love for science. This is why I chose my unit of Kindergarten Science, Weather and Seasons. What I hope for my future students to get out of this lesson is that they will understand and be ab...

Teacher:   Tiffany Turner Class:   Kindergarten Science Unit: Exploring Pumpkins Lesson Title:   Pumpkin Life Cycle Duration: 1 lesson, 30 minutes Objectives: ·            Given a lesson on the life cycle of a pumpkin the student will be able to tell you how a pumpkin grows with 100% accuracy. Standard(s): Materials: Glue, Scissors, Crayons Bloom’s Taxonomy: Anticipatory Set: When students walk into class, have a pumpkin sitting in front of class. Have students come to carpet (or large group area) and have the question: How is a pumpkin grown? on the board.   Have students take guesses on how a pumpkin is grown. Read, From Seed to Pumpkin By Wendy Pfeffer.  Teaching: Input: Show students what a pumpkin looks like and what pumpkin seeds look like. Name the life cycle of a pumpk...

A  performance task  is any learning activity or  assessment  that asks students to perform to demonstrate their knowledge, understanding and proficiency. ( https://blog.performancetask.com/what-is-a-performance-task-part-1-9fa0d99ead3b ) Formative assessment  refers to a wide variety of methods that teachers use to conduct in-process evaluations of student comprehension, learning needs, and academic progress during a lesson, unit, or course. ( https://www.edglossary.org/formative-assessment/ ) Formative tasks are good for seeing growth over time while performance tasks (or assessments) are good for assessing the mastery of the unit or tasks. An example of a formative assessment is  student and teacher discussions, journals and homework. An example of a performance task is tests such as teacher created or multiple choice and capstone projects.