Craftivity?

I finally just have to say it. I'm not a fan of the word "craftivity." If you're an elementary teacher, you probably know of what I speak. Somewhere along the line, a very creative and lovely teacher invented this word. It stuck. It spread. I'd like to point out some reasons why it hasn't done so with me.

1. It seems like "fake" art to me. Finished pieces basically look the same.

2. I've noticed that craftivities are often loosely integrated with language arts, and I understand the good intentions. Yet with the limited time we have, language arts doesn't need to be cutesy. Activities and crafts muddy the waters and steal precious time away from authentic reading and writing.

3. One of the advantages to art is that it demands a growth mindset. It's two for the price of one. Making the 3D cats in the picture below was a perfect opportunity to practice optimism, persistence, flexibility, and resilience. I don't see any of that taking place when students are asked to glue pre-cut pieces together.

I realize that craftivities are not ruining our students or their education, and my opinion is simply just that - an opinion. Yet there's always room to ask "Why?" 

Right?

Brain Growers: Persistence

Have you read A Mindset for Learning by Kristine Mraz and Christine Hertz? It's a brilliant growth mindset resource for elementary students. I'd highly recommend it.  

I've been sharing brain growers here on my blog for several weeks now. Last week we learned about persistence.

Day one: We read Almost by Richard Torrey. It helped us learn about and define persistence. We also told stories of persistence from our lives.

Day two: We read Can I Play Too? by Mo Willems. We looked for persistence in the story before practicing the brain grower with some extreme sour Warheads. If that doesn't take persistence, I don't know what will. (I learned this trick from a blogging friend.)

Day three: We read Flight School by Lita Judge and then used persistence to build houses of cards.

Day four: We can You Can Do It Bert by Ole Könnecke. We also made a crown to celebrate moments of persistence.

These brain growers are lifetime skills. I'm honored to teach them to some of our youngest learners.

Brain Growers: Resilience

I'm back with another view of growth mindset in my classroom based on the book A Mindset for Learning. This week we learned about resilience. (We've already learned about optimism and flexibility. You can read about those here on my blog.)

Day 1
We watched this video. The kids loved it, and it was a great example of resilience. After the video, we learned the definition of resilience, and kids told stories of their own resilience.

Day 2

We read Everyone Can Learn to Ride a Bicycle. The kids were asked to find resilience in the book.

Day 3

We read The Most Magnificent Thing. Then the kids worked in partners and used dominoes to practice resilience. 

Day 4

We read Little Owl Lost. We also created a chart to house future resilient stories on post-its notes.

Day 5

We read What To Do With a Problem and created our resilient crown.

I think this stuff is sinking in. It's a process and there are ups and downs, but I'm feeling good about what I'm depositing into their lives.

Brain Growers: Flexibility

I'm enjoying incorporating growth mindset from A Mindset for Learning into the first several weeks of school. (Check out my post on optimism.) This week we've been learning about flexibility. It's a must-have brain grower for sure. 

Day 1:
We read Stuck by Oliver Jeffers. Our discussion led us into the definition of flexibility, as seen in the picture. We also shared life stories of flexibility.

Day 2:
We read Bunny Cakes by Rosemary Wells. I challenged the kids to find flexibility in the book. Then I paired the kids up and asked them to create paper playgrounds. I told them they'd have chances to use flexibility, and they did.

Day 3: We read Shh! We Have a Plan! by Chris Haughton with the expectation that they look for flexibility. 

Day 4: We watched Beautiful Oops! by Barney Saltzberg on youtube and created our crown to celebrate moments of flexibility.

SaveSave

Brain Growers: Optimism

Teaching our youngest learners that they can grow their brains is a must. I can hardly imagine a better resource than A Mindset for Learning by Kristine Mraz and Christine Hertz.  

As suggested in the book, I'm teaching my first graders five brain growers. This last week we learned about optimism. I chose to introduce the idea with this video. "Kiddos, watch this video with me to find out how this girl grew her brain." (We only watched the first few minutes.)

After a discussion of what they noticed and learned, we were ready to define optimism. I used the definition and visual given in A Mindset for Learning. We then shared personal stories of optimism.

It was then the perfect time to create our Can poster, a project I've been doing for a few years now. Look here.

Throughout the week, we also read Elephants Cannot Dance by Mo Willems and The Carrot Seed by Ruth Krauss. "Kiddos, let's look for evidence of optimism in this book today."

We also took on the chain challenge. Check it out here. It certainly requires optimism.

Later in the week we used interactive writing to create an optimism crown that's great for celebrating those who are growing their brains. 

I'm looking forward to practicing flexibility next week. Let's grow some brains!

P.S. I published a book for teachers! Look here to check it out.