Past projects 7
Cheers to a New (school) Year!
Funded Dec 21, 2023Thank you, thank you for your generosity. My students and I appreciate your donation that has brought us a vast supply for our everyday classroom tools. When I brought in our new posters, fidgets, dry erase boards and rugs. My students were in awe and thanked me for bringing in and decorating the room. I had to explain that through the generous donations on Donorschoose, WE were able to get all of these fun new things.
Now, my students are reading the different motivated messages. Students are asking to sit in the calm down corner even if when they are not in distress, We are actively using our dry erase boards for interactive guided and independent tasks in math and reading. We are calm, cool and bright.”
With gratitude,
Ms. Alexis
Tackling the New Classroom Norms
Funded Sep 23, 2021Pandemic aka Covid teaching is not a joke. Teachers are facing more challenges then ever and the help from your donation has assisted in so many ways. It has alleviated at least a few stressors that I have had to face with concerns of protecting ourselves from sharing germs. On the elementary level, some students have a hard time keeping their mask on and the mask straps help secure the mask over their nose and mouth. Having many alternatives for protection especially with special needs students who have social and communication challenges has been God sent. At this point int he school year, I can say we have maintained a safe routine thanks to you. We thank you.”
With gratitude,
Ms. Alexis
Our New Normal of Tools
Funded Dec 16, 2020My students and I are using the bins to store their personal school materials in class such as notebooks, pencils, sharpeners, rulers, crayons, glue etc. During this Covid time, we are not allowed to share materials as we once did in our classroom community. We as a class community will utilize technology to the utmost capacity, the stylus pens come very handy for interactive lessons. My students are using the stylus pens to complete assignments that are posted in the Google classroom. During our JAMBOARD interactive lessons, students are able to participate remotely by editing (with their stylus pens)slides in real-time. While Students are using their tablets/iPads to answer questions with minimal contact but continuous participation, to keep our room sanitized the air purifier has been useful and addition since when I created the project, my school has provided my one. The more, the better and the safer.
As we received the different resources to our classroom. My students were filled with so many questions. They were excited about the color stylus pens because one of our last projects from Donors choose were all black stylus pens. Some students noticed that they could choose a stylus pen that matched their device's case or personal outfit. The student had many questions for the purpose the air purifier but we did some research on google through images, videos and articles explaining the importance of how the purifier filters the air in a single room and can remove some air contaminants. The filter does not kill the virus, but rather it exchanges clean air more rapidly to get rid of the virus. My students were not as excited about the storage bin than I was but it has been very helpful for keeping their personal things organized.
These supplies have been very helpful and we appreciate your generosity.”
With gratitude,
Ms. Alexis
This classroom project was brought to life by The DonorsChoose 20th Anniversary Fund and 6 other donors.Look! Books, Books, Books!
Funded Jul 8, 2020The population of students that I teach are of very diverse cultural backgrounds(African American, Asian, African, Hispanic or Caribbean). During vocabulary and phonics lessons, I try to associate images/pictures to help students acquire new words with visual representations. I find it sometimes a challenge to find images/pictures that represent my students cultural backgrounds from online google searches. As I teach guided reading(small group lessons in which I target reading skills that students have not mastered and I use books that are on their independent reading levels) and read aloud(s), I noticed that my students are not represented in the stories that we are reading. It is important to expose students to different schemas but its nice to relate and build connections to the characters that we read about.
This is why it is so imperative and helpful to provide more diverse books. Many of my students have expressive and receptive delays that hinder their understanding and communication. The use of these diverse books bring a clearer understanding. It provides a world of new and unknown vocabulary from their own and different cultures. For example, one of my male Bengali students was drawn to "The Proudest Blue" by lbtihaj Muhammad(Olympic medalist). He said because it had his favorite color blue and he kept touching the cover. I prompted him by asking, did it remind him of anyone he knows. He responded with yes. I continued to ask him, if he knew the name of what she was wearing. I had to clarify that it was called a hijab. He said his mom wears a hijab. This opened a great avenue for the discussion on his cultural norms and as he reads that story we can further discuss new vocabulary and be able to compare customs that he shares with the characters' experiences.
This is just the beginning. With the multicultural books inventory increasing, I look forward to adding more books to this genre in my classroom library.”
With gratitude,
Ms. Alexis
This classroom project was brought to life by Google.org and 2 other donors.Styling with Stylus Pens
Funded May 5, 2020As you know, due to COVID-19, students have had to learn remotely or in a blended model(some days at home and some days in school). As a special education teacher, I find that my students demonstrate challenges with fine motor skills. They also have expressive and receptive delays. I must differentiate or provide different tasks to accommodate for the different learners in my class. As the teacher, I honed in on these factors to understand that my delivery of the information that I provided in the classroom should be very close to what I had them do when they were home to maintain the routine. I asked that parents obtain the DOE IPAD device and knew that interactively this device would be most engaging and easier to use. In addition, the stylus pens had different switchable points for more fine skinnier print as well as a rounder tip for students who had grasping and control deficits. The students love changing between these two features. While navigating through the google classroom, students complete tasks give synchronously and asynchronously through the modes of google docs and google slides with ease as well as completing reinforcing activities through different applications such as abcya, raz-kids or i-ready. Who needs paper anymore?, Not us.”
With gratitude,
Ms. Alexis
This classroom project was brought to life by SONIC Drive-In and 7 other donors.Phonics R' Us
Funded Dec 16, 2015Due to your generous contributions, I was able to add 3 different activities to my reading/ELA centers. Much to their surprise, my students were curious about what came in the big box. When I revealed the new activities, they were excited and wanted to use them right away.
One of the activities was a board game; Sound Switching game, which allows students to play around with identifying and building CVC words. My students are not used to playing board games and we often take these small opportunities for granted but I found it not only beneficial for building reading skills but it also help students learn about following rules, taking turns, winning and losing. I received another center titled Phonics Instant center. This center also included practice for students to build CVC words. They were helpful because this center allowed students to follow picture rules. Hence, provide independence. And the last merchandise was a CD-Rom called Can Do! Phonemic Awareness game. Using our personal laptops, these games also worked on building CVC and CVCC words interactively.
My population of students are non-readers or very low readers and therefore, the addition of these centers were beneficial in providing more opportunities to help with reading strategies. My major goal during the school year is to encourage and provide more opportunities for students to practice their reading. Thanks to your contribution, I have been able to do so. Thank you.”
With gratitude,
Ms. Alexis
This classroom project was brought to life by Google.org and one other donor.Audio Head
Funded Dec 2, 2015Due to your generous contributions, I was able to have 12 sets of head phones to assist in using the personal classroom laptops. Much to their surprise, my students were curious about what came in the big box. I shared that it would be a surprise but I took many predictions such as prizes for the prize box or candy. When I revealed the headphones, they were excited and wanted to use them right away. I explained to my students that we now could use our laptops more often. They were willing and ready to get started right away.
My population of students are non-readers and kindergarten-leveled readers and therefore, completing task independently is truly a challenge when they are on higher grade-levels. My major goal during the school year is to encourage and provide more opportunities for students to practice their reading. Unfortunately these opportunities are the only times students actually practice reading. Therefore, I wanted to use these new resources as soon as possible and as many times in the day that I could to expose my students to interact and read independently. Initially, I began using our new resources during reading/ELA centers. During this period, students are split into groups based on their reading levels. Students interact in a teacher-made phonics games such as spelling/recalling sight words by looking in the newspaper to find and cut letters that spell their weekly sight words. I conduct a guided reading lesson where I give students reading strategies to help read on their independent level. And, using a school reading program called razkids,students are able to use the headphones to focus and read independently. With the headphones, students aren't able to distract each other. These headphones were truly a blessing. I was also able to use the headphones to challenge my higher-leveled students. When I teach reading lessons, I really have to use my paraprofessionals to help students complete task by rereading the read-aloud because they are unable to read. But I have given my higher-leveled students the opportunity to read the grade-level readings independently on the laptops. I have been able to really see what they can accomplish and have seen many gains. These students feel happy that they can work independently and have taken a lot of pride in their work.
I would like to share my thanks again for your contribution because it has provided opportunities that only the teacher has been able to provide. Unfortunately, with the population and area that the students reside in, these reading opportunities only come from in the classroom. And, if i didn't have these headphones, I don't know how I would be able to challenge and engage them.”
With gratitude,
Ms. Alexis
This classroom project was brought to life by Google.org and 7 other donors.