New Teacher Orientation Day 1

Today was the first day of St.James Assiniboia's new professionals orientation session.  We had a wonderful day filled with introductions, conversations, collaboration.  We discussed various topics such as Social Justice in the classroom, Procedures and Routines and Classroom Management.    The new teachers came up with various ideas about what Social Justice "looks" like in the classroom.  Comments such as:  providing choice for demonstrating learning, providing equal learning opportunities for all, providing equal opportunities for success and co-creating classroom rules and norms.  We discussed the importance of teaching procedures and routines in the first few days of school and being consistent with follow through.  We discussed the use of PLC's in schools.  PLC's are to be used as opportunities for collaboration and learning with your colleagues.  The concept of PLC's was extended to PLN's.  A professional learning network is a place for on-line learning. There are different ways to grow your PLN and we looked at some of those ways.  Overall we had a wonderful first day together.  We are excited to work with such an enthusiastic group of educators.  We are back tomorrow for another half day session. 

Check out  the slide share link to 45 interesting ways to use Wordle in the classroom!  Enjoy