Some teachers would choose paper while others would choose whiteboard markers but the one thing I just couldn’t do this job without are my trusty labels!
Labels? After Over 17 Years Of
Teaching And The Greatest Wisdom
You Can Impart On Us Are Labels?
Now before you click outta here believing that years of teaching has driven Madame Kenny over the edge of sanity or perhaps you’re envisioning some obsessed organizational crazed woman feverishly clicking her label maker completely covering her classroom in labels….it’s not what you think…just bear with me!
While I do admire all you label-loving teachers out there… I simply can not possibly ever achieve this type of zen-organization nor am I some crazed label maker whose desire for organization has overtaken my life in some OCD fashion!
Yes… I love my labels…and let me tell you why…
You see…Once upon a time, I was an elementary teacher and a practice that is more commonly used at the elementary level is anecdotal notes…a practice that’s not as common place in middle school. I believe it’s because Middle school has been traditionally a % result product producing system.
However, things are about to change at the middle school level as our province is in the process of changing the report card to a 4 point rubric based report card…so…. Anecdotal evidence will be important again in my evaluation and assessment repertoire.
No matter what profession you’re in…do it for long enough and you pick up some “hacks” along the way…little things which you implement to make your life easier or more efficient…well after teaching for years at the elementary level I’ve run the recording and storing notes gamut… I’ve gone from taped up cue cards to post-it file folders and a few others along the way until one day I was in my husbands home office and came across some printable labels and EUREKA…my search…no my quest for recording and storing notes had finally come to a conclusion. I had finally found the solution I had been searching for all these years!
Now let’s be clear here…I am not claiming to be the mastermind behind this concept…A quick surf around Pinterest will give you all kinds of ways to use labels with anecdotal notes…What I’m saying is that I began using printable labels in my anecdotal notes way before Pinterest was Pinterest.
So as I was saying…after hearing that middle school would be changing the report card to a 4 point rubric based report card I immediately began creating a system in preparation for next year. I’ve been working out some of the kinks, but without a doubt will have it perfected before the roll out in September of next year.
My system is really quite simple actually. In the past, I used to use the address sized labels, however, this year I’m using larger ones because some organization or business in town donated a full box of the larger labels to the school and no one really had any use for them …their loss my gain… So, while I would rather use the smaller labels, beggars can’t be choosers.
I begin by placing one of these printable label sheets on my clipboard and as I note evidence of skills or learning (And sometimes the lack there of) I write the students name and date and what I noticed on the label.
I use separate clip boards for each class and for each subject I teach just to keep things organized.
I know it’s hard to believe but sometimes I run out of time at the end of the day or my EA’s are busy doing something else and there isn’t enough time to transfer the printable label to the permanent document.
When I do have the time or can delegate the task to an EA, I stick the label in a duo-tang that has loose-leaf in it with each students name written on top of the page.
One of the modifications I have made so far it that I put a little red dot on the label if I wrote a note about a student NOT being able to do something and was NOT able to demonstrate knowledge of content.
That red dot allows me to see at a glance what I need to focus on or reassess for each student.
Over the summer, I will be working on this system and will revisit this post for an update before the new school year starts.
If you have any comments or suggestions , I’d love to hear from you. Just leave a comment below.
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