ISM Spotlight–The Secret Journals

This year I am the luckiest teacher in the world. I get to teach at the best school ever – International School of Morocco, with some of the best, most creative, teachers ever. Each time I walk into someone else’s classroom, I get inspired and we just seem to spiral great teaching ideas off of each other. It’s a wonderful place to teach, and since we are all collaborating, it’s a wonderful place for our kids to learn – a teacher’s dream, right? I have tried and tried to convince the other teachers to create blogs of their own to spotlight and share some of their amazing ideas, but everyone is super busy. Instead, they have each agreed to let me spotlight some of their ideas right here on Raki’s Rad Resources. So, each Friday night, I will be posting an ISM Spotlight.

This week, we are spotlighting Olivia Gunning, our Kindergarten teacher. Mrs. Gunning teaches the 4 and 5 year olds at ISM, and she pumps out cute ideas faster than anyone I’ve ever seen.  In addition to teaching, and being a mother, Mrs. Gunning is also a travel writer (check out her articles here).  In order to share her love of writing with the students, she came up with secret journals.

 

As Mrs. Gunning’s students began to explore the concept of writing special ideas down into a notebook, she had the students transform their writing journals into “Secret Journals” which are kept secret through the use of collage.  The students used odds and ends of paper, magazines, string and tissue to create a collage on the front and back cover of their journals.  Now that the journals are covered, Mrs. Gunning will be covering them with plastic – to ensure that the journals stay as beautiful as they are now. 

    

Not only are these journals beautiful, they have also inspired the students to write.  After they learn a new word, or do an interesting activity (like the homemade bread they made this week), they take out their secret journals and fill them with drawings and sentences to help them express the wonder they find in the world around them.

 

Come back next Friday to find out what the other ISM teachers are up to.