https://edufolios.org/kzagotsis/reward-systems/
This will be my 8th year of teaching and within that time, I have never used a reward system. The site I’m at however, has been implementing Positive Behaviour Intervention Support for about a year and a half. This approach uses both incidental and explicit teaching of expected behaviour, which ideally, decreases the negative behaviour […]
Emergent Literacyhttps://edufolios.org/kzagotsis/emergent-literacy/
In this post, Emergent Literacy-Thinking about Writing Instruction, I was considering whether I was using best practice after observing the behaviour of one of my students, undertaking some online professional development on emergent writing and completing some assessment. Interestingly, the training I completed suggested that students did NOT have to know each letter of the […]
Modbury STEM PLC ~Thinking Technologically~May 23rdhttps://edufolios.org/kzagotsis/modbury-stem-plc-thinking-technologicallymay-23rd/
Overview As part of the STEM 500 project I spent Wednesday at Tea Tree Gully library with three lovely ladies from the Modbury partnership; Deanne from my site and Liz and Val from Ardtornish Primary School. Deanne and I both teach at Modbury Special School. Our students have an intellectual disability, the majority are on […]
Prompt Levels, Wait Times and Assessmenthttps://edufolios.org/kzagotsis/prompt-levels-wait-times-and-assessment/
This post was partly inspired by a new relief teacher who shadowed me for the day a few weeks ago and partly by a conversation I had with some colleagues, including Giulia, who is working alongside me for part of this year as a 4th year Pre-Service Teacher. Both observed me working with the students […]
Receptions Using ProloQuo2gohttps://edufolios.org/kzagotsis/receptions-using-proloquo2go/
It’s the end of Week 9 and I’ve been amazed at the progress that my Reception students have made using ProloQuo2go. One of these students is verbal, although this only began in December 2017, so his words aren’t always clear. The others I would consider pre-verbal as they are beginning to make vocalisations. Reading through […]
That “STEM Stuff”https://edufolios.org/kzagotsis/that-stem-stuff/
We are lucky enough at my site to have a Resource SSO, C. She creates Boardmaker visuals, assists with ideas for schedules and also makes activities that are relevant to the Australian Curriculum. At the end of last year, she was ordering resources through Woolworth’s Earn and Learn program. (This was a program where the school community […]
The First Week of 2018https://edufolios.org/kzagotsis/the-first-week-of-2018/
It’s the end of Week 1 with my new class, 5 of whom are new Receptions. My focus has been on establishing relationships with children and their families. I’ve written a letter introducing myself and my team, explained processes, answered questions and sent SeeSaw invitations home. I mentioned my availability and also gave parents my […]
Last Day of Term 4, 2017https://edufolios.org/kzagotsis/last-day-of-term-4-2017/
Last Friday, the last day of school, I stood in the doorway of what had been my classroom for the past two years and just paused for a moment. This space, a double classroom born of necessity of the nature of the students I had, was where I feel I came into my own as […]
Report Writing 2017https://edufolios.org/kzagotsis/report-writing/
Last week I finished my reports for this year. These are written by the class teacher, based on aspects of the Australian Curriculum and baring in mind the priorities discussed with parents/caregivers at the Negotiated Education Plan (NEP) meeting in Term 1, Week 3. I’ve emphasised aspects of as I work at a special school and we’ve […]
An Extracurricular Observationhttps://edufolios.org/kzagotsis/an-extracurricular-observation/
An Extracurricular Observation Last Friday, during Cooking, I had my second observation of the year. I’ve always taken the whole class to the Living Skills room, while some teachers choose to take a few students at a time or to do cooking in their classrooms. I think this a missed learning opportunity, especially as transitioning to […]
