Circle time activities using variety of strategies: Etobicoke High School

Using Assistive Tech and Low-Tech to Engage Students in Circle Time Activities

During a co-teaching session in a Developmental Disability classroom at Central Etobicoke High School, Seleen Brewer, Special Education Teacher, showed observing teachers her morning Circle Time on the Promethean Board.

As part of their morning Circle Time the class talked about the weather. Here is a picture of Seleen with her weather activity page in ActivInspire on the Promethean Board.

Students participated in the weather activity page on the Promethean Board by using their finger, the ActivPen or ActivWand to:

1.    Touch the icon of the world to go to YouTube to watch a video/song about weather.
2.    Touch the speaker icon to hear their “weather song” (pre-recorded by the staff and students in the class).
3.    Touch each weather word and the sentence starter “Today it is” to hear the words said aloud.
4.    Move the appropriate weather word to finish the sentence “Today it is___________”

Students were asked “What is the weather today?”. To help the students understand the meaning of the different weather words, Ms. Brewer used multisensory props. For example she used water in a spray bottle to represent “rain” and cotton balls to represent “cloudy”.

It was great to see how Ms. Brewer used tech (the tools available in ActivInspire) and low-tech (multisensory props) to engage her students and support their learning needs.  Thanks Seleen!