May 2011

  • Unscramble, Write, and Draw

    It is important to have a few Goldilocks tasks in your teaching reservoir. These are quick assignments that your students should find neither too hard nor too easy. These are just right tasks. Here is one that I have found to be particularly useful for students still mastering sentence writing. The task involves reading the […]


  • My Love of Running and No I Didn’t Take That Photo (aka Giving Credit Where It is Due)

    I love running. I think I always have. I remember being on a soccer team when I was very young. This was a non-competitive house league team. We wanted to win, of course, but the coaches always imparted on us the lesson of playing our best game, having fun, and showing sportmanship. I don’t know […]


  • JC Poppe Interview Wraps Up

    We’re back with JC Poppe. If you missed Part 1 of the interview you can go back and read it now, download the whole show to listen to, or stream it with the player below. Chase: “We just played ‘Foundation of a Moment’ by JC Poppe. I really like that track. It speaks to some […]


  • JC Poppe Interview

    Chase: “All right everybody, this is Chase March. Daddy J is on the boards, and we have JC Poppe on the telephone all the way from Milwaukee. You can download this interview for free, stream it with the player below, or continue reading. Welcome to DOPEfm.” JC Poppe: “What’s up? How you guys doing?” Chase: […]


  • How A Gluestick Works

    Image via Wikipedia As a teacher, it is important to capitalize on teachable moments. A small discussion, comment, or even an action from a student can lead to a brilliant impromptu lesson. Case in point, last week I noticed that a student in my class was applying chapstick to her lips every few minutes. Her […]


  • Medway Valley Visual Tour

    It’s time for the very first Visual Running Tour of 2011! Medway Valley Heritage Forest is located in London, Ontario and covers 95 hectares. There are 9 kilometers of trails that hook up to a few other short trail systems in the northern part of the city. For my run today, I covered about five […]


  • My Take on Toronto Freedom Festival (Guest Post)

    This year, I attended my first Toronto Freedom Festival and Global Marijuana March at Queen’s Park in Toronto. The event boasts a peaceful history with no arrests and an estimated 3.5 million dollar impact on the city’s economy. The official festival website states: “In 2007, TFF was developed to offer the necessary infrastructure for the […]


  • How To Fit Small Group Instruction Into Your Routine

    Welcome to Teaching Tip Tuesday! Before we get started today, if you haven’t already, please take a moment to complete this survey. Thanks! And now for today’s tip, How to Fit Small Group Instruction into Your Routine. 1) Remove Timelines Instead of having a specific time and duration for tasks, allow your students to have some autonomy […]


  • A.P.E. Strategy Survey (Guest Post)

    Greetings Chase readers, I was very happy to come across the Teaching Tip Tuesday post which talked about using the A.P.E. strategy for teaching kids how to properly answer a question. I am a recent teacher graduate doing an inquiry about A.P.E. and having a very hard time finding research and literature on the effectiveness […]


  • Love to Hear Mandy Siegfried "Speak"

    The public library is a great resource for audio books. I go there often to find stuff to listen to in the car. It’s great being able to immerse yourself in a story while driving. If often makes the commute seem shorter and gives you something to look forward to as you want to know […]