The Power of T Charts for Higher Level Thinking

Free T-Charts For Students

Haven't Used a T-Chart With Your Students?

It's time to start!

We've long known that graphic organizers are a great tool to promote both written work and higher level thinking. A simple T-Chart can be used with so many concepts and they are pretty easy for students to learn how to use them. A T Chart helps to organize to sides of thinking, they support making decisions, gathering facts, comparing and contrasting and analyze patterns to mention a few.

A T-Chart looks like it sounds, there is a topic and there is a left and right side to the T. Many different words can be used in the T-Chart headings. Here are just a few:
  • Advantages / Disadvantages
  • Pluses / Minuses
  • +  /  -
  • Pros / Cons
  • For  /  Against
  • Positive / Negative
  • Agree / Disagree
  • Favor / Oppose
  • Thumbs up /  Thumbs Down
The topics are endless to use with T-Charts, here are a few to get you started:
  • Homework
  • Owning a Pet
  • Longer Recess
  • A pool in the school
  • Uniforms at school
  • Tablets for all students
This week, I've created a variety of T-Chart graphic organizers.  For a variety of T-Chart graphic organizers and topic ideas, you'll find everything you need right here.



How to Write a Sentence



Teaching Students to Write Sentences

To a large extent, writing sentences is somewhat innate when a child is read to or when a child reads.

The exposure to reading leads naturally to sentence writing.

As children first begin to write sentences, they will take the form of initial and final consonants for words strung together is 3-4 word sentences:

i  wnt owtsid  (I went outside)
i lk flrs (I like flowers)

It's important not to over correct as the child is taking a risk in writing and if you really think about it, they are more right than they are wrong.  The letters are the sounds they hear, they are simply missing more often than not the vowels. Vowels are later in the developmental sequence. If too much time is spent on correcting sentences like those above, the self esteem will be in jeopardy and the child won't take risks in writing which isn't what we want.

Provide many pictures and ask the child to write what they see. To extend the sentences, remember to use who, what, when, where, why and how.
FREE Sentence Writing Unit

This week, I focused on worksheets to support sentence writing.

These worksheets are suitable for early learning and will also help with students who have learning disabilities.


Ready, Set, Goal

Setting Goals Worksheets

Free Goal Setting Worksheets and Strategies


Teachers and educators, with the new year now here there is no better time to have your students set realistic goals for the upcoming new year and or term. Goal setting is a great activity that links to oral language standards and written language.  You'll find these SMART goal setting worksheets and some goal setting worksheets to be a great help for your students. They're done in graphic organizer style and easy to implement.

Another great activity to do with goal setting to ensure that goals are appropriately set is to use the W-5 plus how strategy. Students select a goal and then answer:

Who is responsible for the goal?
What is the goal?
When will the goal be reached?
Where will the goal be implemented?
Why is this goal important?
How will the goal be achieved?

Happy Goal Setting.  Thanks to all of our users and may your upcoming year be prosperous, happy and healthy!