More Children's Books by Sean Covey

This is the book I named my blog after. The students have enjoyed learning about the 7 habits. Sean Covey is working on creating a children's book on each habit.  The first three are shown below.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nFn2DjuCFHQ


In the video from Youtube listed above....listen to Sean Covey talk about how he created the characters in his book and his inspiration for creating these books, along with some great information for parents and teachers.

Sean Covey continues to write children's books about the 7 habits. These are great children's books!

Children's Books were a Huge Success!

In a previous post, I wrote about how I put my students into seven different groups and each group selected one of the seven principles from the book, "The 7 Habits of Happy Kids" and created their own children's book using KERPOOF. The students finished their books last week and were able to share them with their classmates and our first grade buddies. They did such a great job and I believe they enjoyed this experience as much as their first grade buddies! It was such a huge success, I plan on doing this same writing activity again next year.  I took lots of pictures to put on my classroom webpage. As a teacher, I was completely entertained by the books they created and now know how these principles have touched their own lives in a positive way.

Parent Teacher Conferences

I always look forward to Parent Teacher Conferences because I am able to share such valuable information with my parents, but more importantly I am able to learn so much more about each individual child. Fifth graders are invited and encouraged to attend their scheduled meeting with me and their parents. I like to watch the interaction between the parents and their child, but especially enjoy watching the children facilitate their own conference. I feel the student-parent-teacher connection is extremely vital in order for the child to have a successful year. In my opinion, we don't really have many opportunities to meet with the parents...so conferences are a time to really listen to the parents concerns and share strengths about their child as well as areas of concern. After meeting with the parents, the CHALLENGING work really begins because we have common goals to focus on.

Making Children's Books

My students are so excited! They asked me if they could make children's books to read to the kindergarten and first grade classes. We decided we would focus on "The 7 Habits of Happy Kids" and write a book about each of the seven habits. I have 28 students in my class (including 3 students from the Autism department), so I have seven groups with four students in each group. Each group was assigned one of the seven habits and they are using Kerpoof to create their books.  http://www.kerpoof.com/ It will be very interesting to see how their stories turn out, but for now I am pleased they are eager to share their books with the younger students. I will be able to see how well they understand the seven principles in the book, "The 7 Habits of Happy Kids."

Acrostic Poem

This is an acrostic poem I created in another Lesley class. I thought it went well with Assignment #4, so I decided to share it.

Social bookmarking is the practice
Of researching different bookmarks and then
Choosing your favorite ones, so you can save these
Incredible sites to a public Web site.
Activities like social bookmarking allow
Like-minded people to find one another,

By creating new communities
Of users who want to share information with
Others having the same interests. The bookmarks can be tagged with
Key words as each is saved which
Makes it easier to organize information
And categorize important
Resources. This provides an opportunity for individuals to
Keep going back to their favorite sites. There are many social bookmarking
Sites which include del.icio.us, Furl, Simpy and MURL.

Meet the Kids of 7 Oaks

In Sean Covey's book titled, The 7 Habits of Happy Kids, he uses eight different characters in his book to teach children the important values and principles discussed in his father's book, The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People.  Let's meet these characters: Goob Bear, Sophie Squirrel, Pokey Porcupine, Tagalong Allie, Ernie the worm, Jumper Rabbit, Lily Skunk, and Sammy Squirrel.

What I really like about this book is at the end of each story, he has a parent's corner where both parents and teachers can encourage open discussions with their children or students. In the section titled, Baby Steps, children are taught how to take baby steps which encourages them to get involved and be an active participant as they apply these values and principles to their own lives. These are the seven principles discussed in this children's book.
                                                                                                               
Habit 1: Be Proactive                                                                          
Habit 2: Begin with the End in Mind                                                
Habit 3: Put First Things First                                                             
Habit 4: Think Win-Win                                                                   
Habit 5: Seek First to Understand, Then to Be Understood       
Habit 6: Synergize                                                                                 
Habit 7: Sharpen the Saw

What I've found interesting is how much the students really do want to apply these prinicples to their own lives and have been encouraging their families to participate and practice these principles at home. I am in the process of reading all of the books written by Sean Covey. He has written a children's book for each of the seven habits. Each time I've read one of his books...I have at least one student tell me they asked their mom to take them to the library to check out one of his books. What a valuable lesson for us as educators....when you find ideas or topics of interest for children and they are actively engaged, you can create many different lessons centered on academics while incorporating these principles as well. Do you think it is important to teach these principles to children?  Do you apply any of these same principles in your own life? If so, how often?

Book Recommendation

About ten years ago, my principal, at that time, asked me to read the book, Classroom Instruction that Works by Robert J. Marzano, Debra J Pickering, and Jane E. Pollock. I really enjoyed reading this book at the time and put many of these research-based strategies to use in my own classroom. I came across the book on my shelf a few weeks ago and decided I would read it again. In this book, the authors examined decades of research findings and put these findings into nine broad teaching strategies that have positive effects on student learning. After reading this book again...I wanted to share these teaching strategies with you. 1. Identify similarities and differences 2. Summarize and note taking 3. Reinforcing effort and providing recognition. 4. Homework and practice 5. Non-linguistic representation 6. Cooperative learning 7. Setting objectives and providing feedback 8. Generating and testing hypotheses and 9. Questions, cues and advance organizers. As teachers use more technology tools in their classrooms, we need to remember these nine teaching strategies are equally as important in order for children to show significant growth and have a successful educational experience in the 21st century.

Should "Character Education" be Taught More Frequently in Public Schools?

I believe that our society has changed so much in the past 50 years. Many things that were taught at home aren't really being communicated to childen in the homes of today's generation. Families use to spend more time together and life seemed to move at a much slower pace. Parents worked hard and the family was content with very little because they were blessed to have each other. When I look back, I really enjoyed my childhood and being a student in the public schools, especially during my elementary school years. The teachers not only taught me about academics, but life long skills and how to be a person of great character as well. These principles seemed to align with what I was being taught at home too. Times were different for sure. Now, families have less time together and don't always find the time to educate their children on the necessary life long skills needed to become a great person of character, which helps our nation become better and stronger. The "Golden Rule" seems to be something of the past. Also, for the past ten years, the focus in schools has been on making sure no child is left behind academically, which is an excellent goal, but we as a country have lost focus on what it takes to build a strong nation based on integrity, hard work, and high principles. Children need to be encouraged to be great citizens, especially those who may not be receiving this message at home. I believe it takes a village to build stronger families and communities. Our school made the decision to incorportate Sean Covey's principle's in his book The 7 Habits of Happy Kids. Do you think more schools should include character education in their schools today?