About bdonofrio

I taught high school English in Massachusetts for six years before moving to Florida where I taught middle school language arts for seven years. I taught in public schools, in a lock-up facility for juvenile boys, and in a Catholic school. My teaching has been included in the book Teacher to Teacher, Learning from Each Other by Eleanor Duckworth, who was one of my professors at Harvard Graduate School of Education. I write articles for local magazines and newspapers, either about education or parenting, and am slowly working on a couple of books. My husband and I have been married for 22 years, and we have four children.

We’ve been nominated!

Posted on December 8, 2014 by bdonofrio

Yay, Kids! We’re nominated!

Hey Kids and Friends of Kids!

Thank you to our blogging buddies at Huzzah! for nominating us for Best Class Blog! We are so very excited! We are hoping that our blogging friends will vote for us by Dec. 15th by clicking on the badge above. After you have voted, check out the other nominees in categories such as: Best New Blog, Best Individual Blog, Best Student Blog- where our own Chrissy has been nominated, too! Please vote for her as well!- Best Teacher Blog, Best Librarian Blog, Best Administrator Blog, Most Influential Blog Post, Lifetime Achievement and nine other categories.

Since beginning to blog two and a half years ago, we have learned a lot, and we have learned from the best, especially from the folks at Edublogs: Sue Waters and the Student Blogging Challenge. I always say that I have purchased cars for tens of thousands of dollars and not received one hundredth of the customer service help that we have received from Edublogs for $30 a year. Here is what makes the support team so great: they get back to us within hours EVERY TIME!, they often fix whatever problem I am having, they provide very clear directions for a way I can fix my error, they do it all in a polite, positive, and efficient way, and they challenge us to improve our blog with ten weeks of tasks, twice a year.

From the outstanding class blogs we interact with, we have learned how to-

write quality comments and posts- check out Mrs. Yollis’ amazing 3rd graders for advice
embed photos- thanks to a Skype visit on a Saturday morning with Ms. Smith at Huzzah– imagine how kind to give up a Saturday morning to help someone you have never actually met?!
use photos as links- thank you, Mrs. Rombach
use videos in our posts- still on our to-do list- but excellent motivation from Mr. Webb in New Zealand!

We are so honored to be in the company of these all-around outstanding blogs and the teachers behind them. Please take a moment to VISIT THESE BLOGS, and the many others who were nominated, and then leave a quality comment for at least one class or one student. Blogging is all about reading, writing, thinking, learning, and sharing. Let’s do it!

Christmas is Everywhere!

Posted on December 6, 2014 by bdonofrio

Hey Kids,

It’s amazing to me that in our society Christmas has become controversial. Last week someone I know on Facebook posted a story supporting a name change on a school calendar from Christmas Vacation to Holiday Vacation. Lots of schools and towns struggle over displaying Christmas trees. Many businesses are afraid to let their employees say “Merry Christmas” in fear of offending a customer who does not celebrate Christmas. It is strange that a day that marks the birth of a Man whose sole purpose on this planet was to bring love and peace to ALL people has become, for some, a means to spread division and fear among people. I want to feel comfortable saying “Merry Christmas!” to people I meet, and I want others to feel comfortable saying, “Happy Hanukkah!” or “Happy Kwanzaa!” or “Happy Ramadan!” Those greetings mean that one person is trying to share peace and joy with another, not that one person is trying to denigrate the beliefs of another.

I am so very grateful that at our school we can read wonderful literature, written by a very diverse group of authors, that celebrates the joy of Christmas. We read poems, essays, plays, short stories and informational text all with a Christmas theme. We have studied these poems, and many others, over the years:

“On a Pallet of Straw” by Langston Hughes, “A Visit From St. Nicholas” attributed to Clement Clark Moore , “The Bells” by Edgar Allen Poe, “little tree” by e.e. cummings, “December” by John Updike, and “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening” by Robert Frost. Often we use the lyrics of Christmas songs and carols as poems to analyze and annotate. “The Grinch” has great metaphors, hyperboles, and alliteration!

I also love to read “The Gift of the Magi” by O. Henry, “A Christmas Carol” (abridged for middle schoolers) by Charles Dickens, and “Yes, Virginia, there is a Santa Claus” by Francis Pharcellus Church. We have read and delivered oral presentations about Christmas traditions around the globe and throughout history as well.

All these readings remind me that people everywhere, and throughout history, have celebrated Christmas with good cheer and peace toward men. That is the legacy of the birth of Jesus.

So to combat some of the “bah, humbug” that is bound to creep into our celebration of the season of light, I share with you songs and stories that remind us the Spirit of Christmas is everywhere. God bless us, Everyone!

How can you BE THE LIGHT this Christmas?

Created with Padlet

A Fair Welcome to the Season

Posted on December 2, 2014 by bdonofrio

Huzzah! Huzzah!

Welcome one and all to the most merry of occasions, the annual Medieval Fair! By decree of the Queen, we again host jousters, jugglers, jesters, mummers, dancers, artisans, and merchants of all sorts who will entertain, amuse and beguile you with their trades. Come along with us and see from start to finish the makings of a Medieval Fair worthy of the court of the finest nobility in the land.

Medieval Fair 2015 on PhotoPeach

Do you have any shopping or entertainment traditions for the holiday season? What do you do at school or at home to celebrate the winter holidays?

And the Eddie goes to…..

Posted on November 24, 2014 by bdonofrio

Hey Kids,

Do you watch awards shows on t.v.? The entertainment industry has tons of awards they pass out every year to outstanding performers in many fields. I can think of the Oscars, the Emmys, the Grammys, the Tonys, the Golden Globes, the CMAs, the People’s Choice, and the Kids’ Choice Awards right off the top of my head. Writers vie for the Pulitzer, the Newbery, the Caldecott. The Nobel Prize recognizes accomplishments in science, literature, medicine, economics, and peace.

Well, don’t you think it’s time that teachers and students get a little recognition? The folks at Edublogs sure do, and to make sure that happens, they have created their own award:

The Eddie

Use the above link to nominate your favorite blogs, bloggers, and posts.

We would like to give a friendly shout out to our friends at Huzzah!

Thank you from the bottom of our hearts for nominating us! We are thrilled and humbled by your kind words. We would like to let the world know that if it were not for Huzzah, and the intrepid Jan Smith, we are not sure we would have survived our first few months of our blogging adventure. Huzzah is an inspiring blog with unique concepts, both in content and presentation, in each post. Not only is it plain to see the creativity, work ethic, and high standards that occur in class on a daily basis, the genuine love of learning that passes from teacher to students kindles the “lighting of the fire” that is education at its finest. One needs only to read through comments left by students and teacher to see them engaged in such topics as: destination imagination, inquiry questions, back channels, the Dalai Lama, or Glocal. Very often I have never heard of the words used to describe what the Huzzahnians are doing in their classrooms; I am always impressed not only by the content, but also by the style of communication from Ms. Smith and her students. All of the students are stellar in the quality comments they write, and we have had multiple occasions to use Faith’s blog and comments to us as an example of truly inspired writing. Here in Florida, we are learning about writing and blogging from the very best practitioners, who just happen to live 2,727 miles away.

Learning across the miles!

We also discovered some new blogging friends this year. Mrs. Rombach Reads is filled with excellent book suggestions and cool gizmos and gadgets on this class blog. My students love the worm on the hook, and like a fish, we have been caught. This week Mrs. Rombach challenges her students to add 9 items to their student blogs and she offers them tools like Voki and Padlet to help them on their way. Truly, reading outstanding blogs like this and following the student directions is how I learn to improve my own class blog. And just look at her clever title to this week’s post, Who Let the Blogs Out? (I keep singing and adding in woof, woof, woof, woof on my own!) So fun! Mrs. Rombach, thank you for helping us learn!

There are SO MANY wonderful blogs out there. Whenever I can, I travel to blogs, always learning as I go. My kids are loving discussing Minecraft with Mr. Miller in California. I still have a goal, which I will get to soon, of adding video to my posts, thanks to the live action window into Mr. Webb’s classroom in New Zealand. We also got a chance to Skype with Mrs. Emerick’s class, Making Waves in Sixth Grade, last year. So cool.

In my quest for knowledge, I am also trying to navigate the world of Twitter. Through this outlet, I have met even more educators and read their words of wisdom on their blogs. One of my favorite posts was about harnessing the power of social media and was written by teacher Derek Oldfield. I have also been blessed to meet. via Twitter, Joy Kirr, a plethora of information and, like Jan Smith at Huzzah!, kind guidance and help.

No matter where they are or what their subject or grade level, these teachers are kind souls who want to learn about and connect with, and help others learn about and connect with, our world. They are most deserving of their own Award.

Thank you, Edublogs, for the opportunity to share the wonderful teaching and learning with the world. Good luck to all the nominees! We’ll be looking for you on the red carpet!

Thank You to Our Service Men and Women

Posted on November 11, 2014 by bdonofrio

On Veteran’s Day we honor those who served, and continue to serve, our country.

Photo Credit: John via Compfight

“As we express our gratitude, we must never forget that the highest appreciation is not to utter words, but to live by them.”
~John Fitzgerald Kennedy

As President Kennedy suggested, “Actions speak louder than words.” What can we do to live by the words “Veterans Day”? How can we genuinely express our gratitude and appreciation to the men and women who dedicated their very lives so that others may live in peace and with freedom?

One way we decided to to show our appreciation as a nation was to create Veterans Day.

What are some tangible ways you can honor our veterans?

Thank a veteran in person or in writing.
Provide a service to others in honor of those who serve.
Learn about Veterans’ Day.
Visit a veterans or war memorial.
Pray for our veterans and the people they are helping.
Donate to a charity that supports veterans.
Display the American flag at your home.
Sing the National Anthem respectfully at sporting events.
Wear red, white, and blue on patriotic holidays.

Can you think of any other ways to show appreciation to our veterans?

Have you ever done something to show appreciation for our veterans?

What have you done to serve others?

Serving others through Bingo; providing a goat and baby chicks to a poor family.

Serving others rice, one grain at a time.

Serving other through tabs; collecting tabs for Shriners Hospitals.

A Class Act

Posted on November 4, 2014 by bdonofrio

Hey Kids!

Who is one of TIME Magazine’s 100 Most Influential People in the World, Billboard’s youngest ever Woman-of–the-Year, and the youngest artist to win a Grammy for Album of the Year?

Taylor Swift discusses books, reading, and writing with students.

Yes, that’s right. It’s Taylor Swift, or as my 14-year-old son is known to call her, T-Swizzle.

Out of the respect I have for this artist since watching her Scholastic video Reading Opens a World of Possible, I will call her Miss Swift.

At age 24, Miss Swift has already won seven Grammy Awards. She has written ALL her own songs. In fact, she considers writing to be the most important part of her job.

Last week we watched a conversation she had with six individual students, ages 11-15, about writing, reading, and books. In addition to the students she sat with, Miss Smith also invited two classrooms into the discussion via Skype.

Miss Smith and the students addressed such heady topics as dystopian societies and feminism as well as the current and important topic of bullying, especially appropriate as October was Bullying Prevention Month. While talking about their favorite books and Taylor Swift’s writing process, the group discussed point-of-view and poetry, and used such terms as metaphor, rhythm and rhyme. At one point Miss Swift described herself dancing by saying “I look like a baby giraffe learning to walk.” A simile in action.

The songwriter has been keeping a writing journal since she was 13-years-old. She spoke about writing her ideas down whenever inspiration hits and retold the story of collaborating with Ryan Tedder on the song I Know Places. Similar to all writers, Taylor creates a rough draft of the song, her voice accompanied by a piano, on an audio file; she then heads to the studio to polish it by creating a track using background bass and drums. The finished version stays true to the draft, but is enhanced by the additional work. Compare this to all writing: rough draft, revision, finished product. Listen to both versions and the entire conversation by clicking on the photo above.

In her Scholastic conversation, Taylor says, “Books train imaginations to think big.” She and the students discuss books with impact, which range from Percy Jackson to Stargirl. Add your favorite to the board!

Created with Padlet

Scholastic video-interviewed quite a few other students, teachers, and parents to learn about how their favorite books “open a world of possible”. Watch and listen to their ideas about books.

On Thursday of this week Usher will also talk about books with Scholastic. What celebrity would you like to sit down with and have a book chat? What books would you discuss? What would you say about your favorite book?

Taylor Swift chats with one of her guests during a Scholastic book talk, Open Possible.

Watching Taylor Swift talk books, reading, and writing.

National Day on Writing

Posted on October 21, 2014 by bdonofrio

Photo Credit: mbgrigby via Compfight

Raise your hand if you knew today, October 20th, is the National Day on Writing. I admit, at 7:00 this morning, I would not have been able to raise my hand. However, it didn’t take long between emails, tweets, and blogs to learn that today is, in fact, a special occasion, especially for all writers and for those aspiring to be writers.

Happy National Day on Writing!

In honor of the day, let’s share the writing we’ve been doing for the last couple of weeks and then use these tips to create some new writing.

Analyzing and evaluating our writing

These are examples of blog comments we wrote last week. We analyzed them in four parts:

I. Did we create imagery for the reader? (specific nouns, verbs, adjectives/adverbs; figures of speech)

II. Did we make the reader think? (details and examples to support ideas)

III. Did we engage the reader? (variety of sentence structures)

IV. Did we organize our material for the reader? (beginning, middle, end)

We evaluated our writing using FOCUS. An essay that scores a 1 is not very FOCUSed; a score of 6 is quite FOCUSed.

Focus: on topic

Organization: introduction, body, conclusion

Content: supporting examples and details

Usage: proper grammar and mechanics

Style: mature vocabulary, variety of sentence structure, figures of speech

Finally, we identified specific areas that we improved since last week, and explained how we plan to continue to improve.

In honor of National Day on Writing, a most happy occasion, let’s listen to some writing from some American Authors that you may have heard before:

Would you consider today, the National Day on Writing, to be the best day of your life?

If not, what is the best day of your life so far?

Exploring the Middle Ages

Posted on October 14, 2014 by bdonofrio

For the past seven years, our middle school students have hosted a Medieval Fair for our entire school. We read literature pertaining to the Middle Ages, study the history of the time period, and then put our knowledge to use by creating a town fair, complete with jousting tournaments, swordplay, dramatic presentations, juggling, stilt walking, music, and of course, booths of food and wares.

In our blogging adventures, we have noticed that Mr. Miller and his class at Chalone Peaks Middle School in King City, California, also study this era in history, but in a very different way. They bring a modern twist to the Middle Ages by recreating Medieval villages through Minecraft. (Click on the photo to visit Mr. Miller.)

Mr. Miller’s Medieval Minecraft

Mr. Chiu’s class at Aldergove Public School in Ontario, Canada, also studied the Middle Ages. They created 3D models and made oral presentations. Visit Mr. Chiu’s class by clicking on the photo.

A 3D model of a castle in Mr. Chiu’s class

The Year 6 students at Tirlebrook Primary School in Gloucestershire, U.K., took a field trip for a Magnificent Medieval Day this past July. You can watch them in action in a slide show on their blog.

Elder Tree student playing a game of 9 Men’s Morris

Of course, you can see how we celebrate by visiting any of our archived posts listed under Medieval Fair.

In 1271, a young Marco Polo sailed from his home in Venice, Italy, to exotic lands in the Far East, bringing back tales of his adventures. Like the Venetian explorer from the Middle Ages, you can visit other far off classrooms to discover how their studies of the Medieval Era are similar to and different from ours and then write about your travels in a comment or post. Start a conversation with another class who is also studying the Medieval time period.

In addition to blogs, you can visit some cool websites as well!

Medieval Music

Everything Medieval

Happy traveling!

The Journey of a Lifetime

Posted on October 7, 2014 by bdonofrio

Photo Credit: darwin Bell via Compfight

Have you ever heard the expression variety is the spice of life?

The meaning behind that saying is one of the reasons I love teaching language arts. We have so many different avenues to explore which keeps life interesting. Every day we think about something different. To begin with, the basic skills we develop are varied: reading, writing, grammar, vocabulary, speaking, and listening. All of those skills involve using language in some way. Add to that the manner in which we approach the development of these skills: small groups, class discussions, games (a list of choices here: diagram races, Jeopardy, Bingo, baseball), dramatic readings with costumes, traditional note taking, technology (more options: the blog, QR code scavenger hunts, Educreations, Quizlet, Prezi, Powerpoint, Chictionary, iPads, iMovie, Skype, etc), simulations, field trips. Finally, we have a myriad of materials at our disposal: myths, novels, informational text, poems, short stories, essays, and biographies and a plethora of topics: The Odyssey, Jason and the Argonauts, Antigone, Crispin, Beowulf, Macbeth, Romeo and Juliet, Hamlet, Under the Blood Red Sun, Tangerine, The Wednesday Wars, a list too long to continue.

Is it any wonder I am constantly saying, “We need to spend the whole day in language arts!”?

This past week we used our speaking and listening skills to present oral reports about journeys we’d like to take. We chose this topic as we completed our study of The Odyssey. Odysseus’s voyage took ten years to complete. He sailed to a multitude of locations around the Mediterranean. He met strange people, ate unusual foods, and heard enchanting music. In addition to ten years of his own life, the trip cost him the lives of his crew. We thought about adventures we’d like to take: where would we go, how would we travel, what would it cost, and what would we see, hear, taste, and do.

Come fly with us around the world!

Here’s another student making an oral presentation that addresses some of the topics we’ve been thinking about in our class.

What road will you take on your journey in life?

Will you take the road less traveled by?

Click to play clip

Will your journey be one of thousands of miles or a hundred feet?

How will you add spice to your own life and by doing so enrich the lives of others?

Will you become a world-wide traveler? A president? A chef? A language arts teacher?

What is your journey?

Around the World in 80 Minutes

Posted on September 23, 2014 by bdonofrio

Hey Kids,

Do you ever wonder what kids do in other classes?

Do they read the same books we do? Do they dress up in character?

Polyphemus and his Cyclops friends

Jason, the Argonauts, Kings Pelias and Aeetes, Medea, Phineas, and the Harpies

Do they have an 80 minute language arts class?

Do they race to diagram a sentence?

Do they use iPads in the classroom?

Day one of 1:1 iPads

Interviewing each other with our new iPads

Exploring our new technology

When you live in one classroom, it is easy to think that there is only one way to do things. One of the reasons we love blogging is that we get to step into the classrooms of other kids. We see new ways of doing things. Our brains engage in the “what if” scenario. What if we…

knew we could not fail? Visit Mrs. Rombach Reads.
read the books in Mrs. Emerick’s class?
moved half-way around the world, to Bahrain, like Mrs. Krebbs?
studied Minecraft in school like Mr. Miller’s class?
went to school in New Zealand like Mr. Webb‘s students?
had a Teacher-of-the-Year like Mrs. Yollis?
could learn anything with Huzzah!

Visit some of our blogging buddies. Visit their blogging buddies! Read about their classrooms. Write them a quality comment. Ask questions about what they are learning. Share what you are learning. Love. Learn. Soar. Pass it on.