Get to know your students quickly with Pathfinder Student Learning Profiles. Introduce important Lifelong Learning concepts. Create Self-Awareness and Empathy in students and give parents an eye-opening report on their child's development each year. Transform your class into a team where the concepts of trust, respect and skill development flourish. Promote Social-Emotional Learning through play.
Be prepared to invest a couple of hours completing Pathfinder as a class. Explain where and how Pathfinder will be used by watching Home and School Applications. Holistic PD also calls on parents to learn - free and available online 24/7. Please take your time completing Pathfinder.
Focus Questions
1 What is Pathfinder, and how is it used?
Outcome - Be able to name Pathfinder's most important applications.
2. How is Pathfinder used in the WAY Game?
Outcome - Reduce violence in school.
3. How to run Student of the Day.
Outcome - Participate in Student of the Day.
4. Know what files are available.
Outcome - Learners have free access to training and files.
5. Learn to use AI Prompts to improve writing through proofreading.
Outcome - Be a better writer.
Steps - KISS - Keep It Simple & SMART
Print Pathfinder as needed. Insert student picture on Pathfinder, and print three blank copies per student.
Watch Pathfinder - A First Look and Home & School Applications.
Send home Pathfinder Permission Letters.
Invest class time in completing Pathfinder.
Once permission letters are back, start Student of the Day Activities. This can take a month or a day; the pace is up to you. Use this time to learn CAP Notes and Game Cards.
Print Pathfinder Cards for students to collect. Study the Game Card and speculate on the rules for the Seven Games of WAY.
Open 7 Games PowerPoint and play.
Front
Here's a Microsoft Word Pathfinder Class Set of 30.
Back
An Overview of Pathfinder
How & Where Pathfinder is Used
Stop Video, Explain, Continue
Brian's Pathfinder Game Card
The 7 Games of WAY on PowerPoint
Pick a Game - Pick a Number & Play
Pathfinder was created and has evolved and will continue to evolve with your input. Teachers are asked to Differentiate or customize instruction for students. How do you customize learning for a student you know nothing about? Why should a student work hard for a teacher if there are no connections made? Teachers need to create an atmosphere where mystery and imagination meet skills and discipline. A safe place to learn begins with Pathfinder.
Student of the Day - The First Draft is entered into ChatGPT
Improve the following text, conventions, punctuation, order and structure, and make the tone light and friendly. Create an interesting hook-line for the title.
Pathfinder, the WAY Game, and Student of the Day
One of Pathfinder’s many uses is Student of the Day. Students thrive when they get to know one another as unique individuals; bullying is reduced. Pathfinder and Student of the Day are tied into the WAY Game; you see, we’ve taken Pathfinder's content and transformed them into clues for the WAY Game.
The WAY Game is like an Icebreaker Activity that runs all year, building relationships along the way. Students are encouraged to mentor one another, compete for WAY Game prizes and give and receive student Game Card creations on a weekly basis.
The object of the game is to discover the secret identity of the Mystery Kid, a randomly selected student who is chosen with WAY Cards. Students must win clues from the Mystery Kid’s Pathfinder to win the game.
Pathfinder Clues are on Notebook software, or Pathfinder Clue Cards can be printed and bound. Insert student headshot pictures on Pathfinder. Students make three copies of Pathfinder: one for the student, another for mom and dad or primary caregiver, and the third is a teacher’s copy. It must be stressed that this is confidential information that must be secured in a student’s binder. Trust and respect people to use Pathfinder as it was intended – for good.
Student of the Day
First, Parent Permission letters need to be returned, and Pathfinder Response Sheets completed. Each student in the class gets to be Student of the Day. It's - Be Kind to That Student Day; when the student's name was called, I would wheel my chair over to the student, pick them up and wheel them to the center of the room because students are special, and teachers need to show it.
WAY Cards are used to select students and track who has been Student of the Day. A student shuffles the Cards and calls out the name selected. That student may ask one question from the Student of the Day’s Pathfinder Response sheet. The student has two choices – the first is to answer the question, the second is when there is no response written, or the students wants to keep the information to themselves – they say Pass. And that’s OK.
A Class Set of WAY Cards
Students need to listen and remember responses given by all the Students of the Day because this is the information they’ll use to win the game. Every time a team wins one of the seven Games of WAY, teams are awarded a randomly chosen clue from the Mystery Kid’s Pathfinder.
The teacher will fill in the clues the teams have won before the next game. Teams can win up to seven clues per game. If they do, that’s called a thumping.
Once you have been Student of the Day, for the next game, you are the one to use WAY Cards and call on students to ask their questions. When a student asks a question that has already been asked, the class as a whole makes a loud buzzing sound, and the student loses their turn.
Nine Prizes are awarded: one to the Mystery Kid, to two Team Captains, one for Judges, one from the losing team and four to the winning team. Prizes are fun, especially for elementary students. Prizes can also add to student grades, which can motivate students to pay attention to each other’s responses. In the end, Student of the Day is a team-building activity designed to grow trust and respect in students everywhere through fun and games.
As a feature of this Blog, I plan to demo AI Technology for the classroom.
ChatGPT Response { I would cut back on superlatives - fix a few issues, but not bad. }
Title: "Unraveling the Mystery of Student of the Day"
Do you want to reduce bullying, build strong friendships, and have a blast while doing it? Well, you're in luck because we've got an exciting game in store for you! Welcome to "Student of the Day," where making friends is as fun as playing your favourite game.
Know This First:
Pathfinder isn't just a navigation tool [student learning profile]; it's also the key to an awesome game called the WAY Game. We've taken the content from Pathfinders and turned them into clues for an exciting adventure. Picture it as an Icebreaker Activity that lasts the whole year, helping you build fantastic relationships along the way.
In the WAY Game, you're not just a student; you're an adventurer on a mission to discover the secret identity of the Mystery Kid. But that's not all! You also get to mentor each other, compete for fantastic WAY Game prizes, and share your very own Student Game Cards on a weekly basis.
The game revolves around the Mystery Kid's Pathfinder, and you need to gather clues to win. So, grab your Notebook software or print out Pathfinder Clue Cards because the game is afoot!
Now, let's get started! First things first:
[ I used A.C. Doyle's quote, "The game is afoot," in a previous chat; it remembers!]
Student of the Day:
To kick things off, we need those Parent Permission letters returned and your Pathfinder Response Sheets filled out. Once that's done, it's your time to shine as the Student of the Day!
We use WAY Cards to randomly select students and track who's been the star of the day. When your name is called, you get to ask one question from the Student of the Day's Pathfinder Response sheet. You've got two options: answer the question or simply say "Pass." No pressure!
Pay attention because every time a team wins one of the seven Games of WAY, they get a clue from the Mystery Kid's Pathfinder. The more clues, the closer you get to uncovering the secret identity.
And guess what? After you've had your moment as Student of the Day, you get to play the role of the question master for the next game. But be careful! If you ask a question that's already been asked, get ready for a loud buzzing sound from the class, and you lose your turn.
Prizes and More:
There are nine fantastic prizes up for grabs: one for the Mystery Kid, two for Team Captains, one for Judges, one for the losing team, and a whopping four for the winning team. Prizes are not only loads of fun but can also boost your student grades. So, pay attention to each other's responses and claim those rewards!
In the end, "Student of the Day" is all about building trust and respect, all while having a great time. It's the perfect way to make friends, learn about your classmates, and enjoy the adventure of school life. So, are you ready to uncover the Mystery Kid and embark on a journey filled with fun and games? Let's do this!
Teacher Stories
I don't know about you, but coincidences happen to me all the time. For example, today, I was sucking up leaves with a tool like a giant bagpipe. I was struggling with what stories to tell for the Teacher story section. I came up with about twenty-six story topics when I came up with the dilemma of what story to tell first. So, I plugged in the leaf blower but neglected to check if the zipper was zipped. It wasn't, and leaf, dust, and who knows what covered the immediate area. Just like what I did to three trustees from the Calgary Catholic School District.
My advice to all teachers - be on good terms with school caretakers, secretaries and support staff. They can make good things happen or not. This is the story of Badger Bob the school caretaker at the Theatre of Hope, where I taught the Drama program for ten years.
Let me give you some background. Bishop Kidd was a junior high in a rough area. Bishop Kidd was formerly nicknamed Vicious Kidd; the Friday afternoon call over the PA of all male staff to the parking lot was not an unfamiliar request.
Before I got there, the District gave the principal control over hiring; the result was big, talented, mostly male staff who worked hard to bring students a great balanced program of academics, the arts and athletics. In my early days of teaching, I was a substitute teacher. I loved to go to Bishop Kidd because you could actually teach there. Teachers were respected at Bishop Kidd.
I spent ten years at Bishop Kidd as a drama teacher, not that I was trained for it, but the job became available after a year of teaching Language Arts, and I jumped at the opportunity, having more technical knowledge than acting skills. The theatre was named the Theatre of Hope, a double entendre; Larry Hope {cousin to Bob} was a colleague of mine who began a tradition with his grade nine students of writing and producing plays each year.
Theatre in the Round, I had a great facility to teach drama. It was the night of the grade nine plays. Mrs. Valentine, the longstanding head Trustee for the district and three of her colleagues were in attendance. It was a packed house. One of the plays had a pillow fight in it. During intermission, it was my job to vacuum the mess. The vacuum was an industrial model with a large inflatable sack borrowed from the caretaker 'Badger Bob.' Now, I'm not saying that he rigged the vacuum to explode on start-up, but it did. Boom, all over the front row of trustees and valued guests. I thought I'd be fired being a relatively new teacher. I survived.
I was on good terms with Badger Bob; maybe it was just one of those things. Stuff happens.
What's Next
Four short videos of 5M demonstrating the WAY Game.
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