Top Notch Teaching

Last week I was lucky enough to attend a presentation by a lady named ‘Maggie Dent’.    I first became acquainted with Maggie Dent back in 2004 when I attended a teaching conference in Perth.  Her workshop was all about introducing silence and stillness to our children.  The theme of this workshop resonated with me [...]

If you’ve had a chance to read my ‘About Page’ you would have noticed that my main job at the moment is looking after my little girl.  As well as that I work part time at a University managing a bridging program that helps people gain entrance to University courses. Currently, I’ve been working on [...]

Modified sports are adaptations of the sport to make them more appropriate for children.  This could include such adaptations as: Changing the rules; Altering the size and type of equipment; Shortening the length of the games; Use of protective equipment; and Changing the team size Modified sports are a great option for the classroom.  They [...]

These are the teaching principles that I believe in and what I stand for.  My beliefs about teaching and learning have helped to guide me through my teaching career to date. Do you have a teaching manifesto or set of principles that help guide your teaching? Click the link below to download my Manifesto as [...]

Being a teacher can at times be a challenging profession.  I know that I often found myself questioning my choice of careers.  Hopefully these quotes will help you remember why you decided to become a teacher and motivate you to want to keep doing what you do! 1. John Steinbeck – “I have come to [...]

Welcome to Top Notch Teaching; I’m glad you have found your way here!  This blog has grown out of my passion for teaching and the work I have been doing for the past 10 years in education. Top Notch Teaching will provide teachers (both beginning and experienced) with ideas, resources and practical advice to enhance [...]

This lesson plan introduces good safety practices to students.  Whole class and small group discussion are used to elicit knowledge on the topic.  The lesson is designed for the junior primary years and focuses on speaking, listening and writing skills. I hope you enjoy this lesson.  Click the link below to download the lesson. Safety [...]

As a teacher, having good planning documents is a necessity.  These enable you to consider all parts of your lessons; such as the types of questions you may want to ask, listing the resources you will need as well as document the type of assessment to be gathered. Over the years, I changed my daily [...]

Have you ever had that moment where you ask students to begin writing in their daily writing journal (or something similar) and one student says, “But I’ve got nothing to write about”. I was always left scrambling for an idea to help inspire them to begin writing.  Most often, the students who did not start [...]

I absolutely love children’s books.  I often find myself reading through some of my daughter’s books even when she’s not interested!  I have often wished for a great list of books that can be used in my class. This is what has inspired this post.  I thought I would start a series of posts annotating [...]