Finding Out

For the afternoon students, we use a particular book series called, "Finding Out". I don't find them very useful, I only use them as a layout to what I need to teach the kids next. One day, Craig and I decided to skim through the Teacher's Guide of the series to see what tips they gave for teaching the students. Here's what the suggestion is for teaching, "Are you a ...?":

Mime an animal. At first do not make it too obvious which animal you are mining. When a child makes a guess, help her form the question patern, (yes, there is a spelling error in the Teacher's Guide) "Are you a ...?" If she is wrong, just smile mischievously and encourage more guesses. Continue until a child gets the right answer and say, "Yes, I am". Drama is important in this activity.

Next, open class books. Appear fascinated by the page. Let the children guess what is happening and read by themselves. They then read aloud either individually or as a class.

Appear fascinated??? Smile mischievously??? I don't know how to smile mischievously without looking like I have a face deformity.

The best usage for these Finding Out Teacher's Guides is to read them on those days that you need a laugh.