The first 3 people to email me…

UPDATE Mar 7, 2021: This contest is finally closed. It only took me 7 months to get 3 people to email me 🙂

As you can see, your chances of winning FREE TpT Gift Cards from me are epic (due to low participation in my give aways!)

Here’s the list of winners for this give away.
Here’s some info about free TpT resources and current gift card giveaways.

…will get a free $10 gift card to spend on Teachers Pay Teachers stuff.

(and, hopefully, you’ll spend it on an Educircles product but it’s a TpT gift card that you can spend anywhere in the TpT store!)

Email me right now at [email protected] with

what you teach (grade and subject)
where you teach (city)
and which of my Educircles products you’ve used (or want to use.)

The first 3 emails that I receive with all 3 things will receive a $10 gift card code via email.

Special equity / diversity bonus: if you work with a disadvantaged community, let me know. I’ve set aside some bonus gift cards for you after the first 3 prizes are gone!)

FYI: This free gift card give away is just in time for tomorrow’s Back to School Bonus sale

Everything in my Educircles TpT store is 25% off.

On Tuesday, August 18th until 11:59pm ET, all of my products are 20% off including already discounted products.
Let’s look at my Citizenship unit which is normally $10.
Right now, it’s already 50% off to help teachers talk about racism in the classroom, so today, you can get it for $5.
During tomorrow’s sale, you get an additional 20% off the discounted price. So, that $10 lesson will only cost $4 in the shopping cart.
When you get to the check out cart, make sure to use promo code BTSBONUS20 to get an additional 5% discount on everything, so it’s even cheaper!

If I were still teaching in the classroom, what would I teach?

I used to teach Grade 8 in Ottawa, Canada. I had a mental health crisis, and now I don’t.

(Watch this video to find out why I gave up my teaching license and why I’m so passionate about 21st Century skills.)

But, if I were teaching in the classroom this September, my Back to School routine this year would look very different from previous years.

Back to school this year is like no other year.

Things are constantly changing with Covid-19.

Now is not the time for status-quo. Now is the time to help students adapt with change.

I wouldn’t do the typical “all about me” assignments or “let’s make some class rules” discussions, although those are important.

Instead, I would want to develop 3 things in September:

a growth mindset
digital skills to get students ready for blended online learning or completely online remote learning from home
21st century transferable life skills (6 Cs): character, citizenship, collaboration, communication, creativity, and critical thinking skills

It doesn’t matter if I’m teaching students in person (using physical distancing and masks in the classroom) or if I’m teaching virtually (through distance learning or remote learning using Google Classroom).

My back-to-school activities in September would focus on building classroom community by focusing on explicitly teaching students about growth mindset and introducing them to 21st Century competencies / learning skills. This would help build a framework to explore the curriculum throughout the year (even when Covid-19 changes the game next week…)

I would start with Human Bingo as an ice breaker.
I would explicitly talk about Growth Mindset using the slideshow in this Character unit and I would set up my Google Classroom assignments to walk them through the unit (so we can start to get familiar with Google Classroom)
I would give students an opportunity to try to stay in a Growth Mindset by doing increasingly difficult logic puzzles. Watch this video on YouTube to see how students can learn digital skills as they play sudoku in this lesson: https://youtu.be/S2xeMreGZig
Then, I would give them a quick overview of the 6 Cs (21st Century Competencies)
Depending on timing, class dynamics, and physical distancing rules, I would probably use these ice breakers.
And, of course, as a English Language Arts literacy teacher, I need marks, so I would eventually lead towards this challenge task where they have to read a short handout about each of the 6 Cs, identify key aspects for each C, and then synthesize ideas in small groups to co-create a learning skills rubric.
My game plan for Reading would be to explicitly teach / review reading comprehension strategies using this series of video lessons. The videos are also posted on YouTube so students can still learn using distance learning / remote learning.
I would have students practice reading comprehension strategies using these informational texts. Each of these articles connect to a different 21st century, has a slideshow lesson, and a quick video about the news event. The articles are written at 3 different reading levels so I can differentiate for students who have an IEP or are ESL / ELL, or gifted.
And so on…

I miss the classroom.

But, the next best thing is helping teachers around the world. As of this morning, teachers around the world have downloaded my Educircles resources 11,943 times. That’s awesome and humbling.

Which brings me back to the contest. First 3 people to email me with the information at the top of this letter get a $10 TpT gift card. Good luck and happy shopping!

Cheers,

Mike Fuchigami