Teaching

My husband is an incredible teacher. He is able to make the most interesting and amazing lesson out of the simplest object. He teaches so that you don't just hear the information and then have the capability of getting the right answer on the next test (if the test isn't too far from when you learned the material). Rather, he teaches so that you have mastery of the content.

At dinner tonight Joe was telling us about a writing lesson he has been doing using Memory cards. He will give each student three random Memory cards (with a picture of, say, a bird, a flag, and a caterpillar), he will then give the students two minutes to write a mini-story using those three objects. The kids love it! They write as fast as they can and add wonderful details.

After dinner we were looking at the children's shirts and Jonathan had a race car, Abbie a strawberry and Thomas an anchor. So...here is our kindergartner's story that came from those objects:

The Anchor
by Jonathan Joseph Hinrichs, age 5

Once upon a time there was a ship with a boy named Thomas. A big wave came right over his head. It wasn't a storm, just a big wave. Then he started back to land. When he got to land he hoisted the anchor but he hadn't gone shallow enough so the boat floated away. Then he took a raft back to land and checked into the hotel for one night. The next morning they ate breakfast. They ate: strawberries and pancakes. After breakfast they took a taxi, a race car taxi, home. The end