Learning Centers Provide Students With Opportunities To Reinforce What Has Been Taught, Extend Core Content To New Areas Of Interest, And/Or Enhance Previously Learned Information With Independent Study.

Learning centers serve as one instructional strategy that can aid teachers in their quest to meet the demands of the 21st Century education and prepare students for thinking and knowing in a 21st Century society.

The seminal research on learning centers supports their use as a viable means of targeting the individual differences (academic, social, developmental, and behavioral) of students within the regular classroom.

A learning center is meant to function as an additional “teacher” or resource that can support and bolster the mandatory curriculum. Learning centers provide students with opportunities to reinforce what has been taught, extend core content to new areas of interest, and/or enhance previously learned information with independent study.

They can be used as part of a rotational system where students can work independently or in small groups on tasks related to the core content lessons.

Students can self-select tasks within the learning center or can be assigned specific areas within the center to focus on.

Learning centers can vary in shape, size, duration, and implementation.

Think about the standards. talk to someone about how you might be able to use centers to reinforce standards.

Other Ideas

Write new endings to stories, cartoons and books

Alphabet book on a topic of interest

Write and illustrate a book.

Write a picture book with no words

Read a Poem and write a Poem with same rhyme Pattern

they could paint or draw a sketch that was related to the lesson plan for that lecture.

let them do additional research about a topic that interests them.

Writing songs to review the material that they have learned

Put the main character into a different story that you’ve read. How might the character have reacted to these different circumstances?

Computer Programs-KHAN Academy

Logic Elimination Puzzles

Canvas Tier 1 Shares

A writing center, stocked with different types of paper, model fiction or nonfiction pieces, story starters, grammar tip sheets, word lists, and editing pencils

A book box on a table filled with reading materials about a particular subject or theme, or organized by author or genre

An art cart with materials and instruction for making mobiles, dioramas, cartoon strips, crayon rubbings, and friendship cards — all tied to the curriculum

A math path, where students find math games, activities, and manipulatives stored in a large box

A comfy seat in a quiet corner designated for independent reading

Adapted from Learning to Teach...Not Just for Beginners: The Essential Guide for All Teachers by Linda Shalaway.

Many advanced students show incredible creativity, and you can build on that strength by giving them activities that bring out their creative sides. Here are some ideas you could try:

Rewriting the ending of a book that students have read

Writing a historical fiction story that takes place in a time period that they have just learned about

Creating art that mirrors famous pieces of art in the period of history they are learning about

Building a totem pole or a coat of arms that students believe could represent themselves or the whole class (after learning about Native Americans or the Middle Ages)

Writing songs to review the material that they have learned

Some advanced learning activities seem like busywork, but you can help your gifted elementary students see the use in what they are creating if you focus these activities towards real life situations. Here are some ways that you can make students feel that they are doing something practical that could actually be helpful to the rest of the world:

Writing a letter to the editor of a local paper responding to an issue in the community or in the paper itself or writing a letter to the principal, another teacher, parents or residents of a retirement facility and actually send them.

Designing an invention that will actually help people.

Making their own meal plans, calculating how many calories are in various types of food.

Set up an exciting learning menu for math with items like design math flashcards, measure five things in the room, or write math facts in expanded form.

Ask your students in a reading group to draw a picture of the main character. Afterwards, instruct them to write speech bubbles around the character describing what they might say.

Have your students play a game of memory. This game is easy to differentiate because you can have beginner students try to match a letter with its sound, while more advanced children can try and match a letter to a word. To differentiate this station, assign different bags of cards for each level, and direct specific students to the cards they should choose.

Heads or Tails is an easy center! Simply give kids a penny, have them flip it and color in a box for the side that won. They keep flipping and coloring until one of the sides gets to the top. Once heads or tails reaches the top of their bar graph and "wins," they answer the 2 questions. Easy! You can laminate the mat and have them do it over and over.

Check out this Site for Ideas

http://www.teachhub.com/differentiated-instruction-strategies-using-learning-stations

http://www.fcrr.org/curriculum/curriculumStudentCenterActivitiesFAQ.shtm

Dr. Edmund Sass. Resources for Teaching Gifted and Talented Students. Eds.Resources.com.

https://www.hampton.k12.va.us/departments/gifted/Enrichment%20Tips.pdf

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