Are your students engaged and motivated to learn?

The best compliment I get as a teacher is when parents tell me how their child loves coming to school and that I make learning fun and exciting for them.  I think the biggest part of my students motivation for learning comes from our reading and writing workshop time.  To me the most important element during workshop times is sharing.  It is so important that we make time for kids to talk about what they're reading and writing with enthusiasm.  My enthusiasm for reading and writing carries down to them and then they motivate each other through activities such as book shares and author share time.  Students learn so much from each other when they have the chance to listen to another child's thoughts on what they're reading or writing.  My students look forward to getting to the next book on their "Books I want to read next list" and enjoy giving their book recommendations to others.
Setting up specific procedures and practicing what this share time looks and sounds like is key.  It's important that students are taught how to listen and reflect on what their classmates are saying.  This is not something that just comes naturally for most children.  I always post some guidelines for listening/sharing during these times for students to continually refer to on my Activ Board.  I have also been known to video tape the discussions and share sessions for us to reflect on as a whole class.
Take a listen...
The author of the blog site Book Whisperer, Donalyn Miller, discusses in this Choice Literacy podcast how she defines 'engaged' reading and her role in motivating students.  She talks about how she thinks one of the most important things you can do to motivate student reading is by taking time to conference with each child on a one on one basis in the beginning of the year to find out what their interests are and helping them get excited and engaged in a book.  
What do you think is important and necessary to engage the students in your classroom?

Sites to try for helping kids find a just right high interest book:
Access book talks and trailers on this blog site:  http://mrschureads.blogspot.com/
Have your kids check out "bookcasts" to find a book that interests them:  http://www.readinginaction.org/

iPad Evolving into K-12 Learning Tool

iPad Evolving into K-12 Learning Tool 
This Education Week article discusses multiple ways that iPads are being used in classrooms.

iPads, iPods, and iPhones can be really useful tools for teaching literacy in the k-12 classroom. I have been researching different educational apps that are available from apple and giving workshops for pre-service teachers and professors and am really impressed by what's available. The tricky thing to work out is synching all the iPads and not having to pay for the app Check out the links below for app ideas that I found. It's really helpful if you have a delicious account, as you can search for these websites and get some really quick and useful results from others.

http://www.iear.org/iear/tag/reading
This site gives reviews on educational apps. You can narrow your search by topic. One of my fav. reading apps is the "Learning A-Z Leveled Readers" where the kids can access a database of leveled books on their own on Ipads or Ipods.
http://www.onlineclasses.org/2010/06/16/40-amazingly-educational-ipad-apps-for-kids/
Here you’ll find apps for learning the alphabet, using the dictionary, reviewing grammar rules, and more. If you click on the app you can get details and reviews if you scroll down.
http://www.scribd.com/doc/24470331/iPhone-iPad-and-iPod-touch-Apps-for-Special-Education
This site is dedicated to Special Education Apps which are great, there are many that you can use with lower elementary students to develop their reading/writing skills. You can search by category as well. My fav. is "Sentence Builder" which was rated "2010 lEAR lang. arts app. of the year."

Share any apps that you like and give feedack on my posts!