Because I teach third grade, I must communicate all work expectations with the parents of my students. I must be very organized when creating and assigning long-term and short-term projects because the students are just learning to take full responsibility for their own learning in third grade. I create detail assignment descriptions, outlines, due date calenders, and rubrics. The long-term projects completed in third grade involve cooperative learning/problem-based learning. To teach students to pace themselves with a long-term project, work time is allotted during class. I am able to reminds students about due dates and give individualized feedback when the projects are partially completed during class.
I find myself struggling with flipping my lessons because younger students do not seem to realize they are held accountable for the work. I hear many excuses such as "I had gymnastics." or "We were just too busy at home this weekend to do it." I actually feel parents do not realize that their children are fully responsible for their work in third grade because they often make excuses for their children as well. I did not start the year with communicating my flipped lesson expectations because I just began flipping about five weeks ago. I believe that next year will be better in terms of pacing, expectations, and transferring responsibility to the students, Elementary school is much different than middle school and high school. It feels as if I am actually making the outlines, due date schedule, and rubrics for the parents who seem to need all of the details up front more.
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