Our Teacher Resources Page was designed to give you, the prospective teacher, a glimpse into KIPP NYC culture, as well as a view of how a KIPP NYC classroom works. These documents, professional development presentations, and videos were chosen because they are great representations of your future co-workers and the professional development you'll be receiving while teaching at KIPP NYC.
KIPP Documents
KIPP NYC Spiraled Review: This is a review of some of the language and thinking that makes KIPP NYC a special team.
Annotated Lesson Plan: The KIPP NYC Annotated Lesson Plan is intended to provide guidance and structure, while providing teachers with ample room for the intuitiveness, creativity, and freedom necessary to maximize student learning.
Sample Daily Lesson Plan Format: This is a template our teachers use to map out their lesson plans.
KIPP NYC Self-Checking Guide to Teaching Excellence: This document represents a checklist of the areas of focus for great teaching.
KIPP NYC Reading List: Here is a list of some of our favorite books.
KIPP Professional Development
Teaching Mastery Objectives
Setting Up Class for Success
SPED Bag of Tricks
Nonfiction Studies Strategies
Videos
5th Grade Math - 3x2 Multiplication
Special Education Non-Fiction Pullout
6th Grade Non-Fiction – The Digestive System
7th Grade Science Intervention – Book Roundtable Discussion
5th Grade Honors Reading – Conferencing
Course: 5th Grade Math
Lesson: 3x2 Multiplication
Teacher: Joe Negron
Though we often will incorporate chants to aid students in the memorization of simple multiplication facts, we also push them to develop their number sense and will often utilize alternative algorithms to do. In this 5th grade math lesson, students are using the partial products method to multiply 3 digit by 2 digit numbers. In order to hook the students and make an analogy with which they can relate, we use the idea of wrestling, where numbers are on teams and must wrestle every member of the opposing team.
Course: Special Education
Lesson: Non-Fiction Pullout
Teacher: Annica Schroeder
To best serve special education students at our school, we use a combination of push in and pull out services. This video is of reading conference that I had with one of our 15 special education students in the fifth grade. This student is currently reading on a Fontis and Pinel level O (below grade level). While meeting with students one-on-one, I am able to judge which skills are holding her back as her reader and therefore, which skills need the most work. I begin by listening to the student read their on-level independent reading book. When I hear an issue, I take note of it and then work with the child on that specific skill. I find that a holistic approach to decoding is often the most useful for kids. Therefore, we work on decoding words by using root words and parts of words that the student already knows. In this video, the student decodes the word flies incorrectly. She says “fills” at first. However, by focusing her attention on the f+l combination, she figures out that fl sounds like the beginning of the word “flap.” She then uses this information and the picture to come to the decision that the word is flies. There are often so many different skills that my readers need to practice, but by working on the issue that seems most pressing, I am able to keep conferences short and focused while also helping students to make gains. Several months later, this student is now reading on a Fountas and Pinnell level R.
Course: 6th Grade Non-Fiction
Lesson: The Digestive System
Teacher: Allison Willis
During nonfiction research units, we spend the first two weeks building prior knowledge and learning brand-new content before we dive into independent research. This video is of a 6th grade class (26 students) that I see daily for 65 minutes. This lesson is one of four that teach the first week of the unit about body systems (digestive, urinary, endocrine, and reproductive). This video begins after the Do Now where I've reviewed the previous day's material and I'm mid-way through the introduction to new material. The students have already read a short passage about the function of the digestive system and filled out a blank diagram. In order to help them understand the order and purpose of each organ, I create a Digestive System Obstacle Course where individual students pretend to be pieces of food traveling through my (the teacher) system. Pillows represent crunching teeth, water symbolizes saliva and bile, and a sleeping bag acts as the esophagus. At the completion of the lesson, the students draw comic strips with captions showing a piece of food travel through the digestive system. It gets a lot of laughs and is a memorable lesson during their time at Infinity.
Course: 7th Grade Science Intervention
Lesson: Book Roundtable Discussion
Teacher: Doug Dukeman
In 7th grade science intervention, students work interchangeably on four tasks. They are either: conferencing with me one-on-one or in small groups about their work in science, completing their science homework on the evening individually or with a partner, playing science vocabulary flashcard games (variations of the card games War, Go Fish, Memory, etc.) or having roundtable book discussions on science books that they have chosen and read from the science library in my classroom. In this video, students are shown having a roundtable book discussion. The discussion is completely student-led and I just sit back and listen. In this video, a student is leading the group by first having each student introduce his or her book, its author(s) and a quick summary of the book. In the beginning of the year, students also refamiliarize themselves with the layouts of non-fiction texts by explaining the book’s layout to the group as well. After these, the students will each talk about one fact from the book that they found most interesting. Finally, each student will ask one other student a question about their book (most of this is contained in Part 2 of this video). If there is time, they will explain why they chose their book and/or to whom they would recommend the book. I have found that these discussions are a great way to have students reading new science texts that they find and get some practice speaking and explaining them (and the new concepts) to others.
Course: 5th Grade Honors Reading
Lesson: Conferencing
Teacher: Maddie Witter
In reading, we devote a lot of time toward independent reading and talking about books. This video is of a small group (15 students) that I see twice a week for an hour. They are meeting the standards in the fifth grade so we wanted to give them intervention to take them even higher. In the class, I teach a short mini lesson and the students partner read for a half an hour. During the partner reading time, they have different expectations for what they need to write on sticky notes. At the end we have a conversation about the shared text (The Watsons Go to Birmingham). While the students are conferring, I meet with each for a few minutes. I listen in to their fluency and their conversations. During each conference, I will either ask them how it's going or share with them a strategy that might help them. In this video, I shared with them a strategy for making T-S connections more meaningful. The video ultimately became the mini lesson for our next class so I could share the strategy with all of the kids. One of the best ways I find for creating lessons is using what I learn from listening in during their conferences.
