From: Emmet Murphy
To: Teacher2Teacher Service
Date: Jun 12, 1998 at 11:19:58
Subject: "The Bulletin Board"

Hi there!

I am a student teacher in England, and I have recently finished my second 
teaching practice. At the school I was working in (infants school), they did 
this thing with the children called the "Bulletin Board", where there was a 
calendar format on a board, and the children counted the number of days they 
had been at school, and talked about the days of the week, months of the year. 

They also did place value, looking at hundreds, tens, and units (using straws 
- one straw for a unit, a bunch of 10 straws for a 10, and a bunch of 100 
straws for a 100). When they had been in school for 100 days, they had a 100 
day party! 

I was told that this scheme originated in America, and that it was widely used 
over there. I have looked for information on lots of different websites, but 
to no avail. Is something like this done in primary schools in America? Please 
send me any information about it that you feel would be useful to me (e.g. 
book references, lesson plans etc.) as I would really like to teach the 
"Bulletin Board" when I begin teaching. I will be staying in New York this 
summer for a few weeks, so if there are any places there that would be worth 
visiting to research the Bulletin Board and how to teach it, please tell me 
about them!

Many thanks for your time and help,

Emmet Murphy