How puzzling!
If you use crossword puzzles to help students review facts, vocabulary or spelling words, here’s a new twist from Bonnie DeWolf, who teaches eighth-grade U.S. history in LaPorte, Ind. She copies the puzzle onto an overhead transparency and projects the image onto the chalkboard. Clues are provided on half-sheets of paper; students fill in answers directly on the chalkboard. Not only does this method save paper, it "looks pretty neat on the board" even when the overhead is turned off, notes DeWolf. And, she says, "Students will look at this image a lot longer than a traditional crossword."

Go with the flow
Frustrated by glue bottles that are continually clogging up? Kindergarten teacher Marylynne Dinu of Baldwin, N.Y., has a sure-fire solution: Try putting a little petroleum jelly on a cotton swab and rubbing it inside the cap. Works like a charm.

Absent-minded?
With sports, drama and athletics, absences are a routine part of the high school schedule.To help keep a handle on make-up work, high school English teacher Tanya Gray from Charlo, Mont., makes two folders: Absent Work and Absent Agenda. She puts worksheets or notes on the desks of absent students as well as those in class; at the end of the period, she puts the name of the absent student on each handout and tucks them in the first folder. At day’s end, she transcribes the agenda from the board and puts it in the second folder. Instead of having lots of students ask what they missed, she directs them to the two folders.