The Next Step Chapter 1

Things to Think About: 

• How do you introduce your read alouds, shared reading, and independent reading?
• Read alouds are my favorite!  I introduce them to my kids first thing!  Once the whole class has arrived begin my school year by reading a book to them.  This year I think we read You're FINALLY Here!  The kids loved it!  I bring them over to my carpet and read to them several times during the day.  
• Last year I introduced independent reading on the first day in the Daily 5 format.  I explain the best way to become a better reader is to read more.  One thing that has really helped me is giving my kids bubble gum while they read independently.  They love it!  I have them place it in a tissue as soon as I notice they are no longer reading.  We build stamina for weeks and I display a graph outside our door so the whole school can see how we're doing.  I also have my principal and other teacher pop in to see and comment on our progress. 
• I normally introduce shared reading with a big book the 2nd week of school.  I am currently reading Growing Readers by Kathy Collins and realize I need to do a better job of this!  
• Do you have your schedule set?  Do you set your literacy block up in a workshop format?  What will your RW block look like?
• Not yet, though I do know somethings that never change.  In first grade the kids come in between 8-8:20. First period begins at 8:25.  We have recess morning from 10:10-10:25 and lunch/recess from 11:50-12:50.  I just emailed my request to my principal this morning requesting I have no specials until after lunch.  Let's hope it works out for me! 
• For the last two years I have followed the Daily 5 management system and really liked it... but for the upcoming school year I really want to use Kathy Collin's Reading Workshop approach.  
• I am still in the early stages of planning but I would like to have reading workshop in the morning from 8:45-9:45 and then run my own version of Daily 5 from 10:30 -11:30.  For my D5 options I would have Work on Writing, Word Work, Listen to Reading and a poetry station. Has anyone done something similar? 
• What activities do you have your students do for the first 6 weeks to teach independence? Literacy  Work Stations? Daily 5? Other?
• For my reading workshop I plan to follow Kathy's suggest format so the kids will be reading!
• For my modified D5 I will introduce different activities one at a time and help the kids build stamina.  I really like The Daily 5 for Dummies plans for this!  It works! 
• Readers Notebooks:  How will you use these?  What will you use for this?
• Good question!  I'm still not sure!  Jan doesn't really give suggestions for 1st graders so I am at a loss.  Are they necessary for the primary grades?  I use a guided reading notebook in my lessons and for now unless I find a good reason to change I will keep it this way for next year.
• I use spirals for my guided reading notebooks. 

Questions Teachers Ask:

• How do I get everything done in the allotted time?
• Well first I had to get rid of some of the time wasters!  I use to eat snack when my kids ate and try and check email etc.  Now I try use this as story time and read to them.  I also cut my snack time down to 10 minutes.  Before we have 15 minutes for snack and a 25 minute morning recess.  Now I do 10 for snack and 15 for morning recess.  
• Prep the night before!  Have all your materials ready so you don't waste time looking for things.
• Prioritize what is really important and what doesn't need to be covered or addressed at that time.
• Most importantly though I would say, take time in the beginning of the year to teach your procedures and routines correctly so you don't waste time waiting and reminding the rest of the year.
• How can I keep the noise level in my classroom within reasonable limits during GR?
• Make sure the kids know and understand why its important.
• Spread children out so they aren't on top of each other.
• How can I keep my students from interrupting me when I am with a small group.
• I have tried several different things!  The ones that work best have been giving them a chance to use the bathroom and get drink in between rounds, build in buffer time before mini lessons and ignoring them when they come up to my table.
• How do I know children are reading their self selected books?
• I've always just trusted my kids.  I also take a few minutes while my group is working on something to look around and see who's reading.  In first grade you can typically hear them or see their lips moving.  That being said I do hope to do better next year...
• Next year I will be having share time after independent reading.  They can share something they read with a partner.  I am also going to try and do Status of the Class check-ins more often.

If you're reading this and have suggestions on how to do Reading Workshop and modified D5 please let me know!  Also be sure to check out the ladies at Freebie-licous!  

 

School's Out!!

I haven't blogged in oh let's see 5 months and 19 days, so I would indeed consider that failure.  Or perhaps not so much since I wasn't a regular poster before?  In case you're wondering what I have been up to you just check out my Instagram account.  You can catch up on my kids and things I've done in class.  I love Teacher Talk Tuesdays don't you?  School end for my firsties last Friday. I was so sad to see my crew go.  Thankfully my teammate had the great foresight to get 4 of us tickets to see NKOTB, B2M and 98 Degrees that night and I wasn't sad for too long!  I got to tell you if you have the chance to see this show its amazing!!! Sadly this week I am back to going to school to clean up and pack my room up, though I am confident today will be my last day!

Since my last post was about New Year's Resolutions it seems fitting that today's be about...  My Summer To Do List and boy do I have a lot planned for the next 2 months.

Book Studies:

• Growing Readers (with my coworker Sharon)
• Reading with Meaning (with Sharon)
• The Next Step in Guided Reading (with my schools 1st-4th team and on Freebie-licious)

Book Clubs:  This will be my third summer offering summer book clubs for the students or HR.  This year we will have two groups.  Basement Bookworms meet once a week for an hour in the basement of the church.  

• Grades 2&3
• Grades 4&5

Books to Read:

• Finish Reading Reflex (required school reading)
• Finish The Honest Toddlers Guide to Parenting
• The Art of Teaching Reading
• Lemonade Wars (with my 8 year old)
• From the Mixed Up Files... (for our summer book club)
• Stink (for our summer book club)
• Fourth Grade Rats (summer book club)

Class:

• Words Their Way (online training)

Class Organization:

• Level Classroom Library
• Declutter and organize all my binders

I'll throw in some fun non-school related fun stuff as well!

Fun Stuff

• Go to the pool often
• Teach Koey to swim
• Participate in the ROC race in Baltimore
• Take kids to the zoo
• Go to the beach

I promise to be back later with my response to Freebie-licious's Chapter 1 post!  

Resolutions Part 2

Professional Growth---  This one is easy!

• During 2013 I am going to take Phono-Graphix training.  
• I am finally beginning to feel comfortable merging my schools basal program and guided reading so I hope to continue with that as well.  
• I also plan to learn as much about common core before we are required to use it.  

Downtime---  The hardest of all the resolution has to be this one.  I say that because I think these will be the hardest to keep.

• I would like to leave school by 4:30 on Mondays, Wednesdays and Friday.  I tutor until 4:15 on Tuesdays and Thursdays so I will probably stick to my 4:45- 5 pm exit.  
• I am also committing to not bringing work home during the week.  Once put my kiddos in the car I am going to focus on them!  My three are getting so big so fast I didn't realize quite how big until I spent Christmas break with my little Ellie.  Which leads in into my next downtime resolution...
• I plan to focus on my littlest a bit more.  She'll be 3 in 19 days I feel like I need to be more present in her daily life.  I get to spend a lot of time with AJ and Ko during their various activities but I feel like poor E gets slighted.
• Spending time with my Gish is another downtime goal.  Leaving time for us is hard once we take care of the kids and finish our day jobs so planning our monthly outings will be a priority.  

Feeling caught up!  Wooohoo!  Be back tomorrow to complete January's Currently!  

   

Resolutions 2013

Instead of doing one a day to catch up I figure I will just post the first two together, and tomorrow do the middle two!

1.  Technology---  Really this year I just want to take advantage of the technology available to me.  Gish just got me an iPad Mini for Christmas and I haven't a clue how to use it in my classroom.  It's all set to go in my new pink otterbox but I don't know how to make it available to my students, or even if I should.   Perhaps I should use it class to help me manage the classroom better, I heard the sisters have a Pensive App.  I also stopped taking as many pictures this year so I am going get back into the habit of snapping away with my camera and not always relying on my iPhone.  I two things I would love to learn is how to use Photoshop and how to make my own fonts.  So I'm going to add those to my list.  Lastly in terms of technology I'm going to find ways to use my Mimio more.

2.  Organization--- Oh lord do I need help here!  I am so NOT an organized person!  Not because I don't want to be or because I don't see the value cause trust me I do.  It's more a case of I lack commitment.  I come up with a plan and with in a few weeks, okay sometimes while I coming up with said plan I start to think OOOOO maybe X will work better.  So I never come to decision on how to stay organized and stick with it.  Funny thing is all my students parents telling how organized I am.  I will say I can normally find what I'm looking for.  Other may think it's in a weird place but at some point it made sense to me and I remember where I left it.  (most of the time).  So this year I resolve to finish organizing my binders, STICK with a copy system, stick with a planning system and design an guided reading organization plan!

See you peeps tomorrow-- Oh and HAPPY NEW YEAR

Fitness Goals

Jumping in a little late in this blog hopper linky but I plan to catch up! Any who on to my fitness resolutions...
1. Restart couch to 5k program.  Last November, as in November 2011, I hurt my foot and my plantar fasciitis (misspelled I'm sure) and haven't been able to get back to running since.  This year I am determined to do whatever it takes to get back to running.  I have a great love of running.  Well actually I hate it while I'm doing it but nothing beats the feeling when I finish and the high I get when I realize I actually ran.  SO I need to get back on track.  Starting tomorrow and then making an appointment to meet my podiatrist so I can get proper orthodics (again).
2. Run 2 5ks once I finish the program I plan do a run and then sign up for another.  I figure I'll probably have to run/walk 2 and be able to run mid year?
3. Attempt to run a 10k if I can't run it, walk it.  Hope I can do this because I would love to one day train for the Disney Princess Half marathon and this would be a step in the right direction.
4.  Work on rebuilding my core.  Three c-sections have done quite a number on my abs, who am I kidding I have no abs, just jiggle.  So I'm going to work on abs and toning my arms too.

There my friends are my fitness goals!
Make sure to link up with Deedee Wills and share your fitness goals.

Ch-cha-changes Part 1

We got a new administrator last March and though I am SO sad our previous principal retired, I can honestly say my new principal has caused me to rethink and change the way I put my literacy block together.  First was the light bulb moment that went off when she told me she was more interested in WHAT I TAUGHT then she was in WHAT I COVERED!  So often I put pressure on myself and my students to get through a years worth of material whether or not they mastered it and I was nervous if I wasn't moving on like the book said too.  This year I am happily focusing on taking the time to teach and getting to the next skill when we're ready.  We took the first six weeks of school to build D5 stamina, learn procedures and routines and review kindergarten material.  I truly feel it has made a huge difference and I know these kids so much better than I might have had I started Treasures the first week of school.  One of the things I am doing differently is giving spelling a pretest on Friday.  It allows me to look over what the kids already know and give them a differentiated list on Monday.  The pretest is always the 10 words Treasures recommends.  If a student knows all the words or only misses a sight word I will give them two additional words.  I look to see where they made their first two mistakes in the beginning of the year Words Their Way assessment and then try to merge that with the phonetic skill of the week.  So for last week I add the words dish, and ship to the list, giving these students 12 words.  If a student misses four words or less they will study the Treasures list.  For my students who miss more then 4 words I give them the 8 phonetic words and leave off the sight words.  I created the following forms to give the pretest and also to their spelling list home.



 

I fold these in half before passing them out to the kids and then once we take the test have them open them up to see how they did. 



Over the weekend I highlight the words the kids need to study and add words in the two blank spaces.  Once I get to school on Monday I just staple one half into their Word Work book and send the other half home.  On Fridays I use the spelling test papers from What The Teacher Wants.  This method has been working so well this year I couldn't be happier.  It makes me feel like I am really instructing all my kids not just the ones who don't know the 10 words Treasures recommends. 

 

Hellloooo Out There!

To say it's been awhile is an understatement!  What can I say, teaching, working at summer camp and my 3 kiddos have kept me uber busy!  Anywhoo, we've started a new school year here in MD and I have a new group of firsties to work with.  At the end of last  year I was really sad to let my kiddos go.  I seriously wanted to loop with them and even tossed the idea out to our new principal, but knew it wasn't going to happen.  Truthfully it's for the best since my AJ would have once again been in the same grade that I was teaching.  Having been with my new crew for almost 4 weeks now I can tell you I'm so glad I didn't!  Oh my goodness I love these kids already.  They have to be the most energetic, enthusiastic bunch ever!  They love any and everything we do.  They can be a little loud but we're working on it and they're learning.  21 sweeties who love to learn =  one happy teacher!

This year things have changed as far as our reading program and I couldn't be happier.  Our school is focusing on differentiated instruction and small groups which has really challenged me.  I did a lot more small group work last year so it's not a shock but there is a difference in being told to do something and doing cause you want to.  I am back to the D5 framework again this year and trying my best to not give up and do my own version before I give The Sisters recommendations a try.  At the beginning of this 4th week of school my students were reading 32 minutes during R2S.  Today and for the rest of the week we will be trying to do 20 minute rounds were they do either Word Work, R2S, or Work on Writing.  Since this is our trial week I am telling them were to go.  They did pretty good today.  As I have it laid out now I will be meeting with my groups M-Th, with Friday being a wrap-up day. I'm itching to get started and test out the D5 for real.  If any of you are still reading and you do D5 in your classroom along with a basal i.e. Treasures, how do you get your mini lessons in within 10 minutes?  That's my biggest fear for the coming week!

My hope is next week they can start choosing for themselves.  To avoid raising my voice and getting frustrated with my class I decided to takes things really S-L-O-W.  Over the summer my principal told my coworker and me that it was perfectly acceptable to take the whole month of September to introduce and practice routines.  She said it was ok if we didn't get into Treasures until October.  I decided to take her up on that offer and really focus on procedures during September.  It has gone really well.  I can tell the kids are ready for some responsibility and eager to start doing things for real.  Next week will be the test to see if giving them extra modeling/practice time benefited them.

I'll post pictures of my classroom in the next couple days.  I didn't think I changed much but all my students from last year seem to think I did.  I'm really happy with the way its coming along each year.  I have a few more changes to make but for the most part it feels more me then it ever has before!