Learning Snapshots

I wish more of my day was spent teaching students, or preparing to teach students, rather than filling out paperwork.

Nevertheless, this  is the career I signed up for.  Here are some snapshots of our learning lately.

Poetry Mini-Unit

We've been working on different types of literature (RL 5.5).  Students are quite familiar with the components of novels, enjoy reader's theater, but tend to avoid poetry like the plague.  I get it. I don't actively seek out poetry to read during my free time either.

We spent a few days on reader's theater in small groups.  I selected a passage about Mount St. Helens to tie in with our volcano unit (more on that later) and took the assignment as a speaking grade.

They also practiced taking portions of their novels and turning it into reader's theater scripts.

In doing so, students had to analyze what parts would be explicitly stated by the characters, what information would be presented in stage directions, and what parts might be eliminated.

But since poetry is a major deficit for many of my students, we decided as a planning team that this needed to be addressed.  With poetry, we'll discuss summarizing, layout (stanzas, lines), figurative language, and poetic elements.  Coincidentally, February is also poetry month, so we look like we're totally on top of things!

We started with a class guided poem on World of a Blossom, which actually sparked a forty minute conversation on symbolism (I budgeted twenty, tops).  They glue the poem into their notebooks, then practice annotating their thinking.  We worked on identifying types of figurative language before talking about what the flowers might represent.

I modified this lesson from Jefferson County's long range ELA plans, available {here}.  I taught their unit with fidelity a few years ago and really enjoyed their pacing.  Want just the poem? It's page 29 in the PDF.

Some of mine are experimenting with color-coding their notes.  As a teacher, I allow them this flexibility because fifth grade is such a crucial time for them to develop study skills that work for them.  I've had this discussion a few times with fellow teachers, but hold true to my belief that their notebooks are for them. As long as they have the basic requirements, they can annotate however they'd like.  We practice multiple strategies in the first half of the year, but the second semester means I let them choose how they take notes.  It helps get them ready for middle school where they'll take ownership of their learning.

From there, we did some partner and table reads.  I found a book in our school library about states and poems.  I selected some from the New England region to tie in with our geography unit.  As a class, we read about light houses.  As a table, they found alliteration in a poem about Gulls and Buoys.  With partners, they read about the Islands off of Boston Harbor (complete with pirates).

Surprisingly, they're really enjoying it! We spent some time earlier in the year reading The Raven, which they liked.  We'll be trying some colonial poems next, reading about Moana Loa, and ending with New Colossus.  (Timely, right?)

Project Based Learning

With our project-based learning, we ended our unit on catapults and moved into colonial America (which ties in with our social studies plans).  I'm so fortunate to get to work with such an awesome GATE specialist who co-plans and ties her standards in with what we're teaching.  

They're doing a five class period mock simulation of Jamestown and the starving time.  Each group has one leader (John Smith) that has to decide how the money is spent and which building tasks they'll complete during each given class period (season).  When the whole group works together on one task, it often leads to a lot of fighting.  It's interesting to watch which groups are able to divide up the work load to accomplish more during each season.

We also made sure to not select GATE students to be the group leaders.

Here a group is working on building their palisade, to protect Jamestown from wild animals and hostile natives.

Landforms

We also finished up a mini-unit on volcano formation.

A fellow teacher and Hawaiian native came in to talk about Hawaiian culture.  One of her friends sent us a box of goodies from the Hawaiian Research labs on active volcanoes.  We spent time exploring topographic maps of Mauna Loa and watched several Discovery Ed video clips.


We've explored equivalent fractions, fractions on a number line, adding and subtracting fractions.  Once again, color coding the fractional amounts is a helpful strategy for many students.  We use colored pencils quite often in math these days.

We have reviewed with bingo in small groups:

This game was part of an old {donorschoose} project and is still loved by students years later.  Thank you again to friends, family, and strangers who continue to support my students and their learning.


Up next?

This week brings the 100th day of school, Valentine's day and the class party, and getting ready to go to the neighboring middle school for a tour.

#yeareightisgreat

Teaser Tuesday

Sometimes my insomnia is beyond frustrating, but sometimes it yields exciting new classroom ideas.  I'm thankful it's the middle of winter break and I don't really have anywhere to be until around noon tomorrow because my brain simply will not shut off.

I have a million ideas bouncing around in my head for the new year.

I have my next bulletin board picked out.  They're going to write constructed responses about the themes in their latest novel.  We're going to type these responses, thus giving extra computer practice for those who need it.  

I will then take the two novels that we've read as a class (Esperanza Rising and The Lightning Thief) to model comparing and contrasting how the authors arrive at similar themes (family, loyalty, bravery) using the characters. (CCSS/NVACS RL 5.9.  Yes, we've renamed the Common Core Standards the Nevada Academic Content Standards for well, in my humble opinion, ridiculous reasons.)  

I'm excited to start using music for transitions in my classroom, especially at the end of the day.

I'm excited to start teaching more mapping skills, geography, earth science, and most importantly, the return of the map:

Oh yes, we'll build it up again from scratch.  There was a disagreement within my grade level about how to approach maps.  I understand the idea of starting with the 13 colonies, but I also stand by my approach of teaching regions.

We're going to start with what they know: Nevada.  From there, we'll do the surrounding southwestern states.  We'll talk about things these states all have in common and I'll introduce the concept of a region.  From there, we'll explore the other states in a quasi-reverse Westward Expansion kind of way.  We can also connect the map with the settings from Esperanza Rising and The Lightning Thief, which will bring in an exciting literary aspect.

But perhaps the idea I'm most excited about shall be called Teaser Tuesday.

I'll take fifteen minutes or so after lunch to read aloud the first chapter or two of a book.  Read alouds are a pretty common thing in my fifth grade classroom, but here's the new twist: It'll be a mystery.  I'll have the book cover and title hidden.  I'll read just enough to get them interested and of course, stop at a good part.  From there, I'll have them do a written reflection on whether or not they'll want to continue that novel independently.

I've already brainstormed using the following novels:

Tuck Everlasting
The Giver
Number the Stars
Hatchet
Al Capone Shines My Shoes
The Bad Beginning
Steal Away Home
The Red Pyramid

Any other ideas fellow teachers? Must read novels that are super interesting to ten year olds within the first few pages or chapters?

New Opportunities

I've been at my school for five years now and it's time for a change.  We're going year-round and that's not something I wish to do.  While I would appreciate the track breaks to separate the year, I don't think I'd be able to fully enjoy them.  I would be constantly working on school stuff and planning units on my breaks, which isn't good for my mental health.  I was a first year teacher, a first year graduate student, and on an undesired track...it wasn't pleasant.  I don't wish to repeat that year-round schedule again unless I was in a specialist position.

So the time has come to branch out.  As previously stated, I applied for a coaching position and was briefly devastated when that didn't pan out.  I won't have the coursework to be hired provisionally as a librarian, but that dream is still on the back burner.  I applied for a literacy coach almost a month ago and haven't heard back either way, which is frustrating.  I applied to be a digital coach and am in the wait pool, which is better than nothing.

So I decided to look at the transfer list for my school district.  I'm hoping to stick with fifth grade because I'm a little hesitant to try both a new school and a new grade level at the same time.

I looked for schools nearby my new house that were on the traditional 9 month calendar and had fifth grade openings.

Low and behold, I found one.  

So I called the office manager after school.  She asked me to send in my last evaluations and a resume, which I promptly did.  Not twenty minutes later, I had a call from the principal to set up an interview.

I'm really excited about this opportunity!

It's right after school tomorrow, I get a tour and then the interview.  I'm crossing my fingers it all works out as it's meant to!

On a very random note, the Principal's last name is coincidentally the name of the high school I attended in Arizona.  Very, very strange...but perhaps a good sign?

Fingers crossed!

Informational Texts

With the Common Core State Standards, there is an emphasis on informational text.  For elementary school, the split is 50/50 on informational text and literature.  As students move into middle and high school, the amount of instructional time increases in order to prepare students for the upcoming complex texts.

Reading literature and reading informational texts require different skills from readers.  Reading literature requires students to think about narrative elements, keep track of characters, make predictions, etc.  Informational texts tend to require students to keep track of complex ideas, analyze how events or persons are interrelated and understand how text structures lend themselves to 

In order to support this, we have been reading different articles on Monarch butterflies:

Students have been keeping track of ideas and text structures.  They're working collaboratively to read and analyze the text.

Here they are looking at different text features about Monarch Butterflies.

They did such a great job with this task!  They read a Time for Kids article and two other informational passages on the migration patterns of Monarch Butterflies.  We looked at cause and effect and my students did a great job with explaining how events in a passage go together.  Next week we'll watch a short video clip from Discovery on migration patterns, thus tying in that multimedia element.

I love when they're so excited about what they're learning :)

Crossin' My Fingers...

As I previously shared, I didn't get the performance zone coaching position I applied for.  After the news broke, there were a few mopey hours (I'm human) but I realized it wasn't meant to be.

So I kept going and kept researching new opportunities.

Yesterday I submitted my application to be a technology/digital coach.  I love my tech tools and (appropriately) integrating technology into my lessons.  I'd love to spend my days working with other teachers and helping them make the most of amazing web 2.0 tools and integrate technology into their learning activities.

This morning, I worked on my application to be a literacy coach.  Clearly I love reading and would be focusing solely on helping teachers with their small and whole group instruction.  I'm submitting that application when I go back to the district office next week (I have Monday night classes).

I also emailed a few leads about a librarian endorsement and if RPDP offers the right summer classes, I can be a librarian next year (if I have six hours on my provisional license).  Worst case scenario and none of the classes I need are offered? I'll take them next year and spend one more year in the classroom...perhaps in primary? I've heard second grade is pretty fun...

I love that I have a few different venues that I'd be completely happy with.  I'm also slightly terrified that it's mid-March and I don't know what I'll be teaching/doing next year.

(If that uncertainty wasn't enough, I'm meeting with a Realtor on Friday because I'm going to be purchasing my first home...scary steps!)

I'm crossin' my fingers that everything works out as it's meant to.  As long as I'm in some capacity working with reading and technology, I'll be just fine :)

Tech Tip: Scholastic Book Wizard

I some how made it three years into my teaching profession without being told about Scholastic's Book Wizard.  Before that, I was just kind of guessing about novel levels and hoping I was using "just right" leveled books.  (Not to worry, I was!)  However, Scholastic eliminates the guessing game with their book wizard tool:

This free online gem lets you figure out grade levels, DRA levels, lexile levels and recommends similar books.  Scholastic also has some great free resources for books, many of which I've used as supplemental materials for my small literature circles.

Enjoy and happy reading!

Book Club for Battle of the Books

Wednesday afternoons mean one thing for me: Book Club.

For one wonderful hour, me and my twenty-five (ish) readers trek to the library, sprawl out with pillows and enjoy reading.  They've also been working on writing questions about the books, so they break off into small groups and hold their own literature circles.

She made her own questions for the group!

I love that they knew to go back to the text to find answers!

I also made question stems for them to use to guide their discussions, which you can snag here.  Per Battle of the Books norms, I'm not supposed to guide their comprehension of the novels, only encourage them to read and provide strategies.

It's so rewarding to get to spend an hour with my fifth grade book worms.  I love that they're so into reading!

I'm also really appreciative that one of my students encouraged his cousin to join, even though reading is difficult for him.  They're reading the same book and helping each other out, which is great to see.

Today my principal popped in and read with some students:

It totally made their day!  I'm thankful she's supportive of this endeavor and I know she loves talking about reading with students.  

With about two months until their competition, they are going strong!  Many are finishing up their first book and beginning their second.  They have also taken our persuasive writing unit to heart and are encouraging one another to read certain books next, which is adorable.  All the books are wonderful and I love how they're supporting one another.

Happy reading!

Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Days

I had a rough day.  I'd go as far as saying it was a terrible, horrible, no good very bad day and like Alexander, I was ready to pout.  Nothing was going right.  As a teacher, it's kind of expected to always have a happy face but teaching is hard.  Some days, it's really, really hard.  

Granted, teacher problems were slightly more complex than not getting the right shoes, but I get Alexander's frustration too.  I was having a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day. Scratch that, I had five of them in a row.  It was rough week.  There wasn't a day I worked less than 12 hours.  

As an educator, it happens. 

I'm just relieved it's over and I'm in the midst of a relaxing (and reflective) 3 day weekend.

 I got a new student at the last minute.  The stress of preparing for a new kiddo is rough.  Our district has the policy that a student sits the day he or she is enrolled.  In theory, that's wonderful for the student so they don't miss out on another day of learning.

But for a teacher, it's a tad stressful.  I didn't have much notice to find a desk, chair, notebooks, various other supplies and label the necessary classroom items (desk, behavior tracker, file, whiteboard marker, etc) for him.  I knew we had to quickly do a formative diagnostic assessment to figure out which reading room he'd be in, then the opposite period for math, find out if he was in the RTI process or already had an IEP because that also determined which room to place him in depending on the levels of instructional support.  I must say, it's lots of thinking for so early in the morning!  He wasn't the only new student we got this week either.  

I wanted him to feel welcome in my classroom the moment he sat, and that meant some scrambling on my behalf because there was about twenty minutes notice.  But he had a great first day, a great first week and was always smiling.  He's happy to be here, knew about number talks and phonics (score!) and I'm glad he's here.  Sometimes I wish I had a tiny bit more time to prepare for new students' arrival.

I'm in the process of DRA'ing my students in small groups and well, it's time consuming and there's a lot of them.  I know it's useful information and I cut out phonics this week to make extra time for it, but I didn't finish and have to continue testing into next week.  Part of this is my fault because I was unwilling to go a week without meeting with my students to discuss their novels. More importantly, they were unwilling to go a week without meeting.  I'm not kidding when I say there would be lots of pouting, some tears and borderline rebellion (district 13 style) if I told them that sorry, we'll have to wait until next week to talk about The Miserable Mill, the Austere Academy, Hatchet, Harry Potter (1 and 2), Mockingjay, Brian's Winter, Number the Stars, Gossamer, Maniac Magee and Tiger Rising. They become slightly hostile if they aren't given the chance to talk about what happened in their books.  This is a wonderful problem to have and as an educator, I wasn't going to fully cut this opportunity for them to replace it with assessments.  I compromised and shortened our meetings, allowing them to finish without me in the hallway and DRA'd in between.  I didn't finish their assessments, but I also got to see that most of my groups could handle having their own lit circle...which was great.

Battle of the books also started this week and because it was so fun on Wednesday, I had about eight more kids sign up after the deadline.  Of course I accepted them with open arms because they want to read and well, that's awesome.  

I had to turn away one student because his frequent behavior problems are interfering with others' ability to learn. That wouldn't be fair to the students who are trying to work and read in our book club.  I've had several conferences with this student's family and this student is frequently off task and argumentative in my room, so the student didn't earn the privilege of book club.  I talked with my admin and fellow teachers, who were all in support of the decision.  However, it was a very heartbreaking conversation to have.  

We sat in the hallway and talked about all the choices that were made and how these choices took away from learning time.  We talked about all the second chances that had been given and how behavior hadn't changed.  In life, we don't always get unlimited second chances and there are consequences to our actions.  Sometimes, we don't like these consequences and that's a tough lesson to learn.  I also knew that he would have been a disruption every week and that's not fair to the forty students who are so excited to sit and read.  I also knew it wasn't fair for me, who is volunteering to run this club to deal with additional behavior issues with a student who has had several dozen second chances.  

There were tears and that's hard for a teacher.  I made him cry and I couldn't do anything to fix it.  There have to be consequences, even if it's unpleasant.

My mentee is having a rough time with some students and we had a nice long chat about strategies.  She feels better, which is great.  I just wish I could observe her more.  My prep falls during her whole group reading block so that's the only subject I've been able to see her teach.  I wish I could see more.

There's some inconsistencies at our school and it's very bothersome.  I'm not one to slack off and make things up, so it's very frustrating for me to see others doing so.  It's very irksome to see such blatant favoritism.

Take these factors, add in a four hour class, twelve more issues, a few parent teacher conferences, shouting in the hallway (not me, two students), lots of tears and a lot of sleepless nights...and there's my week.  I'm glad it's over.

But I also know I have the amazing opportunity to work with my grade level, which is filled with such dedicated teachers.  I learn from these women daily and know they're also making their decisions based on what's best for students.  Think of a pack of lion mamas and that's our fifth grade team :)

While collectively, they drive me slightly crazy with their talking (which is out of excitement), I do adore these fifth graders.  I love at the end of the day when we fist bump on their way out and they tell me their "click" of the day.  Their click is what is "staying with them" and made sense to them.  Naturally, I pretend frown when they tell me it's a subject I don't teach or recess, but it's great to have them reflect on their learning and share it with me.

I also am appreciative of the support I have from other educators.  My admin made the time out of her very busy schedule to talk through an issue I'd had.  Through our conversation, the missing pieces of information were filled in and now I understand why the decisions were made. lt was a difficult conversation for me to bring up, sharing that I was frustrated with an outcome but through discussion, we both filled in each other's gaps and now the situation makes sense.  

We also had one of our old academic coaches on campus this week and well, she's amazing.  We talked through my structure of small groups and looked at the questions I was asking of my students when they read their novels.  I'm doing everything right, which was nice to hear.  The same amazing coach sent me inspirational texts throughout the week because she knew I was having a rough time.  

She also works at her parents' restaurant which has amazing Italian food.  She suggested I come in on Friday night because in her words, I deserved garlic knots, pasta and cannolis.  It didn't take much arm twisting to convince my boyfriend that we needed date night since he had a rough week too and well, who doesn't love pasta?  We had a wonderful relaxing meal which almost made up for the rough week.  Then I found this note when I got home attached to our left overs:

It made me cry. She's the best.  My grade level is the best.  My students are such hard workers (most of the time) and my family and boyfriend are supportive through my tears and sometimes colorful language. One awesome friend stopped in to work to borrow something and ended up bringing me dinner since I didn't have time to run out and get food before my class.  I'm thankful to not be in this alone. I'm thankful to be an educator, even though it's not always an easy road.  There will be rough days.  There will be terrible, horrible, no good, very bad days.  But some days are like that...

...even in Australia. 


(If you haven't read Judith Viorst's Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day stop what you're doing and go read it immediately.  This blog post and it's images will probably make a lot more sense after!)

Novel Guide: Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix

Yet another product has been revised and posted on TpT!  Like my other novel guides, this product has suggested spelling and vocabulary words, pre and post reading activities, homework questions for each chapter and comprehension questions with suggested answers for each chapter.

I've truly done all the prep work for you! (Since I love reading and the Harry Potter series, it wasn't really work.)

Snag yours here!

New products

I posted some new literacy centers on TpT: 

Hunger Games quote sort & Mockingjay quote sort

(Catching Fire was already available!)

Hope your students enjoy!  If you like the product, please leave feedback.  If you have a suggestion on how this center can be improved to increase effectiveness or rigor, please let me know! I appreciate helpful, constructive, (polite) feedback :)

Happy reading and may the odds be ever in your favor :)

-Ms. Vice

Don't bother me, I'm reading

We got our copies of Tuck Everlasting this week.  Again, a huge thank you to my donorschoose supporters :)

Some of my after school helpers were very, very excited about our new books:

I got the "don't bother me, I'm reading" death glares. 

 I couldn't be more proud.

-Happy reading!

Small Literature Groups

While typing up notes for a novel unit on TpT, I realized I needed to revise my SG notes.  What worked for me my first and second year of teaching doesn't work for me now.

When reflecting on my teaching, I often come back to one of my favorite quotes by Maya Angelou: 

"When you know better, you do better"

Well, I'm going to do better.  I revised my units to add  in answers and increased the complexity of the questions by making them more open-ended.  I also included suggested homework questions for students.  These revised units are available on TpT.

I always have my students divide their notebooks into four sections:

I give them four questions to answer based on the chapter(s) for homework and we discuss those in depth.

For my small groups, I have them keep track of characters, analyze shifts in setting and make note of interesting vocabulary words in their small group notebooks.

We spend most of our time in our group meetings digging deep into the text.  I check their notebooks, set them up for the next discussion (usually allowing them to decide how much they want to read because I set the minimum) and then dive into the text.

Since I have six groups and only an hour each period, I can't meet each group every day. 

Here's our run-down:

First 8 minutes: fluency.

Students work with a partner to "buddy coach".  I set the timer for one minute and half the class reads in a whisper to their coach.  The coach keeps track of errors and at the timer, gives feedback on rate, expression, accuracy and phrasing.  After one minute of coaching, the students track their progress on this chart (from the CORE sourcebook).  Then they switch roles and repeat.

My beloved:

(yes, I'm a little type-A with my tabs)

I get my leveled fluency passages from reading A-Z but I know there are lots of websites and teacher's guides available.  I print them double sided so the students keep the passages for two weeks because that's better for our planet.

They chart on their fluency tracker:

After that, we spend a few minutes going over the week's phonics: Greek & Latin roots.

We look at the roots, add them to our anchor chart and then decompose multisyllabic words to decode the word's meaning.

From there,  I divide the remaining time in two and start pulling my groups.  I leave 2 minutes at the end for clean up and transition time.

To make sure all my groups get equal time at stations, I make this chart for my lesson plans:

That way I can make sure all my groups get the same centers.

This week, our stations are:

1. Fluency binder (like buddy coaching except they select the passage and can work in groups).  I've printed poems, songs, speeches and passages for students to read and buddy coach with.  I used FCRR printables to have students guide their discussions.

2. fluency quiz-quiz trade cards: they rate each other on their expression and accuracy, using these guides which are glued in their notebooks:

3. character jenga (I upcycled a jenga game and put open ended discussion questions for students to quiz each other).  This one gets a little loud but I love the discussions students have with one another about the book so it's worth it.

4. Kidblog.  This great, free resource allows students to respond to each other and to my blog questions on a safe, secure site:

If you view our page, that's all you see.  Students need a log in (their id numbers) and I get full approval of their posts.

5. "build-a-word": They take syllables and create multisyllabic words, recording their answers in their notebooks.  

6. "word-o-matic" (an FCRR center) where they create words.  I printed vowels on one color and consonants on another to make for easy clean up :)

Most of my centers are in manilla envelopes with instructions on sticky labels.  It helps keep students accountable for their behavior.

7.  Writing thank you letters for donor's choose :)  We got our new materials and love them! Thank you again donors!

8. Idiom cards: one of our new donorschoose centers to help with figurative langugage, which we've been working on during whole group reading!

I also posted our group norms:

I got this sweet card from a student today:

Happy reading!
-Ms. Vice