Recapping Reading Week

In college, reading week was this glorious time before finals where I had no responsibilities (other than a few hours at a desk job) but to read and study for finals.

As a teacher, the concept of "reading week" is an entirely different beast.

To start with, we have a week of spirit days.   Now don't misunderstand me, I love spirit days.  I don't love the spirited attitudes that accompany these dress up days.  Because of the surplus of extra fun activities, many students (not just my own rambunctious class) were extra off task and defiant.  It made for a long and exhausting week.

Our school tends to take celebrations to the extreme, and that's okay.  The kids need to have fun in elementary school.  Our reading week activities include:

Book bingo (We get blank boards and a list of titles the week before reading week.  I had students help me fill it out.  Three books were called each morning during announcements.)

Mystery Readers (Students have to guess which staff member is reading the poem or short story aloud over the intercom.  Students submit their guesses on blue colored slips of paper.  One winner from each grade level with the correct guess wins a prize, which is usually a left over poster from the book fair.)

Spirit days (Not only did I give students points on class dojo for participating, but they got pink colored slips of paper to submit.  Once again, one winner from each grade level was chosen for a prize.)

Assemblies (Each grade level got at least one.  Ours featured a local published author who did an amazing job interacting with the kids.)

Lunch with someone you love (families are invited to bring students lunch and eat together in the courtyard.)

Guest readers (Everyone from high school students to the air force to news anchors to families came in to read picture books to the classes.  We had our principal and a fellow teacher's husband (he's in the air force) come read to us Friday afternoon.)

Read around the pod (teachers switch classrooms and read to one another).

Book picnic (Students brought blankets or towels and we read outside on Friday afternoon.  It was mid seventies and gorgeous.) 

No wonder I'm exhausted!  

Our spirit days included:

Monday: Ties & tutus day.  I borrowed an electric blue one from a friend and rocked it with jeans and an eagles shirt (our school mascot).  I had twenty minutes of playground duty, so not only did I start my day with already hitting my 10,000 steps (thanks fitbit!) but I got lots of compliments.  I should wear tutus more often!

Tuesday: Dr. Seuss day.  I snagged a solid red shirt from Target, wore jeans and the electric blue tutu again.  I didn't want to ruin my shirt, so I attached a paper plate from my classroom (a Christmas one no less!) to a lanyard.  With the help of a black sharpie, I became Thing 1.

I also had crosswalk duty.  I got a lot of questions asking if it was spirit day... I didn't really know how to respond to that one.  Do I normally look ridiculous and wear tutus on normal Tuesdays?

Wednesday: Disney day.  (Also, Marvel and Star Wars day!) This was the day Ms. C and I had our Disney themed lip sync battle for students who met their reading goals.

Can you guess which Disney princess I was?

Would it help if I said I carried around a dinglehopper (fork), yellow fish, and red lobster?

Thursday: Dress as your future self day.  Not only did I rock a Hogwarts alum shirt that I snagged at Target, but I also completely dressed another teacher.  She wanted to be Wonder Woman, so I lent her a cape, crown, shirt, and the blue tutu.  (Yes, I do just have those things laying around.)

Friday: Pajama day.  I rocked black yoga pants and an oversized pink shirt that said "I was made for taking naps."  (Another stellar Target find!)

I really failed at taking pictures this year!  

To make things fun for teachers, we were entered in a raffle for free books each time we participated.  While I didn't win, I really like and respect the intermediate teacher who did. 

Reading week was great, our librarian put a lot of hard work into every detail, but I'm really glad it's over.  It's time to get back on track with learning.

 

I'm a Reading Ranger too!

Our school participates in our performance zone's initiative of the Reading Rangers program.  It's a more structured and strategic approach to independent reading, where students work through book levels and badges, slowly increasing their ZPD and taking monthly STAR tests to track growth.

Like all programs, it has its flaws, but I've definitely seen an increase over my previous school in terms of my students' motivation levels to conquer independent reading.

On Tuesday of this week, we attended a several hour long conference on Reading Rangers.


We picked up some new ideas from other schools, definitely had the cutest boards and staff shirts, and were recognized for our performance.

One of my big take aways was to be a reading ranger myself.  So...I did.

Fifth graders have the end of the year goal of graduating Storm at the end of the year, so I gave myself that goal as well.  However, they only gave me until the end of January (thanks kids!)

I've got 2 stars done, 33 more books to read!

Game On

One of the amazing aspects of my school is the healthy sense of competition between classrooms.  This past week, to keep our students motivated before a five day weekend (yes, five days), we had a school wide challenge.  In each grade level, the classroom with the highest engage time got to participate in an activity in front of the entire school.

What is this glorious activity you may ask? 

The teacher who has the highest engage time gets a pie...in the face...from the student who read the most.  

The pie will be mostly whipped cream and trash bags and goggles are provided, but our students were so incredibly motivated to read.  The idea of smashing a pie in my face is quite thrilling and I personally have never felt more loved by my students.  The idea of public embarrassment is perhaps one of the best motivators for my students.

Unfortunately, a sudden downpour caused our celebration to be postponed.  Over nine hundred students (and their families) were outside, in costumes, when a slight drizzle turned into a sudden rainstorm, drenching everyone.  

The celebration will be in the afternoon on Wednesday, November 4th.  For once, I really, really hope I come in second place.

Yeah...we're going to lose.

One of the adorable traditions at my school is the fall decorating of pumpkins for the library.

We get a bunch of pumpkins donated and each class gets to decorate the pumpkin based on a book character.  I tried to slap a post-it on our class pumpkin and say "this is a gourd, we read informational text" but was vetoed.  The pumpkins have to be based on a book character (not a recent movie character).

The pumpkins also can't be punctured in any way because we want them on display in the library for a few weeks.

The primary classes usually produce the most adorable pumpkins because parent helpers or the teachers spend hours crafting very adorable and very complex designs.

Mine however, is completely student driven...and it shows.  

Volunteers stay after school and armed with paint and big ideas, they navigate working together to create this work of art that will be on display for the rest of the school.

I'd love to do this:

However, we haven't read any books on mummies and my students are very excited about all their ideas.  We have an online poll going, but then will turn that into a survey (embedding that technology folks!)

The current winning idea is...

The Minotaur.

From Greek Mythology.

Something tells me we're not going to win the cutest pumpkin contest, but if my students have fun making it, that's all that matters.

Motivation Monday: Minute to Win It

My fifth graders get bored with repetition, so I am always looking for new ways to  motivate them. 

Our school does Reading Rangers, which is a program to inspire students to read independently and move up through badges and ranger level graduations.  While it's in no way perfect because no program is and not every strategy works for every student, I found that in my first year of using this program my students were extremely motivated to read and talk about their books with each other, which is a welcome change.  Last year, even with all my high readers, I still struggled to get them to complete their assignments.  This year, a much higher percentage of my students were motivated to independently read, which is fantastic.

However, it's also the end of the school year and many of them need an additional push.  So, with the help of pinterest ideas, I came up with mystery motivators (minute to win it challenges).

I used a random number generator to make five student groups and they were competing for:
-highest overall percentage correct
-most number of quizzes passed (with failing quizzes counting for negative points)
-most engagement from the whole team

They had a week to complete their goals and I did daily points updates.

After a week of competition, I revealed the winning teams.  The top 3 teams in each category got to participate in minute to win it games.

I chose the following games:
1) Cookie to mouth, using oreos.  Students had a minute to get the oreo from their foreheads into their mouths without using their hands.

2) 100 cup stack challenge.  Goal: create the highest cup structure in a minute.

3) Balancing act.  Using a tongue depressor and linking cubes, they had to stack the cubes on top of the tongue depressors and hold their structure for sixty seconds.


Here is a snapshot of the challenges:

My favorite part? The total cost to me was under ten dollars and they were so motivated to read and win!

How do you motivate your students?

Thankful?

I'm having a bit of a rough time finding positive things.  We are under a lot of pressure at work from a lot of different angles.  Granted, it's no where near the tear-inducing chaos of last year, but still.

We are under pressure to perform well on Reading Rangers.  My students are reading independently and quiz frequently.  However, there's a few boys that aren't following my expectations and do poorly.  They are lower readers and need to read books several times.  They need to conference with a peer about the book.  However, they'll sneak out to the pod or sneak an iPad to quiz and often score 60% or 80%, which brings down our class average.  I am then talked to about why I'm doing so poorly and it's really not fair.  I've had a few times I've been called out for the lowest scores and while some find it motivating, I'm mortified.

I don't like coming in last and I certainly don't like that publicly announced.

My students have between 45 and 60 minutes a day of silent independent reading time with our Reading Rangers program.  During that time I'm pulling small groups or individual conferences, they are writing about what they're reading, conferencing with a peer, taking an AR test, or silently reading.

Other teachers will sometimes skip other subject areas to allow for extra reading time to inflate their scores.  I'm not sorry that I refuse to skip math, writing, or whole group reading to give them silent reading time.  They need instruction in all subjects.

We've started some new positive reinforcements and it's helped.  We are in a race to 100 100%s with another class and it's quite motivating for them.  I also started using classroom dojo to reward them whenever they score 90%, 100%, or complete a badge.  They are quite excited about that.

We're all overwhelmed at work and it's showing.  The amount of effort and care I put into my portion of planning is not necessarily being matched by others and that's difficult.  Things aren't getting done in a timely manner.  There's been some miscommunication and that's difficult.

I think we're all just ready for a break and luckily, Thanksgiving is right around the corner.  I am thankful for that!

Percy the Pumpkin

As I previously blogged about, my class designed a Percy Jackson pumpkin.

I'm going to preface this picture with the disclaimer that it was 100% student made.  All I did was supervise and provide the paint.

The backside has a trident, waves, skull, and Riptide.

Here's Percy:

You can vote for our pumpkin here!

We really want a popcorn party :)

Battle of the Books

On Friday afternoon, I took my enthusiastic team of four students to the district semi-finals.  Clad in our matching navy shirts, they were eager to win.

They participated in the first two rounds, but didn't earn enough combined points to advance.

I stayed with them for both rounds, one round acting as a time keeper and the other as the host.  Both our principal and librarian showed up, which was wonderful for my kiddos to feel supported.

My students lost gracefully and displayed wonderful sportsmen-like conduct, which was heartwarming to see.  I congratulated the winning team and had the audience clap for the effort of both teams.  There were some disrespectful parents, which was a tad frustrating.  Of course each school and family goes in wanting their child to be successful.  But not every team can win.  Every team, however, can conduct themselves with dignity and grace.

I wish those parents were more focused on the true purpose of the event: building enthusiasm for reading.  

My team did their best but most importantly, they had fun. They did the competition completely on their own but were supported the whole time.  They read some great books, strengthened friendships, and enjoyed quizzing each other about the novels.

One of the boys was inexplicably thrilled when I told him that there isn't just one sequel to The Strange Case of Origami Yoda, but four.  I know what his summer plans will be--reading.  Lots of reading.

That's a wonderful thing.

Final meeting for Book Club

Last week was our final meeting for Battle of the Books.  Our school competitions are this coming week and the district finals are on the 25th of April.  I'm excited to take my winning team to face off against the other schools.

I haven't given them any instruction on the books and they held their own small groups.  I'm really proud of how much work they've put into this competition.

One of them even made treats, which was adorable:

Plus they're loving book jeopardy! 

I promised my students we'd play with our small group books during standardized testing time (since they'll need something fun after a long day of bubbling!).

I love watching how much they love reading.

One More Week!

Ladies and gentlemen, I'm pleased to announce there is just one more week of our homework challenge with Ursula:

All she needs is her wand and she'll be ready to reward the students who have earned their homework reward.

Students needed to fully complete their homework for 8 of the 10 weeks to be invited to the reward party.  All I ask of them is one sheet of math homework and their reading logs.  I'm not asking for perfection, I'm asking for effort.

Around twenty of my thirty one students will be attending, so it will be nice to celebrate with the students who are being responsible.

I'm sure I'll get attitude from the ones who aren't invited to our recess celebration, but it's a natural consequence to their actions.  I'm not sure what messages they receive at home, but in my classroom, if you don't do the work, you don't get the reward.  It's that simple.

AM reward

In our SWAG competition between AM and PM, the AM has won again.  This time, they had a half hour of free board game time.  The timing worked out perfectly because we lost twenty minutes of our hour to an assembly, so after fluency there was only time to meet with one group (and cover everything we needed to).

Reward snapshots:

Many of my games were generously funded by friends, family, and strangers on donors choose.  Thank you again for continued support in my classroom!

(The Series of Unfortunate Events board game was perhaps my favorite find ever! I found it at Bookman's, a used bookstore in Arizona.  I didn't even know it existed until one magical spring break!)

I love watching them get so excited about comprehension and reading games!

Ursula Update

Before winter break, I blogged about our new class motivator Ursula:

A few weeks went by and as a class, they didn't earn any pieces.  I could tell most of my class was getting frustrated because it was always 2 or 3 students who didn't do their work and ruined it for the whole class.

Their homework is a reading log, 30 minutes of reading a night and one double sided math sheet that reviews what they learned in class the week before.  They get their homework on Friday and it's due the following Friday, so there is truly no reason it shouldn't get done.

One particularly difficult student kept arguing how the homework simply couldn't get done because of outside commitments.  Now, I've talked with the family about this and the student isn't truthful about the work.  If there's time for video games, there's time for homework.  No excuses.

So we had a class discussion of who has extra curricular activities (sports, church, music, family time, etc.)  Every student raised his or her hand, so we talked about making time for what's important...and that includes homework.  I made the connection with sports and how homework is like practice.  If you don't practice, you won't do as well as you can on game days.  That seemed to resonate with many of my students.

We voted how we wanted to change Ursula.  I suggested a table team reward and that was vetoed by the tables where students aren't doing their work.  Thirty out of my thirty one students wanted Ursula to be on an individual basis so they were only accountable for themselves.

For the next ten weeks, they have to turn in their fully completed homework eighty percent of the time.  (8/10 seems fairly generous).  If they do this, they get to join our lunch party.  One student asked what would happen if she turned in all of her homework (as she's done the entire year), so I said those students would get an extra reward.

I love that they're so motivated now!  

We added our first piece:

Isn't she lovely?

I talked with them about how everyone was still invited, just some students already used one of their two "freebie" weeks.  I hope this really turns around the homework slide we've been noticing!  

Battle of the Books

My fifth graders are competing in our district's Battle of the Books!

I vividly remember participating in this competition when I was their age and still (bitterly) remember how I lost a question for my time.  I forgot "from" when giving the answer: "From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler".  Yup, that one word made a difference!

They're making teams of up to 4 students and between them will read all 8 novels.

View the list here!

My supportive admin ordered books:

I'm so happy they're so excited about reading!

Battle of the Books!

My students are going to be participating in our school district's Battle of the Books in April!  Our school has never participated before and I'm excited to have this experience with them!

My super supportive principal & assistant principal are ordering books for my students and I'll be hosting "book club" after school each week.

I'm sure they'll do great!

We'll have a school competition with the winning team headed to the semi-finals :)

Class Motivator Update

Well, Ursula is here:

When she's done, she'll look a little something like this:

I was hopeful she'd earn her tail today, but 4 students didn't return their weekly homework so she didn't.  (But 4/31 is a huge improvement, so I'm thrilled this positive motivator is working!)

Instead of me expressing my disappointment, I headed over to Voki to make a free online puppet.  I found an eel-like one that reminded me of Ursula's pet eels, so I used that.

I typed up a whole story about how the evil Ariel turned Ursula into a potato head and her eels missed her!  Hear her story here!

I plan to do this a few times as a motivator :)

I'm hoping they all do their work next week so we can add our first piece!

Classroom motivator

I've struggled this year with my students turning in homework. I'm fully aware of the research that traditional homework in elementary school isn't very beneficial, but their homework is reading logs (we expect nightly reading) and math review.  

Instead of being negative and always assigning detention, I've decided to try a more positive approach instead.

Each week that my students bring back their completed homework, they will earn a piece toward our Mr. Potato head.  When our spud is fully assembled, they'll earn a prize.

However, I didn't go for any ordinary Mr. Potato head.  Oh no, I ordered this mermaid version instead:

We shall name her Ursula and she shall have a place of honor in our classroom!  Amazon will deliver her next week :)

Voting

Last week, we went to Kid Vention where our students learned about democracy and voting.  

We had our students write debates and share their thoughts in front of the grade level.

We made them ballots:

And classy voting boxes:

They get to vote on the four issues until tomorrow afternoon.  We're going to analyze the data next week and see whose class had the most voters :)

11/01 Update:

Here's our finalized vote:

Not a lot of votes :(
Exactly how we expected.  Should lead to an interesting conversation on Monday about being passionate about issues and actually taking the time out to vote.

Students couldn't vote during learning time.  They had to come before school, stay after or come in at lunch.  We chose to do this because very few adults get time off to vote, we have to take the time out of our day to perform this civic duty.

Mystery Walker

I've seen this idea all over pinterest and I figured I'd give it a try.

The strategy is "mystery walker".

You can make cute containers to put the names in like picture above, but since I'm pressed for time, a ziplock baggie with little slips of paper works just fine too.

I draw a name and that student is the one I'm focusing on in line.  Instead of always saying "I like how so and so is keeping his/her hands to himself" or using other positive reinforcement strategies, I use "I hope my mystery walker is showing me his/her best halls to earn us student points."  

I don't reveal the gender of the student. 

I've used it for a few days and it's going pretty well.  My students are super motivated to earn student points, which we use for a class competition.  This week they earned almost 20 marbles in their jar, which was very exciting for them :)

Ready for the first day

It's that time of year again.

Come 8 am Monday morning, I'll have students.  28 of of them to be exact.

We had our school's open house on Friday and I met about half of my students and their families.  I must say, I think I lucked out again because my students are adorable.

Here is my room for open house:

I added a FAQs chart on the board so that students and families would have something to do while I was talking with their classmates.

Students will receive their welcome letter and a treat on their desks:

We are bursting with excitement about fifth grade!

They'll also get a pencil Tuesday morning that says "you're just write for this class!".  I'm using sticky labels as flags this year to save time :)

Here are the letters for our class competition for AM and PM:

The first class to fifty points wins the competition with a maximum of 4 points per day.

For my word wall, my awesome coworker gave me her old Scrabble tiles,

Which I added magnets to using hot glue and...

tada!

My new word wall magnets.  Granted, they are tiny but since I have fifth graders, I assume they know the alphabet. 

I'll be putting these on a metal filing cabinet and students will color-code our word wall (reading, science, math and other).

Outside my room is our bulletin board.  Using a pinterest idea, I added letters to paper plates to frame our bulletin board:

It says "what we're learning" and takes up the whole space above the board.

To make it less awkward, I'll add the standards and learning objectives on one side of the board and an explanation of our activity on the other, that way the whole bulletin board can be student work.

I just have to finish prepping a few centers but I think I'm all ready for Monday :)

Ms. Vice

Bring Yo' SWAG, part 2

I posted about our grade level's new management trick a few days ago.

Here's the poster I created to go along with it:

Bring yo' swag fifth graders.