Holiday Games

I don't know about you, but as we get farther into December, it takes even more to capture the attention of my third graders! They have sugar plums in their eyes or something. I love getting them excited about Christmas and winter.

Although it hasn't snowed yet, we are all wishing for some. I made these games with a winter theme to give us a little glimpse of snow!

So... if you want to avoid eyes glazing over, and teach grammar in a fun way, you might like these! They are great for my ESL kiddos to build vocabulary! I hope you like them!

Click {here} to buy them on TpT.

Literacy Centers~ Writing, Game and Computer

I'm continuing talking about Literacy Centers in my classroom. Today I want to talk about Writing, Game and Computer Center. You can read about {Working with Words, Buddy Reading and Listening; and Newspaper, Poetry and Spelling} in my other posts. I also talk about how I manage the centers in this {post}.

Writing

For this center, I usually have a writing prompt or type of writing that I am trying to teach.  I use several sources to help me find what would benefit my students.

Literacy Centers~ Working with Words, Buddy Reading, Listening Center

I talked about Literacy Centers in my previous post, Literacy Centers~ Newpaper, Poetry and Spelling. I introduce those three first as a whole group and we complete the activity together. After that, I will introduce Working with Words, Buddy Reading and Listening Center.

 

Working with Words

Working with words is another center the students look forward to. I used to do this center as a whole group activity when I was teaching in a bilingual 4th grade class because it really helped build vocabulary in English. For this center, I use the book Making Big Words, Grades 3 - 6 by Patricia Cunnigham. For those of you who use Daily 5, I would highly recommend this book.

Here's a page from the book, each "big" word has other words that can be spelled using the letters. I call the big word the secret word, and the students have to find the secret word that uses up all the letters. The students love figuring out the mystery! The book has a list of spelling patterns, so if you are practicing "ie" words you can use those words in your center.

For the center I simply put letter cards that spell out the word in a bag. I write the number of the word on the bag and the letters that should be in the bag. So in the example from the page above, I would write #129 aeeiubbllnv.

I have a recording sheet that my amazing partner teacher made up, that I wish I could share, but it's her work so I won't. The sheet has a spot for recording the words they come up with, the secret word, and then a place for them to write a definition, synonym, antonym, and picture of the secret word.

Buddy Reading

The first year I taught with centers, I had the students chose a book from the buddy reading basket and read together. I found this was way too unstructured to be useful to the students and this center was always the rowdiest. I discovered last year that if I had them complete a certain section from a book and then answer some questions they would stay on task. So this coming year I will be using worksheets that I created from our leveled science reader. The questions on the worksheets are geared towards non-fiction text elements, so I think it will be perfect for our new implementation of Common Core.

The set up  of this center is pretty easy. Simply provide the same two books, and instructions for completing the worksheets. The students will complete a packet with me initially as a whole group so they will know the expectations for capitals, complete sentence, grammar and restating the question.

Listening Center

For this center I use the leveled readers that come with our basal, Treasures. The leveled readers come with CD's as well so I have everything ready to go! I chose books from our leveled readers by the theme we are learning as well as certain text features. As I talked about {here} there is a great website to look up themes and text features.

To prepare this center, I create a response sheet for the book. They might have to make a web or outline of the main details or summarize the story. They listen to the story together and answer the questions.

Anyone else use literacy centers? What have you found that works well for you?

Treasures Leveled Readers Search

In my quest to figure out what leveled readers I have from our basal, Treasures, I found this great website.

I don't use the basal, but I do use the supplemental readers that come with the program for my listening center. With this website you are able to search by keyword, genre, grade level,  skill, text feature etc. I thought this was really handy because I was able to find the books I wanted to use in my listening center by their topic and skill. You don't need to login to use this feature.

Check it out {here}!

Literacy Centers~ Newspaper, Poetry, Spelling

Practice with Purpose: Literacy Work Stations for Grades 3-6

I talked about the management of my centers {here}. I will now talk about Newspaper, Spelling, and Poetry Centers.

 I usually introduce these first as the procedure stays the same through out the year for these centers. I usually change out the materials and don't have to teach a lesson from these centers.

Newspaper: 

Last year I subscribed to Scholastic News for my newspaper center. Now that I have the old magazines from last year, I will use those for my newspaper center. The students are expected to read the article and answer the questions on the back of the paper. Once this is completed their is a skill activity provided by Scholastic that they complete. This center only needs to be explained once, then students are able to independently practice on their own.

Poetry:

Last year the students made acrostic poems, shape poems and a couple of other poems. This year I will be using a poetry book called Read and Understand Poetry, Grades 2-3. I started using this book in the mad scramble before state tests and it was very successful! My students will now start with poems from this book and the accompanying multiple choice and extended response questions. YES, This is built in test prep! Each rotation I simply change the poem, but  I will quickly teach the kind of poem before we start new centers each rotation. Once again, student usually know how to do this center after one round.

Spelling:

My district uses Sitton Spelling so I take activities from the Sitton Spelling chapter we are working on and incorporate it into this center. An easy way to do this is to take the activities that are similar each week but the words change and create a master form. I then take this form put it in a sheet protector and write on it with dry erase marker.  I then put this sheet protector into another sheet protector so the students cannot erase my writing! They fill in the worksheet provided, and BAM! I have another spelling grade!

I will talk about the rest of the centers in the next few days!

Literacy Centers for Third Grade

I utilize Literacy Centers for most of my Language Arts instruction. I have found centers to be an amazing way for students to succeed! The centers I use in my classroom are based on the book Practice with Purpose: Literacy Work Stations for Grades 3-6 by Debbie Diller. Centers change through out the year, but the centers I use are newspaper, game, spelling, vocabulary, spelling, SMART board, word work, writing, poetry, buddy reading, listening center and library.

Classroom management is essential for successful literacy centers. I start from the very first day teaching the procedures and expectations for centers. I start with modeling and practicing movement around the classroom. Once the class can do this quietly, we talk about voices levels in the classroom and how they help or hurt each other.  As I am teaching behavior expectations, I am also teaching the skills needed for each center. We do every center as a whole group activity to teach the product I expect.

After I've taught each center and the expected outcome and norms for center time, I start the first rotation of centers. Students are placed in pairs. I might place two similar level students together, or a high and a low student together. The partners change each time we do centers so that the high student is not always helping the lower student. I also think students will "rise to the occasion" when paired with a student slightly above their level, instead of way above their level.