I think I survived!

Now that I made it through open house and the first few weeks of school, I might be able to breathe again. I am so tired, it is not even funny. I'm sure I will feel much better after sleeping 14 hours tonight! :)

Last night was Curiculum Night, and I think it went well. I once again did a scavenger hunt so parents could look around the classroom with their child in an organized way. I love doing this, because I'm not the center of attention!

In addition to preparing for Curiculum Night, we've been busy getting to know each other, creating goals, and learning all about Third Grade! For goal setting, we've created many goals, both academic and social or personal. We are graphing our NWEA results and creating a goal for when we take the test next week.

 I have been teaching Thinking Maps for the first time, which has been fun and challenging. So far I have introduced the Circle Map and Bubble Map. For the Circle Map, we used it to develop our rules, our classroom volume, and what a great student looks like. So far, I have used Circle Maps to teach about describing characters in a story and an apple. This was such a great way to introduce adjectives. They came up with some great words!

My focus this year is to delve deeper into Common Core for ELA. I have been using some great resources on Read Write Think. They had some great community building and conflict resolution ideas that were really helpful for establishing a positive classroom environment. This lesson, Getting to Know You had the students interviewing each other and completing a bio-cube as a culminating assignment. I used this activity to begin our study on asking and answering questions (RL.3.1).

To introduce the idea of bullying as well as how to respond to literature, we read A Bad Case of Stripes. Read Write Think's lesson helped me to develop the lesson.

We've done other things, of course, but this has what has worked really well for me these past few weeks!
If you are interested, the Curiculum Night Scavenger hunt is available {here} and my goal setting packet {here}.

Literature Circles

I've tried for several years to get Literature Circles going in my classroom. I think they are a great idea and I love the learning that can come from them. One of the biggest problems with Literature Circles that have job roles like illustrator, summarizer and such is that one student would come unprepared and it would mess up the whole process. I wanted to simplify the process of Literature Circles while still enjoying the benefits of students being engaged and talking about books. I also wanted to include a Literature Response component so I could see that learning as well. Towards the end of last year, I began Literature Circles again, this time without the traditional jobs.

I divided my students into 6 groups, so there was 3-4 students in each group. Any more than that and they start to go a little crazy! Since most of my students were about the same level, I let them chose what book they wanted to read. When they chose the book, this put them in their Literature Circle groups. Next, I had the students read with each other. There are pros and cons to this arrangement, one being it takes forever to read together, but it encourages oral language and fluency development. I think next year  I will alternate days between reading silently and reading aloud together. After reading the first day, see where the students are at in their book. I then divide the book into thirds and tell them how many days they have until they should be done with the first section. When they read the first day, they are excited to read so I have an accurate picture of how much they can read, not how much they can read while fooling around! :)

When the students have completed their section of the book, I have them complete a response sheet. This sheet has most of the roles from traditional Literature Circles and is aligned to what CCSS expects for responding to literature. I like that I can assess all students on all aspects of the reading, not just one student illustrating a picture, for example.

After a day to respond to the book on the response sheet, the students come together to talk about the book. This is where I have roles for the students. They absolutely love these, and I use them for most group work, not just Literature Circles. The roles are Discussion Leader, Messenger, Volume Control and Reporter. The Discussion Leader keeps everyone on task, the messenger asks the teacher questions and does the group evaluation, volume control keeps the volume low, and reporter introduces the discussion questions. All students are expected to add to the discussion and this really helps with meeting CCSS standard 3.SL.1.

After the discussion students are expected to fill out an evaluation sheet about their group time. There is a group form for the messenger role to fill out as well as a self evaluation. This helps students with their accountability for their learning. When this is complete they will start the cycle again until they have read all of their book.

All of this of course took awhile to model. Before they could write the response, I had to teach them how to write a summary, how to make text connections, how to look up words in the dictionary, how to correctly illustrate a scene, how to think about author's message and how to come up with discussion questions. Each of these task have a corresponding worksheet and anchor poster.

When I first started  Literature Circles, expressed their concern with how to take grades. I've found that rubrics and anecdotal records are a great way to take grades during Literature Circles. From watching students discuss the books, I know their understanding of what they read, how they are making connections and how they are able to verbalize their answers. From listening to them read, I am able to hear their fluency and where they are struggling. From the Literature Responses, I am able to see their comprehension, text connections, writing, and dictionary skills.

This style of organization has really worked for me. For more ideas on how to implement Literature Circles in your classroom, check out
If you like what you see and you are interested in Literature Circles in a different way, you can purchase Literature Circles~ For Any Book! at my TpT store. What about you? Do you do Literature Circles in your classroom? What works well and what do you struggle with?

Plans for the week...

It's Monday night and I'm planning for my week. One of the standards I need to address is 3.RI.3. This standard has taken me awhile to wrap my mind around, and I'm still trying to figure out how to teach it the best. One of the resources I came across was from Read, Write, Think. If you haven't checked out their website, you absolutely should! It has some great lesson plans. I got there from Read Tennessee, which is another great resource. They have lesson and ideas for every common core standard! It is great! The one I will be using next week is for writing cause and effect essays. I will pretty much be using the lesson from the website.

I know this is hard to see, but click here to see the whole lesson. It gives you graphic organizers for the students, and great graphic organizer tools that can be used on the web. I plan to project the graphic organizer on the SMART board as I read a book about natural disasters, probably this one:

We will fill out the graphic organizer together, and then the students will create one with a partner on a different natural disaster book. I have several books in my class library, as well as there is a couple articles in the Time for Kids supplement we got with Treasures. After that, they will create an essay using the Essay Map program that is also available. We will do this during computer time later in the week.

I would love to hear if any of you have other ideas for teaching this standard, especially the scientific processes part!

Top 8 Tech. Sites for Test Prep~ NWEA MAP Reading

I'm continuing my series on sites I use for test prep. You can check out what I've done so far by clicking on the Technology tab up top!

#3 NWEA MAP Reading

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!

Must Have Picture Books

Here it goes- my very first linky! I'm linking up with Lindsey @theteacherwife. When I saw this I knew I had to participate! I absolutely adore picture books and my third graders love them too! Click the title of the book to purchase on Amazon.

1. Where the Wild Things Are

 I adore this story, always have, always will. I hate the movie! I love how the pictures get bigger as Max goes deeper into the story.

2. If Everybody Did

This is an excellent story for teaching cause and effect. I also use it at the beginning of the year to talk about if everyone colored on the tables, if everyone pulled leaves from trees etc., etc., etc! The class gets a big kick out of this one and usually read it on their own as well.

3. Have You Filled a Bucket Today?

Love, love, love this book. An excellent book to read at the beginning of the year and bring out during the May crazyness. How I use this book in my classroom is available {here}.

 

4. Stand Tall, Molly Lou Melon

An adorable story about what it means to be yourself no matter what. Molly Lou Melon is liked by boys and girls alike! Another book I bring out at the very beginning of the year.

 

5. Chrysanthemum

I use this at the beginning of the year to talk about our names, and then we make nameplates! It also talks about being proud of who you are! (the link for this book is a big book, I could not find the regular paperback on Amazon.


I'm definitely thinking about the beginning of the year! All these are my must have books at the start of the school year.

Thank you Lindsey@theteacherwife for my very first linky!

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.