What Works Wednesday!

So I want to do a helpful post of some substance since I haven't for a long time! ;) 

What's working for me this Wednesday (er...Friday) is... 

my adapted Daily 5 Rotations board. 

I am trying Daily 5 for the first time this year, so it continues to be a learning experience. I first saw Daily 5 on Pinterest and I was intrigued. Isn't everyone always trying to improve their independent work time during Guided Reading?? I felt that I had a good system before, in terms of "crowd control," but I knew it wasn't as productive as it could be. So, after seeing a lot, thinking it might be the system for me, but getting more and more overwhelmed by the sheer number of resources available online, I bought and read The Daily 5 (the book) on my Kindle :) 

After reading the book, I got it. I understood the process and was ready to implement this school year. 

I did notice that my students had excellent stamina while I was watching and able to circulate around and work with them. Probably it is my fault, because I wasn't super-loyal to building stamina up from 3 minutes on for each D5 choice (I didn't have the time necessary to do that--I had to start my guided reading groups sooner than that allowed.), but as soon as I started pulling reading groups, the students' ability of choosing any D5 station they wanted wasn't working. Students were constantly choosing the partner games or Read to Someone, which is perfectly wonderful, but when 14 or 15 students choose a game from Word Work,or they choose Read to Someone, it gets awfully loud and interrupts our reading group, even if all of the students reading and playing are quietly on task.  

So, I knew I had to limit the number of students in each station per day. I tried assigning each reading group to a certain station at a certain time, but that seemed a lot like cheating the program because it took all the student choice out of the equation. Plus, the students were a LOT less excited about Daily 5 each day. I settled on a hybrid model and I love it. It is still a work in progress, but here it is...

I have four reading groups, and they each named their group with a color. The inspiration for this board comes from the Math Workshop board on Clutter-Free Classroom. I love it!! 

Each group has a "Read to Self" rotation required (not because they don't like Read to Self--they do!!! But because this allows at least six students in my class to be silent and it helps to have this silence spread out evenly among the rotations so no one rotation has a ton of students choosing a noisier choice.) and a "Reading Group" rotation required, obviously :) This leaves two "Free Choice" stations and the students can choose among the other D5 choices, whichever they like. They seem to like this a lot! It gives them structure, which they (and I!!!!) crave, but allows a bit of freedom as well.

In addition, I did not include Listen to Reading this year. I simply did not have the number of CDs or books on tape or the time it requires to spend setting up a system that I didn't have at all in place before trying D5. So, I have adapted it and now one of the D5 "Free Choice" choices is for the student to do Study Island on the computer. Our district uses SI and it's a wonderful program with a ton of customization options. I simply set up an assignment for a certain group of readers, and they go online and practice that skill on SI, and then they get a grade, which I can see and use to set up future assignments and to drive instruction. They LOVE the computer time as well!


In short, this is my What Works Wednesday, even though it has taken until Friday (woop woop--it's Friday!!!) to get it posted. That's the story of my life--running behind ;)

I have all the Rotations cards made as well as the bulletin board header on my TpT page for only $1.99! 

Fractured Fairy Tales Unit

I decided to make my first major writing unit a unit on fairy tales. I have involved reading strategies and writing strategies, and the kids are having a blast! I am also going to incorporate a parent involvement component as well--after we're done writing our fairy tales, we are going to read them for the parents to hear. It will be a kind of "Fall Fairy Tale Reading" and we'll have refreshments to go along with it!

I will be posting my unit plan for this unit once I am finished and have honed what I'm doing, as well as some pictures from along the way, and of course, some pictures of the Fall Fairy Tale Reading!

My outlook was to do an entire unit on Fairy Tales and have the students culminate the experience by writing their own fairy tales. But, after talking to a colleague about the idea, she mentioned that she has done fractured fairy tales with her kids. I loved the idea and researched it for myself. I found a really great website from Read Write Think on fractured fairy tales that shows the kids what fractured fairy tales are and then helps them/walks them through brainstorming their own funny version of a fairy tale. Once I discovered that, I was off and running...

...at this point, we have:

-listened to a variety of "traditional" fairy tales, such as "The Shoemaker and the Elves," "Sleeping Beauty," "Cinderella," "The Princess and the Pea," "The Three Little Pigs," "The Emperor's New Clothes," and more

-brainstormed characteristics of fairy tales

-filled in a fairy tale characteristics chart for each fairy tale and spinoff (email me for the file!)

-listened to a variety of modernizations and spinoffs, such as "Princess Furball," "Sleeping Ugly," "The True Story of the Three Little Pigs," "The Three Little Wolves and the Big Bad Pig," and more

-we earned a class reward as well, so we decided to watch Disney's version of "Beauty and the Beast" and we filled in our chart and discussed the fairy tale elements present in the movie

-explored the Read Write Think site as a class, discussed what a "fractured fairy tale" is and read the fractured version of the Prince and the Frog

-made a triorama contrasting the three versions of "The Three Little Pigs" and discussed other differences between traditional and modern and/or fractured versions (as well as versions from other cultures, of which there are many!!) (Email me if you are interested in the triorama!)

Still to do:
-have kids explore the Read Write Think site independently
-have kids begin brainstorming and eventually write their own fractured fairy tale
-draft, edit, revise, publish fairy tales
-dress up like fairy tale characters (????)
-host a "Fall Fairy Tale Reading" for parents and other relatives to come and hear the kids read their fairy tales

Whew! It's been a lot of work so far, but it's been very fun and I'm sure the rest will be even more memorable! I have already gotten some parent compliments on how much their children are enjoying the unit, so that's a great thing :)

Updates to come:
-unit plan
-pictures

Stay tuned.

:o)
Ashley

*This post is part of my "Teaching Writing" series!*

Starting a Writing Unit

I know I'm not doing a great job teaching writing if I haven't given a single structured lesson on writing by the end of September! Usually by this time, we have made a few class books already and I have taught SOMETHING, even if it's only writing a sentence correctly. My class HAS done some writing, in their Daily 5 station of "Work on Writing," but I haven't actually looked at or graded anything.

I have an excuse for my miserably inconsistent writing instruction (and that's exactly what it is--and EXCUSE!, not a valid or acceptable reason) In my school district, there is no writing program to speak of...

....the only thing we have are our vague, inadequate Pennsylvania state standards (we don't use CC yet!) that specify four different types of writing we are supposed to teach: Fairy Tale, Narrative, Description, and Persuasive.

Needless to say, my colleagues and I are always having to do a lot of digging to find decent writing ideas. We barely even have a curriculum to follow!!! And materials all have to come from us.

So in the past I've tried 6-trait writing, and liked it. I liked it a lot actually, and the students really liked it too. And, the students came a LONG way as writers by the end of the year. I left out the trait of voice, becuase my third graders had their hands full enough with the other five traits. I have books on it, and I love how there are very helpful rubrics to use and it is a super-easy-to-follow program. BUT---it is exhausting to teach. I know that's a terrible excuse, but there it is. It takes a lot of time and dedication--and I don't have much time on a daily or weekly basis to teach the program to the fidelity I think it deserves. I suppose our district will make writing a bigger priority when/if the PSSAs demand it...

I've also tried 4-blocks but for some of the same reasons, it just didn't work out. I don't even remember specifically why I didn't stick with it (which is terrible!) but I know I didn't LOVE it. Also, I use Daily 5, and I want something that jives with the Daily 5, which is new for me this year :)

Anyway, In the past I've also focused largely on teaching nonfiction writing, since as students, that's really all we ever NEED TO KNOW how to do. Never in my high school or college career was I ever asked to, required to, or graded on, any imaginative or narrative writing. BUT narrative/fiction wriitng can be really fun (especially for girls), and I think we should all know how to write a decent story, because it's a beneficial and even important part of overall literacy.

With that said, I am going to start with a type of narrative writing that's not only required in our curriculum, but also a very concrete, formulaic type of writing. I did a simple Google search for "Teaching writing fairy tales." And I got a great site that I had never really heard of, or at least, not that I remember.

 I am going to start with this entry as the first in a series of Teaching Writing. I hope it helps some of you out there. As soon as I've made some headway with above unit, I will post my unit plan on my blog here. From there, I will move on to a nonfiction unit (I have a GREAT one!) and so on...

 As an English major, I feel like maybe I complicate teaching writing more than it needs to be, but I feel that I am always looking for better and better ways to teach writing. It's really difficult too when you have few materials (or none!) provided by your district and very little--if any--groundrules or curriculum to follow. Stay tuned for updates on my journey toward a better writing program this year.

:o)
Ashley

*This post is part of my "Teaching Writing" series!*

Genre Posters!

I know for third grade, genre study is an important part of the Language Arts curriculum. I never wanted to spend a ton of money on the genre posters at teacher stores, and they never had the EXACT genres I wanted. So I created my own. The first six are freebies at my TpT Store and there are ten others that match (but they're landscape orientation) for only $1.99! I hope this will help you as much as it helped me and my students!

Spelling Contract on TpT

I have added a new file to my TpT account! It is a spelling contract tic-tac-toe board :) I have used it in the past for my weekly spelling homework. I assign 4 contract activities for the spelling list and check on Friday, before the spelling test. But this printable could be used in class or for homework, in small groups or in whole group instruction. My hubby added a watermark to the jpeg file, but it's not there on the downloadable version :o) ...And the best part is...It's FREE!!!