Buzzing with Ms. B

August 3: Scheduling Your Day! How to spend your time in Reader's Workshop

For my complete Reader's Workshop Pack, visit my TPT store!

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Wednesday, August 14, 2013

Back to School Goals Linky Party

This week I'm wrapping up my Reader's Workshop Miniseries. There are two episodes left: Word Study & Guided Reading.
In the meantime, I thought it'd be fun to join a Back to School Goals linky party! Every year, we gear up and get ourselves mentally ready to start a new year with new little people. I've been working with teachers the past two weeks to help set up some plans for the beginning of this year. We've really appreciated the time to put together our structures and routines for reading and writing. Great way to get a jump on the new school year!
So to help think about my goals for this year, I'm linking up with I (heart) Recess (what a great blog name!) to talk about my Back to School Goals!

Personal: This year is a BIG year for me, personally. I'm going to marry my hunnybun in October! We're gearing up for our wedding and looking forward to taking a fun honeymoon. Sometimes I get really caught up in work, and he does too. I'm a stay late-er, meaning I'll go in to work on time at 7:30 but I'll leave at 5:00 or 5:30, and still bring more home to do. We have Saturday Camps and Saturday School at various times throughout the year, and it seriously takes away from my family time. So this year, I want to make a point of leaving at a decent hour. I'll still stay late (I know myself well enough to know that won't change) but I'm going to try to leave a little earlier and hopefully work less from home.

Organization: I bought my house years ago and have lived by myself for a long time. When my hunnybun moved in almost a year ago, the house was very much mine. My stuff, my furniture, my style, my old TV from the 80s, and my tiny refrigerator that didn't suit two. We've since made some updates and I had to compromise on a lot of things (like sofas and moving a few rooms around) but the house is still mostly what it was before. We started with the backyard already. After we're married, we'd like to redecorate: repaint, new pillows, change some of the colors. I can't wait!

Planning: I don't think this is what "planning" means, but I would like to plan our dinners better. My hunnybun and I both have some weight issues and he has a really bad habit of, if we don't have a plan for dinner, he wants to eat out - and eat badly. He "doesn't like to be limited" his words which annoy me so I have to be careful when planning meals, but I think a good plan would help us.

You can read about my attempts to make healthy kale chips here. Let's just say I need some more practice.

Professional: I plan with teachers every Tuesday for reading and once a month on Thursday afternoons for writing. We also plan as needed and I frequently schedule meetings, classroom visits, and modeled lessons (myself and other teachers modeling for each other). The hard part is meeting with teachers after visits or lessons to debrief. Teacher time is precious and I want to spend it in the most valuable way possible. So I need to make sure that I plan purposefully to review and debrief with teachers about the positives in their teaching and new ideas we have.

Students: I don't have a classroom of my own anymore (boohoo) but I do have teachers who it is my job to grow. I have to consider my teachers as my students. The tough part about that is that, with students, you pretty much know more than them. With teachers, they all have different levels of experience and teaching knowledge, so it's my job to find new and useful ideas and tools to help them, wherever they are!

Motto: I don't always know what the best decision is. In teaching, you try things, and see how they go. You gather your evidence and make plans to improve. You do the same thing in your personal life. The good thing is, professionally and personally, you're not alone. So, no matter how tough things get, we'll figure it out together!

This is what our planning looks like. Messy but useful!

Go visit I (heart) Recess to link up with your Back to School Goals, or read someone else's! Pin It

Tuesday, August 13, 2013

Reader's Workshop MiniSeries: Episode Five: Independent Reading & Reading Responses *Freebie!

It's Episode 5 of my Reader's Workshop miniseries! One of the most difficult things for me to monitor in my classroom was independent reading. That's why it gets a whole special day during my MiniSeries!

The purpose of independent reading is to have students practice reading! Beyond that, they have to practice reading strategically. We want them to read for a purpose so they read closely and make meaning out of the text. These are some important points to consider when thinking about your Independent Reading

Build Up Your Time Let's say that I decided to start running a marathon. Tomorrow, I'm going to lace up my shoes and head out. For the first few minutes, I'll be motivated. I'll be excited that I'm gonna do it this time! After about a mile, I'm going to start thinking things like, "When is this going to be over? How long is a marathon? Should I be coughing up blood? Is that normal?" Needless to say, that will be the first and last "marathon" I'll ever attempt. It works this way with kids. If, on the first day, we throw kids into 45 minutes of independent reading, we're asking for it. They'll try for a few minutes, and then they'll look around the room curiously. Eventually someone will make eye contact, and you will have giggles. The giggling will grow with a series of interesting faces and gestures. Interest in the book will be lost.

We have to build kids up a little bit at a time. I start the first day with a goal of six minutes, and I establish a few ground rules. We talk about what independent reading should look like, and we create an anchor chart.

At the end of the six minutes, I use the chart to have each student evaluate themselves with a fist of 5 (Kagan). 5 fingers = I did each thing on the chart. 3 = I did some things. 1 = I only did one or two things. Then we talk about how to make the next day better. I

I increase the time 2-3 minutes each day, until we are up to 40 minutes of independent reading time.

Set a Purpose
Before students read independently, I set a purpose for them to focus on and to respond to when they're done reading, or during the reading time. This could be... - a foldable to complete - a question to respond to in their notebooks or on a post-it - a graphic organizer to fill out - a verbal response they will have to share with their neighbor after reading. I post this on the board in the front of the room so each students can see the purpose and recall it during their reading.

This is a sample item from my Reading Skills Pack: Context Clues!

Check it out on TPT.

The strategy/skill I want students to practice during independent reading aligns with the strategy we are currently practicing or we have already practiced, so students are able to practice it independently.

Reader's Notebooks

Students record their responses to reading (usually) in their Reader's Notebooks. I have a special section dedicated to reading responses. Students date and title the entry as the title of their book. They record their pages read on their independent reading log and they write their response in their notebook.

What does the teacher do?
During independent reading, you are busy! There was a lovely school of thought that, during independent reading, the teacher would read too, and set the model for reading. This would have been great, but realistically, kids need more support than that. We have to take the time to interact with them in a small group or individual setting to help them grow in their reading comprehension and book choices. For the first couple weeks, I usually do conferences to help kids choose books carefully. I also complete the DRA assessment on each student to identify a beginning of year level and some areas of concern to focus on. During reading conferences, I start my anecdotal notes about each student on index cards. Each student has a card and I record some preliminary notes.

After a couple of weeks, when I'm done with the DRA, I create a few schedules. I put together my Guided Reading schedule, a library schedule, and a carpet schedule. Kids love to sit on the carpet to read, but I find it wastes less reading time if they know which day is theirs. I also find kids are more responsible with their library books if they have their regular day to go to the library. (Ideally, I schedule library visits at another time during the day, such as breakfast if the library is open. I'd rather kids spend their time reading & practicing their comprehension skills during independent reading time, if possible). Consistency helps kids be organized (and me, too.) Check back on August 17 for more details on Guided Reading!

August 3: Scheduling Your Day! How to spend your time in Reader's Workshop

For my complete Reader's Workshop Pack, visit my TPT store!

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Saturday, August 10, 2013

Reader's Workshop MiniSeries: Episode 4: Shared Reading *Freebie!

It's Episode 4 of my Reader's Workshop miniseries! Today is an important piece of Reader's Workshop: Shared Reading.

Shared reading is a valuable tool! During a shared reading experience, each person in the room has access to the text you're reading. This means that each student can have a copy, such as in a classroom set of books, copies of an article, or a text from the textbook, or the text (if short and font-sized large enough) can be projected or on a chart. This works especially well when it's a poem.

I use my scope & sequence to choose the genre of the text and I make sure that the specific skills or strategies we are going to practice are included in the text. I include the following components in a shared reading lesson:

Text Introduction Introduce your shared reading text. This is a good time to activate background knowledge and make predictions based on the features of the text. Prompting students about the features of the text genre is valuable too. Anchor charts help support student's recollection of these features.

The more pre-reading you do with students, the more they are invested in reading the text. Introduce/Model Strategy
Strategy instruction is the heart of Reader's Workshop. Of course, we have to integrate this with our standards and make sure that those are explicitly taught as well. Focusing on one thing at a time can help. Then you can teach students to use these things together to create an in-depth understanding of the text.

Purpose Question I find that a great way to align instruction with standards and to hold students accountable is to establish a purpose question before reading. I chart the question and, as we read, we are looking for evidence to respond to the question. I try to align the question with the strategy we are practicing. For example, if we were using the chart above about making inferences about Ruby Bridges, my question would be something requiring students to make an inference about her character. For example: - What word best describes Ruby and why? - How did Ruby change from the beginning of the story to the end? - Which characters supported Ruby and how? - How can you describe the relationship between Ruby and her teacher?

Questioning to support the strategy
As you're reading, model the strategy, but also provide opportunities for students to think about their reading. One great way to do this is by providing some open-ended questions for students to respond to. They think and share their thinking, gradually coming to a deeper understanding about the text. Student Response Methods
We want students to respond in different ways: verbally, written, or even dramatically! Carefully choose a response method for your students to address the strategy and the purpose question you created. This could end up in their reader's notebooks as an assignment you evaluate.

Follow-Up We want students to practice their strategy in their independent reading text. This means we set a purpose for reading aligned to a strategy we need them to practice. This could take the form of a question, a foldable to create, a handout to fill in about their book, or a notebook response about their reading for that day. To help you get your Reader's Workshop ready & rolling, here's a seven-page Reader's Workshop Freebie Sampler from my Rolling Out Reader's Workshop!
Check out the other "episodes" in the Reader's Workshop MiniSeries:

August 3: Scheduling Your Day! How to spend your time in Reader's Workshop

For my complete Reader's Workshop Pack, visit my TPT store!

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Thursday, August 8, 2013

Reader's Workshop MiniSeries: Episode 3: Read Alouds *Freebie!

Today is my third installment of my Reader's Workshop MiniSeries! Today I'm sharing about an important instructional tool: Read Alouds

Unfortunately, read alouds tend to be the first thing to be cut when your day is busy. To meet the demands of an overburdened schedule, we do without the read alouds, even though they are a valuable tool for teaching reading. These are some great benefits of including a read-aloud in your daily program.
Benefit #1 Exposing Kids to New Books
Wouldn't it be great if kids went over to the library and carefully browsed through the baskets, thinking things like, "Hmmm... I know I enjoy Lois Lowry, but I think I'd like to try something a little different this time!" or "Ah! Look at that historical fiction basket! Maybe I can find something to help me use my background knowledge I gained from our unit on westward expansion!" HAHAHAHAHA I know, it's not nice to laugh. But really? That's something kids learn over time. I'm not saying they'll never get there (ahem ahem) but they aren't there when they walk in your door. Read alouds are opportunities to share books with kids who may not find their reading niche. By exposing them to a variety of books (often carefully chosen because you know your kids), we can help them see what exactly is out there to read. Many of our kids aren't readers because they haven't found the books they love yet. Benefit #2 Opportunity to Model Comprehension Strategies
Read alouds are excellent opportunities to model comprehension strategies. You're the teacher. You know where you're going with your lesson. So you can carefully choose your text and your pause points, making sure that they are the best possible places to pause and practice your strategy. For example, if you're teaching how to make an inference, you pull out your Chris Van Allsburg basket, and BAM! Inference CITY! An inference on every page! And because you're modeling, you'll provide a great example of how to make an excellent inference.

Benefit #3 Opportunities for Students to Respond Verbally
Sometimes, in the race to make student tasks rigorous, I tend to focus on student reading and writing. I often forget the benefits of leveling the playing field by reading a text aloud and having students respond verbally. It takes away all the effort they have to expend on decoding and encoding, and instead allows them to focus on practicing the strategy and verbalizing their responses to their buddies. By creating some well-chosen opportunities to respond, sentence frames, and response structures (i.e., Kagan Structures), you can maximize your independent reading time.

Benefit #4 Model of Fluency

There's a scene in Despicable Me 2 where Agnes is sharing her Mother's Day poem. She reads it like many of our kids do. Robotic. Monotone. Completely dull with no expression! Read alouds are our opportunity to model fluent reading, including expression, intonation, and how to express a character's feelings through tone. At the beginning of the year, I create the above chart (or something similar). It's great to read as a nonexample as fluent reading, and then identify what's wrong with it. Once you create the chart collaboratively, you can use it throughout the year to hold my own reading and the kids' accountable for fluency!
Benefit #5 Models for Writing
I use read alouds as the first opportunity to interact with texts I plan to later use as models for writing. Throughout the year, my students use texts as models. This requires very close reading and dissection of the text. But the first reading should always be for enjoyment. These are a few of my favorite writing model read-alouds:

Benefit #6 It's FUN! It's a sad truth that many of our kids don't love reading. They haven't had the comforting experiences that help us love reading and find it a cozy or exciting activity. Read-alouds are our opportunities to share a special time with our kids, close on the carpet, and grow the love of reading. The more interesting voices you use, the better. If your kids cry, you've hit the reading jackpot.
These are some of my favorite fun read-alouds.

These books won't make your kids cry... but anything by Eve Bunting might. To help you get your Reader's Workshop ready & rolling, here's a seven-page Reader's Workshop Freebie Sampler from my Rolling Out Reader's Workshop!
Check out the other "episodes" in the Reader's Workshop MiniSeries:

August 3: Scheduling Your Day! How to spend your time in Reader's Workshop

For my complete Reader's Workshop Pack, visit my TPT store!

Pin It

Tuesday, August 6, 2013

Reader's Workshop MiniSeries: Episode 2: Classroom Libraries *Freebie!

Today is my second installment of my Reader's Workshop MiniSeries! Today I'm sharing about an important instructional tool: Classroom Libraries.

Not everyone gets a classroom library issued from the school. Even when you do, yours may look more like this than you would like it to.

So the responsibility for a great classroom library is often on the teacher. A well-organized library can help your kids make appropriate book choices.

Key Points
1. Less is more! Well, not too much less. But when you're faced with having an enormous library full of books kids won't read, or a smaller library full of books kids will read, go for the latter. If there's too much in there, kids have to sort through the rubbish to get to the good stuff. And let's face it.... a lot of our kids don't have too much stamina for hunting through a crummy library! 2. Think Bookstore. I was taught this by my first Literacy Leader. She said that bookstores do things for reasons. (I know, duh. But wait! There's more!) They break up the monotony by placing books in different directions on the shelf and by putting some on display. This gives your eyes (and your kids' eyes) places to go. One easy way to do this is with book displays. Mine (in the picture above) came from a book set someone else purchased. It's durable cardboard, so I covered it with a glue gun and fabric. Bookstands are also great for displaying books you want kids to notice:

You can get a simple one at Amazon for 2.49 each! 3. Organization.

I purchase baskets at the Dollar Store and put labels on each one. In my classroom, the library is divided into sections: Fiction and Nonfiction. I often separate the two into two different spaces. I had a student who called the Nonfiction section "The West Wing." lol I also differentiated the labels by color, putting Fiction on green and Nonfiction on yellow, so students could easily tell the difference. More popular baskets often include... - Special authors, such as Lois Lowry, Barbara Park and Jerry Spinelli. - Series books such as The Magic Treehouse, Bailey School Kids, and A to Z Mysteries - Subjects such as school stories, holiday stories, and sports stories - Genres such as historical fiction, science fiction, and fantasy. 4. Teach and Track!
A library sign-out sheet is also important for keeping track of your books. It's easy for kids to toss books back willy-nilly if they've never been taught to take care of them and return them to a special place. I set a special day as the "Grand Opening" for the library. On that day, I teach students how to find books and we chart out some possibilities, using the color-code system. I have a "Return Basket" and a librarian. As students return books to the basket, they mark that they are returned in the Library Binder. In the morning, before school starts, or during breakfast, the librarian returns books to the appropriate place in the library. To help you get your Reader's Workshop ready & rolling, here's a seven-page Reader's Workshop Freebie Sampler from my Rolling Out Reader's Workshop!
Check out the other "episodes" in the Reader's Workshop MiniSeries: