Paragraphing...BACKWARDS: A Five Day Lesson Plan

     I am very proud of my students and the volume of writing they are now able to produce in a single setting. Most of them can routinely write more than one full page.  But with this dramatic increase in volume often comes a lack of punctuation.  In addition as the length of students' stories increases, the skill of paragraphing becomes even more important.
     Most resources about paragraphing are instruction before students begin writing.  There are all sorts of graphic organizers and hamburger diagrams.  I decided to tackle paragraphing after students have written.  By teaching about paragraphing after writing, I can also tackle issues like elaboration and end punctuation, which are still important skills that students lack.
     For the first paragraphing lesson, I copied some pages from the book we are currently reading.  I tell the students the main reasons for paragraphing:  changes in speaker, time, and place.  I used Whole Brain Teaching techniques with pair teaching and gestures to help students remember the reasons for paragraphing.  Using the text selection and highlighters (kids love those), I had my students highlight the three reasons for paragraphing in three different colors.  They did this in pairs. 
     The next day, I gave students a piece of writing I wrote without paragraphs.  Again in pairs, students discussed where the paragraphs should be.  As a class we shared our ideas, making sure to justify our conclusions. 
     On Day #3 it was time for students to begin revising their own writing.  I used Lucy Calkins "box" technique.  In this technique, students draw a box with colored markers around their paragraphs.  Students worked with pairs.  Once students make boxes around their paragraphs, I asked them to count the number of sentences in each box.  For their assignment during Writing Workshop, students need to add some detail sentences to any paragraph that has less than four sentences.  Since students write on every other line in their daybooks, it is relatively easy to add detail sentences.  I collected the daybooks and sorted students by those who were struggling with paragraphing and elaboration and those that were not. 
     The following day, I met with the students who were struggling the most for extra assistance.
     On the final day of the week, I had students choose a section of text and rewrite it for evaluation.  They had to take at least two consecutive paragraphs and rewrite them.  I went over the assessment rubric prior to the assessment.  Students had to be able to show at least two paragraphs of a minimum of four sentences each, correctly punctuated. 

Adventures in Literacy

We are nearing the end of the first month of school.  I have to rank this class as one of the most challenging of my career.  We are moving forward, but at a slower pace than I am accustomed to. 
     During Daily Five we are still working on building stamina.  Many students still just get up to get more books in the middle of it or talk to each other.  Most of that talking is innocent and impulsive, but the fact that they are still doing it shows that they are still working on stamina.  Normally I would be starting reading groups next week.  I still will, but many students will also begin the week with assigned seats that put them where I can see them and more than a single arms length from others (which is what we typically do).  This is the first step I take with students who are not building stamina.  After a week, they can have their choice back.  Make poor choices again and there are no more choices of where to sit.  This is how the CAFE Menu looked half way through individual reading inventories.  The "thumbs up" on the black paper represent the goals of each student.

      After a rough start (again-building stamina), Writing is going well.  I have seen some real improvement already using Lucy Calkins Units of Study.  Her techniques are simple enough that they are easy for students to implement.  They are very concrete as well.  This is how our Writer's Block looks as we are transitioning to from stamina lessons to craft lesssons-

There are lots of resources for students who need ideas to write about, including laminated pages from a costume catalog.

I also saw these descriptors for the four levels I used for Writing.  I thought I would add them to the display: Keep "TRI"- ing, Coming A-"ROUND", "SQUARE" Deal, and Love It!

     In the front of the room I added the class rules (below the board) and a cursive alphabet (above the board.

Week 2 Update: I Love Math

     Those of you that know me well know my passion for differentiated groupings that I call "I Love Math" groups.  I Love Math is a structure  that divides the class into a high, average, and low group and cycles those groups through three different stations.  Once the students get the rotations (which are always in the same order no matter what group the child starts with), things run like clockwork.  In the past I have always had an aide, Title One teacher, or special education teacher in my room to help ensure things go smoothly.  That way two of the groups have adult supervision.
     This year, for the first time, our grade has been required to level for Math.  Since I was in the fifth grade at the time, I could not attend the meetings where they assigned teachers to the different levels.  I have one of the average groups.  Two of our classes (mine and the high group) do not have a support person in the classroom for Math.  The other six specialist are divided among the bottom three classes.  This is my first year trying I Love Math groups by myself.  I knew it would be a real test of the structure that I love so much.  If I can do it alone, then there is hope for other teachers who are solo practitioners.  And yes, even a leveled Math group has enough differences in it to warrant differentiated instruction.
     First of I decided that I needed to have I Love Math groups a lot more often.  In the past I have done them regularly (once or twice a week), but only as needed. I know that the more I do them, the better the students get at it.  I decided that this year I would have a whole class lesson on Monday which would end with an ungraded pre-test.  This would be used to create differentiated groups Tuesday through Thursday.  Friday will be another whole class lesson and post-test.
     I also knew that I needed to use technology to help me keep track of the progress of my students in the same way that another person used to  do.  Luckily I found Ten Marks, a free site where I can assign specific skill lessons for my students. 
     After one week of following this plan the results have been fairly good.  Technology has been the biggest challenge.  Our wireless internet is not always reliable and the students are not used to logging in to the computers and finding websites in a timely manner.  I hope that time and experience will help the students complete this part of the task more quickly and easily.  If not, I may have to alter the activities or the order.  I wish I had enough computers for all of the students to start on them and then move to other activities, but the most I can get are 8.
     Great ideas are worth the time it takes to make them successful.  I'm up for the challenge!

First Week of School Over!

     I just finished my first week (three days) of school.  I can tell this year will be one of professional growth already. 
     I noticed a big difference in the students as I moved down to fourth grade from fifth grade.  The students organizational abilities need a lot of development. They don't clean off their desktops at the end of each academic period.  They don't push in their chairs when they leave their seat.  They have never used Agendas before and they write very slowly. 
     I have a special education aide in my room most of the day whom I have never worked with before.  This means I have one more person that I have to introduce to my classroom routines.  I also have a high percentage of special needs students in my room, including one student with a behavior disorder.  This student started having difficulties the first day of school.  By day 2 I had to have him take an extended time-out in our behavior room.  I am already networking with our resource people for behavior.  Day #3 was better, but I had to stay glued to his side.  I know other students are suffering because they can't work independently for more than five minutes yet and don't know classroom routines.  I will definitely learn some patience this year!
     When I reflect on this first week, I am also thinking about the tremendous growth I experienced as a looping teacher for the past two years.  Although I do not know whether my new principal will allow looping next year, I do know that these students will improve by leaps and bounds this year.  Whether I get to stay with them for one year or two, I know they will make progress like my students do every year.

Displays 2013-2014: Everything Else

Whew,  I'm finally done setting up my classroom.  It always seems like I need more time than I get.  In the middle of this set-up week, a team-mate had her baby early (so we had to visit her, of course and help her long-term sub adjust) and our new Spelling/Vocabulary series arrived (time out to stamp it and deliver it to all the team).  But, all-in-all, I'm ready enough.

This bulletin board idea came from Teachers Pay Teachers.  Right now the pictures are just "place holders".  I'm going to have the kids design their own iPads with a "playlist" of books they have read or want to read.



 "How Much Signal Strength is Your Brain Using Today?" is from literacy specialist Jenn Jones of Hello Literacy. It's a kid-friendly version of Bloom's taxonomy.   This is on our big "team" bulletin board across from the bathrooms/Library.

 These balloons are from Really Good Stuff.  My students decorated them on Step Up Day in the spring.  I think it will be great for them to see something they created on the first day of school.

 These are a couple views of my classroom library.  As a mother of four and the daughter and daughter-in-law of teachers, I am lucky to have an extensive classroom library of about 3,000 titles.  I am also lucky to have a crafty husband to build all these shelves. 



Displays 2013-2014: Reading

I'm nearly done with the displays for my classroom.  Today I laminated a lot of instructional materials.  Hopefully the printers will be hooked up to the wireless internet by tomorrow so I can print all the stuff I bought at the TpT Back to School sale.
I have some new displays for Reading and some old favorites.  Of course, I had to start with the CAFE Menu with new polka dot border and matching header.  I love the magnetic paw prints that hold the border in place.

Opposite the CAFE Menu is my primary teaching area.  I have the easel to work with the whole class on the carpet.  I can easily transition to small groups with the table right next to me.

Last year I moved away from a Math CAFE Menu and found that I really missed it.  So this year it is back.  The hardest part was dealing with the big bulletin board in the middle of the wall.  I'm still not 100% sure that I like the way it is now with fact fluency being the center of attention.  I'll have to see how it works as the year goes on.
 

This new bulletin board will support my new school year resolution to emphasize vocabulary instruction more.  Right now it's just blank with the heading "Word Nerds".  Next to the bulletin board is a list of the CCSS vocabulary standards.

The Theme Board is not new to my classroom.  The idea comes from master teacher Beth Newingham.  I use the stories that we read as a class that are part of my basal series.  After we finish a story, we debate and then vote on the theme. We put a picture of the cover of the story under the theme we decide.   The first few times it is very challenging for students to do this.  As the year progresses they get better and better.

 

This year I added "Got Character?".  The plan is to start by labeling the emotions with different synonyms to expand the students vocabulary for describing characteristics.  Then I'm going to do something very similar to the Theme Board where we will post the name of the character beside the characteristic. 

The last change was the Super Improvers Wall (see www.wholebrainteaching.com).  Previously the colored card system for misbehavior and the reward system of drawing stars in index cards were in two separate locations.  To make room for other interactive displays, I needed to combine the two systems.  For more information on each system, please download Chris Biffle's free ebook or watch his inspiring videos.  

 

One last tip/trick:  I don't know about you, but I just can't seem to get stickers to stick on my cubbies.  They have so much sticker residue built up over the years it's just not working.  My cheap trick is to cover the sticker with clear packing tape.

 

I turn down one top corner to make the tape easier to remove at the end of the year.  Voila!













Displays for 2013-2014: Part 1 Writing

This week we had two days of teacher workshops, so I was able to get back into my room and do a little setting up.  I have been focusing on setting up for Writing instruction.  Here are the latest pics:

My "Writer's Block" starts out very simply.  I have the six traits and the title "Writer's Block".  Over the first weeks of instruction the traits will be moved to the side of the bulletin board as the actual board is filled with posters that we co-create as part of the lessons.

This is the example of one smaller poster.  The words on the poster match the assessment rubric exactly, so that students can get used to the language of the rubric.  On the first day students decorate the cover of their notebook on the inside front cover write their three goals for the year.

Above the Writer's Block is a graphic with the levels of proficiency I use in my classroom:  substantially below proficient, partially proficient, proficient, and distinctive.  These are the same designations used by my state.

These are my completed editor name badges (see this post) with my shape-coded levels.  There are a couple of students without shapes because they are new to our district.  I will do a writing benchmark on them in the first week to get their current level of functioning and complete their name badge.

This is an expanded view to show how the name badges double as an attendance board.