Slice of Life: When the Lights Go Out

Another year comes to a close, yesterday was our final day of school. This year presented several different challenges. My group of learners challenged my thinking (how to handle different types of behavior) I am still thinking about that blog post. There were moments when I thought I had the most thoughtful planned out lessons and as I opened the lesson I knew quickly it was a dud! There use to be moments in my teaching  career when I would fight though a bad lesson forcing it to work. One part of teaching that I am thankful for are the years of experience, I now have the courage to stop at that specific "dud" moment. Hit the breaks - take a huge right turn and change directions. I was honest with my class and if you could have been a fly on the wall, you would have heard this conversation.

• Me "I notice that not everyone is engaged during the opening of the mini lesson."  "Can someone tell me why you appear to be bored?"
• Student "It feels like the same thing as yesterday - we've done character traits with evidence sooooo many times."
• Me  "How could we change this lesson so it doesn't feel sooooo similar?
• Student: "We could choose a character from our read aloud."
• Student:  "We could break into small groups and use our read aloud."
• Student:  "Could we write a script and choose two favorite characters?"

After these conversations, my response was Yes, Yes, and Yes.  There was a different type of buzz and especially their the attitudes and looks on their faces. The lights are out in my classroom but the reflection time of summer is one of most valuable times that I find as an educator.  

Thanks to The Two Writing Teachers for encouraging me to reflect and share my Slices on Tuesday even though I'm a little late to the party.   

I'm extremely thankful to the learners in Room 234 for helping
me continue to grow as a teacher.

Post It Notes are Lonely

I've had the chance to read Connecting Comprehension and Technology which has been a great energizer for me as I continue to think about authentically integrating  technology especially during reading workshop.  Thank you to four super smart women: Stephanie Harvey, Anne Goudvis, Katie Muhtaris and Kristin Ziemke. I loved how the book was organized. Having QR codes that allow a peak into the classroom was powerful as I am a visual learner. In addition, separating the book into primary and intermediate was extremely helpful. I read all the intermediate sections first but went back and read several of the primary sections. It felt like differentiated lessons with the same focus. Such a smart way to organize a book.

There were several big learning moments that pushed me to continue my thinking around collaboration in reading workshop.  The biggest take away was a duh moment, but I am glad I had it.  Sticky note thinking is limited to one individual student and when doing a whole class sharing only one person shares and 23 hopefully listen. My take away is how will I create a collaborative platform in my class?  I liked the organization that Katie  suggested: three groups of eight for a class of 24. Opening the conversation but not too big to overwhelm them.  Right now I am considering Google but more blogs to come on that idea....still percolating.

The idea of back channeling is where I want to begin with our first read aloud. I am still thinking about how I want my students to have time to share questions, new thinking but also time to reflect on their own ideas.  I am thrilled with the instructional shift knowing that  I will not always be calling on one student to share  but small groups will be connected. I am considering a reflection piece at the end of workshop where the students will write about their big learning, new vocabulary, or questions that they have about the story in their own reader's notebook. Bringing post it notes to life is going to totally change the sharing in our workshop -- I'm super excited.

Are You Stuck in LP Boxes?

It is so exciting when pieces of the puzzle begin to fit nicely.  This has happened for me this year.  After spending the summer, thinking, learning and reflecting on how to build stronger readers and writers, I have found the missing piece for me.  First of all my schedule totally changed this year, our language arts block is the last two hours of the day.  I never thought I would like that slot of time, but I have really enjoyed it for several reasons.  The most important one is that I have totally linked my reading, writing and word study together.  I am not quite sure why I haven't seen this as a block of two hours.  Perhaps because my lesson plans are set up with 3 isolated blocked plans:  reading, writing, word study.  I felt the pressure the first several weeks to make it to our writing time.  When I shifted my thinking to a large block of language arts time, I didn't feel the urgency as the minutes clicked away. I wonder how many teachers look at these three areas as three separate parts or one whole?  It sure changed my perspective when it was one large chunk of time.  

The second shift is thanks to my friend, Bill Prosser @ Literate Lives. He taught me several years ago sometimes it is just fun to read a book for the great story!!  While the wall is open, Sarah and I share the same read aloud  Escape from Mr. Lemoncello's Library which we will finish tomorrow.  Everyday our students are listening to our read aloud, having fun solving the puzzles, discussing how the characters are going to escape, and enjoying an excellent book.  Enthusiasm for reading is the goal and we are achieving it.

Finally the last shift is with my thinking. I am helping my students "think as a reader but also think as a writer." When you connect those ideas, the flow of the lessons are amazing.  All of a sudden our mini lesson on the influence of setting in RW is carried into our writer's notebook for our narratives. All three together in sync create an amazing two hours of literacy learning in room 228.

On a side note, as I reflect on the start of my year, I often find myself wondering:  Why does it take so long to figure something out that makes my teaching stronger?  Finally I have realized that all my summer learning is like a file cabinet that is full of ideas, but until I meet my students and learn about their needs I cant access those files.  The answer is not in the why but in the when.  When I know my new students as a class of readers/writers, I finally can pull that file out that makes all the difference for me as well as them. It sure is a great feeling when the pieces of the puzzle all fit together nicely.  (I have no idea why I have so many font changes-oh well letting go trying to
fix them :)

Reflecting OLW on My LIteracy Instruction

I love summer for so many reasons but professionally I enjoy the time to process my school year.  I am a ponderer always thinking if I could have taught that differently? Could I have improved that lesson with a better hook for the students?  Did I choose the correct picture book to introduce the class to a reading mini lesson?  I honestly think a part of my brain stores all these questions for summer and then I have time to process. For that gift of summer, I am thankful.  I have the above picture on my desk at school. It is my reminder, can I see the forest through the trees or in my case, can I see the ducks among the reeds? As I begin to reflect about my school year, there were so many changes.  After teaching 23 years, I would think that parts of my profession I love would stay the same, but education is ever evolving and at a rapid pace the last few years. I wonder if I am changing quickly enough, and am I changing because I had to? This past year, I had to restructure my reading block which changed my writing block. This was not a comfortable change for me. I do believe my instruction for lowers readers was stronger; however, I lost my higher readers and that is one area that I am not pleased with from this year.  I held on to my word study block by my fingertips, but I still cut some parts out that I know in the past my students loved or found valuable in their instruction. Just as a slip of doubt came to me, I opened my email and read this letter from Sara. She will never know how much I needed to read this. Thanks Sara, your teacher is smiling from ear to ear and Yes I wrote write back to her quickly :)

Dear Mrs. Caplin,

    Hi! Are you enjoying your summer? I am SO excited because my brother, my friend Mazie, and I are having a lemonade and dessert stand in our neighborhood. All the money we earn will be donated to Relay For Life. It reminds me about Alex and the Lemonade Stand that we read in class. Speaking about reading, I have already read 2 books meaning that I only have to read 48 more to complete my summer reading goal of reading 50 books. I am having a great summer and I can't wait until Thursday. I miss you so much and I wish school wasn't over because I had such a fun time in your class. Please write back soon!

Your Former Student,

Sara

Follow Your Heart!

Sometime in teaching you just have to follow your heart!  I read James Preller blog all the time for many reasons.  First of all I was able to meet him a few years ago when he visited our school for an author visit.  I was lucky enough to have a few minutes to discuss the idea about starting my blog and he gave me a few words of wisdom that I never will forget.  Next I love the connection he has with his readers and how he constantly writes about his books but more important to me about his readers.  I really like fan mail Wednesday and have shared many of those posts with students in my class during reading workshop.  Finally the part that touches me most are when he shares about his own family.  We both have a passion for baseball and so many of our experiences have been very similar. This week he posted about his daughter, Maggie, Post-It Note Binder.  As a fifth grade teacher and mom it touched my heart so the next day I shared the post with my class.  We talked about how our writer's notebooks should be personal and how it is a place to hold our thinking and treasures.  I asked my students to choose their favorite quote off of Maggie's binder and write about it but then share the quote with the family.  I even suggested to have a family member write about what the quote means to them-all I have to say is WOW!  I read these posts in awe and most important I can't imagine the conversations that happened at home when my students were sharing their quote.

Love the analogy that the parent connected for the child!

I love the way this parent shared their own favorite quote.

This parent connected the quote to a saying in Chinese celebrating their culture.

 

Reading Workshop and iPods-Can they work together?

Favorite reading spot in the summer on my dock.

When I heard I was getting a class set of iPods, one of my biggest concerns was how to use them in Language Arts.  I was able to visualize using them in Social Studies, Science and Math however reading and writing had me stumped.  I went back to my 6-box grid and knew that I started the year in reading with a focus on Our Lives as Readers.  Wednesday''s blog will be about word study and writing.


In reading, I wanted to stay true to my reader’s workshop and begin to use iPods within that setting.  Our fifth grade teams have the students bring in a photo of their favorite place to read at home the first week of school, so that will be the conversation starter.  I thought the first way I could use the iPods was to create a survey using Google docs and ask some questions about their reading lives. The students could take the survey on their iPod and it would gather the data for our class and we could look for patterns to learn about our class as readers.  My long time goal is to repeat the survey at the trimester break as well at the end of the year to see how the students have changed as readers.  Check back in June ☺

Moving from paper to iPods.

I have decided to start the year using Notes which comes loaded on the iPod.  It reminds me of a yellow legal pad, and  I chose this because I think it will a fun way for the students to keep an electronic reading log.  Plus my students will begin the year learning how to use the iPod keyboard and practice their typing.  I am sure they will do better than me because it took me most of the summer to learn how to use the small keyboard. Experience would tell me that 11 year olds typically learn technology quicker than most adults.  One of my roles with implementing  iPods into our classroom this year is to expose the students to the tools that come loaded on them and then allow them the time to explore.