What's new in Kindergarten?

If you haven't already seen it, you need to check out Lucy Calkins' new curricular units for Readers' and Writer's Workshop which are correlated to the Common Core Standards  (which Kindergarten is suppose to be using this year in our county!)

Did I mention that they are an on-line resource and can be downloaded? For only $10 each? And they are grade specific? Amazing!  You can't see me, but I am dancing with delight!

Not only do the units incorporate all of the teaching that we have gleamed over the years from actually visiting Teachers' College for their Summer Institutes, but it also links together Lucy's Units of Study for Primary Writing, Fountas and Pinnell's Phonics Lessons and Baer's Words Their Way! As I have been reading the monthly units, I realize that at Chets Creek we will have to move into the first grade units before the end of the kindergarten year to account for the fact that Florida has universal Voluntary  Pre-kindergarten.  Our students are coming to us with more experiences so we can breeze through some of the earlier units more quickly, but this will be interesting work for our Reading Council this year.  This will become our Reading and Writing Pacing Guide.  Can't wait to see what each of the grade level Reading Leads think about this new resource.  If you get a chance, let me know what you think about the units.

Writing Science Lessons

Today Kindergarten teachers met together for a day of professional development. We are coming to an end of the third nine weeks (can you believe it?) and the teachers are getting together to write new Science lessons for the fourth nine weeks. They were also reviewing and revising lessons that they had already taught The county has adopted the state's Big Ideas for Science and essential questions - a philosophy of teaching concepts in the 5 E format - engage, explore, explain, expand/extend and evaluate. Of course, there are very few lessons and the adopted kindergarten Science text doesn't cover the same standards! Makes you wonder just what other teachers will be teaching? I'm afraid that in some schools the big ideas will simply be skipped! But, of course, that has never been an option at Chets Creek. We take Science very seriously and believe that the foundation for the 5th Grade Science state test is built on the shoulders of what is done in the lower grades.


Debbie Harbour, our Science Lead teacher, began the day by reviewing the 5 E model so that we would have it fresh in our minds as we began to write. Then the team divided into pairs and chose lessons of interest - some to write new and some to review and revise. As the day came to a close, teachers explained to the rest of Kindergarten what they were working on and what they expected to have complete.

Core Reading Curriculum Alignment with Pacing Guide

Last year our county spent millions of dollars adopting a new Core Reading Curriculum. In trying to honor our earlier intensive professional development with the America's Choice School design, the county asked that the publisher rewrite the Teacher Edition so that it would reflect our training with Readers' and Writers' Workshop. Understand that the anthology was not rewritten. The stories and resources were the same, although the county had discretion about which pieces they purchased for teachers. The rewriting simply meant that the resources and lessons were rearranged and rewritten in the Workshop format to meet the county's requirement.

We now have a huge amount of new "stuff" - so much in fact, that it has often been difficult to figure out just what we have in this multi-year adoption and how to best use each piece. The county has spent significantly on these resources, so we certainly have a fiscal responsibility to try to use them and use them well! We also want to make sure that we understand the scope and sequence expectations for each grade level so that as children transfer within our county, there is some standard of consistency.

One of the problems with the Core and its desire to be all things to all people, and especially with the Duval County Teacher Edition, is that the strategies are presented in what Lucy Calkins calls "popcorn" lessons that spiral throughout the curriculum. This means that strategies in reading are presented throughout the year and revisited often. This presentation differs from our earlier professional development where we adopted Ellin Keene, Susan Zimmermann and Debbie Miller's ideas of teaching the strategies with depth over an extended length of time. So... in order to best use the Core as a resource to teach the strategies, it made sense to align the lessons in the Teacher Edition with the seven "Mosaic" comprehension strategies (Monitoring for Meaning, Sensory Images, Making Connections, Questioning, Drawing Inferences, Determining Importance, Synthesizing). In coming to terms with how to do that, it was important to understand that the Core presented both strategies (the same that we were familiar with above), but also skills. The skills, e.g., cause and effect, noting details, compare and contrast, could be taught under different strategies depending on the intent of the instruction. That meant that each Core skill had to be aligned with the strategy that encompassed that skill. We have now completed this alignment for first grade.

This, of course, is not a perfect document and will need to be personalized by each teacher that chooses to use it. This is the way it is designed to be used. As a teacher works through the lessons that she is going to teach for a specific strategy - for instance, Making Connections - she would use ideas from resources such as Mosaic of Thought, Reading with Meaning, 7 Keys to Comprehension, but she would also look through the Houghton Mifflin alignment to review the scope of skills expected to be taught for the grade level and also the sequence in which those skills are intended to be taught. She would review the recommended resources to see how they might be used in mini-lessons, guided reading and centers. She might choose the Houghton Mifflin read aloud story or big book for her mini-lesson demonstration because the Core identified it as having strong connections for first graders. She might choose a set of little books to use with a guided reading group because the Core identified that set of books as below, on or above grade level or because it identified the books with strong connections and she wanted to reinforce the mini-lesson or she might choose resources from the Core that could be used for a center activity. She might also use the cold assessments in the Houghton Mifflin Core to make sure that students have mastered the grade level expectations for that strategy. These are powerful resources to have in her toolbox for teaching.

The idea is to start with the students and their needs and then to design lessons that teach to those needs. This alignment is one way to take what we have and to find a way to use it to make a difference in student achievement - after all, isn't that our goal?

Send them shopping?

Today a group of kindergarten and first grade teachers met to work on our wikis (it's hard to believe that just a year ago, I thought a wiki was some new game!) We looked at both the kinder and first grade wikis and discussed our intent - to gather together resources that would move our work forward. We decided on some guiding principals:

• We would decide on an organizing structure for each page so that items could be found quickly and efficiently.
• We would look at the quality of each item. The purpose of the wikis is not to find everything that has ever written about the subject, but to gather the fewer things that can move our work forward - resources of quality.
• We would describe each item so that a teacher could peruse the list quickly to find what she needs. We would think about our new teachers to make sure that the description adequately described each resource.
• We would be visual as much as possible, including pictures, videos, charts, etc. to make the resources come alive.

At that point we divided into pairs and looked at the same items on both the kindergarten and first grade wiki so that the two would have some organizational similarities. For instance, the team that looked at author studies, looked at the Eric Carle page in kindergarten and both the Mem Fox and Kevin Henkes pages in first grade. We listed all of the pages on the board. Each team chose their own task and then checked it off when it was finished. This is an intense, detail-oriented, time-consuming task that can quickly numb the brain!

The team broke for lunch with most of the participants choosing to go off campus for lunch - a guilty pleasure for a teacher who normally eats very quickly with small children! After the group had been gone for an hour, I got a phone call! They were stranded at Panera's due to car trouble and needed a ride back to school. We hopped in a van to go pick them up and what do I find when I arrive? SHOPPING! This group uses every second productively so while they had to wait, some of the group decided to shop! While they bought a few things, they did assure me that they had worked on our project on one of their iphones during lunch to make sure they made the best use of their time! One of our newest hires was a little distraught that one of her first pictures on the web would be of her shopping instead of working, but she told me to assure Mrs. Phillips that she would work to make up the time! Too funny!

Actually it was a good break for work that is so intense and takes such focus and concentration. When we got back to school, the group buckled down and worked that with fervor. I think the entire group was pleased with our results. Even with the work today, the wikis are still just a work in progress. They will not ever be finished, but will continue to be a place where we can house our newest finds to make our work the most efficient and productive. Probably the best product of the day is teachers who have been given the time to really explore each resource and to think through the best ways to organize for the best usability. I am sure this group will continue to work throughout the summer and next year on adding and editing which, after all, is what this idea of a wiki is all about - a collaboration so that the final product is better than any of us could have done alone. Check out our kindergarten and first grade wikis. Let us know what you think!

K-1 Collaboration

Today a group of kindergarten and first grade looping teachers met together to work on continuity between kindergarten and first grade. Each of these teachers, four currently in kindergarten and four currently in first grade, loop back and forth between kindergarten and first so they have intimate knowledge of both grade levels. They started the morning talking about our Reading assessment where we monitor all of the big five reading areas.

Next they looked at the Pacing Guides for kindergarten and first grade. This is our guideline for teachers, a look across the curriculum for each week of the school year. They discussed the Guide that we have had in effect for many years and that we rework every year. We look at what works and what doesn't in each year, how to tie our Pacing Guide into the county's newly adopted Houghton Mifflin Reading Program and the county learning schedule in reading and writing. The teachers spent several hours editing a Pacing Guide that works for our kids at Chets Creek!

After lunch two second grade teachers joined the group as we discussed persuasive writing K-2. As I have written before, the state has added persuasive writing to our writing schedule but without a lot of direction. This group of teachers talked about the standards and goals for each grade and reviewed all of the county materials and the resources we have found through our work. They came up with a global idea of what a final product would look like for each grade level and then divided to write a rubric for each grade. They selected children's books for each grade and then outlined lessons that will be written over the summer and added to our wikis.

It was such a productive day - a day of collaboration. I think it makes each of us feel good when we have heard the voices of our colleagues and addressed issues. I feel so fortunate to work with a leadership group that values time for teachers to work together and to spend time with teachers who enjoy the work and believe that when they work together they come up with a better product that works for kids!

Kindergarten PLC April 2008

Kindergarten teachers met this week for their fourth full day of professional development. They began the day with a demonstration lesson in Math with a twist. Instead of watching one of their peers, they watched a 2nd grade teacher's lesson, Brook Brown, so that they could see where the pieces they are teaching now are going to fit as the children move forward. Michelle Ellis, Kindergarten Math Coach, debriefed with the group.

Teachers each brought a class set of response-to-literature final pieces. They read some of their higher pieces to each other so they could benchmark off each other's work and then were given time to analyze using a rubic to score their entire set of papers. As they had questions they read their papers to peers for a second opinion. This collegial conversation helped all teachers make sure they understand the rubric language.

Teachers also discussed students to be included in a special safety net for the remainder of the year taught by Maria Mallon. Teachers chose 12 students who are on the line between passing and failing for this last push.

The day continued with Randi Timmons, Elizabeth Conte and Rachael Happ sharing the work they have done with pattern books. Based on the work of First Grade Writers, this threesome completed this unit before the rest of the grade level. That put them in a position to share what they have learned. They shared the sequence of lessons that they taught, showed artifacts made with the children, read books that they used for specific patterns, discussed which patterns they taught and why, and shared student work. Front loading this information for the rest of the grade level relieved stress as teachers prepare for the "sprint to the end."

The final component of the day was professional development around poetry which is the last unit we will teach. To provide more structure we looked at the Poetry Unit (Kindergarten Unit #4) from the Denver Project which dovetails easily into our standards-based design. Teachers shared some of their favorite poetry books and some of the lessons they have used to successfully promote poetry. Several teachers talked about the poetry cafes that they used at the end of their poetry unit last year as a celebration.

All in all this day was about wrapping up lessons and previewing curriculum for the final nine weeks. It was a packed day but left teachers with a good idea of what is to come for the remainder of the year. Get ready, get set - GO!

Pacing Guides

We have a kindergarten Pacing Guide that guides a teacher with echoes across the day, giving suggestions for strings of mini-lessons in Read-aloud, Skills Block, Readers' Workshop, Writers' Workshop, Problem of the Day (Calendar Math), Math, and Science (see 3rd nine weeks Kindergarten Pacing Guide below). The Pacing Guide is meant to be just that - a guide to lay out, especially for new teachers, a suggested way to fit everything in during the year. However, we know that classes do not move at the same pace, so teachers have always had the descretion to tweak the Pacing Guide to meet the needs of their own class. If we tell teachers to look at the children's work today to write the lesson for tomorrow, then we have to give them the profession freedom to do that.That is what recently happened in our classroom. As the class is beginning an Author Study of Eric Carle, the teachers have decided to skip and not to do Authors as Mentors in the Writers' Workshop as is suggested in the Pacing Guide. They will pick up the skills in that book in 1st and 2nd grade as the curriculum spirals. This book really depends on author's craft. As the teachers looked at the author's craft in the Eric Carle series of books they decided that this group of books fit better with a study that we read and worked with last year, "Pattern Books" from First Grade Writers by Stephanie Parsons. As Kindergarten and first grade teachers worked through that book last year we decided that the chapter on pattern books could be taught in Kindergarten, but we had a hard time deciding where we could fit it in. This group of teachers think they have found the right fit! So... they will try to meld the Eric Carle Author Study in Readers' Workshop with a study of pattern books in Writer's Workshop.  At the end of this year, all of the kindergarten teachers will get together and discuss their strengths and challenges this year as they write a new and improved Pacing Guide for next year's teachers.

The important thing here is that we trust teachers as professionals, not to turn the pages straight through a Teacher's Manual, but to think deeply about their curriculum, to make informed decision to drive their instruction, to look at the students' work to assess the next step and to reflect as those decisions are to made. That's what real teaching is all about!