The Science Journal

Today in Science we talked about the instruments and tools that Scientists use.  Mrs. Ruark had prepared a PowerPoint of Scientists' instruments with her pet pugs!  The children love seeing pictures of her animals!  They know them by name, so they really enjoyed the PowerPoint.  After discussing each slide and how a Scientist might use each instrument, the children were given a label of the essential question to put at the top of the page of their Science journal.  Then students were given the directions to divide the paper into fourths with lines and to draw a Scientific instrument in each block.  Below are some of the children's renderings.

 goggles - protect your eyes                    scissors-cut

ruler - measure                               computer

(test tube)                                 beaker - mix

(5 senses) touch,feels, taste, ear-hear, nose-smelling, eye-see                  sticky notes 

ruler                  thermometer

microscope           (5 senses) hearing, feeling, touch, smell, tasting

scissors-cut                test tubes-you test

goggles-protect                    hand lenses

Ants on a Log

Since our theme this year is "Recipe for Success,"  it seemed the perfect time to think about using recipes to introduce procedural writing.  Several years ago, we read Tony Stead's Is That A Fact? and decided to incorporate one of his suggested units for teaching "how to" or procedural writing.  We used cooking projects and then writing about the experience  to teach children to identify ingredients and then the step-by-step procedure for writing a recipe.  That was such a fun unit.  After that year, we continued to do a few cooking projects each year but relied more on Lucy Calkins' Units of Study and folded procedural writing into non-fiction report writing.  We began with having students write a "how to" about something they knew how to do well, such as Karate or making a paper airplane or jumping rope.  Then we moved to including a "how to"  in an "All About" report such as including a "how to hit a ball" in a report "All About Baseball."

This year, however, with our cooking theme, we decided to add that cooking element once again in a more frequent way.  We'll still do our more traditional "how to" unit interwoven in our larger non-fiction writing, but by "cooking" every other Wednesday we'll have a bank of cooking experiences and recipes as the foundation for those beginning "how tos" when we begin our large unit of non-fiction writing in January.

Our first cooking experience was "First Grade Trail Mix."  Today it was "Ants on a Log."  The projects are simple for these first recipes as you can see in the writing below.  We are expecting our students to be able to give the recipe a title, list the ingredients, give the few simple steps and write an opinion to close.  We provide paper specific to this kind of writing.  As the year progresses, the recipes will become a little more complex and the writing will include more detail and description.  But, for today, we enjoyed our healthy snack and our writing lesson!

Translation:

Ants on a Log

Ingredients:

peanut butter

celery

raisins

First you get the celery.  Then you put the peanut butter on the celery.

Next you put raisin on your celery.

Then you eat it.  It was yummy.  I will eat it again.





The Ultimate Kevin Henkes Author Study

I am so pleased to offer my first units on Teachers Pay Teachers. 

For most of my career, I have believed that we should give "for free" the work that we do.  I have felt a moral obligation to share the cooperative, collaborative lessons, videos and artifacts that we have created together as grade level teachers and as a school.  I still feel like that.  When time is given during the school day for teachers to collaborate, imagine and develop ideas and artifacts, I really do feel like we have no other choice than to share when we learn together with anyone that is interested.  For most years, our school was able to give teachers common planning time to meet and discuss and visit with each other.  We were able to carve out time to collaborate every week and then also had time for full days of study.  There is no question that the time given to us on such a regular basis, shaped my thinking and all that I did for years.

However, as budgets have tightened and as RtI has sucked up every free minute, that time to collaborate has dried up.  Teacher planning time is at an all time low.  Common planning time became non-existent last year for the first time - and our school held on to it long after others had to give it up.  The few minutes that co-teachers could discuss the day and make changes to afternoon plans after the morning while they grabbed something to eat were eliminated when teachers had to supervise lunch and recess duty at our school.  Professional development now has to be scheduled during after school meetings that run until 5:00 - something our school never had to do before... but is within the contract.  Up until last year, the school could hire substitutes to carve out time for professional development - for teachers to collaborate and write authentic lessons and experiences,  but last year the number of days that a teacher could take for professional development became limited. Understand - I have a Principal that has stretched every dollar and who held sacred our collaborative planning for as long as she could.   So... the bottom line is that we no longer enjoy collaborative, cooperative time to imagine and dream.  What few minutes we can grab are spent on management and safety - our most basic needs.

That doesn't mean that teachers don't still collaborate, but now it's over the phone while fixing dinner or on Saturday mornings when they grab a cup of coffee together or it's through e-mail or even Facebook!  But... it's off the clock.  So as I have developed more materials in the vacuum of my own home, I have become less committed to offering the materials for free...  The time to create is taken out of my own time which is very different than the artifacts we once created on the school's time together.  I won't add information about teacher salaries remaining the same over the years... that's another post!

With that said,  I am very excited about this Kevin Henkes Author Study that I have rewritten with the Common Core in mind and a Kevin Henkes Vocabulary to go along with it.  This is absolutely some of my best work.  These resources are linked to many other resources that we  have collaborated to produce and are still housed FOR FREE on our grade level wiki.  I hope that you will visit the store and let me know what you think!

P.S. - Don't you love the artwork?  It was done by second grader, Lexie Holtsman (daughter of Chets Creek teacher Melanie Holtsman).  Wouldn't surprise me if she becomes a famous artist some day!

It's a new Science year!

Our county has a new curriculum in Science.  While we still haven't had our first day of professional development to overview the materials (and with the lack of planning time, I wonder when that time might finally come!) I am fortunate to teach with our grade level's Science lead, so... even though the grade level hasn't had the training, our Science lead has. Now, to be fair, the standards have not changed - only the curriculum. 

There has been a push in Science for several years - since the state began to test Science in fifth grade.  It is obvious that our children can't learn all the Science that they need to know in 5th grade unless some of the foundation is built in K-4th.   However, we know that most primary teachers do not consider themselves Science experts.  Most would consider themselves reading experts and maybe a few, Math experts, but very few have an extensive Science background.  They took the standard Science Methods course that was required, but unless they just have a natural interest in some area of Science, their knowledge is generally rather shallow.  Once again I am lucky to teach with a second career teacher who has an extensive Science background.  I realize everyday how much more she knows than I do when she expands on the Science "word of the day" that is introduced every day on our school-wide television "wake up" program.  Off the top of her head she can  expand on the word  and its use in a Scientific context.  Often I learn as much as the children.

Today we had our first investigation around a Five Senses unit.  Items were put in a sock and then the sock was knotted so that the students had to feel the object, describe it and then try to identify it.  This is the kind of activity that our children love.  The new curriculum comes with workbooks which I normally am not a fan, but in this case where the investigations are new to teachers, the workbooks form a support of how to work through the investigation.  I would think that after using the workbooks this year, that we will be able to transfer to Science journals next year.

This Science curriculum also comes with readers that are at, above and below the expected first grade reading levels.  I'm not sure exactly how they are meant to to used but the idea of having the readers opens lots of possibilities!  This is really going to be a great year in Science!

We Begin Skills Centers, 2012

Once a week on Wednesdays, the children participate in Skill Centers.  We take the phonics skills we are working on and each of our six tables gets a basket of interactive activities.  The six centers for the next six weeks include writing cvc words from pictures on white boards (this student also likes to draw the picture, which is not required!),

short vowel slides,

writing "real" words given short vowels in a cvc pattern (this is an FCRR activity) - which vowel a-e-i-o-u- make the word g_t ?

matching pictures to initial blends and digraphs, a Concentration game using the first nine weeks sight words and writing initial blends for picture words.  Each week the students work with one of the activities for about 20 minutes.  The next Wednesday they get to work with a different activity until they have worked with all six. This is really a fun time for the students!  And it gives teachers a chance to work with individual students in areas where they might struggle.  Not bad!

The Highs and Lows of Technology

We took our first graders to the computer lab today for the first time this year.  We took them a couple of times last year but just teaching kindergartners to sign in is close to impossible.  In our county students use a 9-10 number/letter username and a 9-10 number/letter password.  Just getting youngsters to follow the sequence of the letters - and did I mention that some are uppercase and some lowercase so you have teach them to use the shift key - is a tedious task.  Now granted, once they learn the username and password at least they keep the same one for the duration of their time in Duval County.

In Kindergarten it is hardly worth the time it takes to get kids signed in, but by the time students reach first grade, there are several programs that the county has paid big money for that really can supplement the curriculum.  So... off we go to the computer lab to practice turning on the computer and signing in...

We have to sign up for the lab, but the calendar was blank today and probably will be until the lab is filled for mandatory testing.  Regardless, when we troop up the stairs  - a first for most of our students - we find another small group in the room - not using the computers, just using the room.  As sweetly as I can muster, I say that we came because we didn't see anyone on the calendar.  We even checked with the front office to be sure.  She, just as sweetly, says the room should have been signed out to her every day from 9-10 to work with her small group.  My line of first graders out the door are getting antsy as she kindly agrees to find another place to work.  Good thing too because I have promised these pint-sized learners an exciting hour!

We never really have enough computers  in the lab for every child to have their own, especially when our numbers are so swollen at the beginning of the year.  You can see the disappointment as children are asked to share... And, as always a few of the computers don't work.  While I'm sure this happens everywhere, younger students really have not developed much patience and tolerance for broken machines and again, even  a few more have to double up. 

As I am leaning over computers to help students realize that the 1 they typed is actually a lowercase l and the o is really the number zero 0 and not the letter O, the sweat rolls down my back.  It's bloody hot in this lab, but I guess no one has used the Lab this year to report that the air is not working properly.  Why is it that I seem to be the only one sweating as the children are totally engrossed with the task at hand!  Of course, there are several trying to sign in once, throwing their hands up in utter exasperation and complaining that their computer is broken.  I want to yell - IT'S USER ERROR! - but instead I smile and go the next student that has a hand raised.

Finally - and I do mean F-I-N-A-L-L-Y - we get to the site - SRA Number Worlds - and are faced with another username and password - a different one, of course. We have been working for an hour now when a few students finally reach the game stage.  Of course, now we realize that most of the computers don't have headphones.  The noise level begins to rise so... we congratulate the children for getting the computers turned on and teach them how to sign off!  Are we really going to call this Math today?

It was an exhausting lesson, but most of the children leave with smiles.  The first students sign in on our four computers when we get back to the room and we're off and running.  We've assigned a few computer "experts" to help friends get signed on so we are not disturbed every time a child wants to use the computers throughout the day. So... with all the barriers and all the bumps along the way, why do we make the effort?  Because this generation of children will be digital natives and will grow up in a world that we can't even imagine, and also because... it's part of our first grade standards!

Reviewing Student Work

I brought my writing folders home over the long Labor Day weekend -  all 35 folders! - so I could analyze student writing and get a good idea of how much of the teaching I have been doing is getting through.  I also want to try to learn each author as a writer.  As I go through each folder I have been writing and printing notes on labels to post in our Writer's Notebook under each child's name.  This is an example of one child's note:



Name      9/1/12       Pattern Books 
+good spacing with sight words spelled correctly and phonetic spelling of unknown words
+good fluency
+has started "Have you seen my mom?..." pattern book

-work on finishing pattern and creating a "changed up" ending
-add question mark to "Have you seen my mom?" and capital after the question mark

These notes are a little more thoughtful and longer than I am usually able to write after a conference because we always have a number of children waiting for a conference and the time seems so short... so my jots during the Writers' Workshop are quicker and more to the point.  I do like the + (plus) to indicate noticings and things they already do well and the - (minus) to indicate next things to work on.  Because we have more than one teacher using our Writers' Notebook, we generally write our notes on sticky notes during the Workshop and add them at the end of the day under each child's name.  When you have more than one teacher involved, it is extremely important to make sure you know what the other teacher(s) may have talked to the student about the last time they had a conference so it's important to review the notes before each conference.  The Writer's Notebook becomes our way of detailing the progress of each learner.

I learned so much about these writers... As I was reading the pattern books I came across one student's pattern book that broke my heart.

Translation:
My Dad does not have a job.
My mom does not have a job.
My brother does not have a job.
I do not have a job.
My uncle does not have a job.
Does anyone have a job?

The pattern is perfect.  The message... heartbreaking.