Oh, Literacy Stations are 'a' knockin'

OH WHY YES... Yes, I did find a way to make literacy stations work in my third grade classroom! I am Oh so excited about it too! I know, I just did that whole readers workshop post about independent reading and responding and don't totally ignore that because that is STILL the way I'm doing it BUT, I found a way to make stations work just a whittle bit. This is thanks to fourth and ten for the Ah-Ha moment! 

You know when you have those and then you go...um... duh!!! Why on earth didn't I think of that? That's totally fine though--that's why we have these IG accounts, blogs and facebook pages! We get to collaborate and share ideas and become better teachers (this is a whole other post in itself-so. I'm stopping this now).

So, here is the dealio... daily 3! They do two stations: spelling, task cards, word study, read to partner, read to self. But, wait THAT'S FIVE?! Jessica, can you count?! Um... why yes, I can. (I am so in the mood to talk in third person right now).

What we are doing IS THIS:

The kids visit ONLY three: 

Group 1: Spelling Station, Read to Partner, Read to self

Group 2: Word Study, Task Cards, Read to self

Group 3: Read to partner, Word Study, Read to Self

Group 4: Listen to Reading, Spelling Station, Read to Self

Group 5: Task Cards, Listen to Reading, Read to Self

Then, each day I will move each groups cards down (last row up) and the next day they get to a whole new rotation. Now, the independent reading part... notice their all read to self at the end? I plan... on having them start stations RIGHT after recess: Stop them after 2: mini-lesson and readers workshop model. I'll also do guided reading during stations (probably one group). So, yes sometimes they may miss stations-but, in my opinion, what they're learning with me is way more important than what they're doing at this station.

Why am I doing stations like this?

I want students to practice spelling, grammar and be able to read to a partner on a regular basis. I knew I couldn't fit it in everyday. This is perfect because it gives them just enough exposure to practice the concepts AND I don't have to do so much weekly prep for stations. It's basically a win-win situation! So, if you're like me and in a time crunch-then, maybe it'll work for you!

You can grab the station cards you see on my rotation board here!

Let me know if you have any questions! I'll keep updating you on my stations progress throughout the year!

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Text Connections with the iPads!

Today, we had a full day of learning to use the iPads to make movies. I purchased Tunstall's iPad Basics bundle and it inspired me to bring movie making into my reading lesson today! The kids are still working on their video & probably won't be finished until Friday... But, I just couldn't wait to share this with you all!

All last week and into this week we have been learning about how to make meaningful connections to the books we are reading. We've written responses about it, discussed it, modeled it to each other and learned about it some more. So, to end our unit - we are making movies to teach other students! (I may or may not have students show this to another class-depending on how these turn out) ;)

If you want to do a lesson such as this: I highly recommend that you spend a full week on connections - make sure students are writing down lots and lots of connections!

When, I began this lesson I first told students that they were going to be making a movie to show all that they have learned this past week and a half about text connections!
(UPROAR of excitement right here!!)

The students watched a video that I *quickly* created to see what they were going to do:
It isn't super in-depth - I just wanted them to get the idea of what they were doing today.

Here are the steps students followed to brainstorm, organize and create their videos:

1. Pick a book that you made a connection to.

2. Find your response that you wrote about that book.

3. Fill out your brainstorming form:

Students had to answer 4 questions to organize their thoughts: 1. What kind of connection did you make? 2. Explain the connection. 3. What part of the book made you make the connection? 4. Explain the connection you had to the book.

4. Write your script: Not all students did this because they felt that they could just use their brainstorming form. Some students wrote scripts and it helped them organize their thoughts - others did not and they did just fine!

After they did all that jazzy stuff, they followed these simple steps:

As I introduced these steps and explained the activity, I had students actually video tape me & I'm so mad right now that I forgot to e-mail it to myself (I'll add me teaching-in tomorrow)... So, come check back for that!

This is where the classroom got BUSY! If you would have walked in - you would have thought I was a crazy lady.. but, oh my goodness - these kids learned WAY MORE than just reading!

They were collaborating, problem-solving and using technology! 

All of this on top of their reading skill that they were practicing?! Um... just pure amazing!

Can you really ask for a better picture than the one above?!

Or this one? You can literally see them collaborating in this picture! We have serious faces, hand motions and listening ears!

 This is the beautiful part of this all: If the students forgot how to do something, they went to the computer and watched either the video I made or Reagan made to answer their questions on how to do something. I could literally facilitate today!  I believe this is what's called 'blended learning!'

I hope you can use a lesson such as this in your own classroom! I'll be sure to do many more of these lessons!

Don't forget to check back tomorrow for the video of me teaching the lesson to the kids! That'll make everything much clearer!

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Math Workshop this year!

Hey all! So, a few days ago I shared how Reading Workshop runs in my classroom and today I'm going to share how I've been math workshop-ping it up in this year with the kids! If you are a K-2 teacher and you are curious about math workshop then you're in luck! I did a post last year for my first grade classroom on math workshop and you can find it here.

My math workshop from 1st to 3rd, honestly, isn't that drastically different. You all know how much I love hands on stuff and well... I am going to keep the hands on stuff present in my third grade classroom... the kids LOVE IT!! I always say they love stuff... ha ha - maybe I should take a survey?! Anywho... Here is how it runs this yea: (so far) ;)

Here is my daily schedule too for this year in case you were wondering about my day.

This lesson was on number patterns and you can grab it here.

 You can find these football math stations here.

If you haven't heard of adapted mind, then... um... you might want to take a look.

It's awesome! It has videos that teach kids concepts at their levels. So, if they need review...ba boom- there it is. If they're ready to move on.. KaPOW... it does it for you! AND!!!!... You can to see their progress... AND they're super motivated because they earn cool badges!!

Another cool online math program is called Ten Marks... this is totally free AND directly correlates to the Common Core! So, you are doing standard 3.OA.9?... Guess what... there are practice questions for the students to do. I assign this as homework! It's awesome, easy AND again, you can see their progress! I'll be posted more about these two soon: but, until then... I would check this out ASAP if I were you!

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My Readers Workshop

Reading Workshop was something that was SO HARD for me to wrap my head around. I'm coming from first grade, stations-movement, hands-on ... always on the go, go, go. Now, I'm in third grade and their reading and working stamina is so well developed. My kids LOVE to read. I've been battling with myself, "Should I do stations, should I do readers workshop or can I combine them in some way?" I'm still in experimental mode, but, I am feeling like it's all coming together. So, here a bit of what I'm doing in my classroom!

If you are wondering what I am using right now to guide my instruction it is......

THIS...

Ashleigh Swinford created an amazing guided reading bundle! I highly recommend this!

It is helping me SO MUCH this year! It gives me a timeline, texts to use and a variety of ways to teach the concepts. The kids are loving it, they're learning from it and so am I!

I also like to visit this webpage when I have questions: http://www.readersworkshop.org/
This video is awesome to really see readers workshop in action:

I'll be back to share more about my Readers Workshops, but, for now... I hope this can help you out!! :)

Have a happy weekend!!

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Our Second Week!!

Last week went by so quickly! We read a lot of books, responded to text, discussed rules of reading and writers workshop and began writing in our journals. That's a mouthful!

We are GREAT at independently reading and writing! The students made this transition so easy so we were able to jump right in to learning! We learned that while we read, we need to always THINK! I read the students a story and during the read aloud students wrote down thoughts and questions about the book. 

Here is the chart we created together! It was very neat to see how many of the students had the same thoughts and/or questions about the book!

We also read, "The Wednesday Surprise" and worked on responding to text. I wanted to see how well students responded to text. We simply read the book, discussed it and then I had students choose two questions to answer. 

Math workshop was in full swing this week! It's amazing how well these students grasp rules and procedures! We can just jump right on it and start learning!! We'll see a lot of growth this year!

We continued to work on number patterns to review number sense! 

Everything we used this week was from my Teach Me Math - Number Patterns unit!

On Friday, we completed a number pattern craft that is now displayed in our hallway!

We worked on coming up with our own number patterns when given a rule to follow.

We were working on number pattern task cards.

Students began to explore the base 10 blocks!

THIS WEEK WE ARE LEARNING...

 In Reading: We are going to be learning how to use sensory details (5 senses) to create mental images while we read a story. 

In Writing: We are taking a step back and telling oral stories to classmates. We need to focus on story elements and identify WHAT it takes to actual make a narrative (story about themselves) story. We will be charting the different elements and we'll use that chart as a reference through out narrative writing unit.

In Math: We are discussing/reviewing place value to the 100 and 1,000's place. Then, we are learning about standard form, written form and expanded form numbers!

In Grammar: I've noticed that we are forgetting to use correct punctuation or even using punctuation at the end of sentences. We are going to take this week to review the three different ending punctuation marks. We will work on using them through interactive activities! 

In Science/Health: We are learning how to take care of ourselves through healthy eating, exercising and making good choices.

In Phonics: We are getting our first list of spelling words. We are taking a pre-test tomorrow. If students get certain words correct and I feel they are ready for a challenge then, they'll 'shop' for new words. They'll bring home their spelling lists tomorrow and our tests will be Friday.

Vocabulary: We are reading the book, "Twilight Comes Twice." We are pulling new words out of the text to expand our vocabulary. Each day we will learn and use two new words. Friday, we are taking a quiz over the words. (all together this week) The words will be sent home tomorrow.

Yes... busy, busy week!!! :) 

Lots of learning and fun will be happening this week!

This is our focus wall. This is where learning targets are stated so students know what they're learning each day.

We *might* begin to learn about our reading workshop rotations?! This is a more interactive way to get students engaged in a variety of texts and to allow them to work on different comprehension strategies each day!

You can grab the station cards here!

I hope you have a great week!!!

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