The Writing Center

      Writing is a great center for kids. It gives them a chance to practice their newfound skills in another setting besides writing workshop (because, of course, we want kids to think of their skills in isolation) and explore different types and purposes for writing. This is also a great time for students to practice writing to a prompt. In writing workshop they usually have the freedom to use their own ideas and choose their topics. Almost all writing tests students will ever take, though, involve prompts so it is important that they are able to do that, too. Prompts can be as vague or specific as you’d like. Many time Kindergartners struggle with staying on one topic and this is a skill you can reinforce in your writing mini-lessons. Some teachers like to write prompts and post them in the writing area while others like to give slightly more choice. One of my favorite compromises was to make posters with similar themes, ex: Clifford, Froggy, Curious George, Olivia, and Chester Raccoon and then give a prompt such as “Please write a story about one of these characters and the adventure they have.” By this time we’ve talking about plot, setting, character, so the students have ideas about what their story’s shape will look like. You could make similar posters for setting, problem, or theme.

          The writing center can also encourage students to use functional forms of writing as well. They can write letters to friends and family, make shopping lists for the grocery store, or write a diary or journal entry about their day.

          The writing center’s location is extremely important. Anchor charts, word walls, picture dictionaries, samples of good and bad student work, idea charts, sound charts, pencils, crayons, erasers, paper choices, and handwriting charts should all be close by and easily seen. If you have the resources, students can also publish their writing on the computer through word processing programs. Many kids programs, such as Kid Keys, allow students to illustrate their work on the computer as well.

          In addition to your “I Can” chart you may also want to work with your students in interactive writing to make a chart about writing topic ideas. It will be important for you to model the different forms of writing children may do (you may only want to start with one or two choices), how to sound out words, how to use your classroom resources, taking out and putting materials away, sharing with peers, how to use pictures dictionaries, and what to do with finished and unfinished work. Many of these mini-lessons will also be replicated during your writing block, but you may find you need to reinforce them during literacy centers.

Writing Ideas

          -writing prompts

          -free choice

          -meaningful story recall

          -meaningful story predictions

          -write lists, cards, letters, stories, journal entries, books, surveys

          -write descriptions for pictures

The Pursuit of “Hoppy”ness.

Many teachers have a theme or “thing” that defines their classroom. For the room next door it is turtles, down the hall it’s cats, across the way it’s the ocean. Lots of times there is some alliteration like Smith’s Stars or Davis’ Dogs. I don’t have a thing – except I like my room to be neat (which probably doesn’t count). So one year while I was frantically stocking up on everything I needed (and many things I didn’t need) from the local teacher store, I saw that there was a line of frog products from stickers to name plates to decorations to notepads. Now, I don’t like frogs and probably if I saw one would steer clear, but there’s something about Carson-Dellosa because they make everything look happy.

So I loaded up my cart with all the frog essentials and decided my welcome to kindergarten display would be called “I’m very HOPPY you’re here!” I bought two big frogs and a bunch of smaller frogs for each child’s name to go in the “pond.” If I had been thinking, tadpoles would have been cuter, but I’m not sure most kids would have gotten the joke. (Actually, some of my parents probably wouldn’t have either.)

Before school began I worked on my welcome display, which as I've mentioned, is one of my favorite parts of the year. I made a cute pond from blue bulletin board paper and then cut green paper in a circle around the blue "pond" to look like grass and flowers. Inside the pond were some lilly pads and fish. I placed the two big frogs on the lilly pads and put mine and my assistant’s names on each one and then the new kindergartners names on the little frogs.

I did like the display, but the frog theme never caught on for me in the room. That’s OK; in fact I’m a little “hoppy” it didn’t! (Sorry – had to)

Mary Wore Her Red Dress, Red Dress, Red Dress

When I was student teaching I worked with a lady who I think had been a Kindergarten teacher for about a million years and she was still fabulous at it. At the start of the year she began with a theme on colors. Although most of her kids had mastered colors several years ago she always liked to start with something they felt confident with and activities to learn each other’s names. One of these activities was developed around the book Mary Wore Her Red Dress.

In the story Mary Wore Her Red Dress, animals are heading to a birthday party. The book begins in black and white and as characters are introduced it is around their clothing and its color. So as Mary enters on the first page with her red dress all the other images on the page that are red start to appear and so it continues through the end of the book when finally all the colors are revealed. There is a song that goes with the book as well and you can usually purchase the book with an accompanying tape or CD.

After reading the book, the class would make their own big book to mirror the story. Ahead of time, we had cut out items of clothing (shirts, dresses, shorts, pants) in a variety of colors. Each child would then pick one piece of clothing and take it back to their seat. They would glue the clothing to a large piece of paper and then draw the rest of their body around the clothing. (This took a little modeling before they started, but they actually do a great job.)

Then at the bottom of the piece of paper we would write a sentence like in the text, such as “Peter wore his yellow shirt.” When all the pages were done, we would laminate them and make them into a class big book. The next day we would read our class big book together and “sing” the book like we did with Mary Wore Her Red Dress.

The kids love this big book and it was a class favorite they returned to over and over again to read in the library. Not only did it help some friends who may be shaky with colors, but more importantly it was another fun way to learn everyone’s name at the start of the year.

The Beautiful Kinder-Garden

One of the most played up takes on Kindergarten is, of course, the Kinder "garden." Like most teachers I have planted the Kindergarden outside, but since I do not have a green thumb I am always more excited about plants and flowers I can’t kill.

I was always amazed at how much students grew in Kindergarten. Sometimes it seemed they just shot up over night! So a few years ago I started measuring kids during the first week of school. I would then cut a strip of green construction paper (about 2 inches wide) to their height. They would then decorate a large flower to put at the top of this green stem and finally add some leaves to the sides. Since I was the last room in the hallway, there was a stretch of about fifteen feet outside my door to the end of the hall that wasn’t really used. After our flowers were done, I would “plant” them outside in the hallway for the year. During the last few weeks of school I would measure the kids again and cut another strip of green construction paper to their height. This made their second stem. Again they would decorate a flower for the top and add leaves or other details. We would “plant” these flowers next to the ones from the start of school to see how much our garden had grown and at the end of the year the students took home both flowers from their “kindergarden.”

The Big Book Center

Big books easily has the chance to become a favorite center! It is one of the easiest to maintain and gives students a high level of reading support since they are books you have completed in shared reading. I do one big book each week as part of my shared reading. At the end of the week, I place the big book in our laundry basket and the students were then allowed to use it as part of their big book center. (Lakeshore and other education companies offer beautiful storage furniture for big books. A cheaper option is to purchase the type of laundry basket that has the very tall sides. It is a cheaper alternative and a great way to store big books. Also, many of them come with wheel which is great perk for moving it when it gets full of books!)

In the big book center I often see students working independently or cooperatively to play “teacher.” They echo teacher talk and even some of the concepts, vocabulary, and ideas I’ve introduced. The fabulous part is as you teach shared reading lessons this was the model for the big book center.  

There are many things students can do in big book center. They can explore concepts about print through one to one matching, return sweep, left – right, top – bottom, or identify parts of the book. A great way to facilitate this is to provide pointers for your students. Pointers can be purchased at almost any teacher store but they can also be made easily from supplies from any craft store. By gluing a cute animal or figure on the end of a dowel rod you have a pointer. Other things that can be used are magic wands, chopsticks, rulers, Halloween witch fingers, or flyswatters.

While students are reading big books, there should be a higher level of fluency and phrasing. This is due to the previous work in shared reading. During shared reading I spend time encouraging students to run the pointer under the words instead of pointing to each one, one at a time. By moving the pointer faster and sweeping their eyes, this can help with their reading pace, fluency, and intonation.

As I mentioned earlier, students will try to model your behavior. They may ask their partners to find high frequency words, ask them questions about the text, correct each others errors, read in “character voices”, highlight key words, cover certain words with post its and write the correct word or synonym on top, discuss their favorite parts of the book, or turn the big book into readers theatre. Students may even carry activities over from the library center. They may mark text connections with sticky notes or share out a book review for the class. Another idea for Big Book activities is to place sticky notes inside each book cover with words from the book. Students can find the words in the book and cover them with the sticky notes and then reread the book. If sticky notes aren’t working, clip a ziplock back to the back cover with index cards with the words already written on them. Highlighter tape, post it notes, and markers can be stored in the bag as well.

There are several key areas to look at in big books before deciding to introduce them in shared reading and then a center. First, is this a picture book that has just been made big? Many publishers take their picture books and blow them up for quick sells. Although these are good for read alouds as they do truly let all students see the pictures, these are not good for shared reading. Shared reading texts should be something that is slightly above the average reading level of the class. Since the teacher provides a high level of support, it is not necessary that students can read it on their own the first time. I look for a book with familiar characters, is enjoyable year after year, read after read, has rhythm, rhyme and repetition, contains several key high frequency words that repeat over and over again, can be turned into a readers theatre piece, and has text large enough to be read by all students. Many of Joy Cowley books emulate these concepts. A personal favorite of mine is Mrs. Wishy-Washy. Through the year kids LOVE this book. They will read it over and over and over again. This book has endless opportunities for readers’ theatre, high frequency words, and class projects. I wrote out this entire story on sentence strips and we would go around to all the Kindergarten classes sharing the story while we acted it out. Another benefit of Mrs. Wishy-Washy is there are series of books with her, her cow, duck, and pig while she constantly tried to keep them clean. An example of a poor choice for shared reading and big book center might be If You Give A Mouse a Cookie or Brave Irene because of the high level of the text. 

Although I will spend time modeling this center throughout the year, I always make an “I Can” chart during shared or interactive writing with what students may do in this center. Mini-lessons on topics such as on book care, use of highlighter tape, post its, taking big books out and putting them away, and pointer use, as there is always someone who wants to turn it into a sword, can go a long way too in helping the center run smoothly.

Remember to include your class-made big books in the center as well. Almost any big book has a component that can be rewritten by your class or continued. By publishing your classes work, you can ensure there is always something for all your readers to read.

Anno’s Counting Book

One of my favorite changes recently in math adoption programs is the addition of quality literacy materials. In my district’s current math adoption, each teacher received a series of math texts to be used as read alouds and a big book. I love that publishers are starting to understand content area integration and providing support and materials to facilitate that process. 

Starting in the early 2000’s, when I first starting using the math adoption Investigations, I will admit it took me a while to really understand how to implement it in the classroom. I was used to very traditional math programs and Investigations definitely is not traditional. One of my favorite parts of the series were the trade books and the activities that aligned with them. Classic texts like Mouse Count added a fun twist on traditional math instruction. In Kindergarten, one of the most fundamental pieces of the curriculum is numeracy and helping children develop a deep understanding of numbers and number concept that will help them as they move onto more complicated topics in the future.

In Anno’s Counting Book, the story develops as through each page more images are added, but always in sets equal to the number for the page. For example “Page 0” is completely blank. Then, on “Page 1” there is one house, one sun, one tree, etc. I used this book a ton throughout the year and finally went on Amazon and bought the big book. Last time I check it was around $16.00, which, as big books go, is pretty decent.

In the Investigations series, after reading Anno’s Counting Book, the students make their own counting book named after themselves. They have pages similar to Anno’s, and as they move through the book they complete it in the same way. So for example, on “Page 2” the student mike draw two chairs, two pencils, two students, two dogs, etc. The point is that they are not just making on representation of the number, but really understanding the number as a set.

As an adult, I think back on my own math instruction as a child and remember how I easily picked up addition, subtraction, multiplication, division, but I really was just memorizing facts. One of the best gifts we can give kids early is a deep understanding of numbers and I love finding books that can help me do that.

A Pooh-fect Time of Year

As a kid I loved Winnie the Pooh, probably because my grandmother (who watched me during the day) thought Winnie the Pooh was the best. As I was older and babysitting for family and friends, I used to watch The New Adventures of Winnie the Pooh and even had a few laughs then. One year for my outside display I decided to create a Pooh theme. After finding that you cannot purchase large prints or posters of the Pooh characters I found black and white images and copied them on transparencies and used the overhead to blow them up to “life size.” I traced each character on its primary color (e.g., orange for Tigger or pink for Piglet) and then used markers, construction paper, and paint to color the other key to match. After I had my life size shapes I put them outside in the hallway on top of a “100 Acre Forest” scene I had created from bulletin board paper (basically a blue background, green grass, and a tree trunk). I then placed the characters around the display so they looked like they were having a great time and wrote on the top “It’s a Pooh-fect Time to be in Kindergarten.” Around Pooh and his honey pot I glued bees with each child’s name on it.

As excited as I was about Pooh and his friends, I learned that year that Dora was much bigger than Pooh with my class. Something like “It’s a Dora-ific Time to be in Kindergarten” may have been more popular, but at least I enjoyed my trip down memory lane. J

Student Picture Displays

For several years I displayed students work by attaching it to the cork strips or taping it to the walls. I found though that sometimes, in the effort of putting it up and taking it down I might damage the work or it took so long to change the display it became outdated. I decided I needed a quick (but nice) way to display each student’s work in the hallway. The next year I took blue, green, and purple 12”x18” pieces of construction paper (the calming colors!) and attached them outside my wall in a rectangle. To account for new students arriving during the school year, I generally made it about seven pieces across and four down for 28 squares. I left a space between each piece of paper to avoid looking like it was a patchwork quilt.

At the start of the school year, I would take each child’s picture. I usually made several copies since we would use them on our name chart and for other projects through the year, but one picture I would glue at the top of the large construction paper sheet. Then I would print each child’s name with a fun font and attach two paper clips, spaced about 6 inches apart under the photo. That way whenever I wanted to display a project or a student’s super work I would run out to the hall and attach it to their construction paper page using the clothes pins. Anyone who came down the hallway could easily see whose project or paper it was by the name and the picture. Because it was so easy to use I was able to constantly keep it updated and have current work out in the hallway. A win-win for everyone.

Chair Pockets

When I started teaching Kindergarten in a new school I went in early over the summer to meet some of the teachers who would be on my team. When I walked into T’s classroom, I saw she had chair pockets for each of her students’ chairs. In the chair pocket was the child’s journal and their bag of crayons. T explained that by each child keeping their crayons in a ziplock bag labeled with their name it avoided fights over crayon colors and the destruction of the crayon boxes that typically happens within the first millisecond of being touched. Also, not having to include transition time for looking for and finding journals and then returning back to their seat reduced transition time during the writing block or when children chose to write after finishing their center activities. The first thing I thought was, “YES! No more crayon boxes!” and the second thing I thought was “I must have these.”

T had actually paid a fair amount for hers and being the “frugal” person I am, I checked them out and thought – huh, I can make these. After all, I did get an A in middle school home ec. Long story short, by the time I bought the fabric, matching thread, and – wait for it – a sewing machine, I am not sure I saved any money. Fortunately, though, the chair pockets are actually pretty easy to make and basically only took about a day to make 30 or so.

To make a chair pocket you want to first make sure that your fabric is wide enough to cover the width of the chair plus about two/three inches. Depending on the length you want the chair pockets to be, I measured from the top of the chair to about six inches or from the floor and doubled it. This gave me enough material to cover the back of the chair and the “fold up” where the materials are stored. For my kid size chairs, the rectangle of material generally was about 16 inches wide and about 48 inches long.

The first thing is to hem the two edges. Lay the rectangle of fabric down. Take one short side and fold the hem up, then take the other short side and fold the hem down. Sew the hems. Now lay the fabric down again. Measure to the middle of the fabric on the long side and mark with a pin. Fold one side of the fabric to the middle and pin the edges (the hem should be facing up). Then turn the fabric over and fold the other side of the fabric to the middle and pin the edges (again the hem should be facing up). Run a line of pins down the outer edges to secure the fabric together. It should almost look like an “S” if you look at it sideways. Run the sewing machine down each edge. You have been sewing on the “wrong side” of the fabric. Now turn it right side out and you have a chair pocket! You may want to play with the length, width or format, so I always took a chair home with me to try it out right away so I didn’t have to wait until I went back to school to see if it worked.

As you can see in the picture, I am really into colors and my tables are color coded. The blue table has blue chair pockets, a blue table canister, blue matting under their name tag, and blue matting under their behavior chart. I even had blue pencils and blue erasers one year. It is pretty hard to forget which color table you sit at. When looking for fabrics, look for a pretty thick fabric that will hold together well. Since I wanted different colors for my fabric, I was a little more limited in my choice, but T’s are a thick fabric with a heavy weight as compared to mine that were more cottony. I generally have to replace mine about every two to three years, while T’s have lasted at least six. Finally, make sure you get a washable fabric as I take mine home about two times each year to spruce them up and erase the beautiful crayon marks that have somehow magically appeared. Isn’t that funny how that happens?

Hot Town Summer in the City!

A few years ago I stumbled upon the website kizclub.com. On the website they have a ton of activities, crafts, games, and lessons and best of all it is completely and totally free. Music to my ears and bank account! The crafts are some of my favorite and are easy to use since the blackline masters are always provided. One of my favorite crafts for the summer is the Fancy Sunglasses. The website offers a color pattern and a black and white pattern. I recommend printing the pattern on cardstock since that helps with the durability of the glasses. The website recommends you then use colored cellophane or plastic wrap for the lenses of the glasses. I use both hot glue and white glue and both seem to work well to attach the cellophane to the glasses but you want to make sure to be careful with the white glue as it can smear.

The kids love to wear the sunglasses outside and will actually last for a while since they are almost unbreakable! Every year I take a class picture of us in our shades – me and my stylin’ group of students. J

Self Sustained Reading

Today I learned more about the Self-Selected Reading Block (SSR) in my new, used Four Blocks book. In the introduction the authors share that SSR ensures all students experience daily-read alouds and time for reading books of their choice and on their own level – which is an idea I really like. Too many kids do not have the opportunity or desire to read at home and we know that continued reading makes you a better reader.

The SSR is made up of four big components: (1) Teacher read aloud to begin the block, (2) Children reading independently books of their own choosing, (3) Teacher conferencing, and (4) Sharing or reader’s chair.

The first section is the read aloud, which we know is a huge part, or should be, a huge part of any classroom for modeling, developing language skills, serving as mentor texts, reviewing comprehension skills and strategies, building background knowledge, learning new information – and of course the list goes on. What I liked that the authors mentioned was the scary lack of non-fiction or informational books as part of read alouds. I think this stems from the root of what makes us want to be teachers. As a kid playing school, which were the books I modeled reading aloud? Fiction! And, of course, I had to read it just like my teacher and librarian did by holding the book so my “students” could see the pictures! As teachers I think we loved the classic stories and can’t wait to share them with our students, however, not only is the collection of quality children’s non-fiction growing, but students routinely show they love non-fiction! I really have to make a conscious effort to make sure I am pairing fiction and non-fiction texts in the classroom to meet all my students’ needs and interests.

The second and third sessions, which occur concurrently, are the student’s independent reading and teacher conferencing. In the book, the authors share that students may participate in SSR by reading from collections of texts or rotating through centers that have a clear reading focus (e.g., big book center, magazine center, author study center, etc.) This of course differs from say, the Daily Five where you include writing and word work as part of your literacy centers.

During this time students may select the texts they read. The goal of course is that they are selecting texts on their reading level and aligned to their interests. Maybe because I taught younger grades, but I found my students had a really hard time finding an appropriate book in a sea of choices. Eventually I divided my reading centers into two separate centers. When students were at the “Independent Reading” center, they would get their book box (cardboard magazine files I bought online) which contained all the books they had read over the past few weeks in guided reading and their reader’s notebook. They had complete choice about which books to read, but that way I knew that at least in that center the students were reading books at their independent level. Then I created a “Library” center where students could read in the library, which contained books sorted by theme, topic, genre, and select whatever book they wanted to read. This allowed students the free choice and opportunity that was important as well. Although it may not be the best strategy altogether, this way I was assured that students were getting exposure to books on their level and books they were interested in.

Since I was always pulling guided reading groups, I never really got to conference with my students during independent reading or library center. In Four Books, the authors suggest that your conferencing focus on the child and their reading development since this is one of the few 1-1 times you have with that child that day. The basic conference procedures includes having the child read a page or two to assess if the book is on the appropriate instructional level, asking a general question or two for background information (Why did you choose this book?, What might happen next?), asking deeper comprehension questions (such as about the author or a focus skill or strategy), and open ended questions to facilitate discussion (Do you like the book? Why or why not? What was your favorite part?)

The find session is the sharing session. Most kids love to talk anyway, but Four Blocks shared some ways to make it “extra” exciting such as letting kids talk into a microphone, pretending to be on TV, having a reading party, or reading to younger reading buddies.

I like the idea of the SSR, but I also like the idea of literacy centers and traditional guided reading. I think there are ways to combine the best of the best practices together into a comprehensive literacy framework that supports students’ reading development and love of reading. I think I need to start with adding two more hours to every school day though because otherwise I don’t think I can get it all in!

It’s a Beautiful Day for a New School Year

As I’ve mentioned, I love decorating for a new school year. One of my favorite “welcoming” displays was one I have used twice. It involves making a cute outdoor scene with blue poster paper as the background and green paper as the grass. And, then if you’re like me and have a slight case of OCD, some kind of border so it looks all neat.

You can then make several oversized sunflowers with large yellow leaves for the display. Eventually each child’s name will be written on one of the flower petals. Then, either on the display or close to it, post “Meet Our Sun-Sational Class!” or “We are going to have a Sun-Sational time in Kindergarten!”

I used to post this with die-cut letters from the Ellison machine, but then I saw my friend glue the die-cut letters onto colored squares and then laminate the squares. She then would hot glue the letters where she needed them (such as on the hallway wall) and then they would just peel off when she changed the display and she could save them – it was great! As a plus, I just really liked the way they looked as well. It is a sun-sational idea!

The Kissing Hand

While in Virginia I had the privilege of working with an amazing team of Kindergarten teachers. They had Kindergarten down to a science and it was a great place to learn while not having to get lost in planning and coming up with new ideas all the time. They really were a PLC before ‘Professional Learning Communities’ were in style.

At the start of the year, the very first book they read was The Kissing Hand by Audrey Penn. The Kissing Hand is a story about Chester Raccoon who is getting ready to go to school for the first time – and is really unsure about this idea. His mom tells him about all the fun things he will do, but then shares a special secret with him that will keep him warm and cozy at school.

The secret is the Kissing Hand, which is a special kiss from Chester’s mom onto the palm of his hand. Whenever Chester is lonely, he can press his hand to his cheek for a kiss from his mom and remember that he is loved. It is a wonderful book for the first day of school and after reading the book we all make “Kissing Hands” to take home from school for our families. 

Since it was the first day of school, my assistant and I would trace the shapes onto the felt and paper so the students only had to cut them out. Felt can be a little tricky, but with the Fiskar scissors it usually went pretty well. It was always nice to have something to take home at the end of the first day and a story to share. I will say I usually waited until the mid-afternoon for this project since it gave any friends who might be having a hard time on the first day of school a chance to calm down and realize school was fun before hearing the story.

Since The Kissing Hand I believe Audrey Penn has written two sequels that include stories about Chester’s brother called A Pocket Full of Kisses and A Kiss Goodbye.   

Kindergarten Rocks!

If you met me now you’d never know that I hated art in school. One of my absolute favorite parts of the year is decorating the hallway outside my room to welcome my new class. OK, crazy I know. Over the past few years I’ve created, borrowed, begged, and probably stolen ideas for to decorate my room for the start of the year.

One of my favorite displays actually wasn’t mine, but my good friend next door. She was an amazing artist and created a huge picture of a juke box (probably about four feet tall and 2-3 feet wide) and several kids who looked like they were rockin’ and dancin’. (Seriously, she should go work for Carson-Dellosa.) Starting in the hallway outside her room (maybe about 10 feet or so from her door) she started placing the kids so they looked like they were dancing towards her door. Then right before her door she put up the juke box with the words “Rock on in to Kindergarten!” On different types of music notes and records, she wrote each child’s name and placed them around the display. It really looked amazing.

Although I’ve never tried this one on my own (yet!), I did find a black and white coloring book juke box image on edupics.com. Since I do not draw well (ask my kids), I would make this into a transparency and use an overhead projector onto white poster paper to draw the lines of the juke box and then color or paint the inside once the lines were drawn. My friend laminated all her pieces as well and now stores them in one of the chart paper storage boxes so she can just whip them out again in a few years and blow away another group of families!

The ABC Center

The ABC Center is one of my favorite centers in the primary classroom and offers an opportunity to reinforce letter knowledge and high frequency words. Although I like to stock this center with things like ABC puzzles, ABC books, stamps, ABC bingo, and magnetic letters, I also like to have a product at this center for students to complete.

At the start of the year, students spend time working on letters and letter formations. Activities such as sorting letters or making letters with different types of materials help to draw attention to the features of letters. As students progress, I like to introduce high frequency and sight words into the center. More advanced students can sort words by spelling pattern, initial/ending sounds, blends or digraphs, number of syllables, etc., while students working on building their reading vocabulary can use their kinesthetic skills to make the word multiple ways. For example, if a student was working on the word “would” (which would be reinforced in their guided reading lesson), I would have the student make the word (with magnetic letters, Wikki Stix, or macaroni), write the word, stamp the word, and find the letters in a magazine to make the word. My students loved all the activities in this center and I found it incorporated many ways for them to look at the same word in different ways.

 

Another activity for ABC center is making picture dictionaries or ABC books. This is a great activity for ESL students as it reinforces their learning in literacy and vocabulary. If you have an ESL inclusion teacher, this is a great center for them to work at.

Students can go on word hunts, put words in ABC order, play word games such as sight word bingo, hangman, Boggle, Jr. or Scrabble, Jr. For more advanced students they can begin to do some dictionary and thesaurus work. Obviously, I don’t want students copying definitions or lists of synonyms, but it is important that students learn how to use these resources.

Correct letter formation should be a staple of this center. Although explicit handwriting instruction comes at different points during the day, students should continue to practice at each center. I make a chart with the students that shows correct letter formation with arrows and descriptions and place it by the center for support if they forget how to form a letter.

            In the ABC center some work will be self-differentiating. Other areas through will require the teacher to think about appropriate activities for each child. Some children may need work on basic words like: is, to, like, and see. Other children may have already moved on to more challenging spelling patterns or irregular words. One way to keep work separated is by labeling folders or activities with different colors. For example if I am doing spelling patterns, maybe the green folder is working on the pattern –at, the purple folder on –ike, and the blue folder on –ow.

            Some parts of the ABC center may have a product while others may not. While my guided reading groups are switching, I try to move around to the ABC center and note what activities and on what level students are learning/working. Students’ reading and writing will give many clues about their phonics knowledge. By monitoring their writing, miscues, and errors I come up with ABC activities specifically targeted to their needs.

ABC Center Ideas:

            -sort letters by shape, attribute, sound, feature

            -make letters and words out of felt, paper, Wikki Stix, magnetic letters, play dough

-alphabetize words

-read/write ABC books

-play ABC Bingo or other games

-string ABC beads in ABC order or to make words

-match alphabet cards with the same beginning/ending sounds

-dictionary/thesaurus work

-complete ABC puzzles

-illustrate and match ABC words

-use letter stamps to make HFWs/sequence letters/stamp beginning/ending/medial sounds

-make ABC charts 

-stamp pictures to match initial sound

Correct Spelling or Inventive Spelling – That is the Question

As I work my way through my new, used Four Blocks book, I was excited to read the writing section. I love to teach writing, but feel that is by far the hardest area for me to teach. I still struggle with topics for mini-lessons and how to balance model, shared, and interactive writing as part of my mini-lesson. In the Four Blocks writing vignette, the authors describe a teacher using modeled writing for the mini-lesson with a focus on think-alouds, using writing resources, and simple editing.

A part of the vignette jumped out at me though as contrary to everything I had been taught. As the teacher was modeling inventive spelling she spelled frightening as “fritning.” I went back and read this part again as I had always been taught and had read that you never intentionally spell a word wrong in front of students. If you are teaching students strong early phonemic awareness and phonics skills, then inventive spelling is the byproduct of students applying the knowledge you have taught them. As teachers we model how to spell/sound out/write words, but never model misspellings.

This point was driven home for me two years ago when I visited a colleague’s classroom. We were spending time observing fellow teachers and I was able to see her lesson during the writing block. She started off with interactive writing as part of her mini-lesson. The word ‘when’ was part of the sentence. When she got to 'when,' the class modeled stretching it out. One boy said, “I think it is w-e-n.” For a kindergartner, this is completely appropriate for that time of year (fall) and I was impressed that he heard the medial sound as well. What I would have done is said something like, “Wow, you are exactly right – all of those sounds are in when! There is actually another letter too, sometimes ‘wh’ makes the /w/ sound and when we spell ‘when’ there is an ‘h’ in the word as well.” This validates the students thinking, but also models the correct spelling for the students who are at that level and ready to internalize that information. Instead the teacher said, “You are exactly right – great job hearing all those sounds!” and wrote ‘wen’ on the paper for 'when.'

The mini-lesson ended and the students went back to their seats for writing workshop. As I circulated talking to students, I stopped to conference with another little boy on his writing. As I saw with him, he was working on the word ‘when’ as well. He started writing and said “when, wwwwwweeeeeeeeennnnnnnnn.” and actually wrote ‘when’ correctly on his paper. Then suddenly he stopped and looked back at the interactive writing paper from the mini-lesson and said, “Oh wait, it’s just w-e-n.”

I didn’t exactly know what to do as he started erasing his work. I mean, what can you say – your teacher wrote it wrong, but you have it right? I tell this story a lot in trainings and professional development because it just hit home how important it is that everything we do as teachers, from actions to writing to reading to speaking, is a model for our students. Everything that is posted in the room or written should be spelled correctly and have correct grammar. It seems like such a simple thing, but I’ve often wondered about that little guy and what other words he learned to ‘misspell’ that year.

Time for Bed

I like many of Mem Fox's books, but my favorite story is Time For Bed. Mem wrote this book in the early 1990s, but I didn't stumble upon it until a few years ago. In Time For Bed, different animal moms and dads send their babies off to bed with a couplet, such as:

     Time for bed, little mouse, little mouse,
     Darkness is falling all over the house.

It even has a soft, sweet tone to the poem that makes it perfect for a "good night" read. After I bought this book I struggled with where to use it in my class. Of course there is always time for a good read aloud, but since there are so many fabulous children's book out there (and more appearing each day), I like to at least have some common themes in my read alouds during different units or parts of the year.

I finally decided to include this book as part of my Valentine's Day theme. I have several other books, such as Guess How Much I Love You, that I read as part of this unit when we talk about the love families have for each other. It seems to fit nicely there and gives us a chance to talk about how we can tell the animal families in the book love each other. A great companion text is Goodnight Moon where we compare our bedtime routines and how we get ready for bed each night.

I keep this book in my "special" section. Most of the time I let my kids get their hands on the books I use for read aloud, even though 99% of the time they are too hard, just because I think that is an important experience. However, I do keep a special section of books on a shelf that if I ever have kids will be coming home with me because I love them that much - this book made the cut!

Word Walls Ideas from Four Blocks

When I read the word wall section in the overview of Four Blocks one area I was interested in was the idea of adding five words to the word wall each week. I don’t know if Four Blocks started this idea, but I’ve heard it a lot, especially when I was teaching first grade. One school I worked at used “buddy study” as the method for spelling instruction during the second half of first grade. As I learned about it there was a lot about buddy study I really liked, but one of the things I found interesting was that, like Four Blocks, students focused on five words a week. Unlike Four Blocks, though, buddy study allowed each child to focus on five words at their level while in Four Blocks all students work on the same five words a week. I also wondered if in Four Blocks the five word wall words were considered the spelling words for the week (like in buddy study) or if these were separate from the spelling principle or word list.

In the Four Blocks overview I liked how the teacher reviewed ideas like why the words are placed by their first letter or why they are on different colors. I loved the gold star idea and can’t wait to try that out to support spelling patterns connection. How the gold star idea words is that when a word is placed on the word wall (for example: make), that has many words that rhyme with it and a consistent spelling pattern (bake, cake, fake, rake, sake, take, etc.) a gold star is placed on the word. This can help students if they are trying to spell an unfamiliar word but find a word that rhymes with in on the word wall. In most classrooms, ‘cake’ is not going to be a word wall word, but if a child can find ‘make’ or ‘take’ they can use that knowledge to help them spell ‘cake.’

Another idea I liked from the overview was the idea of developing a take-home word wall sheet for students to use during writing at home or homework. The only part I didn’t like about that was the idea of students ending up with 20-30 sheets of paper with five words on them that they would have to sort through to find the word they wanted to spell. I thought about how you could have a take home word wall that continually grew – for example having a student word wall spread across the inside of a manilla or two-pocket folder and then printing the words on small return address labels. Students could then peel their words and stick them in the letter box inside their personal word wall. Realistically, I’m not sure how much time, money, or energy would go into printing and sticking 100 new words in personal word walls each week, but maybe some students could complete it as a morning activity or as part of the afternoon wrap up.

One thing I consistently found as a barrier to my own work with students in writing was the fact that as soon as they went home and wanted to spell something their parents told them how to spell it. Then when they came to school they were frustrated that I actually wanted them to think for themselves.  By sending a portable word wall home with kids, I think this could help parents learn how to facilitate and continue the learning process at home instead of just giving them the answer. Although I think it may take some time to work out a smooth routine, this is definitely something I want to try in the future to extend and enhance writing and learning at home.   

A New Idea – The Reader’s Chair

Yesterday I thought a lot about the Author’s Chair, but today I read about the Reader’s Chair. In the Four Blocks model, every day students spend at least 30 minutes engaged in self-selected reading. The block begins with a teacher led read aloud followed by movement into independent reading. As in the writing block, the teacher conferences with students regarding their reading and reading comprehension. This is also an informal assessment time for the teacher to make observations and anecdotal notes about the child’s reading development or book choice.

When I read this I reflected on the fact that Four Blocks is a framework designed for students in grades 1-3. Although slightly different, this sounded very similar to Fountas & Pinnell’s framework in Guiding Readers and Writers, which is written for grades 3-5. Although a key difference is that in the F&P model the teacher can meet with guided reading groups during the block instead of conferencing. The times are also slightly different as Four Blocks assigns 30 minutes and F&P assign a minimum of 60.

The Four Blocks Self-Selected Reading Block closes with the Reader’s Chair. In Reader’s Chair several students share what they have read that day. I think that this can give closure to the block, share books with peers that others may like, and offer an opportunity for students to understand the connection between reading, and learning. If this was the end of the literacy block, it would also be a great way for students to apply knowledge regarding literacy skills and strategies that may be a focus during that week. For example, if the strategy is “author’s purpose,” the student might wrap up their sharing by offering the author’s purpose for writing the text. I always like to see echoes of learning throughout the day and the more relevant and real learning can become, the more likely it is to be internalized and understood by students.

I often think about how different elementary school is today than from when I was there. As a child I

 loved, loved, loved to read. When I was in about second or third grade, my mom introduced me to the “old” Nancy Drew mystery series. I was hooked. I loved this series so much that I used to read at the foot of my bed at night which was the only place the light from the hall provided enough light to read. When I heard someone coming I would quickly rush to the head of the bed and pretend to be asleep. Pretty soon I got the idea that I should be reading Nancy Drew at school, too. During math I would pull my book out and read it under my desk. I am sure my fabulous third grade teacher knew, but never stopped me (I guess I was still doing OK in math). J

This is kind of round about way of saying that in the past few years when D.E.A.R. time and S.S.R. and reading workshop have become so huge, especially in the upper elementary grades, I am completely and totally jealous. Where was this when I was in school – this would have been my dream time every day!!! On a separate note, when I started teaching fourth grade, I was completely convinced my students would love Nancy Drew, too, and started reading her first book, The Secret of the Old Clock, to my kids at the end of each day. In short, it never really caught on with my kids, but I still got excited about seeing what adventure Nancy was going to get into that day and, of course, how she was going to get out of it!