How to Buzz

Last week we taught a lesson called, “How to Buzz.”   In this lesson, we try to build the skills needed for good discussions over fiction or nonfiction text.

After going over this anchor chart, we read a short article.

sorry for the poor pic quality... you get the gist.

 

I had the students write a two-column chart called “It says/ I say” in their writer’s notebooks.  On the “It says” side, students found 2-3 quotes from the text that seemed important or interesting.  On the “I say” side, students add their own thinking or response to the text.  This gave them some talking points for our buzzing convos.

Check out this great buzzing in action:

 

 

 

 



 

How do you build students up for book or text discussions?  Any good tips?

Anchor Chart Friday

...that's not a real thing.  But maybe it will become one!

ATP and I taught about book levels earlier this week.  Thanks to an idea from sweet colleagues, we demonstrated finding a "just right" book by having student volunteers try on three sizes of t-shirt: too small, too big, and just right. 

It was a great visual metaphor to address the fact that yes you CAN read a book that's too easy, or too hard, but it won't be comfortable or good for you as a reader.

Check out our anchor chart below, which goes along with the "5 Finger Test" to check for challenging words.

 

p.s. Make sure you check back on Monday for an EXCITING give away!

Activating Schema

Monday I'm leading a professional development for teachers in another district.  So that means this girl's at school today!

It's always amazing how much preparing to lead and teach others helps me grow in my own knowledge of a skill area.

Tomorrow one of my discussions is on helping students activate their schema to improve comprehension.

I'm starting with a little illustration using this text:

The Batsmen were merciless against the Bowlers.  The Bowlers placed their men in slips and covers.  But to no avail.  The Batsmen hit one four after another along with an occasional six.  Not once did their balls hit their stumps or get caught.

Did you know it was about cricket?  Probably not!  If I had told you that prior to reading and we had discussed what we know about cricket teams, equipment, and scoring would it have helped your comprehension?

That's schema!

We're going to practice with a text on the American Revolution's Shay's Rebellion by looking at Tier 2 & 3 vocabulary and discussing ways to help students be successful with both. 

But I wanted a little more to help teachers visualize more specifically what building schema could look like in their classrooms.  Bring on Pinterest!  Check out these two great ideas:

This one is from blogger Amanda at One Degree Extra.  I love the way she segmented the poster to really dig into students' prior knowledge AND included the misconceptions section, too.

 

I also love this "Word Splash" poster from Really Good Stuff.  I'm not sure if I want to pay $5.50 for it, but I'm totally going to steal the concept. What a quick and easy way to front-load a unit or topic by posting key words before a lesson and reviewing them with students.



I'm excited to work with these teachers tomorrow and hear their own ideas to help students fully grasp and retain important vocabulary.

Classroom Tour pt 6- Writing Wall

Since my first year of teaching I have had a board in my room featuring reading genres.  A few years ago I realized that my students had a hard time distinguishing between reading genres and types of writing.  So with the help of some great former writers, I created a board in my room with examples.

It's a great way to not only remind students of the types of writing we've done/ are working on, but it also motivates students to add a little variety into their work during journaling time.  Plus they always like seeing siblings' and neighbors' work.

Don't you love this feature article on bacon?! 

Classroom Tour pt 2- Grammar Goodness

In case you've forgotten, I'm a bit of a grammar nut.  My favorite text to inspire fun and purposeful grammar instruction is Mechanically Inclined  (read my review here). 

There are several ways this text and method of instruction manifests itself in my classroom.  Namely, the walls are covered in our imitated sentences.

The rule of thumb is students are allowed to display their sentences on any wall and they can stay up until they fall down.  This seems to really get students excited about grammar and showing off their uniquely constructed work off of whatever concept we're practicing.  Admittedly, the room looks a bit crazy at times, but I remind myself that it shows the serious work we're doing.

The sentences above are based on our beginning of the year work discovering the basic parts of a sentence.  (And a few on serial commas and appositives.) For some reason students seem to have nouns down, but struggle a bit more with the concept of a verb.  To help reinforce this, a few years ago my students helped me create our verb rocking chair. 

 

I took a formerly unfinished wood rocking chair and spray painted it black.  Each student chose one favorite verb and used acrylic paint to write it onto the chair.  (tip: I had them write 3 verb choices on an index card to prevent multiples and any that were too crude.  I didn't need a whole chair covered in "burp.")  Then I sewed the cushion for a pop of color from Eric Carle patterned-fabric.  Now it's my favorite special chair for read- alouds.

 

 

In another part of the room we have a "Grammar Brushstrokes" wall to remind us of all the work we've done, including mentor sentences, wall charts, and our imitated sentences.

Personal Essays

We're in full swing of our first writing project, Personal Essays.  They're going well and I'm super impressed with the writers in my classroom this year.  We have topics ranging from "My mom has taught me how to care for others," to "Even though moving is hard, it can also be exciting," to "Football has shown me how to have teamwork and responsibility."  I'm loving the one on one conferences I've gotten to have so far with my writers on their various topics.

For mini lessons, we've been working on a series of structure/ drafting lessons.  I'm pumped to be sharing them on TpT.  Check them out and let me know what you think!

Not the prettiest wall chart....but good stuff the students discovered after reading sample essays.

 What are your students writing these days?