Character Traits using Literature

Whew, TGIF! I had a rough week with my kids and ironically we have started our Character Traits unit. I'm not sure why we save this in our district until the end of the year because so many kids would benefit from it sooner. I have enjoyed it a lot more this year because we have done more read and respond with it. Here's a look at what we've done so far.

Here is our 'Hall of Fame' and 'Wall of Shame' chart. Around the chart are 16 vocabulary cards with various traits we are studying.  The sentence strips have the trait written on it with a color picture of the book that exhibited that trait.

We read the book Kate Shelly and the Midnight Express. My class loved it! Kate really demonstrated the character trait of determination and bravery. There is a picture of the book cover on that sentence strip, too.

Here is our 'Wall of Shame' characters - so far. These are some of my most favorite books!

Here is a foldable we made comparing and contrasting what Elbert did in Elbert's bad word vs. what we would do. Notice the Angel and Devil in the picture.

This was a great place to write a brief summary of the story.

Funny, this was the common reaction of my students yet I don't believe they would all pretend like they didn't hear that bad word!

 

Here is our 'Most Wanted' posters. They are about Camilla Capybara. They include a description of her crime, whereabouts, and reward for her capture. She was obviously a shameful character!

 All of these items can be found in my Character Trait unit. Click below to head on over and get a copy for yourself. 

 

Mother's Day Poems

I'm super excited about the upcoming holiday. This is my second mother's day as a mother and it's so much more meaningful for me now. I decided this year to incorporate the holiday with our poetry unit that we do in April. I created a packet of poems and have posted it at Teachers Pay Teachers. You can find it here.

Our plan is to create these poetry books. There are two thinking sheets and 7 poem templates. We will work on it during our writing block the next two weeks. In May we are going to celebrate the end of our poetry unit by inviting our moms into the room for a 'Mother's Day Tea.' We will have refreshments, share our work, and I'm going to make a slideshow for the mom's. I'm super excited!

Here is the beginnings of our project. We started with Haikus and a circle map. They are my favorite! 

Planning and counting syllables.

More planning. This is the 'sloppy copy.' We transposed the following day.

A Portrait of my Mom. Love how the hair curls!

Do I spot a future artist for Scrappin' Doodles?

Click the picture above to go and get a copy of this mother's day book! :)
 

Tall Tale Genre Study and Giveaway

Ahh.... I am finally done with our district map testing. I'm so relieved because I feel like I can go back to teaching in a more relaxed mode. We started our newest genre study. I love genre studies! The kids do so much better when you isolate skills. It's seem so simple sometimes, yet in education I feel like we can over complicate things! Am I the only one who feels that way? Anyway, here is a look at what our unit contains and what we will be doing.

 I started by changing our focus books to all Tall Tales. I didn't really tell anyone what genre the new books were. These books are read alouds I do during the week. If the students finish early with work they often go and grab a book from here. It's like a mini library. A few students noticed the new books but not everyone.

 The next thing I did was introduce the word tall tale. We did a consensogram. I was pleased that I had most students honestly answer this. They really did not know very much about tall tales. That's okay - we are just starting out! I think this is a big struggle in elementary school. Everyone wants to be an expert the first day.

 While my students were doing some independent reading I changed out the vocabulary cards and focus chart on our spotlight wall. We then read the story of Pecos Bill. We talked about these different elements and the kids even wanted to keep a tally of the hyperboles that occurred in that story. I hung up our consensogram but will be adding our tally chart of hyperboles to this wall.

Here is Pecos Bill's horse. Some versions call this horse Widow Maker and some call his horse Lightning. I  like the name Widow Maker because it gives you a chance to teach a new word! The speech bubble is a summary of the story. We made a list of major events on an is, can, has anchor chart. Then, the students wrote their summaries of the Tall Tale. 

 Here is a Paul Bunyan summary. I got the idea of Pinterest to make his body long. I used clip art from Scrappin Doodles. I didn't print the kids copies in color but I told them to outline and add their own color. They turned out cute!

 The body part of Paul Bunyan is a summary of the story of Paul Bunyan. We used an ABC graphic organizer to record important events. Then, the kids worked on them. I have a clothesline in my room and am going to stay after tomorrow to hang all of these little fellas up! I can't wait. :)



All of the resources above can be bought in my tall tale genre study unit. I will give away three to the first three people that leave me a comment with their email address!

This unit does include Johnny Appleseed and Davey Crockett. As a disclaimer they are included in our standards and we often discuss how the oral history of Tall Tales has caused two real life people to find their names on the tall tale list.

 How do you teach tall tales?  Am I missing a great activity that I should add next year?

 

Reading Tracks and a Freebie

It seems like all I post about is literacy, but I promise we do other things in my classroom. I will post some more about math but I just love Daily 5 and teaching kids to read. I really do feel like reading and writing are at the heart of the other subjects and so essential for success! Some of the teachers in my grade level require daily reading response logs. For the struggling writer it detracts from their reading time. I find it hard to remediate for logs and I eventually got away from it. I do guided writing during my reading groups often so I am able to provide writing support. This independent writing time seemed to be just a busy work activity. I felt like I needed something more so I poked around in my literacy lab at school and came across ....

How fortunate I was to have this resource in my district. I have used it some for shared reading but never delved into very deeply. It really helped me boost my independent reading time. Each book takes a strategy you would teach. The author's keep their mini lessons interactive and have kids record ideas on post it notes. I have done this type of thing before but I had never added any sort of codes for organization. That has been the huge difference. The pictures below will explain it better.

Graphics courtesy of DJ Inkers.

Click here to get a copy of the anchor charts and code poster.

I started by making a class anchor chart with one strategy a week. We practiced that strategy whole group and used post it notes - a lot. Now that we are good at it I don't have the class made anchor chart I have replaced it with this smaller version as a simple reminder. I modeled certain reading tracks and we sorted them based on their quality. I saw this idea on Pinterest. My anchor chart is much more plain, but you get the idea. Level one is a poor response and needs a life preserver. Level two is a bit better and begins to dig deeper, thus the anchor. Level 3 is a great reading track and is considered treasure. The kids will often ask if something is a Level 3 reading track. Here is a copy of that anchor chart from Pinterest. It really puts mine to shame.

The students practice the codes during independent reading time. They are shortened, mini responses. They are not required but we do practice them during strategy groups quite often. It helps my readers be intentional about their thinking.

This year I began allowing my readers to lounge and get comfortable. I found these wonderful mats at the Dollar Tree. I'm pretty sure they are floor rugs. They look like mini horse blankets and the kids love them. They are a plus for independent reading.  Some kids take clipboards or just bear down on their book bins.

Here is a visualization.  If a student stops during their reading and says words that go along with visualizations I will say, "Sketch that!" We practiced sketching using a timer so that readers would not become artists. I usually try to limit them to a good minute or minute and a half. They are good now about self monitoring.

Sometimes their visualizations can help them understand tricky parts. This reader was unsure about how exactly a sea horse can be protected since it's so small. A quick sketch led to a conversation which led to understanding. Nothing the V on the bottom of this post it.

We have talked a lot about listening to our inside reader's voice. When I am doing a think aloud or a read aloud and I come across something weird or odd or confusing I will go 'Beep, beep, beep'  like an alarm. The kids will often sit up with looks on their faces like 'Oh yea, this is going to be good.' You can see that this reader started his post it with the words 'Awesome.' This shows he was listening to his reader's voice and the beep beep sound in his own head. I also stress using those emotions and reactions when we read because readers that react to their text are MUCH more likely to remember it. This was a learned fact but you can't see the L because he wrote a lot more on the back.

This one is a bit light but it is a main idea web.  He wrote the book title in the middle of the circle and looked for interesting words on one page. We have practiced deconstructing texts and orally reconstructing them. My students know to write one or two words to jog their memory. This has been a year long skill to practice. There is a W in the bottom of this post it note.

Reading codes work for chapter books, too! This is a connection to a Magic Tree House Research Guided about Husky Dogs. This particular student did a great job because he made a connection and used a support word (because). We work hard on using that support and having a level 3 response.

 This visualization is a funny one to me. He drew a picture of a snake and wrote the words weird. He should have included what made it weird, but he did verbalize it to me. His book was about green anacondas which are brown and black. He thought it strange that they are called the green anaconda when they are not green.

The kids are always very proud of their post it notes. I try to let them share them at least once a week or after a strategy group. I find it's hard to always get to them so we hang them on our Show it Off wall. You can read about that here.

Since I didn't like the traditional read and respond format this has been a good fit for me. I'd love to know what you do. How do you get kids writing but keep them reading?

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Daily 5 Working with Words

One of my favorite times of the day is Daily 5. Before this year I dreaded this time of year because centers became boring and behaviors became problematic. The Daily 5 has changed this so much for me. I really was afraid that the items would seem mundane after a while but that has not been the case. So this post is going to show you a few of my favorites for Working with Words. I do a lot of the traditional word study activities and wanted to share my class' favorites.

Here is where we store the Working with Words Activities.  I scored this wonderful drawer set at a thrift shop for $7!! :)

I saw this idea on Pinterest and loved it! I used tacky glue and scrap book letters to create an interesting way to spell spelling words. The kids do like this one quite a bit.

The play doh letters were not that great for my kids but I did find this worked as an alternative. I bought some stampers at Target back in the summer at the dollar spot. Don't you love Target? Anyway, they make great indentions into the play doh and the kids love to use them. 

Here is a close up of the stampers. These were only a buck! I bought several sets so we use them with ink pads and with play doh.

Bead spelling is always popular!

I found this little tiny storage container in the craft section. It's double sided so there are plenty of beads in it. The stickers on the sides help the kids not have to search and search for beads.

Boggle is the favorite in my class because I do offer rewards for a full sheet of words.

I found these round Scrabble tiles online. The kids love to do a little math with their spelling.

This is another favorite. It's just popsicle sticks poked into Play Doh so they will stand. On the sticks there are foam craft letters. They have held up all year with only one casualty.

You can barely see the container but it has stickers on it for easy organization. 

 Hope this gives you a few ideas of some things to do in your room. We love learning about words and these activities have helped keep my kids calm AND engaged. I love Daily 5, don't you?


 

Genre Study and A Giveaway!

With common core coming the students are expected to have a much greater language arts base. I knew right away that I would have to tackle a variety of texts. I try to read aloud to my class every day at least once from a chapter book, once from a poetry anthology, and once from a picture book. Even if it's just for a few minutes I know that it is helpful. This year we have done genre studies and my kids are really good at picking out what type of a book they are reading. Here are some pictures of what we do and how it works.

First off we focus on a genre. I try to do most of my read alouds from that genre.  I have genre posters with catchy poems to help the students remember which is which.  Here is an example of two of them. I hang them up on our genre focus wall.

I wrote these myself. I love poetry!

Next I put only the books we are studying for that unit out on my display cart. The kids like to go to these after they have been read. They often use them for partner reading or for early finishers. This also helps with fluency.

Something new we have started now that we have worked through all the genres is an interactive genre graph. As the kids do independent reading they can move their name to match the genre they are reading.

We've done some writing about our genres for hall displays. It's great to have the students write opinion pieces and defend them using support. This is huge with common core. 

All of these wonderful genre ideas are available for purchase in my Teachers pay Teachers store. But I will give the entire document away to the first three people that comment. Just make sure you follow me, leave a comment with your email address, and enjoy!