journal 44 bad teacher

This wil be my last teacher journal before break and I've been thinking of things I will do during my break.  One thing I have to do is take home all the reaidng response binders and respond respond respond.  I have been unable to figure out a way that works fore me so that I can respond to the kids on a daily basis and I feel awful about it.  It's something I've woken up a few times during the night thinking about.  I'm asking them to do this on a daily basis-write to me-yet I'm not fniding the time to write back to them.  The purpose of this daily is to have that relationship with the teacher and reading.  I must get it done.  I feel like the binders are laughing at me.

journal 43 likes that it's different

Today I worked with two groups totaling 12 kids.  The novel studies that they are doing are holiday books, but don't scream HOLIDAY!!  When I asked them how they felt about their novel studies they said, "we like them it's something different than what we've done before."  This made me think about if they've had a lot of reading independence before?  Or, have they just not worked in small groups?  If it's something that's different now and they're in third grade then what type of small group work has gone on in previous years?

journal 42-academic focus

Keeping an academic focus this week is going to be tough but today my kids did much better than they did at the end of last week!  I didn't have to have chats with them during their daily time they were almost all on task. 

I have been forgetting to make a new Text Talk for the word work daily so I've been having those kid read to self.  I think there's value in this because then more of my students are getting uninterrupted time to be reading. They do ask about the text talk but I just haven't had time.  And secretly I want them to be reading to self a little bit more.  :)

journal 41 torture

Can I just say that it's almost a week until Christmas break and that no matter how awesome my classroom is at the Dailies, no child should have to be in school one more week!  They were so off today and I don't blame them.  But we have another week to go!!

journal 40 meeting

At the end of each reading period we have a short meeting in which students check in with me.  They do thumbs up, thumbs down, thumbs middle based on how they did during their daily that day.  I thought this would be a huge data point in my action research but have found that so many kids think they are doing a great job no matter what and also don't want to get in trouble so they will always put thumbs up.  Today I had 3 lone rangers say thumbs middle and when I asked them what they did that wasn't so rock start today they said-
"I wasn't really in the book, I was talking more and not getting lost."
"My nose wasn't in the book enough."
"I was looking around a lot."

These responses made me think that they are being reflective.  These students were kids that I had caught eyes with throughout the Daily time and they knew they weren't doing what they were supposed to be doing the minute I caught eyes with them.  But then, after I catch eyes with them I don't talk with them about what they're doing wrong.  They came up with that themselves.  It made me think that they are being reflective and know what they are supposed to be doing, but I realize I can't be too tough on them.  Unless they are repeat offenders, I've got to sometimes just realize that they are kids and they aren't always going to be able to be 100% on at all times.

journal 39 listening to reading

In between working with groups today, I sat back and looked around at the kids who were listening to reading as their daily.  They were so into the book and listening and following along.  Not one of my students in the daily listening to reading got up once during the time (unless they had to change their picture book).  It really is great to see this.  What it made me realize is that even the smartest kids sometimes struggle to read words but listening to reading takes away that problem of decoding and students can just focus on getting lost in a book and loving it.  It made me think even more that it's important for us as adults to read to the kids around us.  Though I don't have kids of my own, when I do I know I will read to them.  They need to learn to love to read and love books listening to an adult read whether on CD or in person is a magical experience for a reader no matter the instructional level.  Every kid smart or struggling loves to have a book read to them.

journal 38 how many!

Since my last fellowship meeting I've really been trying to see how many kids I pull on a daily basis.  Such a huge part of my wanting to use the Daily 5 was because it gave me a built in time during the day to work with small groups on Reading.  But since I'm human some days I'd work with more and some days I'd work with less depending solely on how I was feeling.  I have got to snap out of that.  The point of using this program is to give the kids individualized instruction that they need targeted at what they need.  So Today I worked with 12 kids!!  That's half my class during Reading.  I was very excited to see this.  I worked one on one with one student on making words for Kindergarten and then two reading groups.  One was on their novel study and another was on the questioning technique!  I was so happy and I felt like such a great teacher.  This is making my the kind of reading teacher I want to be.

journal 37 background knowledge

In our mini-lessons this week we've been working on read nonfiction text and dicsovering new learning.  Then when students go to their dailies they are reading nonfiction and writing down their new learning.  What I've been noticing a lot of is they are jotting down EVERYTHING.  This got me to thinking-many of the students in my class don't have much background knowledge about the topics they are choosing to read about.  They don't know much about the human body, the solar system, the way things move, or even about historical figures.  What surprises me is that I thought my animal nonfiction bin would be empty during this study of nonfiction.  It's not.  They aren't choosing things to read because they already know about it.  However, I know that a lot of the research says that it's best to give students books that they have some background knowledge on so that it helps with their reading comprehension.  I agree with this research but think it's interesting that my students don't gravitate to the subjects that they have background knowledge on.  If we weren't doing the dailies, the students wouldn't have the time to be reading about new topics-things that they want to learn about.   

journal 36 growing experts

In the last couple of weeks we've been reading a lot of nonfiction during our mini-lessons.  Then, the kids go back and read nonfiction during their daily time.  They've been keep track of their learning and each kiddo has a nonfiction book in their book bag.  The best things are happening with this. I was expecting for the boys to soar with this, which they are but the girls are really getting into it too!  I have one little girl that LOVES to read about the human body and I think has every nonfiction book in her book bag.  In fact, she asks me if she can read to self if she's in another daily so that she can have time to read her nonfiction.  Today she said to me, "Ms. T did you know you have 9 bones in your leg?  That's why it hurts so much if you break it!"  I love how this is giving them the time to become experts and really love reading.  Growing experts, growing lifelong readers.  :)

journal 35 novel studies

I'm trying to make my small gropu time more effective and beneficial to my students.  I'm having trouble with the huge range of kids in my room.  One student is still working on Kindergareten making words while the others are soaring.  It's so difficult no matter what program you are using to manage all those levels and to give each student enough attention based on what they need.  It's sad to say but so often the lowest kids are the ones that grab our attention first and the highest get pushed aside.  That's what RTI is supposed to prevent and should allow by third grade for that not to happen.  In my thinking about my small groups and what I'm doing with them and moving ahead with having a plan each time I work with them I think I am going to do a novel study with my two highest groups.  They don't need my guidance to read because they are all fluent and have sound vocabulary.  They can work together to read and discuss and then come back with me and discuss even more.  So I've started the novel studies and they seem to be going great!  They are really into them.  What I'm having a hard time with is if the books are appropriate for them.  With the higher levels comes some more mature material and I still have to remember they are in third grade and some things they shouldn't be exposed to.  While the text is at their reading level, I'm reading the books with them to make sure that they are on their maturity level.  It's a balancing act I guess.

journal 34-baby steps...SMALL baby steps

Ok after an awful day yesterday I tried again today.  I pulled the same group and gave them a different leveled text.   

I decided that I was going to change the approach to the way I was teaching questioning in my below group's guided reading lesson.  Instead of saying "think of a question about what you've learned" and "find something new you learned and turn it into a question,"  I said, "Pretend you're the teach and you get to make up a test.  What questions would you ask using these question starters?"  What a world of difference that made.  One kiddo said "is that what you wanted us to do yesterday?  We could have done that!"  Apparently they could tell I was frustrated...:)  While not every kid came up with stellar right there questions, they did learn what a right there question starts with and where to find the answer.  A successful day in my book. 

And on the whole group front the kids are doing great reading nonfiction!  We've been working on asking questions while we are reading and boy do they have a lot of questions!  We're just getting into the QAR board and I can tell it's going to be great.  I hope...