Informative writing

We began working on informative writing this week. We began with looking at our writing standard. First we broke it apart into different pieces and talked through the language of the standard. While we were discussing we were highlighting pieces of the standard on our smart board. We also discussed the difference between the fourth grade standard and the third grade standard. The students were able to notice several things such as the addition of using precise language and having headings in their papers.  After that we worked on locating pieces of our standard in a mentor text that we had previously worked with to focus on structure of a text (ri.5). After spending some time focusing on this we worked on transferring this new knowledge to our interactive notebooks. Then we began to make goals for ourselves based on the what area of the standard we need to work on. 

FAST Characteristics

One of the first standards that we are working on this year is RL.4.3 "Describe in depth a character drawing on specific details in a text (eg, thoughts words or actions). I pulled a resource from Pinterest from iheartliteracy. She had used this to teach characterization during independent work time. I worked towards them being able to do this independently.

First we started with last year's standard of being able to identify character traits inside and outside. We began this with interviewing our fellow classmates so that we are starting with something that everyone will be able to access. We discovered that is a lot easier to figure out what the outside of our classmate versus inside our classmate.  The next day we began to transfer our new knowledge to our new chart. We used Tales of a Fourth Grade Nothing to begin to categorize our thoughts on the main character and his Feelings, Actions, Sayings, and Thoughts.

We worked on this whole group to help familiarize the students with the organizer. We gradually moved students from whole group, to partners, and eventually to independent work.

For the most part this was very successful. Students began to work on inferencing about how a character feels using information from their head and evidence from the text. When they were working independently they would notate where they were drawing inferences from by a I with a circle around it.

I still struggle with how to help students who are have trouble doing this work independently and how they can interact with the standard when they are reading well below grade level. I found Tales of a Fourth Grade Nothing online, so that helped some.

This was a good sequence of lessons to give the students some practice in locating and determining details in text through inferencing as well as textual evidence, and being able to describe a character in depth.

Begin the year with a Promise

Begin the Year with a Promise....

Our building has been learning about different ways to interact with kids that will give you the biggest bang for your buck. One of the big ones is helping kids be a part of your vision. So this year we are working on making promises with our kids. I decieded that we would start with them helping me make my promise. So we brainstormed different things they wanted from their teacher this year. Having taught kinder last year it was a pretty neat surprise to see all of the thinking the "big kids" had. My favorite still is..."Get to lunch on time" but I also got a good glimpse of their little spirits with comments like " No Yelling," and "If you are having a bad day, don't take it out on us," as well as " If we act like something is wrong, ask us how we are feeling," and lastly " Just care about us." So we grouped them into different categories such as

1. Listen, act, and talk respectfully

2. Help us be responsible 

3. Provide engaging activities 

Then I put them into partners and asked them what they needed to be successful this year...I also talked about how they needed to make sure to match mine. For example if they wanted me to provide engaging activities, they needed to be engaged ( another big bang for your buck item). We got them all together and grouped them. Theirs were very similar to mine with:

1. Be respectful (listen, act, and talk)

2. Be responsible (taking care of my stuff)

3. Be engaged

We were able to have a very good conversation about the difference between being engaged and just behaving. When you are engaged you are talking and asking questions...when you are behaving, you are just sitting there without talking. 

Writing Workshop

Writing Workshop

 

One of my favorite things of kindergarten is the end of the year...It is not seeing them leave, but seeing what they can do. We started the year talking about how to hold a pencil and the letters in their names and now we are writing books about China or the new waterpark or hunting for Easter eggs. Katie Wood Ray's book In Pictures, In Words has been such a resource in my classroom this year. We started the year working on using our illustrations to tell a story. It was a balance between telling a story and the mechanics of writing, but when I look around the room and see my authors working so hard...I realize that they will leave with a love of writing. 



 

 

 

 



 



In my classroom we work hard to learn from real authors, some of our favorites are Tomie DePaolo and Angela Johnson. They teach so much more than I possibly could alone. I use many techniques in Katie Wood Ray's book In Pictures, In Words. I believe because of this book, my kiddos are able to analyze pictures and determine how and why authors put different details in their pictures. The really amazing thing...I am starting to see this translate into their writing. I also use many different techniques in Lucy Caulkin's Units of Primary Writing. My kiddos use books and mentor authors to add details to their stories. Lucy Caulkins writes a lot about writing "seed" stories. My kids have latched onto this concept and work on stretching the details in their seed stories to create a picture for their reader.

 

I'll tell you a secret...writing is my favorite time of the day. To see my kiddos get their writing folders and write, just fills up my teacher heart. I get to spend time watching them create stories and get so caught up in their writing that they moan when it is over. It is the best way to end the day...after a long day it is just what all of us need.

Welcome Back!

It has been a crazy year! I just wrapped up National Boards. I have learned a lot about myself and teaching, but I am glad to be able to say I am done with the writing. So on that note...not much has been written on my blog lately. But some things that I have begun to think about lately...would I want to be a student in my room?

Would I want to be a student in my room?

I was a good student growing up...I knew all the right answers...and worked hard to figure them out. I wanted to know exactly what the teacher wanted me to say. Then I would say it. I graduated with honors both in high school and college.

Fast forward to my classroom. Guess what??? I would hate to be in my room. In my room there is no easy answer. My students have to work to explain their thinking. They talk about how they figured out the answer and I am no longer the giver of knowledge. I would have hated it....I would have wanted to know the right answer. Now my kids are able to explain their thinking. They look at themselves to find answers, they question, they analyze, they decide and guess what they are 5. 

Research in Kindergarten, Part 3

After we did our research it was time to write. I put the kids in groups so that it would be easier to help them and they would be able to help each other. I put the kids in 3 groups, introduction page, animal page and places page. We first worked on drawing our pictures.

In our class this year we have talked a lot about illustration and how they help tell the story. I LOVE Katie Wood Ray's book In Pictures, In Words. It really talks about how young writers carry a message in their illustrations and helping them understand that they are telling a story through thier illustratons. I think as the year as progressed that they were able to write more detailed writing, because they had started the year thinking about how to add details to thier pictures.
 

Anyways...they began with working on pictures with labels. We have talked about how we can not take anything from our schema file, but rather everything needs to come from our book. So we put all of our research and books on the carpet at the front of the room, so when kids needed to, they were able to go back and look at the research. After creating the picture, outlining it in black marker, and coloring we were ready to move onto writing.

They were still in thier groups. Again this helped with management and they were able to help each other. The group that was working on introduction is the group that tends to struggle. They were able to get a lot more support and one on one attention, by putting them all together. We talked about how we start our sentences and writing simple sight words. The other groups were pretty much able to do this independently. We talked about expanding our sentences and how we could make them more interesting. ( RL.K.1f)

After each group was done with writing thier page,w e put all the pages together and began to produce our writing using digital tools (W.K.6).

Research in Kindergarten Part 2

After we signed up for research, we got into our groups and I assigned a person in charge of the book. Then they looked through their book and talked to each other about it. Then we came back together as a group and I modeled how to work on research using animals from Europe. We found animals in our book and drew a picture and labeled it. Then I assigned them a job either the writer or the illustrator. And they began...After working in their groups, we came back together and shared out what we learned with everyone else.