Daily Five and CAFÉ are keeping me up at night! The excitement I have over these two programs is ridiculous! Last night I was up at 4:00 in the morning thinking about how I can encourage my students to pick “Read to Someone” more often (I will talk more about this later). Instead of blogging I went downstairs to watch Grays Anatomy. Something about blogging at 4:00 in the morning just wasn’t sitting well with me, so I resisted the urge and instead turned to TV. It worked but then at 10 in the morning I woke and said to myself, “I just need to blog!”. So here it is Ladies and Gentlemen….
So much has happened in my classroom this week. First I would like to start off with the kids comments and stories about their learning. I visit “The Daily Café” and Pro-teacher often. I always come across kid stories that I can’t believe are true. I tend to read these stories about things that kids are saying and my response is first “Really?????” and then why don’t I hear these comments. This week I did! Not just one, but a few. While reading this keep in mind that I am sharing these stories with you so you can see the success of Daily Five and CAFÉ. Oh and if you have a cute story please share in the comments….
Story #1:
Student A is a struggling reader, whom the reading teacher and I work with on a daily basis to help. Earlier in the week it was math time and when I looked over at him he was reading the book “Diary of a Wimpy Kid”, instead of doing his math work. This was not the first time I had to ask him to put away a book because it was not reading time. While looking at him two things crossed my mind, 1. He shouldn’t be reading during math time and he knows this and 2. Why is he reading the “Diary of a Wimpy Kid”! That is not a good-fit book! I couldn’t resist the urge to have a mini-conference with him. He wasn’t paying attention to the math lesson anyway, right? I went over to him and asked him to talk with me in the hallway (the math teacher was teaching the class). When in the hallway we spoke about how I have asked him not to read during other subjects and he is continuously choosing to not listen. Tears start rolling down his face!! Student A is not a crier, so I knew something was bothering him. We sat there for five minutes without him talking and me asking him to tell me what was bothering him, so that I could help him. Finally, after 5 minutes he looked at me with tears in his eyes and said, “I want to get better at reading and you said the best way to get better at reading is to read!” Wow! Needless to say we talk about this and of course the Good Fit book topic.
Story # 2:
In talking with my kids about inner conversation, one of my students raised their hand and said, “When I have a inner conversation while reading a book, I noticed that my voice and me are reading the book together, at the same time!”
Story #3:
While checking in for our third round the other day multiple kids raised their hands and said, “Can I meet with you to talk about my strategies and goals?” How cute!!!! So this round went a little longer than normal but I couldn’t resist meeting with these children. During the conferences I was SO impressed by my students abilities to choose goals and strategies that truly met their needs. They were able to express to me why they were choosing the particular goals and strategies.
In addition to these great stories, many other happenings took place in CAFÉ 48. We had a successful week meeting our goal of 3 rounds on all days. I was also able to meet with Guided Reading groups, Words their Way groups, and conference with individual students (next week I will tackle strategy groups). Doing all three in one week was a lot to handle!!! The schedule I spoke about in my last blog worked out wonderfully, although a few minor changes were made. I added another two rounds of Guided Reading. Now my groups are being met with on Tuesday and Thursday, however these may at times turn into Strategy Groups, depending on the children’s needs. Also, on Fridays we will have two rounds of Words their Way assessments, the third round will now be devoted to strategy groups and/or conferencing. Next week I may try partner testing. I’ll keep you updated on that, if it happens.
The mini-lessons that took place this past week were all devoted to “Listening to our Inner Voice” and “Leaving Tracks of your Thinking”. The books I read were “Fly Away Home”, “Ruby Bridges”, and the “Secret Garden”. All three books had the children thinking and wondering. We also had a few mini lessons on “Noticing when you are confused while reading”. As I have written in the past many of my mini-lessons come from the Comprehension Tool Kit, Reading with Meaning, and Strategies that Work. I am using the existing strategies on the CAFÉ menu and also adding my own, as need be, to match our reading and writing curriculum.
During my mini lessons this week I saw the benefits of having the CAFÉ board to keep track of the strategies taught. While talking about “Listening to our Inner Conversation” and “Signals that we are confused”, my kids would raise their hands and say, “Isn’t this similar to Check for Understanding” or “Don’t we already know that we need to Back Up and Reread if we are confused”. I love how my students see the connections between all of the strategies and they are also using the language on a daily basis. For writing this week, we started to learn about writing letters and responding to reading in writing. We will continue these lessons next week. In past years I noticed that my children’s letters were not up to par with my expectations and I would continually have to meet with a few students. This year I want to take it very slow and model, model, model!
Listening to Reading was also in full swing!!!! My kids LOVE listening to reading. Of course getting to be on the computer was a HUGE perk. We did however have to go over the guidelines for Raz-Kids. If you use Raz-Kids tune in now… Although the Raz Rockets is a wonderful tool and motivator the children quickly learned that if they just click through a book or quiz, they will still get points for Raz Rockets. When I looked at the records for the week many children read 5 or more books, but were not doing well on the quizzes. This was a great indicator that they were not listening to the stories carefully. So we installed guidelines for Raz Kids. The children are now allowed to choose a second book for the day after they receive a 100 on the quiz or tried the quiz 3x’s. You may be saying wow a 100 that harsh! I agree, but this is teaching the children to go back to the story when they don’t get an answer correct. I explained to the children that if they get an answer incorrect, they should reread the story with that question in their mind. I also told the kids that if they tried 3x and still did not get a 100, to choose another story and I would review the original story with them in a conference. However, they must try at least 3x. “Student A” from the earlier story did this and was so proud of his 100 on the 3rd try. When we checked in after the round in which he did Listening to Reading, he said, the first time he took the quiz he didn’t do well, the second time he listened to the story again and still got a few wrong, but after the third try he got a 100!!!! WOW! I can’t even begin to write out all of the benefits that he got from just this one round of listening to reading. This one round truly instilled in his head that when he is confused, if he go back to the story and rereads, he will understand the story better.
I started off the blog mentioning that I wanted the children to “Read to Someone” more often. I think this is so beneficial for their fluency and comprehension. I also think that the students will learn a lot about the use of the fix-up strategies through coaching and time. My problem is that currently the kids are required to do “Read to Self” and “Word Work”. This only leaves one round for complete choice. Usually during the third round the kids really want to do “Listening to Reading”. With only three rounds, how can I get them to choose “Read to Someone”? Any suggestions??? I will definitely talk with them this week about the benefits of read to someone. I may even tell them that they can choose either “Read to Self” or “Read to Someone”, instead of saying “Read to Self” is a must. Both choices have wonderful benefits!
Well, that is our week in a nutshell! I told you a lot of wonderful things happened! Please leave comments…. I love to know that people are out there reading my blogs! I also want this blog to be a place for reflection and sharing with other teachers who are using Daily Five and CAFÉ. I’m looking forward to hearing from you.
As always…
Words of Advice:
Tune into your inner voice while reading a book. It is a great learning tool that will enhance your teaching. This past week I have been trying out the reading strategies I teach the kids, in my own reading. Paying attention to my use of these reading strategies, has really helped me to understand what I am asking of the students do.
Also, if you are a third grade teacher (maybe other grades too, but I know it works for third) read the book “The Secret Garden” to your children. This book is a wonderful read aloud that lends itself to teaching and discussing many reading strategies! We have 2 more chapters left and I know my kids are going to be very sad when it is over. My next book will be “The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane”.
Enjoy your long weekend! Now that I have blogged, I look forward to a great night of sleep!!!!
Until next week…
No comments:
Post a Comment