The Aliens are Coming! The Aliens are Coming!

Students will be starting a nonfiction unit on outer space and the planets this coming week up until the beginning of March. But why are aliens coming you ask?? Well to make the unit more interesting and to work in a bit of persuasive writing of course! Students are being told that a colony of aliens is looking to start a new community somewhere in outer space and our class is being split into two teams- team Inner Planets and team Outer Planets. It is their job to convince the aliens why they must settle in one place over the other. 

The ending celebration for this unit will be our Mission Day. Students will present a 3D model of the solar system, poster projects, research reports and other cool things we have been working on over  the next month or so. We will be inviting other classes, teachers, administrators, and parents to come in and see all of our hard work. 

I am also hoping to raise money for the class to make their own team shirts and wear on Mission Day so in the next week or so be expecting a newsletter with even more information about our upcoming learning!! 

Nonfiction Anchor Charts

Just wanted to post our KWL chart we completed on cheetahs and a couple anchor charts we made listing all the nonfiction features we know and what they are used for. 

Nonfiction and KWL Charts

As we prepare for our space unit research, I had students work with a nonfiction text about cheetahs. I know I have a lot of students whose favorite animal is the cheetah so I picked it to keep interest and excitement up.

The first thing students and I worked on was creating a KWL chart. K is what we already know about cheetahs, W is what we want to know, and L would be what we learned after doing the research. As one would think, the class already knew plenty of information about cheetahs and was able to add quite a bit of facts to the K portion of our graphic organizer. When it came to the W however, they were a little more reserved considering they thought they already knew everything they had to know about the animal. With a little encouragement and questions from myself and Mrs. Turgeon, our classroom educational technician, questions were soon bursting out of them though. 

Finally, students were presented with a two page article on cheetahs and were asked to collect any new information we didn't already have under the K and W. They would add that information to the L section. Students could work independently, with a partner, or as a whole group on this task. In the end, they were so excited because they found so many new facts and confirmation of the facts they already knew. Most importantly, Sam was really excited because he found a fact that proved one of our K facts wrong and we had to go back and fix our chart!

In the end, our class decided it is important to organize nonfiction information and research using a KWL chart because it shows us those things we know and helps us to really focus on what we need to find out and where to get it. After we completed this first article and our L section, students crossed of questions in the W section that had been answered and made a plan to go look in other sources for questions we had and still hadn't answered yet. Yay for learning!!

Putting Up Our 3D Community

Our classroom has made a lot of progress on our 3D community lately and we were able to hang up a majority of our work. We are still waiting to hang up some students buildings, those are the blank white spots on the map... but we've come pretty far haven't we?

Writing to Sandy Hook

The last day before Christmas vacation students in our classroom spent time making cards for the students and teachers of Sandy Hook Elementary School. When students had come to school that previous Monday, right after the tragedy, a lot of them had questions about what had happened and why. We talked about how sad and scary it was and how our school was talking about ways we could make sure students were always safe here at Montello. We also talked about how it would be nice to write the students and teachers at Sandy Hook to let them know we were thinking of them during that week and throughout our holiday season. 

When we started making cards, the students and I talked about things we could say and things that might not be so appropriate. We didn't want to say anything that would make people too sad or upset. We had decided that our cards would be happy and uplifting. We wanted them to know we were their friends and they could write us back if they wanted to. I was so happy seeing how much hard work students put into these cards and I know you will be impressed once you see these photos of their hard work! So take a look at our awesome holiday/sympathy cards for Sandy Hook students and teachers...

3D Community Construction

We have been working really hard to get our 3D community together as of late. It was a lot harder of a project than we thought it was going to be. We collected all of our cardboard boxes from moms and dads and started talking about what a community map would look like. Where would the houses go? Where are the stores, restaurants, post office, police and fire department? 

After we had created the draft of our community map, students found out which building they would be creating for the house. We drew papers from a pencil cup we had in the classroom and had one chance to trade for a different building if we did not like our first one. After finding out what building we were creating, students drew a draft building on scrap paper to prepare for the real project.

From the draft, they were able to pick a box, tape it together, wrap the box in butcher paper, and paint it to look like the building they were creating. We planned on using markers to add in tiny details after the paint had dried. 

If all goes as planned, we will be putting together our 3D map this week and have it up before we leave for Christmas vacation. We have yet to decide if it will be hung in the classroom or in the hall for all to see. What would you do? We will keep you posted with our final outcome during break at some point! 

Daily 5 Break Down

The Daily 5 is composed of five different literacy tasks that will make your students stronger readers and writers. The five tasks are read to self, read to someone, listen to reading, work on writing, and word work. In our class we work to have students read to self and work on writing daily, while listening to reading, reading to someone, and completing word work at least 3 times each week. 

We work on writing everyday during writing workshop block (11-12) while read to self and two other assigned tasks are completed during 20 minute rotations in reading workshop block (1-2:30). Reading workshop also consists of a teacher read aloud, mini lesson, and group closing share. 

While work on writing and read to self are  pretty self explanatory, the other centers took a little bit more practice for the students to get used to. Above is a picture of read to someone. Students take turns reading books to one another. They can read their own personal book choice to a friend, two students can choose to take turns reading the same story, they can read the words out loud together, or they can even mimic one another's reading trying to improve their voice and fluency. 

Listen to reading is the part of the day where students can use a website called Bookflix to listen to and watch stories online. The books are read to them while the computer highlights the words and sometimes even adds animation to the illustrations. If you are interested in using this website at home, http://auth.grolier.com/login/bookflix/login.php, your students should know the username and password already, and if they don't- just let me know and I can send it home to you. 

In word work, students practice their weekly spelling words using a variety of materials. They can make words using play-doh, stamp letters and ink, magnet letters, or they can even type letters on fancy decorated keyboards! Since we have started practicing the word work strategy, students are very excited about all the new materials. They are working independently and are proud to share their hard work with friends and teachers. Keep an eye out for other word work stations that we will be trying through out the year. I have found a variety of activities that will keep spelling new and exciting for your children!

S Mart... Monthly Pod Store

As you may or may not know, the Spruce pod hosts a pod store on the last Friday of every month. Students can do classroom jobs to earn money as well as hand in homework, answer questions correctly, or stay on task and follow directions consistently. 

When they get to pod store, students will find tables of items marked by their price. There are $3, $5, $10, $15, $20, and $25 tables. Students can buy pencils, notebooks, fancy erasers and glue sticks, bags, purses, calendars, and games at the store as well as multiple other interesting items.

Teachers fill the store through shopping trips, and visits to the Share Center in Lewiston/Auburn and Ruth's Reusables in Portland. Any donations you feel might add to our pod store, please feel free to send them in. We are always looking for new items to sell to students who are working hard for those Spruce bucks!