Book Clubs **UPDATED***

Hey all!

Hooray testing is finally over!  I am finally getting a chance now to think about what I "wish" I did this year around routines for myself and the kids.  I love to use this time to test out new ideas I have for the following year.

I was talking to the most amazing co-teacher in the world about what are some things we took the time to do for ourselves and we both agreed that we wanted to do book clubs this year for ourselves.  Here are the books we have planned to read / re-read

June:  Falling in love with Close Reading*
July:  The Together Teacher ( help us start the year off organized with our time)
August:  The Mindful Child
September: Teach Like a Pirate
October:  End of Molasses Classes ( a great quick read to demotivate us in that usual October slump where you start to realize you are no where near summer!)
November:  Leverage Leadership*
December:
January
February:
March:
April:
May:
June:

*New additions based on what I have seen online!*

As you can see we are missing a book for a few months.  If you have any suggestions let us know!  What have you read that really excited you and changed the way you taught/ran something in your room?


Best,

Test Prep Fun!

Hey all!  I don't know about you but all this testing nonsense really has me stressed out.  I can not stop thinking about how I can ensure my kids go from not knowing to mastering skills in days.  While I recognize that it is not possible- I do know that there are simple things that I can fix.  Lots of times my scholars have a hard time deciding what "trick" to use to add, subtract, multiply, or divide fractions.  Or when they set up a line plot they never put the fractions in order.  Or worse yet- They STILL don't use a place value chart to answer any question about place value- they would rather guess.

So I talked it over again with the most amazing co-teacher in the world and we came up with a GREAT idea!  We decided to take away our children's special (before you kill me hear me out.  I work at a school where 4 out of the 5 days of specials have a sub, and in the last week we have had 2 physical fights, 1 student embarrassed and parents calling mandatory meetings, and 5 days of NOTHING done).  We wanted to make it fun and NOT stressful at all because when we stress them out they obviously don't do well.  We make 6-7 centers depending on the week that reinforced or taught simple skills the scholars are getting wrong.  My kids would graph each day how they did and would work towards getting better at the skill,


It was AMAZING! Attached are some pictures of them working on the centers skills.  I included all documents I made.  Please feel free to use them or change them based on your needs.



Here is the graph that my students used to plot how they did:






Here is an example of the direction cards I made:

Here are the different pieces needed:

The Cover Page

The Centers Page the students write on

The task Cards I used

This is for the first week- I will gladly attach the centers we did for the 2nd week if you like!




Love,

Science?!

So in DC, our 5th graders take a Science state test.  They don't actually count towards our state goal, but it is still something our students need to learn.  In a chart school where making gains on ELA and Math are the sole focus- Science will sometimes get pushed off to the side.  Last year we never even put it in the schedule.  We've tried to hire science teachers as a specials, and have spent lots of money on kits to make life "easier" for the teacher.

Over the holiday break I really tried to figure out what I was supposed to use as a guide for 5th grade science, and what I needed to ensure my kids were ready to answer questions about.  In comes:  The Next Generation Science Standards.  These standards are supposed to become the Common Core of Science.  The one thing I love- THERE ARE STANDARDS! I was just pulling out of a hat what to teach.  

Right now they are just in the stages of producing the standards, but as always I go to my favorite teacher research site aka pinterest and I clearly see that there are lots of teachers already trying to create things to make the NGSS understandable for teachers like me (who have no idea how to teach science!).  

The first site I wanted to showcase was:  Jason's online classroom.  There I found some posters that I actually bought because they helped me break down with pictures the standards into some type of objective.  I wish that they came with some type of plan- but that is where I am trying to fill in the gaps!


So I am asking you- do you have any ideas on how I can easily integrate science?  I have about 45 minutes 3-4 times a week.  Any advice would be great!

Customary and Metric Units of Measure

Hey everyone!


So the past two weeks we have been talking about customary and metric units of measure.  We just did a basic understanding of how to convert and I am trying to think about ways I can extend my children's real world connection.  They are very familiar with the obvious "we measure things like a house, or our height, or our weight."  And they have always done model homes- what else can we do?!


Also, I wanted to attach a sheet I found about the metric system.  It really helped my children understand the metric system.  I do not know who this came from- so if it's yours please let me know so I can give you credit!!!!!!

Metric Conversions

Fun Friday

Hey all!

This school year my school has decided to implement a "Fun Friday".  Fun Friday is 30 minutes every Friday where students who demonstrated awesome behavior and completed their homework can have some fun.  In order to keep the Fun Friday's interesting we allow our students to vote at the beginning of the week for things they would like to do.

Here are some examples of Fun Friday's we have talked about/ actually had because they received the most votes!

Lapbooks-Just the beginning!

Hey all!

Happy Holidays!  So my co-teacher and I wanted to stop giving so many worksheets and multiple choice questions, so we decided (well she had this great idea and I jumped right on!) that after Christmas we would start trying to infuse lap books to help them learn the information and then try and have them apply what they learned through the lap books into grade level texts.

Cue:  Lapbook 101


Here we are today (we didn't have a snow day, but did have a 2 hour delay which is basically the same thing but I can at least be in my classroom)  trying to make 25 lap books to start our kids off with.

Please mind the tons of pictures but I wanted to ensure that you understood what we did!

First we started with a plain manilla folder.  This is the outer layer of our lap book.

We folded the one side so that the tab touched the middle fold.

Then we did the same to the other side.

We were left with a lap book that looked like this:

Now to make the inside of the lap book.

First, we started by cutting off the top parts of the folders (the tabbed area where you would write)

 Next, we cut the folders in Half.  We only did this so that we would have enough flaps for the actual lap books (1 per lap book- so we cut about 13 folders)

 We took a piece of paper and used little baby dots on the outside of the paper to glue it to the back of the lap book.  Baby dots are the key to ensuring that the paper does not get crinkly if you do not have glue sticks.

 Next we put tape on one side of the lap book.  This is so that I can punch holes in the lap book so they can store them in their binders, and i won't get destroyed.

 Almost there!

Now we took the half folder and taped the top to the inside of the folder so that it would flap upwards.

Last, we needed to hole punch the lap books so that they would fit inside the scholars binders.

 Viola!!!!!!

My next post will be about our very first lap book and what they created.  We are planning to make these during our week of testing so that the students can review Main Idea in a positive way.

Properties of Addition and Multiplication

This week I am going to be "unleashing" the properties of addition and multiplication.  I use a word like unleashing because it is a HUGE amount of information for very little to be done.  Since it involves a lot of information up front, I tried to make a foldable that was easy for my kids to make and would not take up too much time.  Cue Foldable!

Here is the final product of the foldable.  I used 11 x 17 paper because I did want it to be larger than some I have seen online that can fit into a notebook.  The template that I made does allow for you to make them smaller so they can fit into a notebook.

 I started by making all the labels, definitions, and examples for each property.

 Here they are cut out and placed in piles based on what they are (name, definition, or example)

I then cut them out and glued (really taped for my copy) the names on the outside.  The definitions are on the back of the flap, and the examples are on the inside back.

Sorry that you can not see at all the information inside- but I really just wanted you to see how I set it up using my template that you can have for free below!

Then I created a worksheet that has examples for each that students will identify which property they follow.  We are going to be placing emphasis on the distributive property because we are about to embark on a long unit all about division of whole numbers and decimals!


Here is the link for the foldable and the worksheet to practice locating the property type!

Let me know your thoughts and what you might have done to help your children understand the different properties!



Best,