All kinds of important stuff!

Yesterday there was a lot of debate in my mind about how (if) I was going to proceed with the book study.   There was a flurry of activity as sellers on Teachers Pay Teachers were told to remove any downloads that referred to The Sisters or Daily 5 and CAFE due to copyright issues.  At first I was VERY angry, because that included organizational freebies that I know many teachers have worked hard on so that they could be shared, thus making the implementation of these ideas 'easy peazy, lemon squeezy' so that teachers could focus on more important things:  teaching.  I admit it, I was in a huff.  How dare The Sisters line their pockets with more money....to my knowledge they do not supply CAFE posters or the anchor charts needed to get started.  So what was up??  It's called 'Publishing'.  And publishers like money.  I wonder if the publishers realize that these books sell a lot more because we write about them?? We are giving them free marketing!

So, now there is discussion going on about what we can distribute and put up for download and what we cannot.  Stay tuned as we all wait and find out when you do!  So, for now, in my eyes, book studies are not copy written, so I think we are good to go.  Now...on with my answers to the questions!

1. On pages 4-6, the authors present two different pictures of their classrooms. In thinking about and reflecting on your own practice, how would you characterize your literacy block? Does it look more like the first or second scenario, or is it somewhere in between? How will you change it?

Centers in my room involve a lot of student choice.  Having done Daily 5 before, most of my centers are closely aligned and Daily 5 like.  I do however need to help my students develop stamina so that they work harder and concentrate more.

2. The typical teacher is very busy having students do lots of different activities. How is what you are having students do now in your classroom creating quality readers and writers? 

My theory has always been read, read, read.  I have even gotten in trouble before for having 'time to read' as a center choice when I knew my kids weren't reading at home.  How else do you get better at something?  You have to practice!


3. What sets the Daily 5 structure apart from what you are doing in your classroom?

The biggest thing that will happen is that I anticipate my students working at making the reading block more higher level with less goofing off.

Chapter 2: 

1 .What goals do you have for your classroom as you work to implement the principles and foundations of the Daily 5 discussed in chapter 2? What support do you need to do this?

I need to work harder at not letting off task behaviors seem 'ok'.  Stamina is going to be the hardest for me because it involves changing ME.

2. What stands out as the most significant aspects of this chapter? 

This one needs more time for reflection!

 3. How do the foundational principles of the Daily 5 structure (trust, choice, community, sense of urgency, and stamina), align with your beliefs that support your teaching strategies and the decisions that you make about student learning? All of them!  Urgency is definitely there because of our testing situation and the introduction of Common Core.  Stamina also will be hard for me.

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Now, we all know that Common Core is causing quite a stir.  There are certain mandates and guidelines and explicit skills that we have to teach.  But, did you know that we have explicit vocabulary that we need to teach??  We are talking more than 'vocabulary words' that go with a piece of literature.  We are talking about THE REAL NITTY GRITTY vocabulary that is pretty technical.  Words like encoding, word analysis....etc.  So, I sat down here the other day wondering how I was going to do that, when I got the idea to create vocabulary posters that help with the definitions of all of these technical words.  So, I started with Reading Foundational Skills 2.3 (for second grade) and created posters that I think are going to be DYNAMIC and change the way I teach.  I envision using them during mini-lessons as we think critically about the skills and behaviors needed to express understanding.  They look like this!  So far I have only worked on posters for 2nd grade.  I am toying with the idea of creating a first and third grade set of posters as well if there is a need for them.  Is there a need for them??  I need some feedback!!  You can click on a pic to go to Teachers Pay Teachers, too.

I hope you guys have a great day.  As soon as I hear something in regard to Daily 5, I will update you!

Jenn