Reading Without Limits Book Study Week 6

Hello everyone.  It is 6 AM here and I got up early in the hopes of getting the post done before leaving out for my 2nd day of Common Core training.  The training is pretty intense and tiring, so I thought I might ought to do this while I have a brain cell or 2 working!! 

I apologize ahead of time--Blogger is doing something wacky with the fonts this morning.  Apparently it is choosing when to change fonts on its own.  Very odd! I think there are 3 or 4 different fonts and spacings on this post!

 So, anyway, here we go to work on the answers for last week and get the new questions for Chapters 10 and 11.

                                    Feel Free to Pin This!


If you haven't purchased the book you can find it at Amazon!  Just click on the link below and you can go straight to the book to purchase it.

Just click here to purchase!

Here are the answers for Chapters 8 and 9:

Chapter 8

1. What is a pitfall you have faced in your class room. How did you fix it?

My biggest pitfall in my classroom would be managing my schedule.  It is easy to lose time when you get engrossed in a lesson.

2.  Why do you want lessons to be bizarre?

To keep their attention, of course!!!

3.  How do you address pitfalls?

I have classroom meetings each morning to talk about issues that are arising in the classroom.  It gives the kids ownership of the problem and makes them work to solve problems.

Chap 9

1.  Share an 'aha' moment with us. We want to learn from YOU!!

An aha moment:  I can't do everything.  I have tried, and the result is becoming burnt out and run down.  Each year, more is expected of teachers, and while I think we need to do our utmost to teach our kids, there is just no way to incorporate EVERYTHING.  I have learned I have to pick and choose what I teach and how I teach it.

2.  What is the difference between racetrack and halftime conferences?

Halftime conferences is when you are addressing the whole class using a trend you saw the students demonstrate throughout the work time. Racetrack conferences are individual conferences with as many students as possible to see if they understood the lesson.

3.  What is a grow goal? How can you manage them in your classroom?

A grow goal is a goal that is set with a student and is worked on until it is mastered. Identify the goal, help provide support by setting ‘next steps’, take anecdotal records of process, and above all, make the student be accountable!

4.  On pages 238-239, Maddie gives a format for reteaching. Summarize the format.

                                                                                                            

        a. Check in and conference with the student to see what needs to           be worked on.

        b.   Reteach

        c.   Hold the student accountable for the expectations that are set.

        d.   Give affirmation and praise the student for meeting the goal.

        e.   Set a new goal.

Here are the answers for Chapters 10 and 11:

Chapter 10

1.  Did you know that any child can be gifted?  Gifted status is determined by the amount of words a child hears between the year of their birth and age 3.  Knowing that, why is teaching vocabulary important?

2.  What is the difference between these words:  tier 1, tier 2, and tier 3?

3.  What is a morpheme?

4.  Summarize the 4 Week Word Cycle.

5.  What is your 'vocabulary' schedule like?  

Chap 11

1.  What are 'think, pair, shares'?  Why does Maddie recommend using a partner checklist?

2.  Why do teachers recommend using rubrics?

3.  How are discussions supposed to be conducted?  <pgs. 279-285>

I wanted to share an 'aha' moment that my students and I had 2 years ago.  We decided that we needed to create our own 'lesson plan' for guided reading.  To be honest, it is actually more or a record of what they are learning or what they think they need to learn while at the table with me.  Just go to my store to grab the set!  I hope you can use them! 

 Just click here to jet on over to download them for free!

Here is a button for you to use on your blog if you would like to incorporate your thoughts into a post:

Announcing 3 Winners

Well friends, it is official--I am braindead.  I spent 7 hours learning more about Common Core today with about 50 other second grade teachers and I AM TUCKERED OUT!  To the CORE!  HAHA!!  Sorry for the bad humor...but that is what happens when I am tired.  

I have to say that I feel better than usual because I drank my Zeal Vitamin Drink around 10 A.M. which is actually later than I usually drink it.  But, what they hay...that is what happens when kids can't find their glasses, or their medicine, or their shoes....mom didn't get to eat breakfast or have anything to drink at all until the 10 A.M. potty break this morning.  By 10:20 I was on top of things though and coring along with the best of them!  

Now, if your name is below, email me <there is a link on the side> and I will send you the packet that you helped me pin.  

Last night's Pin It To Win It winners are

and

And, our winner for our last giveaway 

for the Visible Learners book is

                               

Cyndy, I will need you to email me with your address so that I can send the book to you in the mail!  This is what she won!!  

                       Here is a link to the book here if you want to go to Amazon and take a look at it!

Pin It To Win It--Bloggy Style!

I worked ALL DAY LONG on this packet today and I am completely worn out.  To tired to even pin my latest creation.  So, I am going to ask you for some help!!  All I need for you to do is pin this packet to Pinterest to let the world know that there is something new out there.  I am planning to use this baby to keep everything working smoothly when we go back to school and I am doing my running records.  Just pin the pic and leave me the link below in the comment area.  Tomorrow night I will have my 8 year old pic the winner <or maybe a couple of winners if there is a good turn out!!> and announce it on the blog.  We'll work out the details of how I am going to get it to you later...my brain just stopped working.  Oops.  Night ya'll!

If you want to take a sec to look at it on Teachers pay Teachers, just click HERE or on the pic below!

 HINT:  The page below is the best one to pin!!  <wink wink>

New Decor Coming to A Classroom Near You

Well...if you live close to me that is!  HAA HAA!!

So far I have a new love seat cover that is being tie dyed with purple dye by The Math Fairy.  She is my partner in crime!!  I have my eye on a new carpet for my classroom because I figured the other one has LITERALLY seen enough blood and guts and it is time to move on.  I just need to find one cheap enough for me to afford and that will accommodate about 24 or 25 second graders.  If you know of any sites that I can look at, PLEASE leave me a link in the comment section!!

This past week I printed off and laminated my new classroom decor that incorporates all of the colors of the rainbow since the teacher that had the room before me painted the coat rack a bright green and the shelves the color of 'strawberry fields' which I translate into a hot pinkish color of red.  Very odd.  And then, the trim is all done in purple.  I was able to repaint the shelves a pretty teal color and had planned on painting the coat rack, but I just ran out of steam.  So I just gave up and I throw all of the colors together!!

We went to the hardware store today to get 3 new cinder blocks so that I can add another shelf to my classroom library.  My husband is busy painting them outside as I type right now.  At one point I had the cinder blocks wrapped with material to look like presents, but have no desire to go through that process again....so my daughter and I picked out a beautiful purple color.  I kept sending my daughter outside to take pictures of the blocks being painted with Kilz and then with the purple paint, but my husband and son just never seemed to really get started.  Men!  What do you do with them?  We finally just gave up. So, here is a picture of them ready to paint with just a smidgen of my daughter's finger.  Great eye candy, I know!

I've spent a LOT of time browsing the web looking for neat ideas....living on Pinterest.  (I'll let you in on a secret--I have 2 Pinterest addresses.  One for Best Practices and one that I am reformatting for Charts N Chit Chat and you are welcome to follow both!)  My other favorite of course, is Amazon, because if you've read any of my blog posts you know that I hate to go into stores and shop.  By the time I get done going through a store my anxiety level is up, my back and legs hurt because the Fibromyalgia, and I've usually had to wrangle a couple of kids, too.  So...Amazon, in my point of view, is the bomb!!  Here are some of the things I am looking into and remember you can always click on the pic and go read more about the products I found:

I am REALLY interested in this because my dry erase boards are REALLY scratched up and you can't erase the marker residue off of them anymore.  Does anyone have any experience with this kind of paint?  Does it work??

I love the idea of incorporating this and wish I had enough energy to try it on some cabinets at school.  I think that would be a great way to organize memos and such that I need to be able to grab on the run.

I've seen this around for years and know of teachers that repainted their chalkboards, but I had no idea that you could use it to paint on the regular wall!  Pretty cool!!

I already ordered 2 cans of this glow in the dark paint after seeing the picture on Pinterest showing the glow in the dark planters. To be honest...I am REALLY wishing I could figure out how to use the planter idea in my classroom for days when our power goes out at school <someone is always running into a transformer it seems> or just to turn the lights off and have some ambiance!!  If you have any ideas on how to incorporate some glow in the dark features, leave me a comment and let me know!

Also, just a reminder...don't forget to go by our newest collaborative blog for 2nd and 3rd grade teachers--or if you don't teach those grades, send the link to a friend.  There is a huge giveaway going on right now and there will be about a month of freebies given away, too!  You won't want to miss it.  Just click below to to check it out.

Thanks for coming by!!

Hi everyone! I'm Jen from

I'm so excited to be over here for Jenn. I wanted to share a few things you might want to use in the beginning of the year (ack! don't hate me for talking about the dreaded BTS....BUT, I'm less than a month away, so that's what's on my brain...sometimes! lol)

This time capsule is something I do every year, here is a picture of us doing it at the end of the year and comparing it to the one from the beginning of the year. It was so neat to see how they've grown!

It's a FREEBIE! And there is one for grades K-5!

See the blog post on these HERE 

Also, on that blog post, I have a lot more freebies to get you started for the new year! If you're anything like me, I try to get as much for the next year copied off before I leave for the summer. 

Hope you enjoyed this blog post! Thanks, Jen for letting me come by!

Hope you enjoyed this post!!

New to teaching reading?

Here are some resources that helped me when I was first converting from traditional reading groups to guided reading groups.  I've also been fortunate to meet Pat Pavelka and sit in on one of the professional developments that she lead in my county.  


All of these book covers are linked to Amazon so that you can read more about them!!

My guided reading mangement is full of sticky notes, group meeting plans, and notes filled with ideas...it is very well used.

The Making Connections book was a HUGE help to me and helped me to realize that I really wasn't putting enough wait on getting my students to make connections with what they were reading.  I HIGHLY recommend this book.

                       (Amazon does not currently have this book in stock.)

During the 2nd semester I give the question prompt book to my literature circle group and let them use it to come up with questions to ask each other.  It is great for self directed learners!!

The Create Independent Learners book is new to me and I haven't read it, but if it is like all of the other Pat Pavelka books, it is highly worth purchasing!

If you are knew to differentiated learning and how it can shape your centers, this little book is great, too!

Good luck with reading this year.  If I can help in any way or if you have questions that I can possibly answer, I am here, or just an email away!

This and That And a Little More

First off, I found a lot of coupons, so if you are a couponer or need to run to the grocery story, maybe this will help.  It also has some really good offers like the ones below:


Click on these offers to check them out:

Also, there is quite a bit of Instagram going on among bloggers.  Here are a few of the activities!

Here is what Jessica says:  Are you on instagram?  If so join me in connecting teachers on instagram! Copy or screenshot the above photo and post it on your Instagram with the hashtag #teachersfollowteachers. You can then click on that hashtag to find other teachers to follow! 

Alisha, aka The Bubbly Blonde is asking that teachers take pictures of great Back 2 School finds.  Upload them and use the hashtag in the pic!!

Last but not least, here is an item in my Teachers Pay Teachers store that I recently revamped:

This is a pretty cool set of 'stuff' if I have to say so myself!  Lots of fun activities for kids to do so that they can learn more about sentences.  It is kinesthetic in that there are games and sentence sorts incuded!  There are enough activites in this packet to last at least a month, or maybe more!

Well, that is all for today!!  I hope you found something that you can use!

Reading Without Limits Book Study: Week 5

Happy Wednesday, everyone!!

                                    Feel Free to Pin This!


If you haven't purchased the book you can find it at Amazon!  Just click on the link below and you can go straight to the book to purchase it.

Just click here to purchase!

Here are the answers for Chapter 7:

1.  What is one of your 'most relied upon routines?

My most relied upon routine is counting down from 10 to 1.  When I do that, my students know that I mean business and that they better be in their seats by the time I reach number 1.  I have 2 other routines that I use and they just so happen to be freebies!  Just click on their picture to download.

The first freebie is a set of desk citations I use to warn my clutterbugs that there desks, cubbies, or other areas need to be cleaned up.  You can tell that this is one of the first products I made for Teachers Pay Teachers.  I've come a long way, baby!!

The second freebie is a set of behavior punch cards that I use with my whole class.  It is sort of a 'caught being good' reward system with those with all of the bees punched out by the end of the week earning a trip to the treasure box.  Everybody needs some form of a paycheck, right?

2.  What is a muscle memory routine?

It is a routine of some sort of action that imprints on the brain. The action of DOING it or SAYING it reinforces the behavior that we want.

3.  Explain figure 7.1 on page 186.

Maddie recommends that we repeatedly expose our kids to behaviors or routines that we want by defining accepted behaviors and unacceptable behaviors.  Role playing is perfect for this!  She also recommends that we incorporate something 'bizarre' (for example, acting in a manner not expected) to help students remember what is expected.  I do this in my classroom by wearing wacky 'reading hats' when I am teaching guided reading.  Why my hat is on, I am NOT to be disturbed unless a student has one of the 4 B's:  Blood, Bruising, Barfing, or Broken.  I have an assortment of hats which range from a tiara that lights up to a sombrero and I even have a frog hat!!  

4.  How can you incorporate "hot or not" in your classroom?

I love the example of how to treat books and creating an anchor chart about this.  I can see expanding the idea to apply it to grammar skills such as, "Is this a noun?  Hot or Not".  I think it would be a lot of fun!

5.  Read through the routines on pages 192 to 205.  Choose a routine you can use and summarize it!

Summaries will vary!!

Here are the questions for Chapters 8 and 9:

Chapter 8

1. What is a pitfall you have faced in your classroom. How did you fix it?

2.  Why do you want lessons to be bizarre?

3.  How do you address pitfalls?

Chap 9

1.  Share an 'aha' moment with us. We want to learn from YOU!!

2.  What is the difference between racetrack and halftime conferences?

3.  What is a grow goal? How can you manage them in your classroom?

4.  On pages 238-239, Maddie gives a format for reteaching. Summarize the format.

Here is a button for you to use on your blog if you would like to incorporate your thoughts into a post: