Freebie! All About Me Book Assignment Packet for Parents

I have had several people ask me about the All About Me Book that I have the parents do at the beginning of the year with their kiddos.  I have put together a packet that can be given to the parents as a resource for completing this project with their kiddos.  It is free and it is available at my TPT store.  I hope this helps you all.  This is a great way to introduce "reading to self" and "reading to a partner".  I also use these books to teach the kids how to care for not only their books, but all classroom materials.  I will be handing this out to my parents at Kindergarten Orientation.  I can't wait to see the books they create this year.  I will post pictures after they come in. 

Link to free All About Me Book Parent Packet on Teachers Pay Teachers

Sorry, I know it is not the best picture but you can see it much better at Teachers Pay Teachers.

Daily Five Chapter Five part 1

Tuesday, July 10, 2012

1. How will you instill the importance (or urgency as the sisters call it) of 'listening to reading' in your students and especially those students who have had little 'lap time' or reading done for them in their own homes?

I think the best way to do this is to make listening to reading super fun and exciting when they listen to me.  I use puppets, I dress up, I jump up and down, act things out and use different voices and I even use sound effects when I read.  When I download a book (which I do when I am on a long car trip) I often listen to snippets before downloading the book to see if the reader can keep my attention.  For those that haven’t had a lot of “lap time” I think it is also important during the first several weeks of school to spend lots of time on the floor reading to kids, modeling what it should look like, sound like and feel like.  I will also be starting a blog with ideas for parents to spice up listening to reading at home and explaining the importance.  I love some of the web sites other bloggers are posting that have actors reading stories (for free!) kids books.  I will be making a list of those to share with parents and to use in my reading nook!

2. What devices or strategies are you going to use to conduct listen to reading?' Will you use a community recording device with one cd and several earphones, individual cd players, tape recorders, ipod-type devices or computers?

I love my iPad for listening to reading.  The kids are enthralled with it and several kiddos can listen at one time.  I am looking to pick up some cheap cd players and tape recorders because I have picked up lots of tapes (cheap) from an on-line yahoo teachers group where you can list items you have for sale and other teachers can list what they are looking for. 

3. What expectations will you have for your students during 'listen to reading' and how will you keep them on task and independent instead of needing your assistance when they can't manage 'devices?'

My expectations are for them to actually listen to what is being read.  This means quiet voices, listening ears, watching eyes.  I will keep them on track by modeling how to listen to reading on the Smart Board as a large group by going to an on-line reading resource and having everyone practice together.  We will make an anchor chart and model it doing it correctly and incorrectly.  Practice, practice, practice.  I love the set of posters on the blog A Differentiated Kindergarten http://www.differentiatedkindergarten.com/2012/07/kindergaten-daily-5-link-up-and.html  so I will be downloading those and using them as well!  Thanks for making those!

4. Do you have enough 'listening to reading' type materials? If not, what ideas do you have for securing these materials? Where will you store them? How will your students retrieve these items? Where will they be used (will there be a designated spot in your class for listen or reading or will it be their choice)?

No, I do not have enough material, but I am stalking garage sales, thrift stores, on-line resources (like the one I mentioned above) and friends and families to get more tapes and CD’s to go with books for listening to reading.  I also have subscribed to several apps that have free books, interactive books and add new books each week.  I have a special place with a special book shelf, a beach umbrella and beach chairs for the kids to listen to reading.  I can’t wait to set it up.  They can listen anywhere in the classroom, but I am hoping this becomes a special place for them.  As long as supplies return to the shelf they are allowed to go where they are comfortable. 

6. The sisters do not really talk about this in their book, but how do you feel about listening response sheets? Will listening to reading be just for 'listening' or will there be follow-up work required of your students? If there is reading response sheets, what will they look like?

I think taking data on what the kiddos are getting out of their listening to reading experience is important, but I do it on a bi-weekly basis and do not have the kiddos fill out a sheet each time they listen to reading.  I hope to see the kids re-enacting stories they listen to during their center time play, but I need formal assessment so I know if the books they are listening to are interesting and challenging for them.  I have a feeling as the year progresses I will add more assessment to the listening to reading section of our Daily Five routine.

7. I would be remiss to not add this so . . . how can this station be differentiated to meet the various learning profiles, interests and/or readiness of your students?

I love my iPad for differentiating for children at different levels.  Some books can be interactive for my kinesthetic learners; some books can be shorter for my kiddos with shorter attention spans, longer for kids that are ready for that.  I love that I can get books that light up or highlight the words as they are read for my visual learners or the ones that have cool sound effects for my auditory learners.  I can also download books that focus on a certain topic so the kids that are into dinosaurs can read about dinosaurs on so on.  It is cheaper to download a lot of these books than it is for me to buy them from a store many times.

Daily 5 Book Study Chapter 3

Link to Chapter Three D5 book study

1.     Establish a gathering place for brain and body breaks. (Do you call your gathering place anything special? 

I never really called it anything special.  I used the one carpet we had in the room for so many different things I never thought about giving it a name.  I will think about that now for this upcoming school year though.  I can’t wait to see what some other people call it.

2.    Developing the concept of "good fit" books. 

I can see this is where I have more to learn than to offer anyone.  I have worked with Pre-K for the past 5 years and before that special education Resource Room so I never had a group of kiddos that could read or read at approximately the same level (as a Resource Room teacher I had kiddos K-6^th).  I have been thinking a lot about finding good fit books and I have been searching garage sales and on-line teacher sites grabbing up everything I can!

3.     Create anchor charts with students How will these be visual in the room? Where will you store them? What about small spaces?  

 Funny thing about this.  I train adults in early childhood and as an adult trainer I used anchor charts, I just didn’t know that they were called that.  I am struggling trying to figure out how to display these in the room this year.  My mentor teacher keeps them all together on an easel as she creates them so she can refer back to them all year.  The kids can go through and find the one they need.  I like that idea, but I would like to have them in a really big stable book type things.  Maybe I will take cardboard and fashion my own book that is free standing to store them in so the kids can always have access to them.  As an adult trainer I used a lot of books about Mind Mapping and Visual Thinking.  As soon as I read this Chapter I knew I had to dig them out.  I highly recommend anyone using anchor charts get these.  They will also help the children in visually capturing their thoughts before they can write.  I am also doing the In Pictures and In Words book study and will be sharing this there as well.  Do check out these books.  I really think you will love them.  I need to practice drawing with these again.  They make it so easy!

4.    Short, repeated intervals of independent practice and setting up book boxes (How are you going to keep track of stamina? What will you use for book boxes? What are you going to put in those book boxes on the 1st day of school?)

  I am frankly going to steal all of the good ideas that are being posted by you wonderful people to set up my book boxes.  I have several old book shelves that I am painting black and I bought tons of plastic bins at the dollar stores to use to separate my books and activities for each of the Daily 5 stations.  What am I going to put in these boxes the first day of school?  Lots of alphabet stuff to see which kiddos recognize the letters and can make the sounds.  I will have tons of books on tape/CD to listen to for them as well.  Keeping track of stamina will be tricky at first, but I love the idea of the class setting a goal and keeping a timer on the Smart Board so they can see how long they have gone.  There is a Smart Board program I believe that has a runner on it showing how long they have read.  I am still stalking blogs and pinterest boards looking for more ideas.

5.    Calm Signals and check in procedures (Do you already have a signal? How will you handle check ins?) 

I have always done a song (such as, come on over, come on over, come on over, it’s time for morning meeting……………..I need to see your eyes……….it’s time to come to the carpet).  I love the idea of a wind chime or some other musical instrument to use as a signal.  I am searching garage sales now to find the perfect thing!

6.    Using the correct model/incorrect model approach for demonstrating appropriate behaviors. (Will you keep track of inappropriate behaviors? If they are not doing what is expected, then they are calling out for attention...what other ways can you give them some extra atention so that they can be more independent during D5?) 

 I really don’t like to give a lot of attention to negative behavior.  I love the role playing of positive and negative behaviors as a class.  I am a big believer of giving children sensory input to help them with wiggly bodies.  I don’t mind gum chewing for my more oral kiddos (I know, I am weird).  I keep lots of fidget toys for large group time.  I put smelly stuff into my play dough to keep more than one sense engaged at a time.  I let them write in glitter pens, I let them pick the music to have on in the background (usually they can pick from a composer we have studied or a genre we have explored).  I just think the more senses that can be engaged during an activity the less likely negative behaviors will occur.  I also schedule a sitting activity immediately followed by a whole body activity.  Sometimes I think we set the behaviors off by forgetting how long they can actually attend to a single activity.  Really, if I had to sit all day long and listen to someone talk at me I would act out too!  Now you know why I teach young children.  I am so much like them!

Well that is it for me.  I hope you will follow my blog so I can find you.  I can't wait to read what everyone has to say about this chapter.  And again, special thanks to Live, Love, Laugh Everyday in Kindergarten for hosting this awesome study!  You Rock!

While at the beach.......

Last week I was lucky enough to go to Avon in the Outer Banks of North Carolina.  While there I was able to read several books (on the plane, in the car, on the ferry, sitting on the sand).  I fell in love with these two books.

I wish I would have been exposed to these books while teaching Early Childhood Pre-K.  I really think so many of the ideas in these two books could be used with much younger children.  We read to them, they read to each other, they listen to books, they write in their journals.  It makes me feel good that I was doing some of this as a teacher before I read these books, but I could have done so much more. 

So, now I am full of even more ideas for my classroom.  It is getting so bad I have to rent a storage unit for my classroom materials.  We want to put the house on the market and my teaching stuff is taking over.  I have books, book shelves, pillows, sofa, teaching units, decorations, and much more.  I stay awake some nights planning out my classroom.

Unfortunately the flooring has not been put into the new wing of the school where my new classroom is located.  Which means EVERYTHING is at my house.  This is not good.  I have to wait until August 1, 2012.  Until then I will read more, collect more and lose more sleep!

The point of this post?  Read these books.  That is all.  If you are lucky enough, read them on a beach.  The sand doesn't hurt the books at all.  I recommend you don't put them in the water though.

Summer Reading

So, the summer reading has begun.  These are the first three on my list.  I just started this one and I love it.  I am dreaming about the I CAN charts I want to make to help me and the student's use the work stations more effectively.  Good thing my new classroom has 975 square feet because I am going to need every foot to cram full of great learning stations!  I will post the I CAN posters after I make them.

I devoured this book as soon as I got it!  Love, Love, Love some of the ideas.  I started raiding the dollar stores, Hobby Lobby, Jo Ann Fabric and Michael's after I looked through this book.  Garage sales aren't safe either this summer.  This really got my creative juices flowing, although the bank account is not very happy about it.  I find myself dreaming about all the neat things I can do to create learning spaces for the next school year.  I will take pictures of what I come up with in August.  Wish I could get into my classroom now.

I haven't started this one yet.  Hopefully next week.  I have about eight books I want to get through this summer.  This one looks very interesting.  I am really having to think about how to go from learning centers to literacy centers.  I love learning but my brain is going into over drive.  Wonder which books I will end up taking to the beach in two weeks?  I know, I am a dork and should leave the books at home and take something not school related!