Daily Five Chapter Four Book Study

Link to Daily Five Chapter Four Book Study at Mrs Miner's Kindergarten Monkey Business

Read to Self is a segment of the Daily 5 framework when students need to be reading quietly and constantly for a set amount of time in the classroom.

1)  How far into the school year do you think kinders need to be to be able to begin the process of Read to Self? What is realistic? When do you plan to begin implementation

I will start probably the first day.  I am planning on taking a book in myself and reading when they do at first.  I am going to send home a note with the parents at Kindergarten Orientation explaining Read To Self and I will ask the parents to introduce the term at home and to practice with their child for two minutes each night until Kindergarten starts.  I think it is important for the parents to understand the importance so they can practice at home and have the concept reinforced and practiced when they are not at school.

2)  How will you make sure that each child views him/herself as a reader (whether they are reading words or not)?

Oh my!  They are readers!  I believe that before they even come to school and they will hear it at Orientation.  I will be giving them book marks that say “I AM A SUPER READER!”.  I will have lots of environmental print in the Dramatic Play area to reinforce that they are already reading!  I will also have many “favorite” books that they can “read” to me and to their friends.

3)  What are some ideas you have about "Launching Read to Self" in kindergarten? How will you go about it and what are some ways to make sure it is "kinder friendly"?

I have a ton of stuffed animals that are characters from many of the popular books (I Love Kohl’s for doing this).  They can get an animal to sit with them when they read at first.  I know this is more of a read to a friend strategy, but at first I think it will make reading to self less intimidating.  I also have mentioned their All About Me book they put together to bring to school during the first week of school.  It is great because they can all read about themselves!  I have a special book case they go into so they can always pick their special book about themselves to read.  It is critical that they are given an opportunity to be successful right from the start, and that book they bring from home really seems to help.  We will also discuss reading to self during morning meeting starting the first day.  I have tons of pillows, kids size beach chairs, a beach umbrella they can sit under, I have cut off two rocking chairs and made them kids size so they can have lots of different areas of the room they want to explore with a book!  I want them to snuggle down with a book and really enjoy the atmosphere.

4)  How will you/do you build the children's belief that this IS important? What can we do to encourage the ones who do not value it and create disruptions for others?

Again, I think it is about making them successful.  No one wants to fail, and letting them read the All About Me book they bring with them creates success.  I have also been collecting a lot of non-fiction books (lots of boys really love these, real pictures of real tangible things can really entice some kids to enjoy books because they don’t have to follow a “story” but can understand reading about “real” things is reading and RESEARCH.  My aren’t they smart to be doing all that already!).  I always ask the kids the first day of school what they want to learn about and then it is my job to get books specifically about their interest.  The kids can’t believe that I would go to the library and pick out books special, just for them.  I also write it down for them to take to the library (both school and public) so they can had it to the media specialist (some are shy and don’t want to talk).  I make special book marks for them featuring their interests so they don’t forget what they want to read about (I might put pictures of dinosaurs, princesses, animals, whatever they list onto the bookmark).

5)      How valuable is Checking In and Reviewing with kindergarteners? How often will you do it? When will you do it? What are some different ways to "check in"?

I want to have a morning meeting and an afternoon meeting to check in with the class.  I will check in with small groups and individuals at different times during the day.  This is something I have never done formally (remember, Daily Five is new to me) so this is an area I need to introduce to myself this year.  I am looking forward to seeing what everyone else has to say about this.

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!

The Daily Five book study

Kindergarten Smiles

Make sure you go to Kindergarten Smiles blog to see lots of other responses!

1.      Do you trust your students? How do you build this trust? Are you able to trust them and allow them to be independent throughout all aspects of your day? Are you going to be able to stay out of their way?  Yes I trust my student’s.  No matter where they are in their development I trust them to learn, to try and to make progress.  I build that trust by giving them choices, letting them explore, asking them what they want to learn about and developing materials and lessons that honor them as individuals and as a group.  I trust them to be independent and the amount of time I trust them grows as they do.  When I listen to them, get to know them and honor their ideas and interests then they are able to be independent for longer periods of time.  Remember, I have been teaching Pre-K and this fall I am going to Kindergarten so I have to keep in mind what is developmentally appropriate for them during the school year.  Can I stay out of their way?  Most of the time, but I have had to develop this skill!  It took a lot for me to “let go” of the kiddos and let them develop and grow WITHOUT me telling them how to solve every problem and make every decision for them.  And you know what, something amazing happened.  They started solving problems, making decisions and becoming more responsible for their own behavior and learning.  I wish I would have learned this earlier in my teaching career.

2.      How much choice do you give your students throughout the day? (would love for you to share some examples!) Do you go over your daily schedule with your students or is it just 'posted' in the room?  By October the kiddos are able to have many more choices during the day than at the beginning of the school year.  Learning about their interests helps me develop activities for literacy and math that make sure their choices will help them reach their educational goals.  At first I go over their daily schedule every day.  After a while, they know they what comes next and like the routine.  Many times if they are engaged in a particular activity or something happens (like snow, or rain, or a guest) that warrants a “teachable moment” then we can throw the schedule out the window!  Learning is the main goal and that over rides everything else.

3.      How are you going to create that sense of community where students will hold each other accountable?  At the beginning of the year I have each child create an All About Me book at home.  During the first few weeks of school they bring in their books to share with the class.  They stay at school the whole year.  They share their books with each other during Read To A Buddy time and at morning meeting.  They love learning about each other, sharing their books and reading.  I have had children be out sick for a long time and the children will go to their friends book and remember their friend by reading their book.  I have also had a child move and they chose to leave their book behind.  This really helped the other kids remember their friend and deal with “losing” their friend.  By sharing their books, they find commonalities with each other and this build community.  We also use the Be Safe, Be Kind and Be Responsible format to guide our daily thoughts and actions.  This builds a safe, kind and respectful community that they love!  They respect and care for each other and their classroom.  Here is the link to this free set at Teachers Pay Teachers 

4.      How do you establish urgency?  Again, I go back to my responsibility to get to know the children and their interests in order to create learning environments that they are URGENT to explore.  I also dress up to support units (Cat in the Hat, pirate, on and on).  They are wild to learn when I do silly things like that!  I also like to invite their families to come in and share customs, culture and to act as readers.  This creates wonderful urgency for the children because they have ownership of the events and teachers.

5.      Stamina! How are you going to build stamina with reading? independent work? Will you use a timer? Will you set goals?  This is a new concept for me.  I have never really thought about stamina before.  I know that I helped the children create it by offering long term reading, writing and project based approach learning activities.  You can go to my classroom blog at www.us411.blogspot.com to see lots of long term lessons that required the students to use stamina.  I hope you will visit and write me back on your thoughts and ideas on how I can build stamina with my students this fall.