MATH
We have finished up our multi digit adding practice with the stack and add algorithm. The students did a great job trying the three strategies and choosing a favourite! We have now moved on to multi digit subtraction. We have been working with the number line method. Most students are grasping this concept with ease!
Here is a quick tutorial on this method: http://youtu.be/BepTP0VUxik
Please note: We start our number lines at the lowest number in the subtraction question, not at zero.
There are many advantages to this method! It helps develop number sense, is easily used while subtracting using mental math and, for many students, is more reliable than the stack and subtract method!
We will be moving on to the stack and subtract method on Wednesday.
LANGUAGE ARTS
During read aloud time, we finished up the book Frindle by Andrew Clements. This is one of my favourite books to read to my students each year!
While reading to the students, I focus on a variety of comprehension strategies. We frequently stop and make predictions, ask questions and make connections with the story and it's characters. Building our vocabulary of specific words and common phrases is also a focus when we reading together. We discussed topics like freedom of speech/the press, the phrase "Extra! Extra! Read all about it!", copyrights, trust funds, etc. It's amazing how many times we, as adults, assume that our children understand "common" expressions...and they actually have no clue what we're talking about! This book always brings up some interesting topics to discuss and always makes me tear up in the final pages!
In writing, we have been preparing to write our first story. An important thing to point out before I launch into a description of our story planning/writing process, is my expectations of student writing. On my first day of a two day writing workshop with JoAnne Moore, JoAnne asked us (a group of about 200 teachers) a series of interesting questions:
She asked us, with a show of hands, who felt comfortable writing a story for a group of kindergarten students?
Everyone raised their hands.
She asked us who felt comfortable writing a story for a grade two class?
Most people put up their hands.
She asked us who thought they could write a simple novel for a grade three or four class?
Less than a quarter of the teachers put up their hands!
She kept the questioning going for a few more higher grades and fewer and fewer hands were raised. By the time she got to grade 12, only one brave soul out of 200 felt confident.
Her point was critical. Although our reading levels were higher than a grade twelve level, only one of us felt confident that our writing skills were at the same level. The majority of us had very little confidence in our writing abilities and were well aware that we would have to gear our story writing to a younger audience.
How does this influence my expectations of my students?
I explain to them from day one that I don't expect them to write the type of story that they would choose to read during read to self time because I can't even expect that of myself as their teacher. I explain to them, that I want them to focus on writing a simple story that would be perfect for a grade one student. This seems to take the pressure off and allows them the opportunity to focus on what is really important with writing, planning and word choice.
My writing program is quite different from what the students are used to. Instead of quickly planning out our characters, setting and "problem" before sitting down to write, we go much deeper into the specifics of our upcoming story. When we plan a stuck story, we focus on each of the following story elements:
Characters
Setting (where and when the story takes place)
Motive (what does the character want)
Stuck (how the character gets stuck that doesn't let them get what they want)
Attempt #1 that doesn't work
Attempt #2 that doesn't work
Successful attempt
Motive carried out (the character getting what they want)
Last week we planned a stuck story that takes place on a farm in the spring time. This is our story plan:
Our next step is to brainstorm a setting dictionary. During this step, we think of all of the nouns that we will encounter in our story (cow, horse, donkey, 9 year old boy, chicken coop, fence, sun, wind, farmhouse, etc) and brainstorm specific verbs to go with them. This process gets the ball rolling for the students when it comes to word choice.
Once our setting dictionary is good to go, we will start writing the story one paragraph at a time. Each story component will have its own paragraph (except character and motive goes together in one paragraph). Each paragraph will contain between 4-7 sentences. We will edit each paragraph right after we write it. This editing piece is critical!
Do you remember when you were in school and you had just poured your heart into a long story? Do you remember how painful it was to edit your work from beginning to end? Catching a mistake you made at the very beginning, that you continued to repeat throughout your story? Let's face it, by the time you finally finished writing your rough copy, you were past the point of caring! You just wanted to be done!
We eliminate this painful process by writing and editing one paragraph each day! This way, when we finish our last paragraph and edit it, we are DONE! Ready to publish!
You will all have a chance to read your child's story in progress at our Student Led Conferences next week!
Phew! I think that's all for now! I warned you that I was pretty passionate about story writing!
A few quick important reminders:
Spell-a-thon pledge forms due ASAP
Spell-a-thon test on Thursday
Yoga on Wednesday
Parent Council meeting on Wednesday
Beach Day on Friday
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