Lilly the Mouse

This year, our character/series reading unit corresponded with our "Authors as Mentors" writing unit, so we were able to use Kevin Henkes books as mentor texts for both!  In reading, I relied heavily on the Lilly books, including Lilly's Purple Plastic Purse, Lilly's Big Day, Julius, the Baby of the World, Chester's Way, and Lilly's Chocolate Heart.  Lilly is a complex character so she is great to consider across texts.

As I read each book aloud, the kiddos worked to identify Lilly's likes and dislikes, emotions, and traits. We noticed how many of her traits carried across multiple books.  For instance, Lilly demonstrates loyalty when she defends Chester and Wilson in Chester's Way, and when she stands up for Julius in Julius, Baby of the World.  Lilly is jealous of Julius in Baby of the World, and she's jealous of Ginger in Lilly's Big Day.  The kiddos recorded their own observations on this cute worksheet and then practiced identifying other characters' emotions and traits in their own books. 

The kiddos really loved the Lilly books!  Toward the end of the unit, after we had read each of the Lilly books, we took a vote on our favorite Lilly book. Lilly's Big Day was the big winner, but Chester's Way was the 2nd most popular among my avid readers.  I'm hoping to incorporate more graphing in to our thematic reading/writing units in the future!

Nonfiction Explorer Journals

Wow, well, February just came and went!  We actually just finished up our nonfiction reading and writing units, but since I didn't get around to posting them, I'm going back to review how things went.

I started out this unit by introducing new Nonfiction Explorers Journal.  I created this journal as a central place for all of the graphic organizers and reading responses that are part of our nonfiction unit.  I loved the explorers theme woven through this journal and the kiddos really enjoyed using their journals.  

More importantly, I had built-in exit tickets for almost every lesson.  Each page corresponded with one of the reading lessons I taught so my readers always had a place to record their notes. They learned to notice important vocabulary, record key facts, and connect big ideas with supporting details.

The kiddos kept these journals in their reading bins, along with leveled books and some nonfiction books from our topic bins (which we created here.)  In addition to getting a few leveled books (fiction or nonfiction) I encouraged my explorers to use the "Five Finger Test" to fill their bins with nonfiction books they could read.  I always find it interesting how this unit can push struggling readers to new heights as they seek to read challenging books on the topics that interested them. 

Once again, this unit allowed my readers to stretch their decoding and comprehending muscles and many of them move up at least one reading level during this month!

The Nonfiction Reader Experience

We have just wrapped up our nonfiction unit in Readers' Workshop.  For the past month, the kiddos have read almost exclusively nonfiction books!  When we came back from Winter Break, I had turned over my library from primarily fiction books in leveled bins (based on the Fountas & Pinnel leveling system) to nonfiction books in subject bins.

Throughout this unit, the kiddos had an opportunity to explore each subject bin.  I created my bins based on the books we had available, so we had bins for Animals, Insects, Plants, Space, Geology, People/Cultures, Biography, How-to, and Holidays.  Interestingly, Animals and Biography seemed to be the class favorites this year.

One of the primary goals of this unit is developing the kiddos' fluency while reading nonfiction.  To do this, we used some videos of The Jeff Corwin Experience from Animal Planet to help the kiddos learn what a "narrator voice" should sound like.  Jeff Corwin is very expressive (as you can see in this clip).  The little guys learned to bring their voice down to a whisper at exciting places in a story, sound dramatic at exciting parts, and slow down a bit when describing important details.

This unit was very popular among the kiddos. They learned how to use post-its to mark their thinking, make connections between books on the same topic, identify the main idea of a section or book, and pick out key details.  This week, the kiddos were able to shop from the leveled bins again, but I noticed that many of them were still eager to choose some nonfiction titles.  It's exciting to see them developing a passion for learning through reading!

Inferring with Blues Clues

Over the past couple of weeks, we have been "getting to know our characters" during Readers' Workshop.  This unit focuses on summarizing, identifying character traits, making connections, and inferring.  We have had a lot of fun reading about some favorite characters including Olivia, Franklin, and Arthur.  During the first part of the unit, I encouraged the kiddos to stay close to the text.  We put post-its in our books to mark our thinking and made text-to-self and text-to-text connections to help us understand our characters better.

When it came to teaching inferring though, I needed the kiddos to think beyond the text.  On the suggestion of a colleague, we started inferring with wordless books.  We used the image of separate "text clues" and "schema" puzzle pieces coming together to create an inference.  Wordless books are great for getting kiddos to realize their schema, or prior knowledge and understanding of a topic.  However, I wanted the kiddos to think about the text as well, so I had the idea to try a Blue's Clues book to teach the next step in inferencing.

I wasn't surprised when my "big kid" first-graders balked at the idea of reading a "baby book" like Blue's Clues.  But I persevered, ignoring their eye rolls and groans.  Then I avoided pointing out that every one of them called out "a clue, a clue!" on the first page with Blue's paw print.  I've always enjoyed Bue's Clues, and appreciated the concept of the show even more after reading Malcolm Gladwell's analysis of the show in The Tipping Point.  It turns out that even big first graders can benefit from the structure of the story (the books follow the same layout at the TV show).

Within the first few pages, the kiddos were eager to solve Blue's mystery.  A few pages later I had the kiddos make inferences about what Blue might want using the first two clues and their schema.  One of the books we read was called Blue's Frustrating Day.  In it, Blue is on her way to a birthday party but is frustrated about something.  Two of Blue's clues were a bow and a string so the kiddos inferred that perhaps Blue was frustrated because she could not tie a bow on a present.  Their schema told them that when you go to a birthday party you often bring a present.  After the final clue, a shoe, we revised our inference using the new information.  We determined that Blue was frustrated because she couldn't tie her shoes.  The kiddos took it one step further though, by inferring that Blue needed to wear shoes to the birthday party because people dress up for parties.  It was great to see them getting into the story and making thoughtful, logical inferences.  I think we are well set up to start inferring in other books!

Asking Questions

As I've posted before, I love finding new teaching videos.  I recently found this one about asking questions before, during, and after reading and decided to try it in my class.

I made a few adaptations to the lesson to make it work a little better for my first grade kiddos.  I used the book Milo and the Fire Engine Parade (although Supermotamus looks like a fun book!) and I started the lesson by modeling how I would look at the book and generate "Before Reading" questions.  Then I gave each kid two post-its.  One said "During reading, I wonder..." and the other said, "After reading, I wonder..." As I read the story, I paused and gave the kiddos a chance to write down their questions.  At the end of the story, I went through the same process as the teacher in the video and we considered whether or not our questions had been answered.  I really liked this aspect of the lesson because I think it was an important point to make -- while we look for answers in the story, sometimes we don't find the answers and that's okay if the question wasn't essential to our understanding.

Then, I took the practice a step further by asking the kids to do the same process in their Independent Reading.  I gave them a sheet with three boxes to practice asking questions before, during, and after reading a "Just-Right" (Independent Level) book.  This was a good check to see if the kiddos really got the idea.  Asking questions about their own reading is an important Common Core Literacy Standard so it's something I will revisit frequently this year, but this was a great start!  Plus it went right along with our newest Comprehension Helper: Questioning Owl.   

I'm so glad I found a video to inspire yet another lesson.  As it happend, the day I was taught this lesson, I was being filmed as well.  A few months ago I volunteered to participate in a program with my school district to gather footage that will be used as part of a training for new teachers in the district. I'm pleased to say that the folks from the district were very impressed with my kiddos! :)

Reading Helpers

One of the most important jobs of first grade teachers is teaching our kiddos how to "tackle trouble" while reading.  I teach my kids that they have a toolbox of strategies they can use as readers to help them when they are stuck.  But we all know that when you are in a tough spot, it's often hardest to recall all the strategies you know.

This year I am using "Reading Helpers" to introduce each strategy. These helpers are actually characters who personify each strategy, like "Eagle Eyes" who reminds you to look at the pictures for clues.  I have to give full credit to the newest teacher at my school who shared this amazing idea with me.  Apparently, teachers all over the place have been utilizing "Beanie Baby Reading Helpers" to introduce essential reading strategies to little ones, but I had never heard of this.    Well, thank goodness that now I have!  Reading Helpers are amazing!  Some teachers actually purchase beanie babies to go along with each strategy, but so far the posters seem to be enough.  I'm hearing conversations among my readers that I never thought I'd hear... comments like "I used 'Eagle Eyes' but the picture didn't really help me, so then I used 'Stretchy Snake' to stretch out the word but it didn't work, so I had to use 'Flippy the Dolphin' and when I flipped the vowel then I figured it out!"  I can't remember where I got all the cliparts from but I created my own posters (and corresponding bookmarks) to introduce each strategy.

I also found a few people who use Reading Helpers for comprehension strategies too.  I've made posters for these as well but we haven't introduced them yet.  I can't wait!

Literacy Work Stations

Last year, I wanted to have Centers in my classroom, but somehow they never quite came together.  This summer I was determined to figure out how to implement centers in my first grade class.  Although our school doesn't use the Daily Five, I found a lot of great resources on centers from teachers who do.  My Literacy Work Stations resemble Daily Five centers in that each Station focuses on a different literacy skill: Comprehension, Writing, Word Work (sight words), and Phonics.  For each center, I have 1 weekly activity that students must do.  Then I have additional activities (such as the activity from previous weeks) that student can do if they finish.  While students are in centers I am able to meet with Guided Reading groups which is fabulous, because last year I had to meet with groups during Readers' Workshop which meant that I didn't get to do individual conferencing every day.

I'll have to post more about each station at some point, but I'm particularly excited about my Comprehension Station.  Each week during Read-Aloud, I focus on a comprehension skill (mainly from the Common Core Standards), such as main character, setting, perspective, predictions, etc.. Then the following week, students read their own Just-Right books and complete a Comprehension Worksheet related to the skill. I've never had students respond to their reading  in this way before so I wasn't sure how well it would go, but so far I've been really excited about the work they've produced!

Story Retelling

My students love to re-tell stories! They feel so successful when they can "read" all by themselves. They also love to use props to help them re-tell.