Independent Workers

I know it may have been hard heading back to school in mid-August this year, but what a great feeling it is sitting here on Labor Day knowing that when I pull small groups tomorrow, the first graders will be able to work independently when they are not working with me!

The first few weeks of school are all about setting up the structures and routines of the classroom. We learn a lot, but we do a great deal of whole group work and are continuously practicing independent work activities.

Our hard work is paying off and the first graders are getting better and better at working independently; this enables me to work with small groups.

I use workshops to teach reading, writing and math. The following is the layout of a typical workshop schedule:

• Short whole group mini-lesson (teacher teaching the whole class together)
• Student application/small group or one-on-one instruction (The kids are given a chance to apply what they have learned in the small group mini-lesson independently. During this time, I confer with students one on one or work with them at their level in a small group)
• Sharing time (We all gather together to share what we have learned about ourselves as readers/writers/mathematicians that day.)

Using this workshop format gives me the ability to work with each child at his/her level while the other students are engaged in meaningful activities.

3 Ways to Read a Book

During the first two days of school we learned about three different ways to read a book.

• Read the pictures- this is more than just glancing at the pictures as you flip through a book. It is using the pictures to tell the story and really thinking about what is happening.
• Read the words
• Retell the story- we can tell stories that we have read or heard in our own words.

Most importantly, we understand that reading is ALWAYS about thinking, no matter which way you choose to read a book! Please keep these three ways of reading in mind as your first grader practices reading at home.

Read to Self

Read to Self is the first component of the Daily 5 that I teach. We began working on Read to Self on the very first day of school.

The first thing we did was create a sense of urgency by brainstorming reasons why Read to Self is so important. Here are the reasons our class came up with:
* It's fun
* It helps us get better at reading
* Comprehension
* To learn new things

After we understood why Read to Self was so important, we listed things that the students and the teacher would be doing during read to self (see picture).

Using the chart we created to guide us (we call it an I chart), we started building stamina by practicing Read to Self for very short periods of time. After we practiced Read to Self, we returned to the I-chart reviewed the ideal behaviors and reflected on things that went well and areas in which we need to improve. Then, we went out and did it all again! By Friday afternoon, we were reading for 4-5 minutes. Before long, we'll be reading for 20-25 minutes!

The Daily 5

Before long, you will undoubtedly hear your child mention The Daily 5. The Daily 5 is a management tool that keeps the first graders engaged in meaningful reading and writing activities while I work with small groups or confer individually with students.

Each day we will have 3 sessions of the Daily 5. The first graders will choose 3 of the 5 following tasks to complete each day:

• Read to Self
• Work on Writing
• Read to Someone
• Word Work
• Listen to Reading

I spend the first few weeks of school explicitly teaching these 5 tasks so the students know exactly what to do. We start out practicing each task for 3 minutes or less and gradually increase the time as we "build stamina" for each task.

I know the time spent slowly introducing the Daily 5 is well worth it when I see the students truly engaged and working independently on authentic reading and writing activities. This allows me to work with other students in small groups with very few interruptions!

2009-2010 School Year

I love the feeling of nervousness, anticipation and pure excitement that a new school year brings out. I feel this way at the beginning of every school year as I think about the joys, challenges and triumphs that the school year will bring.

This year in particular, I feel an overwhelming sense of excitement as I think about the year that lies ahead. This being my second year teaching first grade, I have seen the places that 6-7 year olds can go and the things they can do and I can't wait for the class of 2021 to absolutely amaze me!

The nervousness comes in when I think about the tools I have to give them (or simply help them discover they already have) to get them there. Although this is a scary thought, I know we will get there as we learn from each other this school year. Together we will accomplish great things!

One thing that I learned about myself as a teacher from last year's class is that I had greatly underestimated the abilities of some of the youngest learners in our school system. Don't get me wrong...I have worked with 5-7 year olds for 10 years and have seen them move from virtually non-readers/writers at the beginning of first grade and kindergarten to independent readers and writers by the end of the year, so I knew they could accomplish great things. Last year we raised the bar for first graders and asked them not only to work on those important decoding skills but also to do some very high level work with reading comprehension. By the end of the year we had first graders making connections, visualizing, inferring, questioning and synthesizing their reading!

This got me thinking and reflecting upon other areas that we may underestimate these very capable young students. I knew that one of those areas was the meaningful use of technology. I created this blog last year in hopes that, along with being a great way to communicate between home and school, it would give students an authentic purpose for using technology. Throughout the year, the blog kept families informed of the happenings in first grade and served as an excellent way to share photos, videos and student work. However, I found that I seemed to be the main user of this technology- I was the one that was updating the blog, posting pictures and ultimately deciding what was important enough to share with families. We had succeeded in making the blog a tool for home/school communication but I had failed in truly involving students in the project.

So...how do I fix this? I truly did enjoy the blog last year and I got some positive feedback from parents so I didn't want to completely scratch the idea but I knew this wasn't enough for my students. I pushed the problem to the back of my mind for a while and went on with my summer. It wasn't until one evening, late in the summer, I was having dinner with my husband and discussing life before Facebook. After using Facebook for only about 9 months, we knew the ins and outs of the lives of people we hadn't seen since high school. It had connected us in a way that cell phones, the internet and even email hadn't. It was hard to imagine life without Facebook. It was then that my husband (who is a high school teacher and is beginning his master's work in instructional technology) suggested I create a Facebook page for my class. For a split second, I thought he was crazy- "Yeah, right", I thought, "six year olds using a social networking tool...that'll fly!" But then we began to discuss the practical applications of Facebook and how they might be used in a classroom and a vision was born!

Imagine knowing what your child was doing at school moments after it happened. Imagine sending your child a message during the school day and having them read it and respond within a few hours. Imagine first graders telling you what they think is most important about the work they are doing at school. Facebook will give your child the tools to do all these things and more!

I know it's a new idea and it might seem a little scary at first. I hope you can trust the first graders and myself to make this project a success. It's okay to have butterflies in your stomach- that often means that something great is about to happen.