Spring Break

This week is/was our Spring Break. Thankfully, the weather decided to cooperate. It's been close to 80 and clear all week long. I have indulged in reading some books on my "want to read" list and starting one that wasn't on the list. I avoided school work like it was a plague.


I decided today would be the day that I got some of my ridiculous paperwork done. I have spent almost 3 hours at Panera Bread grading tests and filling out data forms. Clearly, I procrastinated doing this for far too long. But, oh well. I hate grading papers. I used to think I'd love it when I was a kid. Why would I think that? I have to look at the same papers 24 times. Who wants to spend their time doing that? I need an assistant. Or just to quit procrastinating. Yah..that's probably it.


After grading two Reading theme tests, I can officially say I am irritated. Why do I spend all my time trying to get them reading, when they go and bomb the tests? I expect them to take their time and do their best. We talk about it ALL.THE.TIME. !! When our tests ask for the students to fill in the missing words, we have practiced over and over again how we try all the words to find the one that fits and not just choose the one we know how to read right away. 


I know at least three of my students continually rush through the test without even reading it. Do they expect to do well? It's a READING test. You HAVE to read it. Oh. my. 


I am going to give them an ear full on Monday and all next week. This laziness has to stop. I can't continue to have these terrible scores when do so well on everything else. The majority of the class is reading on-grade level. Our Early STAR Literacy scores are top of the district (as a complete 1st grade). They continue to show growth every time they take it. As a grade level, we probably have at least a third of our students who are taking the STAR Reading test that begins in 2nd grade. We have students that are learning the 2nd and 3rd grade Sight words. Our Math scores are great. 


Why are they bombing this reading test EVERY TIME!?!?


Now, I realize that they have to read the test on their own, but it's words we see all the time. I make sure that we spend a good portion of time learning the phonics skills for the week. It's reinforced in our stations, spelling lists and stories. I don't get it. If I could I'd test them all in small groups, but with 24 that's not possible. So depressing and frustrating.


I guess it's just fueling my fire for the rest of the year. I fell like coming out guns blazing.    Hopefully, we can pull it together before testing next month...which has been pushed back two weeks!!! We won't be taking our test until the last week in April. But then we will be about 3 weeks until the end of school. PTL! :)

ou/ow phonics

Since we were testing last week, I took the time to review our phonics skill from last week. We learned ou and ow as in ouch and owl. My scholars brainstormed a list of words they knew that had the ow/ou sound. (My handwriting stinks without line sometimes, too.)

Here's our Ou/Ow Cloud:

My scholars then had to choose 4 words to write on their clouds. They then cut and pasted them on a piece of construction paper. They had to choose at least one word to use in a sentence. They wrote their sentence on their construction paper and then had to illustrate it.

Here's a couple of my favorites. Sorrythe pictures are bad. My camera and my room lighting do not like each other.

This sentence: "I found a big room in a big house." This is one of my "low" scholars. He still struggles to write without lines but has improved GREATLY!! since the beginning of the year.

This sentence: "I am loud." (and she really is...)

This sentence: "The clown bowed and had a crown and said how did I win first prize." She drew a clown at a clown contest. (one of my high scholars who used all 4 of her words)

As much as I sometimes want my scholar's work to be perfect or neat, I really love their creative, personal expression.

Anchor Charts

Over Spring BreakThe first day of my Spring Break, I read Reading with Intention by Debbie Miller. I made notes while I read the book to make the learning stick and to have note to use when I met with mentor later in the week.

In the book, Debbie mentions several times "anchor charts". She doesn't give any definition of them or anything. Unfortunately, in my ENTIRE teacher preparation/education not one teacher mentioned the term anchor charts. Yes, we made charts, but I had never heard that term. I made a note of it as something to ask my mentor about. She was pretty floored that I wasn't sure what it was (as she was when I couldn't define or explain what shared reading is...thanks University!).

I realized that I was already making them, just not calling them anchor charts. I make them all the time, especially when we are learning new phonics sounds.

Last week and this week, I have challenged myself to make charts that are creative and really help my scholars cement the phonics skills.

Here's my /ie/ pie. I know I could have added words like tried and pried, but I really wanted to keep the words simple for this one. I am definitely not an artist. My scholars think I am. I am pretty proud of it. We're going to make an /igh/ light bulb this week, too. The picture is not the best quality. I took it with my phone.

Brag moment: My sweet, most struggling reader and I have been working one on one for the last month. He's reading 30% of our HFW. I started having him chant the words he doesn't know 5 at a time this week. We have been working on 5 for the last two day, and I am going to add one or two more tomorrow. Today we started a new story. I did a thorough picture walk using the words in the story and tapping into his schema of planting flowers with his mom. While reading the story, he read poke, seeds and holes BY HIMSELF!!! We sounded out the word 'next' together. When he came to the word 'shake', he started sounding it out by himself. As I quickly dealt with a scholar having a melt down, I heard him start with the s and h separate, but then put them together to make one sound. When I got back to him about 10 seconds later, I praised him to for sounding them out and then remembering that they go together. I asked him what he knows when there's an 'e' a the end of the word. He remembered that they say nothing and make the other vowel say the long sound. He put the /sh/, /A/ and/k/ together to say the word. Oh man, he was on point today. SO SO proud of him.