Daily 5...

What is it? And why do I use it?

I have been using the Daily 5 model to teach reading for around 5 years. When I first started (after being fortunate enough to attend a day long workshop with the two sisters, Gail Boushey and Joan Moser, who created it) I followed it to the letter. Bought the book. Joined the website. Joined Yahoo groups just for Daily 5. Wore the t-shirt. Used the pompoms. You get the idea. 

But, as the years have passed, I have kept what I loved, thrown out the rest and added in a bunch of my own methods and techniques for teaching reading. I was already using teaching methods that were successful for teaching reading. I didn't want to throw out the baby with the bathwater, so to speak. It works for me and it has worked with the classes I have taught.

The aspect from the Daily 5 that I have loved from the very start is the way that they train the kids to be independent and build stamina. I have talked a bit about this before (remember my "teaching routines can be mind numbingly boring " post?) and, just like every other routine, getting the kids to meet expectations and criteria in Daily 5 is a slow but oh, so necessary step in the learning process.

We start by creating an anchor chart with expectations and criteria for Read to Self. The one below is one I found on pinterest (there are A LOT of teachers out there using Daily 5!!) and is pretty much what ours looks like (just prettier!)



Then we practice meeting the criteria. I have a student come up and demonstrate doing meeting all of the criteria correctly. Then (and this is key) I pick a student to come up and show us doing it wrong. Well, you can bet I have a lot of volunteers for this one! They all want the chance to not do what I want them to do!!!!

The Sisters say to pick the child in the class that you expect to have the hardest time following the criteria. I call that student up and they read to self all wrong - books are upside down, they wiggle around, they talk to everyone, they stand up, etc etc etc. THEN I immediately ask the same student to show the class meeting the criteria correctly. And, whamo!, just like that each and every child in the class (including the one demonstrating) knows that this child (who usually has trouble during group activities - talks, distracts others etc) CAN read to self properly. Everyone can do it. This is very powerful stuff.

Then all the kids go off to practice read to self and build their reading muscles! I make sure that everyone has chosen a good spot where they can be successful and then the timer starts. On day 1 this year we got to 30 seconds before someone in the room did not meet the criteria. This means that they either talked to someone, stood up and moved, stopped reading etc.

The second (and I mean the very second) that someone stops following the criteria I stop the entire class. We put our book boxes away, come back to the carpet and start all over again. Review the criteria. Have someone demo it properly. Have someone else demo doing it wrong and then properly. Choosing our spots again. Starting the timer. Stopping again the second someone stops meeting the criteria. Repeat. Repeat. Repeat.

We have been working on this for a week and a half or so and have now gotten to 5 minutes of independent, on task reading to self. I mentioned it in my Friday Favourites this past Friday. If you read that you might not have realized how much of an accomplishment getting to 5 minutes was! We had to practice read to self for about 3 hours to get to that 5 minutes!

This week I am hopeful that we will get to 10 minutes. I might be expecting too much but I am getting so impatient! I really want to be able to start working with individual children so that I can begin doing reading assessments and helping them to grow as readers. But I know, know that I have to keep it slow and steady and we will get there. Eventually.

Of course, once we are at 10 minutes with read to self, we will then continue to build time until we get to 20 minutes. And, then we will start practicing word work or partner reading the same way we started read to self. Model, model, model, try, model again, try again ad nauseum until it becomes second nature.

This goes on for each of the Daily 5 areas (I actually don't do all five - I like to do writing as a separate lesson) that we learn. I am thinking I need to come up with some other name for what I do than Daily 5 since, with the exception of the method of training kids to be independent workers, I am really not up to date on what the Sisters are doing in Daily 5 these days. I will have to think of a new acronym for my reading program. Any ideas?

Ms. Hughes

A Word About Word Work

Last week we learned some new word work activities to do during Daily 5 in preparation for beginning Word Work Tic-Tac-Toe. (I forgot my camera today but will take pics to post soon so you can see what each activity looks like.)

Today students got their first Word Work Tic-Tac-Toe page. The tic-tac-toe board looks like this:

Find as many words as you can that have the same letter in them. Clipboard Cruising	Word Work Game Play a word work game with a friend.	Magnet Words Build your spelling words using magnets.
Rainbow Words Print your spelling words using a different colour for each letter.	Stamp each of your spelling words one time. Stamp A Word	Scoop & Spell Take one scoop of beans. Make as many words as you can. Print the words on the worksheet.
Shopping For Words Print each of your words. Figure out the cost of each letter and word. Then finish the worksheet.	Super Sentences Write a sentence for each of your spelling words. Use details!	Boggle Words Use the boggle game to get your letters. Make as many words as you can.

Except the tic-tac-toe board the kids have has pictures to go with each item on the board. It didn't copy over for some reason. Oh well! 

Beside the tic-tac-toe board is a list with this week's words on it. The list has 10 words - 8 regular words and 2 challenge words. This week all students are working on words with a short vowel a sound (as in cat and dad). I know that the words are going to be too easy for some students.  As time goes on, students will likely have different lists so that they can work on attributes of words that are relevant to their developmental level. For the next few weeks, though, we will all be doing the same lists as we learn how the Word Work Tic-Tac-Toe system works.

During Daily 5, students are now required to complete one row of tic-tac-toe word work each week. They have to do the activities using this week's words unless it is an activity where they make up words (like Boggle) or search for words (like Clipboard Cruising). Some weeks there will be different tic-tac-toe choices such as alphabetical order or word sorts etc.

As a supplement to the word work in class, I have signed up to use the website Spelling City. At the end of the day today I showed the class how to get to our word list on this site. Here are the steps:

1. Google Spelling City (or click on the link above)

2. Go to Spelling City - it is the first link that shows up when you google it

3. Click on Find A List

4. Search for the list by entering my name Olwyn Hughes

in the search box. Make sure that the second box says you are searching by teacher name!

5. Click on my name at the bottom of the screen. It will be in bright blue.

6. Go to the box that says Vocabulary and Spelling Lists (it is about half way down the page)

7. Click on the list you want.

Spelling City has lots of activities. Students can take a test, practice flash cards and play games to practice their words. Students need to make choices from the Free Choices column (I do not have a premium membership).

When you follow the instructions above, you will see that right now there is only one list (Short Vowel A) but we will be having a new set of words every Friday afternoon. I will do my best to have the students write their list into their planners each week (we didn't do that this week as I was sick last Friday).

The goal with these word lists is NOT to have students memorize words and take a test once a week. The goal is for students to practice using words that follow different word patterns and then assimilate that learning into their reading and writing. I will not be giving a weekly quiz. If your child really wants to take a quiz, then I suggest they do the test on Spelling City on Thursday evening each week before getting the new week's words on Friday afternoons.

The class was very excited to get their first Word Work Tic-Tac-Toe board today and I am hoping that they will find Spelling City to be another fun way to practice learning more about word patterns.

Thanks for all your support at home!

A Little of This, A Little of That

Things are chugging along in Turtlepond these days! It is hard to believe that we are only 9 school days away from our Winter holidays. How did that happen? Over the last few days I have taken a bunch of pictures that are completely unrelated to each other so I thought I would just share them anyways! So, here goes....

We got mail! Today we got two postcards from Beijing, China! Last week we got a postcard from Texas. If you get the chance to check out the blackboard above our book boxes you will see the map of the world I have hung there with strings going from the places to the mail we have received. We sent off 23 letters to various schools participating in our holiday mail exchange and are hopeful that we will also get more mail from relatives of the students in our class. We can hardly wait to see what comes next!

We have discovered that you can draw a picture with our felt pens and then use water and a paint brush to turn it into a watercolour! This moment of serendipity happened on a day when I just didn't have time to get out the paints during choosing and suggested a student try doing this instead. Tons of fun (and art) ensued!

Four of the boys built this very complex structure during choosing. It is an entire village surrounded by a wall with a blacksmith, horses and everything all made out of Lego. They had me take a gazillion photos from various angles which would take up about 4 pages if I tried to post them all. Cool, huh?

And we have been reading a variety of versions of the Gingerbread Boy story. So far we have read the following versions...

We have been comparing each of the versions to the ones we have read before and discovering many similarities and differences. Reading the Hawaiian version (The Musubi Man) was particularly fun as it ends in an entirely new way from the original. And today we started working on our own class version of the Gingerbread Man story that we hope to finish before the holidays and have our very own "Conan The Librarian" put it in the library for all to read!

In Math Stations we have been working on gingerbread boy patterns, number printing, addition and subtraction games and completing math assessments with me. I am discovering that quite a few of the grade 2's need to work on quick recall of their math facts to 20. We still have a lot of kids counting using strategies like their fingers, objects etc. which is fine as a strategy but really slows down their ability to do math facts quickly and accurately. We are going to be working on place value in the new year and begin doing more column addition with and without regrouping. Knowing their math facts is kind of like knowing sight words. It allows them to spend their time thinking about the question and how to do it rather than having to stop and count on their fingers each time they have to add another two numbers together. A set of math fact flash cards in each stocking this Christmas would be a very good idea!

This Thursday we are looking forward to making Christmas ornaments with our parent volunteers. Before the holidays, we will be doing a scrapbook page about the holidays for our scrapbooks. And next week we are going to be singing Christmas carols in the gym on a couple of mornings. I will let you know which days we are going. Hope that you can join us!