Book Study: Worksheets Don't Grow Dendrites - Chapter 1

So, I decided to take part in an online book study reading, discussing and putting into practice the ideas in the book Worksheets Don't Grow Dendrites by Marcia L. Tate.

I decided to do this for a few reasons:

1) I have pretty much been out of the classroom for 6 weeks as I've had a student teacher doing 80% of the teaching. She leaves next week and this book study came along at just the right time to get me fired up for teaching again.

2) I always have more to learn! After perusing the book, which arrived one day before the official start date of the book study (thanks Amazon!), I realize that I am doing some of the strategies but I know that there is always room for improvement. 

3) The book study is being hosted by some of my favourite bloggers. I admire the work they do and hope to learn more by linking up with them.

4) It looked like fun!

So, Chapter 1 is about the strategy Brainstorming and Discussion. Elizabeth over at Kickin' It In Kindergarten kindly shared a graphic organizer to organize our thinking as we do the book study. Here are my thoughts:

I feel like I am doing a lot around brainstorming and discussion in whole group situations but there is definitely room for improvement in the small group or 1-1 area. I plan to add more of this when I am back to teaching full-time after Spring Break. 

I love the Whole Brain Teaching (WBT) strategies in general and have had great success using both the "class, class, class" and mirror strategies. I want to spend some time training the class in the "OK Teach" strategy. 

We will be doing the Second Step program after Spring Break and I think that more partner talk will deepen their learning. What better way to teach social and emotional learning than through real interactions with others?

Also, I really like the idea of  schema charts rather than K/W/L charts. I saw these over on Deanna Jump's blog post for this book study. Just click on the link above and it'll take you there! A traditional K/W/L chart gets the students to tell what they Know about a topic, then say what they Wonder about the topic and, finally, to reflect on what they have Learned about the topic. While I have never had problems doing the K and L parts of the K/W/L, it seems like we never manage to cover all of the W's that come up. I have never felt like the kids, or myself for that matter, really click with the K/W/L charts. They have always just felt like a hoop to jump through. You know, that thing they told you in Teacher's College that you have to do at the start of every new unit. 

I feel like the schema chart just fits me better somehow. And I know from experience that if I am invested in something then that comes across to the students and they become invested too. I like that a schema chart asks students what they already know, what new learning they acquire through the unit and what misconceptions they held. I also like that the language (using the word schema) ties in so nicely with the teaching I have already done around reading. And I love the way Deanna Jump does them using colour coded post-it notes (the colour coding makes my heart go pitter-patter!) I am going to use this for my Grade 1 science unit on Seasons in second term. Thanks for the great idea, Deanna!

I will post about Chapter 2 later in a separate blog post. It is on the strategy of using drawing and artwork. One of my favourite things to do!!!!

Cheers!

Olwyn

No time to get bored when you have this board....

I am in love, love, love with this poster! I need one, no two (or maybe three) hanging in different places in our community. 

There is very little I dislike more than a student telling me they are bored. The majority of activities I give students are open ended so that they can challenge themselves. (Think of the doubles exercise where one student chose 20+20=40 even though that was not one of the simple doubles taught) They can always challenge themselves to do more, be more, show more in their work. So, no excuse for being "bored."

And, it is especially annoying when a student tells me there is "nothing to do" or that they are "bored" during centres when they have a gazillion choices to make and (on community centres days) four rooms of activites to choose from! Blocks, lego, marble run, drawing, sewing, k'nex, puzzles, math tubs, reading, writing, arts and crafts...the list goes on. How can anyone be bored amidst all of those choices? 

Some days I think it is not boredom so much as an inability to make choices on their own. So many of our kids spend so much of their time in planned, programmed schedules where they go from this activity to the next without choosing. Give them a choice and they don't know what to do. 

I love that this poster gives a very simple yet effective way to redirect students who use the B word. You can be sure you'll see this in my classroom very soon!

Ms. Hughes

Keep an Eagle Eye!!!

Our school secretary came in just after recess today and brought us this amazing, sparkly package. What could it be?

It was a package from a reading friend! His name is Eagle Eye. He came to our class and brought us some goodies to help us use our own eagle eyes in our reading!

This is the one of the strategies the students will learn this year to help them beome better readers. 

Eagle Eye is a very important strategy.

Especially for beginning readers because he is all about paying attention when reading and using everything on the page to read words accurately.

For beginning readers, he reminds them to look carefully at the pictures if they get stuck on a word because sometimes (almost always in early readers series books) the pictures will give a clue to the word. 

For the more advanced readers, he reminds them to read carefully and look with their "Eagle Eyes" to ensure accuracy when reading.

To that end, Eagle Eye brought us some tools to use to be better readers. He brought everyone their own "eagle eye" to use when reading. This serves as a visual reminder for students.

He also brought us some magic "reading" glasses. When wearing these glasses readers are able to pay attention to all the details. The glasses are magic!!! (BTW, if you have old glasses or sunglasses you want to get rid of, we'll take them!)

And, last but not least, he brought us some reading wands. See them in the picture above? These glitter wands help students to track their reading and look carefully at each word. These should be a huge hit. Glitter makes everything better, don't you think?

Happy Reading!

Ms. Hughes

Summer Reading Tip #1

Have you been reading every day so far this summer? I hope so! I have been inhaling books like you wouldn’t believe. I have been reading a novel a day pretty much. I am so grateful for our public library. Imagine if we didn’t have that amazing resource! We are so, so, so lucky to be able to read so many wonderful books.

I wanted to take a minute to send out a reading tip for parents. I really want the students to maintain or increase their reading abilities over the summer and that means doing some thinking and talking about their reading!

Beginning readers often get so involved in decoding the letters and words that they forget to stop and think about their reading.

I tell them that reading is like a sandwich.

On one slice of bread is the words - being able to read them and know how to say them properly.

On the other slice is the comprehension or understanding what the words mean and how they come together to form ideas within a story.

You have to have both sides of the sandwich for it to be complete, for it to make sense and be a proper sandwich.

So, today I want to talk a little bit about comprehension. There are different strategies good readers use to help them comprehend what they are reading. I will be going over many of them this summer. But for today we are focusing on...

Connections

 Good readers make connections in three ways.

• They connect the text to something personal about themselves (text to self)
• They connect to something out in the world (text to world)
• They connect to another book (text to text)

Making connections gets our schema working. Connections make a book more meaningful and they help us to enjoy what we are reading even more.

I think that making connections is one of the easiest strategies to use - especially the text to self type of connection. We all have life experiences and so we are all capable of finding something within a story with which to connect. I find that the older I get and the more my schema is filled with life experiences, other books, trips, information etc. the more I make connections in my reading without even having to stop and think if I have a connection. It is just there!

I am going to walk you through an example of making connections with a very simple story. Imagine I am reading the book Goodnight Moon by Margaret Wise Brown (I am pretty sure that there is not a child or parent in our continent who does not know this story).

As I read, I stop every few pages and ask myself “Does that make me think of anything else?” or think to myself "That reminds me of..."

Each time I can answer or fill in what it reminds me of, I have made a connection! Just like that!

Here are some of my connections:

1. This book makes me think about when I was little and my nanny, Wilson, would read to me. I still have my first hard copy of this book given to me in 1974. (text to self)
2. This in turn makes me wonder about other children, in other countries reading this story. I wonder if they have this book in places like Africa. And, if they do, is it a prized possession?(text to world)
3. The cow jumping over the moon reminds me of l the nursery rhyme it came from (text to text)
4. The title makes me think of the book Goodnight Ipad which came out recently and which I read to my class, not in book format, but on the smartboard. So 21st Century!!!! (text to text)        
5. A bowl full of mush makes me think of all the cream of wheat I ate as a child.(text to self)
6. The ending where it says goodnight to the air and the stars etc. gives me a lovely, comfy feeling. It reminds me of the feeling of childhood. (text to self)
7. The little old lady rocking in the room makes me think of the rocking chair that my Grandmama had on her back porch (text to self)

So, you see how reading something can make your mind go in all different directions? Most of the connections a young reader will make are of the text to self variety. Or, at least, they will probably be able to think of these more easily. Often I find that when reading one story, it will make a child think of another story (text to text). This is especially true of fairy tales. Text to world connections can be a little trickier for the beginning reader. It just depends on their personal life experience and how much is already in their schema.

Parents, you can help your child to make better connections by sitting down once or twice a week and reading to them. Pick a book that your child wants to read (it does not matter if they can read it or not) and then read out loud to your child. Stop every once in awhile to share a connection you make with the story, stop every once in awhile to ask your child if they have any connections. 

I don't care if your child is already reading chapter books. Create a time when they listen to you read and ask them to tell you their connections. Don't just leave them reading on their own all the time and assume that they are understanding everything that they read. Chances are very high that they are not!!!!!

schemas!!!!