Literacy

INFORMATIONAL/NON-FICTION WRITING UNIT
Today we began working on an informational/non-fiction writing unit. We will spend the next couple of weeks developing our pieces of writing. Today we discussed the unit as a whole and the main topic of animals. Each learner then had a chance to look through a collection on non-fiction text on a variety of animals. They needed to pick their top 3 choices of animals they would like to research. Tomorrow, they will begin research on their top choice. They will use the books to start with pulling out fascinating facts about their animal. From there will be begin to develop that into sentences and writing and create our books. I am very excited about this unit, and the learners seemed very excited to be creating this as well.



NEW SPELLING LISTS
Today you should have seen new spelling assessments come home. I took the words that each learner missed and created individualized spelling lists. These words are ones that they will be working on during word work in Daily 5. They will have both hands-on and electronic activities that involve these words. However, working on them at home is also important. Spelling is something that all learners need to improve. If you have any questions regarding the spelling lists and words, please don't hesitate to ask. :)



SYNONYMS
We have been exploring synonyms now that we looked closely at antonyms. We have been completing some similar activities for synonyms that we did with antonyms. Learners are very excited to share the examples that they have come up with. :)



EMPOWER LOG IN
On Thursday last week, we made our first attempt to log in to Empower. With the exception of a couple learners, everyone was successful with logging in and uploading a couple of pieces of evidence to show their learning on some ELA targets we have been working on. It was great to have the learners sharing their own evidence. We will be uploading a few more pieces of evidence soon, and after vacation we will be uploading more and using Empower more. :)



NWEA TESTING COMPLETE
Our NWEA testing is complete. All learners made progress and I am very proud of them! As soon as everyone in the school finishes, and results are finalized, I will be sending home their scores :)


NWEA TESTING
We completed the Winter session of our reading NWEA testing on Wednesday and some finished on Thursday as well. The session went great, and I am proud to announce that every learner's score increased! Once we finish up the testing for both math and ELA, a print out of results will go home. :)



ANTONYM SCAVENGER HUNT
Learners were given the task to find and complete the 24 antonym questions around the room. Each paper gave them a sentence with an underlined word. They needed to read the sentence with the underlined word and write down the antonym for that word. It was a great activity to assess their knowledge of figure out antonyms, following directions, managing their impulsivity to complete a task, and get some fun moving in in the process.





ANTONYMS
We have been looking at antonyms during writing. We talked about the fact that they are words whose relationship is that they are opposites of each other. We generated our own list of antonyms as well as created antonym flip books today. :) We will work on a few more activities over the next couple days and add some of these games to our word work activities.




WORD PATTERN WORK
We have spent some time the past few class periods discussing digraphs and beginning on long vowel patterns. The long vowel pattern we have been focusing on is for the long a sound and words that have that pattern with a silent e (CVCe) as well as when 2 vowels are present together (CVVC) words. We have worked on the saying "when 2 vowel go a walking, the first one does the talking". We have looked closely at these words and completed some word sorts as well. We will continue to work on long vowel patterns for the next few weeks.


CHARLIE AND THE CHOCOLATE FACTORY
We are about half way through our shared reading book. We have spent a lot of time discussing the characters, setting, and how some of the character traits in the story are beginning to change. The learners are really enjoying the story and looking forward to finishing, watching the movie, and doing some comparison activities between the book and movie.


NEW SHARED READING BOOK 
We started a new shared reading book today. The learners choose to read Charlie and The Chocolate Factory. We read the first 2 chapters today and discussed the characters we had met so far, the setting of the story, and some of the details about the characters and setting that we read. We will continue to read the story, discussing the characters and character traits that each show, we will observe how or if they change, and we will watch the movie at the end and do some comparisons between the book and movie.


SHARED READING BOOK - "HENRY AND RIBSY"
On Monday, we started a shared reading book. We have been reading a chapter in the book every other day together. As we read each chapter, the learners have questions to answer that help solidify their comprehension and gets them thinking about what we just read.


WORD WORK AND COLOR CODED READING GROUPS
Starting last week, we introduced more word work centers and made our reading groups color coded. Please ask your child which colored group they are part of. There is a black, red, green, and blue group. As far as our Daily 5 word work station, the red group has been learning about possessive nouns (cat's ..... or Bill's .....) and has games and activities to complete that support their learning with possessives to choose from during Daily 5. The blue and green groups have been focusing on contractions (can't, haven't, they'll, etc) and have related activities and games, and the black group has been learning about digraphs and blends (sh, th, wh, etc.) and has games and activities that are related to that goal. Overall, these topics are covered during guided reading groups as well as practicing our reading strategies we have working on.



EXPRESSION
We put a focus this past week on reading with expression and using punctation to help us do that. We talked about this as a whole group and practiced during guided reading groups. :)


SPELLING
We began to work on our spelling this past week. We are using the high frequency words that are available with our Fountas and Pinnell reading assessment program. The top 50 high frequency words were assessed using a new app called Spelling City. This app allowed me to assess all learners on all 50 words while also meeting with reading groups. Now that these assessments are done, each learner will have their own individualized list of words that they will work on spelling. Activities will be done on their iPad using Spelling City as well as hands-on activities during our Daily 5 time in the Word Work center. At parent/teacher conferences you will receive the list of all of the words that they missed, and as their specific lists are created and worked through you will receive those as well. Spelling is something that can definitely worked on at home along with reading on a nightly basis. :)



NARRATIVE WRITING
As we have began to dig into narrative writing, we have also dug into different ways to show our books. We have been using different graphic organizers as well writing our narratives out on paper. This week, the learners were given more independence on how they were going to get their thoughts down for their narrative writing. They were able to use Explain Everything to show and tell, the video option for just explaining, or paper and pencil to write it out or draw it out. Once their thoughts were down, they had the choice to create their piece of writing in either BookCreator or on paper.  It was great to see all of the different ways that they each learner chose to share their narrative piece of writing. We will continue working on our narratives next week. :)



EXPLAINING OUR THINKING
We spent this week discussing what summarizing is. We discussed that it isn't all of the details of the story but picking out the key details and sequencing them. We explored a new app called Explain Everything which allows us to not only show our thinking using drawings, pictures, screenshots, etc, but also has a recording feature to explain our thinking as we go. We used it this week to summarize a book we had read from our reading folders. This was on top of our guided reading groups and Daily 5 choices that we made during reading. Soon learners will be able to send these videos to me for scoring, as well as home to you so you can see what they are doing throughout the day. :)


LITERARY CHARACTER PARTY
Thank you to all of the families who were able to attend and also those who were unable to attend but provided a snack. It was greatly appreciated and it was so nice to see everyone. We had a great time dressing up and discussing our favorite literacy characters as well as completing a few other literacy activities. We created a classroom book, and each learner made their own page stating who their favorite literacy character was and why. We also read the book That is Not a Good Idea by Mo Williams and created character masks based on the main characters and did a retelling activity using our masks. It was a super fun time. :)





LITERARY CHARACTER PARTY
You should have received an invitation home in your child's folder last week about the Literary Character Party happening on Thursday, October 22nd! We are excited to dress up like our favorite literacy characters and engage together in some literacy activities. The party is from 9:00am to 10:30am. All families are welcome to join! We will be having a snack, and if you are able to contribute anything to the snack please let me know. :) Otherwise happy costume making and I look forward to seeing everyone on Thursday.


NWEA TESTING
Today we began taking the NWEA testing for ELA. The NWEA is a computer/iPad based assessment which gives us information about the learners know and what they need to work on. The assessment is great and gives us a very accurate picture because as learners get questions correct they get harder and as they questions wrong they get easier until it levels out. Therefore, we have an accurate representation of what they know and don't know. Once all assessments have been completed and scores have been reported, we will be sending home the results so that you have this information as well. :) If you have any questions regarding the testing, please let me know.


WRITING WORK
In the last couple of weeks, we have been focusing on our punctuation and capitalization. We looked at end punctuation in particular and capitalization as it pertains to the first letter in a sentence, first letter of a name, days of the week, and months of the year. We will be moving in our informative writing unit this week.


READING STRATEGIES
This week we began guided reading groups, as well as began discussing some reading strategies through our CAFE model. The 3 strategies that we looked at were Cross Checking (Does it look right? Does is sound right? Does it make sense?), Using the Pictures to ensure comprehension (Do the pictures and words match?), and Back-Up and Reread to ensure accuracy. These strategies the learners are using on their own and when they are reading with me.


READING ASSESSMENTS
This week students have been taking part in the Fountas and Pinnell reading assessment. I have pulling them 1 on 1 to complete the assessment. The results are telling me what guided reading level they are at along with some information on their comprehension and fluency. Next week, we will begin collecting leveled books to add to their reading folders to ensure they are reading "Just Right Books" during read to self and read to someone. We will also begin guided reading groups as well. Other than the reading assessment, we have been working on learning the expectations and practicing read to someone and work on writing.



WELCOME TO MY LITERACY GROUP!
The first week of literacy has gone very well. We focused this week on beginning to learn and practice the Daily 5 model. The Daily 5 consists of 5 activities that learners can choose to do on a daily basis while they are not meeting with me. The activities are read to self, read to someone, listen to reading, work on writing, or word work. This week we focused solely on practicing read to self. We created an anchor chart which shows us the appropriate behavior and expectations when you are reading to yourself. We also discussed the 3 ways to read a book including reading the words, the pictures, and retelling the story. We also discussed how to find a successful reading spot around the room. Our read alouds this week included stories such as My Lucky Day by Keiko Kasza, A Hippopotamus Ate the Teacher by Mike Thaler, and A Wolf's Tale by Eva Montanari. We discussed key vocabulary, looked at story elements, and enjoyed reading and making connections together. I am excited for the upcoming week!



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