Second Grade Opinion/Persuasive Writing

Hello!

It's been 7 months since I last posted ANYTHING. I'm sorry! I've been keeping up with Instagram and Facebook though. You can connect with me here:
 

 I've made the switch to second grade. So far, it is absolutely terrific. I have the SWEETEST class! They are a joy to teach.  We just wrapped up a 3 month unit on opinion and persuasive writing. It was a blast to teach. This year, I've been religious about using mentor texts to help model the type of writing we are doing.

These are the 9 mentor texts that anchored my opinion/persuasive writing unit.

I get a lot of questions about how my one hour of writer's workshop is set up. Here is a breakdown (I receive RTI and ELL support from 3 other teachers during this time. I can't tell you how amazing these ladies are! They are the backbone of my writing program.)

10:10 to 10:15: Brain Break (I love GoNoodle!)
10:15 to 10:30: Mentor Text Read Aloud/Discussion (Each book takes us 1-2 weeks to get through).
10:30 to 10:40 Grammar/language game or activity
10:45 to 11:15: The students work in small groups with a teacher on their writing. If they're done with a brainstorm or rough draft, they are to quietly get a writing task card to work on.

I was in desperate need of an opinion writing unit. I put one together that is inspired by the mentor texts above, while at the same time general enough to use if you do not have a specific book! This unit saved my sanity! Take a look:

 

We will be starting our informational/non fiction writing after spring break. I can't wait to let you know how it goes! Until then! 

- The First Grade Flair 

Creating Non Fiction Books During Summer School

On Monday, I asked my summer school kiddos what they knew about non fiction books.

"They're make believe."
"No, no, I think they're real"
"Mrs. H?!?!"

I reached for a book about cheetahs. I asked them to turn to a partner and discuss why an author would write this book. I was relieved they found a partner quickly! Progress.

What was supposed to be a short mini lesson on non fiction text features turned into a week-long exploration of cheetahs, research skills, and creating non fiction books.

I know some people beat up on KWL charts, but sometimes tried and true is the way to go. They're not the be all, end all of graphic organizers but when used with intention and purpose, they can be incredibly beneficial to students.. We made our chart Monday with questions and added a bit to it each time we read from the book.

This morning, I passed out a blank book to each student and asked them to create a book about cheetahs. I had planned for about 30 minutes before I would hear, "I'm done!"

They worked on their books for an hour and half. When I finally asked them to stop, I became the least popular person in the room.

I was floored by how impressive their books were! They had tables of contents, headings, glossaries, labeled pictures and facts about cheetahs.

On their way out, I was asked which animal we would be researching next week. I figured one more week of guiding them through research and then they can select an animal to discover. The students are really into creating their own books. I hope we can keep the momentum going for the next to weeks as summer school winds down. It's pretty remarkable how much you can get done with just 12 students in your class!  What do you enjoy about summer school?

Until next time!

Second Grade, SIOP, & Summer School

My last post was in November. That says something. I'll leave it to you to figure out what :).

The First Grade Flair is going to second grade! I'm excited but so nervous. I've taught kindergarten and first grade. Second grade is going to be a new adventure! I will miss my amazing first grade team but I'm staying in the first grade hallway. What a perk! I have the same butterflies I had my first day teaching. Some friendly faces will help!

SIOP, SIOP, SIOP! You've heard the joke right? "SIOP is like an onion, it has many layers and makes you cry." Sorry, I channel that inner dork sometimes. I recently went through SIOP training for the millionth time and this time I learned something! We watched videos of lessons and rated them. It's definitely turned me onto the power of peer observations. What do you think stops some teachers from visitng each other's classrooms?

My SIOP goals for next year (I will have 30 ESL students in my class):

• More randomizing and rotating 
• Trying higher order activities (Jig-Saw, Gallery Walk, 4, 3, 2, 1, reader's theater)
• Increasing time on task (I feel like I worry so much about the schedule...)
• Promoting cooperative learning skills 
• Exit Tickets 
• Informal assessments (thumbs up, thumbs to the side, white boards, student writing)

That brings me to summer school. I have 2nd graders entering 3rd grade. They are as sweet as pie! We have a terrific instructional coach who works with us once a week for 2 hours. We are implementing "The Core Six."

It's a great and easy read (I get nothing for saying this). We have talked about "Reading for Meaning" and "Compare and Contrast." Reading for meaning  promotes a closer reading of the text and using text evidence to support your statements. We have had a blast using it with the "Little Red Hen!"

An example:

The students were able to go back to the text and find evidence for supporting or disagreeing with the statement. We also did a few other activities from my Little Red Hen Activity Set.

I have a few more reading activities planned for next week from my "Reading for Meaning Unit." I will post pictures next week! In the mean time, take a peek at the unit!

No Nonsense November

Is it really November? I was running off a turkey addition page and thought to myself, "It's too early for this!"

I always enjoy November and December because things start to "click" in first grade. We did an assessment today and I had mentioned to the students several times that it would be "tricky" and to just try their best.

Well the assessment was done when one of my little sweeties said, "The hard part never came!"

It was one of those times where my heart felt super happy.

Speaking of happy, guess who managed to leave their work, at work this weekend? This girl right here!

We have a very busy week ahead of us next week! We are right in the middle of assessment season and I'm constantly looking for ways to keep things engaging. I have a very young class this year and most of us are JUST turning 6!

Between activities, we are doing brain breaks using the free website: Gonoodle.com. They have a great blend of calming, energizing, and everything in between when it comes to ways to get the wiggles out.

We are going to be doing a character study unit on "The Littlest Pilgrim" starting next week.
We read "Turkey Trouble" this week too!

 

Next week we will be doing a bunch of fun activities from my Turkey Trouble Common Core Unit!  

 Tom the Turkey will be the focus of our exploration of character traits!

In math we are exploring place value and addition to 20.

We are going to use the Turkey Trouble addition color by number as an independent math by myself choice during Math workshop.

Next week, I'll be discussing math workshop and how I've modified it to work with 30 first graders at very different levels of mathematical understanding.

Until then,

Halloween in First Grade

Happy Halloween! I had a blast (a very tiring one) celebrating Halloween with my little pumpkins today!

We started the morning off with labeling pumpkins and putting treats away for the afternoon. This isn't even half of it. I'm pretty glad it's a Friday and that by Monday, they will have all this sugar out of their system.

I have to give them credit though, we managed to get everyone's pumpkins labeled, treats put away, folders and homework checked, and morning work in 15 minutes. Pretty impressive!

For Daily 5, we read "Splat and the Pumpkin Picking Plan." We then retold the story using a beginning, middle, and end graphic organizer. This year we can't get enough Splat! Last year they loved the Little Old Lady Who..books.

We also did a Halloween safety sorting activity. This page came from my Second Grade Halloween Math & ELA Unit.

We also had an hour long Halloween celebration. We decorated pumpkins, passed out treats, and watch "The Cat in the Hat: Tricks and Treats."

But that is not all...we also did math AFTER the party and everyone was pretty focused despite the excitement! We practiced addition within 10 using these adorable pumpkin pails and cauldrons. Each had a sum on it and the popsicle sticks had the equations.

I'm pretty sure we did a million other things too! Halloween is my favorite holiday and it probably showed in my lessons this week!

I came home with close to 100 pieces of candy somehow. Let's see how many are left by Monday.

I'll be blogging about some of my favorite November activities soon!

Until then,

It's October! Really?!

I can't believe it is October already!

We have been very busy in our classroom. It explains my lack of blogging recently.

My students are having a blast learning how to be first graders. They are also enjoying partner work, a whole lot!

Last week, we did a sorting activity about past and present. I have a large population of ELLs and wanted to facilitate a chance for them to have a discussion using the vocabulary past and present. I took the time to make the picture cards to sort. The students benefited from identifying the objects in the picture such as "phone, airplane, and even dinosaurs." I loved how everything came together.

 

As far as planning for October, I am looking forward to using the following Math and ELA seasonal resources. My birthday is in October and I just adore everything about the month! Halloween is my favorite holiday and this is apparent within 5 minutes of visiting my classroom. My October must-haves:

I use the First Grade Halloween Math & ELA Activities Set which is Common Core Aligned for homework and math stations.

  I love the Little Old Lady! We read the book "There was an Old Lady who Swallowed Some Leaves." Next, we worked on sequencing the story. This week we will use the packet to do syllable counting and some math patterning. The packet can be found here.

Second Week of First Grade

I do not enjoy Sunday lesson plans. I do not enjoy them on a sunny day. I do not enjoy them on a rainy day. I do not enjoy them in the beginning of the year.

You get the idea. I'm usually a Thursday night lesson planning type of girl. This week...I just don't know what happened.

We had a great first week of school. I have a very sweet class!

This week we are working on all sorts of fun things. We still have so much ground to cover with procedures but you can't do procedures all day.

We are still launching Daily 5. We got to 5 minutes of read to self last week! They were pretty happy with themselves and so was I !

Social Studies: We are learning about rules at school and at home. I grabbed this awesome product off of TeachersPayTeachers:  School Rules Book (Free!)

Science: We are doing popcorn investigations! I have it scheduled for Thursday which is our Open House...will our classroom smell like popcorn for families? Maybe... I'll have to let you know! I am using this super generous free product: 5 Senses - Popcorn Investigation


Math: We are working on number sense and identifying numbers this week. I am using one of my favorite TeachersPayTeachers products to supplement my teaching because I am not bringing out the workbooks yet. We are having a challenging time with figuring out what "comes next" after a number. I'm hoping this awesome product will help us out. 

I'm super excited for Fall too! Fingers crossed we can use pages from my Fall Math & ELA Activity set. I'm hoping to do the even/odd sorting page this week. Will let you know how it goes.

We will also be working on 5 frames. I know this is a big topic in first grade right now. I have a FREEBIE for you to enjoy: http://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/FREEBIE-Five-Frames-883875.

Until next week!