Saving Math Class (and a great TPT product to share)

Hey everyone!

I'm dropping back in today to tell you about something great.  (At this busy point in the year, dropping in from time to time is all I can manage.)  This year, my class is diverse in more ways than one.  I love having a diverse class, but this year, my class is particularly academically diverse, which does present some challenges.  It is so hard to give everybody what they need at their just right level, particularly when I find myself using a curriculum that is designed with the whole-group approach in mind.  In no subject is this more difficult than in math.

Some of you may have read my previous posts and might be aware that I have begun to move more toward a workshop model so that I can teach math at a variety of levels.  This has been accomplished largely with the help of many of you and your wonderful TPT products.

Today, I want to share a WONDERFUL product with you that has greatly helped me to transform my math class.  That product is her Take Home Math Kits by the wonderful Casey over at Second Grade Math Maniac.  This bundle of 30 activities is an absolute STEAL at $16.00.  Once you click on the link, you should probably just check out and purchase her entire TPT store.  :-)  Go check out her blog.  Her posts alone are full of ideas that will save your mathematical LIFE.

  

Okay, back to her product and how parts of it have been used in my classroom.  First, I used it with one of my second graders who I'm tutoring.  This was so easy for me to prepare, and it really built my student's confidence with money.  With a variety of amounts under $1.00, there are amounts from 6 cents to almost a dollar, giving students the opportunity to start small and build their confidence.  I liked how easy all of the activities were to prepare-super easy for a busy teacher to throw together during a conference period so that it's ready for after school tutoring. (Note, I also sent home a doubles activity from this pack with my student, but I just didn't manage to get a picture taken of it.  Tutoring is a busy time, as I'm sure you all understand.  What part of our day isn't busy, really?!)    

After seeing the success of this product, I chose several other activities from this kit to let my whole class try out.  We worked in groups of 3, and each tried a couple of the activities.  These activities are great for review, remediation (for some), and previewing.  One of the activities we used focused on odd and even, which we have covered before, but are about to revisit as our curriculum tends to spiral.  The game provided a fun way to practice this skill and introduce the new unit, while at the same time giving me some formative assessment data.  Since I have used these activities to supplement my district's existing math curriculum, the only thing I feel that this pack is missing (since we just studied it) is fractions.  I LOVE this pack and think it's fabulous, but the inclusion of fractions would really push it over the top.  

Odd or Even Sorting

Spin to 100.  

Teddy Bear Arrays

Ordering Numbers

Time to the 5 Minutes

Anyway, these are just a few of the many activities included in this pack.  Hopefully, you can see that it covers a multitude of skills.  My students and I both enjoyed using the activities in this resource, and I can't wait to try out the rest of them.  Here are a few parting thoughts about this terrific pack.

1) The activities are very appropriate for 2nd grade students, as well as strong 1st grade students.  My students' comments about the activities ranged from "a little difficult," to "just right," to "a little too easy," which shows me that the activities' level of difficulty is on target for 2nd grade (remember, my class has very diverse math abilities, so this makes sense.

2) I LOVED how easy these were to prepare.  They also require very little in the way of materials.  I put some coins with the money game, and I used a paper clip for the spinner, but that was really it.  Most of her other games don't require much other than some dice.

3) These activities are great for tutoring and math class alike.  While I have only sent them home with one student that I tutor this year, I plan to implement these early on next year and send them home to families.  Bottom line, the activities made math fun and different for my students, so that's a win!

4) This is just a small sample of the activities included in the Take Home Math Kits.  There's so much more, including measurement, skip counting, etc.  

5) Finally, I must apologize for any blurry pictures in this post.  I took them on my phone while the students were working.  Since spring fever has set in, my 2nd graders are always on the go and don't stop for much.  :-)  

Hopefully, I've managed to convince you that this is truly a wonderful resource, that is worth your time and money.  I know it was certainly worth mine.  Head on over to Casey's TPT store and purchase this invaluable resource for yourself.  

Thanks for reading!    

  

  

My First Five for Friday

Hey everyone!

I'm trying something new today, and participating in the Five for Friday linky with Doodle Bugs.  If you have any tips for me about this linky, please let me know.  (Please note, it was a CRAZY busy week, so only a few pictures will be featured.  The rest are all from Google Images.)  

1) We are continuing to work through our math Investigations curriculum.  We have been working with 100, adding up to it and subtracting from it.  Here you can see one of the games the kids played this week.  

To play this game, students first covered the game board with 100 cubes.  They rolled 2 dice or number cubes to determine how many cubes to take away.  After each turn, students said how many cubes were still on the board.

2) We have been studying weather and seasons in science.  Students made a poster this week that illustrated what each season looks like outdoors, which months fell in each season, what a person might wear in each season, and a typical activity for each season.  My girls made me laugh because we decided that they could wear "tasteful" swimsuits for their summer pictures.  

  

3)  With all of this beautiful spring weather in Texas, the only drawback has made its appearance.  Seasonal allergies.  When I have what I fondly refer to as a "sinus eye-graine" (that delightful headache you get right behind your eyeball), I find that there's only one cure (especially when I'm at school):

Needless to say, it's a good thing that our vending machine now takes credit and debit cards.  

4) This month at school, we are promoting Autism awareness, so we all wore blue today.  We also have been given ribbons like the one below that we are wearing each day this month.  

  

5) Tomorrow, my dad and I are finally going to go see Divergent.  I've read the entire series, and I remember Insurgent was a bit difficult to get through (not unlike Mockingjay from the Hunger Games series).  Nevertheless, I'm looking forward to seeing the movie.  The guy who plays Four (Theo James) is ADORABLE!!!  I know I'll enjoy watching the movie for that reason alone, if nothing else.  

  

Anyway, I hope you enjoyed my first attempt at the Five for Friday linky.  Head over to Doodle Bugs Teaching to link up and join the fun. 

Until next time,

Currently April

I'm ba-ack!!!

Hi everyone!  I'm telling you, this is just one of those years for me where I just reset each day.  I have a very diverse class, which I love, but it also makes you feel like you need to work all.  the.  time.  However, I want to keep this blog upbeat and not use it as a platform from which to complain.  I merely wanted to explain my absence.

So here we go: Currently April (How did THAT happen?).

Anyway, as you can see above, I'm taking a much needed personal day on Friday.  My brother will be passing through town to attend a friend's wedding, so I'm looking forward to seeing him.  Needless to say, I'm also in desperate need of a guilty pleasure shopping trip to Target.  :-)  Hopefully, I can stop back by my blog sooner than 3 months from now, but we'll see how it goes.  Due to the varied levels of my students this year, I have made some changes in my classroom and my instruction that I'm excited to share with you.  I'm so thankful to say that many of you and your fabulous TPT products have helped me to make these changes, so for that, I thank you.  

Until next time!

January Currently

Hey everyone, I'm back again to link up with Farley for some January Currently.

Listening: While I am a Sooner alum and HUGE fan, I'm watching this game today for my dad who is busy working and unable to watch.  Plus, as you'll see below, I really wanted to try out football-watching on my new HUGE TV.

Loving: Guys, I got a HUGE (50 ") TV for Christmas.  Not only is this a gift for my family room, but it's a gift for my bedroom as well.  I moved the old TV from the family room in there, so I finally have a TV in my bedroom.

Thinking: I received an LL Bean gift card from my grandparents for Christmas, and I have decided to put it towards a quilt for my guest bedroom.  The guest bathroom has blue and green towels, so I think it will coordinate beautifully.  

Check it out here-it's also reversible :-)  

Wanting: I've alluded to a few things, but I have also recently purchased dining room furniture, some of which is being delivered on Saturday.  Plus ALL of the paint in my house needs a touch-up, and I'm excited to say I am SUPER CLOSE to deciding on a paint color for all of the trim/doors.  

Needing: Pretty self-explanatory.  Just know that I consistently try to put this off as long as possible since it is one of my least favorite places to go.

Memory/Tradition: Again, self-explanatory.  I think this tradition was born because younger versions of ourselves simply couldn't make it to Christmas morning without opening something.  We were also those stereotypical kids who spent days leading up to Christmas shaking our presents and trying to guess what they were.  

This was a particularly fun Currently for me.  This month's version has shown me that I have a lot to look forward to as I celebrate the new year.  Many positive things are happening in my life.  What are you up to this month?  

A New Beginning/The Times, They are A-Changin'

Happy New Year (it will be anyway, by the time I finish this and get it posted)!

I have several items to discuss today:

1) I am the worst blogger EVER!  I can't keep a promise to myself about blogging, letting alone a promise to those of you in the blogiverse.

2) I have been thoroughly enjoying my Christmas break by doing a whole lot of nothing...

3)...and yet, this afternoon/evening, I found myself in total "school mode."  I think it's because a) I have a meeting for a student the Tuesday I get back and b) I actually have the time to put enough thought into my lessons to make them excellent.

I have made so many changes in my classroom this fall (some of them alluded to in previous blog posts).  I have been gifted a very diverse group of students this year.  They could not be more different from each other.  To best serve them, I have had to make some HUGE adjustments (and I mean HUGE!!!).  Of course, I realized this about 3 weeks before Christmas break when everything was completely insane.  My students needed change NOW and could not afford to wait for it.  So, I was forced to jump in and develop our new instructional routines as we went.  So what have I done/what am I doing?

1) I have made a significant shift toward math workshop.  With the use of our student workbooks that come with our curriculum, resources from many of the fabulous teachers on TPT (most notably Amy Lemons), and various math games, manipulatives, and technology from my classroom), our math workshop is up and running.  I can't wait to continue refining this system in my classroom, but here's essentially what it looks like.  I split my class up into 3 groups.  They all meet with me for one of the rotations and we work through problems in their workbook together.  Another rotation has them working on an activity that is either a review or extra practice of a current skill.  The activity has a recording sheet so that I can see what they do/don't understand.  Finally, the third rotation has the students doing FasttMath on the computers as well as playing various math games I have shown them in my classroom.   Not to make another empty bloggy promise, but I'd like to eventually get to writing another post specifically about Math Workshop.  It's so new, I haven't had the time to take photos of it in action in my classroom.  In general, my two inspirations/resources are:

and 

Amanda Wilkie's posts about Math Workshop on her blog, Reaching for the Top!  

   

It has also occurred to me that I need to go back and review Guided Math by Laney Sammons.  

Do any of you use Math Workshop in your classrooms?  Do you do it every day?  What does it look like?  What tips do you have?  Who are your professional gurus?  Do you and your students love it as much as my students and I do?

2) Along the same lines, I have also begun to shift toward Reader's Workshop.  My grade level already does Writing Workshop, and we do it fairly well (there's always room for improvement, right?).  While my students are also on vastly different reading levels, reading time has not been nearly as painful as math time.  This change is mostly motivated by my desire to provide relevant, meaningful instruction for all of my students.  I have several ELLs who are really struggling with comprehension of whole group stories.  I believe this is because the stories are so far above their level that even the whole group support I provide to the class as well as the extra time I spend with these students is proving to be inadequate.  I realized that it was most important to me that the students master the specific reading skills instead of reading specific stories outlined by the school district.  One way I am accommodating everyone is to move away from the basal stories (I still do them, but I just expose my students to them, rather than focus on them) and instead use the companion level readers that are part of our reading adoption.  My goals for the spring include establishing reading response journals/interactive reading journals (not sure exactly what this will look like yet), and engaging my students in authentic literacy activities that they can complete with increasing independence, allowing me to meet more frequently with each of my students in small groups and individual reading conferences.  

Finally, I have a terrifying step that I'm going to be taking on my blog today.  As I change my reading instruction and tiptoe into reading response, I've been thinking ahead to the next story we have planned to teach from our basal.  We use Harcourt Journeys in my district.  :-)  While I decide which direction to take with individual reading response and good fit books in my classroom, I know I cannot stop teaching reading strategies.  I also know that I need to continue teaching my students how to respond in writing to what they read (they have had a small amount of instruction in this at this point).  I also know that I have one week with my students when we return next week, before I am drowning in mid-year assessments, and I want my students to be engaged in meaningful work while I swim my way free of those assessments.  With all that taken into account and the extra time I've had this week, I'm about to take a risk.  I have been wanting to get into the creating portion of blogging for awhile (although I'll be honest, I was scared to DEATH when in a previous blog post discussing The Book Whisperer, a sweet follower asked if I had created something to address a need I expressed).  I have done some searches and gained a small amount of tips for creating my own resources.  With all that being said, I looked at the objectives related to our next story and created something small that I could use with my students to address those two objectives for our story, The Goat in the Rug as told to Charles L. Blood and Martin Link (Geraldine the Goat is given credit as the story's author).  

The students are expected to summarize the story and draw conclusions about the characters.  Anyway, please keep in mind that this is my very first attempt at creating ANYTHING for my own classroom use.  I hope one of you out there in Blog Land can use it, and if not, I just wanted to share so I could be accountable to myself.  Be gentle with your feedback.  :-)  I do welcome any tips you blog/TPT superstars might have for me as I continue down this path of creating resources for my classroom.  Feel free to check out what I created below.  

The Goat in the Rug Resources (Click Me!)  

Anyway, for those of you still with me, thanks for reading.  I'd love to hear any and all thoughts on the many topics I covered in today's ADHD-addled post.  :-)  Do you use math or reading workshop in your classrooms?  What tips do you have?  (If you do, leave me a comment-I'd love for you to be a guest blogger.)  Do you create your own resources for your classroom?  Tell me your best piece of advice.  

That's all for now.  See you next time I manage to blog.  :-)  

  

Ice Day and Chapters 6-7 of Guided Reading

Hey y'all!

Today I enjoyed one of the perks of living in Texas and dealing with its freaky weather.  Due to some major ice, school was cancelled today.  I stayed home and acted the part of a major couch potato.  I'll have to make up the day Easter weekend, but I was really exhausted from this week, so I'm okay with it.

Anyway, I've been reading the Fountas and Pinnell book, Guided Reading, and I've been recording some notes here to refer back to.  I have recently read chapters 6-10 that tackle assessment in guided reading as well as scheduling and leveled book selection.

While this post is mostly for me, if you're reading and you have any guided reading tips, tricks, and/or advice, I encourage you to leave me a comment.

Chapter 6:

• I love how they say, "We believe that conversation and ongoing observation are equal to the task of assessing children's attitudes and interests" (p. 84).  While this is a very specific form of assessment and purpose for it, I still feel as though they validate formative, informal assessment.
• I like the literacy folder idea, presented on p. 86.  I think I would change it to a binder with a tab for each student.  Some things that the authors suggest that I might put in it include DRA results, running records, anecdotal records from guided reading, individual book lists for students (also give the student a copy), a book graph, and additional writing/spelling assessments.  I think this would be a great way to have material for parent conferences and/or ARDS altogether in one place.  

Chapter 7:

• This chapter was nice to read as it validated many of the things I have been doing.  Fountas and Pinnell suggest taking running records on texts students have read 1 or 2 times before, occasionally taking one on a text a student has read to gauge whether the level is a good fit.  I always do the former, but I'd like to get in the habit of doing the latter.  I usually take one running record as a grade each grading period, so I think that the latter method would be most accurate.  
• I also found it interesting that Fountas and Pinnell said that the most neutral and inobtrusive thing to do when a student comes upon a word they do not know during a running record is to tell them the word.  
• I would like to start adding a label of independent, instructional, or hard based on the criteria presented (for levels A-K, 95-100% accuracy is independent, 90-94% accuracy is instructional, and below 90% is hard; for levels L-N 98-100% is independent, 95-97% is instructional; and below 95% is hard).  Instructional level texts should be tackled during guided reading.  
• The teacher's introduction to a book during guided reading groups is "especially important in helping children read text independently (p. 92).  While listening to students read, the teacher looks for use of strategies as well as cues such as meaning cues, structure cues, and visual information cues (p. 92-93).  

Extra info: 

     I recently discovered a great app that I can't wait to try out in guided reading.  It is called Record of Reading.  The FREE(!!!) iPad app was developed by Clemson University, and you can check it out at this link (that will take you to the iTunes App Store.  It seems really neat.  You can record a student reading, while simultaneously marking the running record on a white screen on the app.  

Click here to go the the App Store and download the app.  

Sample running record, courtesy of the Apple iTunes App Store

Now, of course I wasn't paid to mention this app, and I have honestly told you that I haven't used it yet.  However, it seems very easy to use, and I can't wait to incorporate it into my guided reading groups.  I found out about the app on the internet, but I can't remember where (Pinterest, maybe?).  Anyway, if you blogged about it first, please let me know so that I can attribute credit to you.  If you've used this app, let me know, too, because I'd love to hear how you like it, what you do with the information, etc.  I have some ideas for the latter, that I will share if I am able to implement them successfully.

 

While I stated that I have read chapters 6-10, my lazy day at home (thank you Texas ice!) has made me tired, so I'll address chapter 8-10 at a later date.  I think this is appropriate as they go hand-in-hand with some of the changes I've had to make in my classroom lately that I want to share.  I'm excited to keep reading this book.  While I found the beginning a little slow, I"m really motivated to keep reading at this point since I find it directly applicable to my students and my teaching.

Anyway, in the spirit of the Christmas movies I watched today, I'm going to end this post with...

"...and to all a good night!!!"      

Currently December

Hey blog world.  Today, I'm just speeding through the blog lane to join the December Currently linky.  However, I have approximately 5 billion blog posts written in my brain right now, so I'll be back lots (hopefully this week) to catch up on those posts.  I hope you all had a terrific Thanksgiving holiday.  Clearly, I did, and I utterly neglected work and all work-related things (including my lovely blog).

Without further ado, my edition of Currently December:

See you soon (I hope!!!).  :-)