First Day Jitters Activity

So the first day of school for NYC is upon us. On Monday I plan to read "First Day Jitters" by Julie Danneberg. I taught this lesson last year but I vamped it up this year with more questions for my students. I also found this really cute poem for "Jitter Juice" I plan to give my kids. I saw a lot of recipes that had soda in it and I'm not really comfortable giving that to them since we promote healthy eating at our school. So instead I'm going to mix lemonade or orange juice with seltzer water using equal parts. I created a powerpoint that goes along with the story using a venn diagram to compare how teachers and students got ready for the first day, leveled questioning and follow up activities to do in class. I believe this lesson can really be stretched out over 2 days if you really put some thought into it. You can find my lesson here on my TpT store.

Writing Bulletin Board

Yesterday I went in to set up my classroom so I can have my two full days next week to plan and not have to worry about cosmetic things. Of course when I show up my classroom looks as if it went through a tornado over the summer. Everything was out of place and I made the mistake of not taking a photo before I put everything away. So with that I decided to move things around because change is good. I'm on an owl kick if you haven't noticed. Since I've gotten photoshop I started playing and I've created owls, hence my classroom theme for the year.

I just finished up my reading bulletin board and you can check that out on my previous post. So, today I spent the day creating my writing bulletin board where I hang up the 5 major elements in writing. This is what I teach my first graders throughout the year. There are 5 areas we focus on: focus, detail, structure, voice and conventions. After the first month of school and assessing where my students are they are assigned reading and writing goals. We conference together and talk about their strengths and weaknesses in writing and how we can get better. Students write out their goals and stick a small post it with their name on the goal they are working on. I actually thought this would be too much for my kids last year but most of them really understood what we were expecting out of them. It was nice to see a piece of writing they did and how proud they were when they met or came close to that goal. You can find my writing goals on my TpT store. Here's a sample of my writing goals. I printed them on card stock and laminated them. They look amazing. Next up are my owl labels for my classroom door. Stay tuned!

Reading Strategies

Today I spent the day thinking about my bulletin board for Readers Workshop. I wasn't too thrilled with the layout I had last year so I decided I would change it up a little bit this year and make it bright and fun. I just started to play with Photoshop and I'm having way too much fun with it. I think I'm addicted. My first design was a simple owl and I created them in different colors to represent a particular area of reading. Under each heading are little subheadings or strategies I teach my students to improve their Accuracy, Fluency, Comprehension and Vocabulary. I can't wait to hang them up this week when I go in to set up. Here's a preview of my newest creation!

There are 34 different reading strategies I teach my students in order to be proficient in reading. In September when we launch Reader's Workshop I introduce my students to a new strategy at least once a week. If I see they are independently using their strategies then I'll expose them them to more or go over other strategies during Guided Reading. My next project is creating a strategy list for my students to place in their book baggy so they can take it home and use it in class. You can purchase my strategy set on my TpT page.