Category Archives: Uncategorized

Library Redo

Remember last year when we worked on organizing our classroom library?  You might not, because I couldn’t find it on the blog….:(  Maybe the post I thought I wrote got lost in the “it-has-to-be-finished-and-perfect” list I told you about yesterday.  Well, since my pledge is to tell all the stories, not just the finished ones, I’ll share the parts of this story that we have finished (and that I have pictures of!).

We left at the end of 1st grade with a (mostly) organized library, which we had worked on together little-by-little last year.  We packed it away in that same way, which always helps when I put the classroom back together the next fall.  We figured out, though, that we had never gotten the boxes fully labeled, and so as we started using the books again this year, they got all mixed up.  We decided we should probably just start over; I was the only one who knew what most of the categories were supposed to be.

We started by pairing up, and first going through the boxes we already had established.  I gave each pair a box, and their job was 1) to figure out what their books had in common, 2) decide if they had any that didn’t match that category, 3) and then make a label that matched their newly decided-upon category.  All of the extras got piled up in the middle of the room for later.

The second year together has been a great learning process in many ways.  Of course, for many reasons, we’re doing many things differently, but there are also some things that are the same that they are doing differently.  This is a perfect example.  The understanding they have of genre and the difference between fiction/non-fiction, as well as the ability to see similarities and differences is deeper than when they did the library sort as first graders, so the same activity is even more meaningful than the first time.  Even the way they “get” why we did it, why we did it together (as opposed to just having ME take care of it), and why we should keep it organized is different than last year.

 

Getting on the Bus by Donalyn Miller

Sometimes when you read someone else’s blog post you just wish you would have said those same words. This was one of those times. Instead of writing my response, I’ll just reblog the original ones. Donalyn Miller said them better than I could have anyway. I COMPLETELY agree with the huge responsibility we have as teachers to share our reading lives with kiddos and help them become life-long readers and thinkers themselves.

donalynm's avatarNerdy Book Club

Last Monday, a tiny corner of the world celebrated the announcements of the American Library Association’s 2016 Youth Media Awards. Watching the announcements via live streaming, I switched between jotting book titles in my notebook, Voxing my excitement to my #bookaday group, clapping and hooting, and texting friends who were attending the announcements in person. The celebration continued online all week as authors and illustrators shared their gratitude on social media, and in-the-know librarians and teachers commented on the books we enjoyed, the books we missed (and immediately ordered), and the books we wanted to share with our students and children.

There was also a bit of armchair quarterbacking about who won and who didn’t win. I am surprised when some of the people who question a book’s merit admit they haven’t read it. Judging a book by its cover? It seems some feel confident judging a book by…

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So I Have This Thing…

So I have this thing where I can’t write about something on the blog until after it’s finished.  Like the whole thing.  Even if it’s a Writing unit, a Social Studies project that takes 6 weeks or a Math investigation that is 10 days long.  I guess part of the reason is I want to make sure I have all of the parts to tell the full story–the beginning, middle and end–as well as to make sure that I’ve figured out the angle, the focus or the Big Idea I want to make sure to highlight.  I want to have identified the problem and then share the solution.  I want to have taken all the right pictures (which I have now learned the hard way have to be compressed before I upload them!) and figured out just the right words to write so that the most people want to read–and then comment on!–the post.  You get it the idea.  I want it to be perfect.

But unfortunately what happens when I work like that is that often time gets away from me.  I wait too long and a whole list of things occur: a teachable moment goes uncelebrated and the story goes untold, I forget the best parts of the story because too much time passes, I lose momentum, or even worse I end up with SO MUCH to write that then I can’t do it.  And then my blog sits untouched since mid-December, with many amazing learning experiences not shared.  And the funny thing is it’s taken me what seems like FOREVER to figure out that maybe that’s not working.  Yeah, I guess I’m kind of a slow learner.

So I’m not sure where that leaves me then.  I could go back and (with the help of the pictures I’ve taken) catch up on the 1,000 things that have happened since a month ago (ouch!); I could just shared the “finished” things that have occurred this week and celebrate the amazing things my students are learning–as well as what they are teaching; or I could just start writing about things in a new way and not worry so much about making sure that every post, every “story” is complete before I tell it.  Often, it’s the middle, the messy parts, the while-it’s-happening stuff that is the most interesting anyway.  It’s the things I learn when I’m not expecting them that are the most enlightening.  It’s the lessons that don’t go the way their supposed to that often have the most impact, and it’s when I stretch myself out of my comfort zone and try things a new way that often I find I wonder why I didn’t do that a long time before.

I guess I just made the decision then.  I am resolving to try something new this year (but I still say I don’t make New Years’ Resolutions), and tell stories at whatever stage of completion that they are in.  I pledge to share the ugly parts of learning as well as the well-planned, perfectly-executed, went-just-the-way-I-wanted-them-to parts (yeah…there’s much more of the previous than the latter anyway, so it’ll give me lots more to write about!).  I guess I already try to share the whole story anyway, but I’ll try to make sure I am ok with just little bits at a time instead of just the final product.  It’s the process not the product anyway, right?

Thanks for listening to my rambling, especially if this is the first time you’ve been back to our blog in a while and were expecting something different (which makes me wonder–what do you expect when you come here?  I’d love to know! Leave me a comment. 🙂 ).  I hope to make this a time to turn over a little bit of a new leaf and start the year with a fresh commitment to share the amazingness that happens in Rm. 202 every day.  I hope you stay around to join us for the ride.  It will definitely be fun, and probably pretty messy.  Great combination, I’d say! 🙂

It’s Wednesday (Here’s What We’re Reading)

If you spend any time with teachers, librarians or authors on Twitter, then you’ve probably heard of #IMWAYR (It’s Monday What are You Reading?).  It’s a great way to both share books you’re enjoying as well as to learn about new ones that you might want to try.  I’ve even done it in my classroom with previous groups as a way to document the books they’re reading, how long they’re spending in a book, what/when they’re abandoning books, etc.  It’s quick and easy.

Well, no, it’s not Monday, and honestly I don’t really plan on this being a “quick and easy” kind of post.  But then, well, when are my blog posts ever quick and easy? LOL (Oh, come on, you know you like it that way!?).

As we voted on the timeline image for our 7th book (and we’re already in the middle of book 8), I realized that I haven’t done much writing about what we’re choosing to read as 2nd graders (we’ve got a big job to do this year after all of the AMAZING things we read together last year!).  I figured that should change. 🙂  So here we go!

This year so far we’ve chosen 8 books together.  We have somehow gotten into a pattern where I choose one then they choose one, and so on (and actually then I guess I had too many good ones because I chose two in-a-row and then they did, too.).  It’s been kind of fun to see how their tastes have changed since last year when they were a year younger.  And yes, I’d like to think that the choices we made together (or the titles I introduced them to) have helped make them more sophisticated readers.  I guess the verdict is still out on that, but for sure they are enjoying stories that are beyond what I read the last time I taught 2nd grade!

  1. We started the year with an old favorite from 1st grade, as a way to ease into the year and introduce our new friends to the way we do read aloud in Rm. 2o2Screenshot 2015-12-09 21.15.17-min (which is honestly very different from what happens in many other classrooms).  Together we agreed upon The Lunch Lady and the Author Visit Vendetta.  We loved The Lunch Lady and her crazy antics last year and this one did not disappoint.  It was great to connect with the author visits we’ve had with Mary Cassanova and Betty Birney.  I have loved sharing graphic novels with my students; before Babymouse and Lunch Lady last year, many of them had never heard or or read one.  It’s been a great way to get readers interested in things that maybe they wouldn’t have otherwise chosen.  And as far as I’m concerned (and no, it’s not an original idea), if you find a kid who says they don’t like reading, it’s probably because they just haven’t yet found the right book. 🙂
  2. Next we went WAY back to my childhood and were introduced to Ramona Quimby.  It was my choice and I had great memories of reading and hearing the many beloved tales from Beverly Cleary when I was a second grader myself, so our next book was Beezus and Ramona.Screenshot 2015-12-09 21.15.24-min  As far as I could tell it was the first of the Ramona stories that was written, so it made sense to start there.  And while I was totally excited about being the first to share this funny girl with my students, I quickly remembered the movie made from this book a few years ago.  Oh well, it was a great read anyway, with many situations and experiences that were easy for us to make connections to as we listened.  And as we had gotten into the habit of doing last year when we read The Wizard of Oz, kiddos kept track of those connections by taking notes as we read.  Because the book was longer than some (like the Lunch Lady, for instance), writing and drawing about it every day made it easy for us to remember what had happened in the story every day.
  3. What do you read after a great Ramona story?  Another one, of course!  Book #3 this year was Ramona the Pest.  This one was especially fun because of all of the Screenshot 2015-12-09 21.15.45-mincrazy things Ramona did at school.  We kept laughing as we tried to imaging doing some of those same things in our own classroom–like “boinging” a friend’s curl, leaving school in the middle of the day, staying home because your teacher doesn’t like you, and being late to school because you don’t yet understand what a “quarter after the hour” means.  This book brought lots of laughs to Rm. 202.
  4. Screenshot 2015-12-09 21.15.53-minThe next read aloud found us smack dab in the middle of learning about how to use our new Writers’ Notebooks.  I knew the PERFECT book to read during that time would be one that showed someone else’s Writers’ Notebook and ideas from when they were a kid.  And if you know me at all (or at least a little about me as a writer), you know that Ralph Fletcher is one of those authors that I LOVE!  I have read his books over and over and appreciate both his style as a fiction author and his insight and expertise as a writer of professional development titles for teachers.  This book, a memoir, gave us both funny stories of childhood to enjoy as readers, but many pieces of text to examine as writers and consider what they would have looked like as a WNB entry.  This one was a great title to help push us to make connections between reading and writing.
  5. Screenshot 2015-12-09 21.16.04-minThe me-them-me-them pattern was broken when I made the decision for our next read aloud.  Hey, I had a good reason, though, as we were about to start participating in the Global Read Aloud and needed to choose a title that was on the list.  The book I chose to read was actually one I had heard of earlier in the year but hadn’t yet tried.  We read The Year of Billy Miller by Kevin Henkes (yes, the same Kevin Henkes we love because of his beloved mouse characters!) along with many other classes around the world!  While we did not participate in the GRA like I would have liked (with collaborative activities and Skype sessions), we did have great conversations among ourselves, and dug pretty deep into Billy (who is a 2nd grader!) and the other characters in the story (which was great because this fit in with the focus of our Readers’ Workshop study at the time).  While we didn’t share our work with the rest of our GRA group, we did follow along and do the suggested activities on our own.  If I’m invited to join again next year, I am sure we’ll be better able to share our thinking in a more global setting.
  6. Screenshot 2015-12-09 21.19.48-minThe next book was kids’ choice and they went with another favorite from last year.  Well, sort of.  We enjoyed reading all of the Mercy Watson series, and so when I found a book that focused on a Mercy character–Francine Poulet–I figured it would be one we’d enjoy, so we read Francine Poulet Meets the Ghost Raccoon. I was right and they liked making connections between what we knew about her from last year and what she did in this book.  I wasn’t there on the day they finished this sotry, but if I remember correctly, the last scene is around the Watsons’ dinner table and included toast with lots and lots of butter (just how Mercy likes it!).
  7. Screenshot 2015-12-09 21.16.14-min Screenshot 2015-12-09 22.03.39-min 2Kids’ next choice was holiday themed and actually included two books at the same time.  No, I’m not crazy–they were meant to go together. 🙂  If you’ve ever read a Magic Tree House book, then you know that Mary Pope Osborne has written Fact Tracker texts to accompany the adventure Jack and Annie are experiencing in the story so readers can learn more about the real thing.  I’ve been interested in them for a while, and this year was the year I had committed to trying to read one together with a Jack and Annie story.  So…when Thanksgiving came along it seemed like it would make sense.  And Rm. 202 kids agreed!  We read Thanksgiving on Thursday and Pilgrims, then, during November.  It was great to be able to cross-reference parts of the story with the information given in the Fact Tracker.  We didn’t read the NF one front to back, but instead used it on an as-needed basis when we had questions.  I liked the way it worked and will definitely try it again!
  8. Screenshot 2015-12-09 21.20.44-minThat brings us up to our current book.  I don’t have tons to share about it yet, except that it was my choice and is one of my ALL TIME FAVORITE read alouds.  I have read it with almost every class I’ve taught over the last 10 years–mostly 4th and 5th graders.  So, trying to decide if the text was right for 2nd graders took some thought.  But 1) it is an author they know (Ralph Fletcher!), 2) it goes along with Marshfield Dreams and works great to make connections again between how entries in our notebooks can be turned into stories, 3) I like it, 4) I read it to my son when he was in K or 1st grade and he loved it so I figured these friends could enjoy it, too, 5) it’s about a family, and 6) I like it. LOL  But hey, that has to stand for something, right? So far I’ve been right on and they LOVE it.  They are making great connections between the true stories from Ralph’s life and the variations on those stories that happen to Cliff and his family in the book.  If you see a friend of mine, ask them what a “yidda yadda” is, ok?

So what are you reading?  Have you read any of these titles that we’ve enjoyed this year?  What did you think?  What recommendations do you have for us?  We are definitely voracious readers in Rm. 202 and we lvoe to try new things!  We’d love to hear from you. 🙂

Field Trip Fun in Downtown StL

We are lucky to be able to take field trips–pretty much to anywhere we want to go!  This year our team was trying to think outside-the-box a little more than usual, planning for field studies that not only connect to our 2nd grade curriculum, but that are important experiences for all kids to have in general.  We’ve thrown out some amazing ideas, and this fall we ended up with a trip that I’m pretty sure no one had ever gone on before. It was related to our study of economics, and was loads of fun, too. 🙂

Mrs. Driscoll worked it out for us to be able to visit the Federal Reserve Bank (and I hate to admit I didn’t even know we had one in our city!), as well as the Old Courthouse, which is a great historical building to visit.  But wait–the best part (or at least the fancy-schmanciest part) is that we got to eat lunch in a hotel ballroom!  Yep–she worked hard to secure a venue that would accommodate us no matter what St. Louis fall weather would throw at us–and we ended up being welcomed by the Crowne Plaza hotel, which was right across the street from both of the places we were visiting.  And yes, it was a lucky find–by the time it was time for lunch it was pouring down rain!  Way to go, Mrs. Driscoll, and thanks Crowne Plaza!

One more picture:

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Look! Ava got to have both of her parents on our trip–Mom came along as a chaperone, and Dad works at the Federal Reserve Bank and got to join us for lunch! He was working that day and planned it so he could be on duty when we visited the museum at the bank.  What a special surprise!

We learned much, laughed a lot and had a great time!

Halloween 2015 (a little late…)

Yep, I know.  It’s Thanksgiving week.  And you know what?  If I remember correctly, I posted about Halloween on Thanksgiving last year, too.  And this year, too.  Man.  Oh well, it’s true that it’s better late than never, right? 🙂

I don’t have much to say about it, except that we had SUPER 2nd grade costumes, a SUPER party thanks to Mr. and Mrs. Gordhamer (it even involved an obstacle course in our room that TOTALLY worked, even among the other stations with games and a snack.  Kiddos totally ROCKED being respectful and appropriate!), and a SUPER parade around the grounds of Aberdeen Heights next door.  The residents love to see our smiling faces and fancy costumes and we waved at SO MANY PEOPLE!

Yep, it was great!  I don’t have many pictures because I was too busy having fun, but here are a few:

Twin Red Riding Hoods!
Lawrence had his Spidey-Sense going!
Ella Marie was a bat. 🙂
Second grade Halloween selfie!

Ok, and since this is my blog, and so I can be a little bit indulgent sometimes, here are two more from my own Halloween at home (you know you were wondering!!):

Luke and his droid. 🙂
Bearden tribute to Star Wars

Hope yours was fun!  Here’s to posting Halloween pics in October next year! LOL

 

Twins

Ok, so not really, but when you take a great picture with another great teacher, you have to share it, right?  Well, yes. 🙂

IMG_5525-minAnd yes, I know it looks silly for me to be holding Diet Dr. Pepper, but it’s really life, so I left it there.  Just focus on how happy we are.  Robinson is a great place to be every day!!

Video of the Day: May 28, 2015–BE THE CHANGE!!

I wasn’t even sure how to title this post, because it’s really not about me or even about the kids in Rm. 202.  It’s from May 28, for sure, but is more focused on the AMAZING work of Mrs. Puzzo and her 4th graders in Rm. 206.  They have worked pretty much the whole year with making a change in our school, our community, our world at large, after learning about social injustice.  The story is much longer than can be told here, but after reading A Friendship for Today (which actually took place in our school!), and learning more about situations closer to home (i.e. Ferguson), Rm. 206 kids wanted to do something.

I’m attaching the video they made (along with help from StLTV), as well as an invitation to you to help these friends be the change–as well as you!

First check out the video:

You can also check out what’s going on with this story on Facebook and Twitter. Get involved and please share this post with others!  Excited to see what happens when we all work together to be the change!

Pictures of the Day: May 6, 2015

 

Ok, hold on tight–today was a VERY eventful day and so this post is picture-heavy. I think I counted 10.  But then I may have added more. 🙂  You ready?  Let’s go!

I usually put the pics in these posts in order based on when they happen, so these would come first anyway, but I’m also putting them first because I think they set the tone for the whole day.  The way things usually work in Rm. 202 is that I have a plan and then we decide how that will work for us that day, and often times things change (sometimes really drastically, sometime they just take a little bit different direction).

I was meeting with a group today and after our book, we got out our whiteboards for word work.  I remembered that we had talked about a chart/sign to help kiddos remember what to do with the pencil sharpener (we just got 2 new crank ones–you know, old school!) and for some reason people are CRAZY with them.  What I know about what this group knows and what they need, they were the ones to make the chart!  As we talked about what the sign should be called, they agreed that “PENCIL SHARPENER RULES” would make sense (like the chart we made to help our friends remember how to wisely use our construction paper).  As we got started talking about how to write PENCIL, we clapped out the syllables, wrote the PEN part and started working on the CIL chunk, talking about how it could either be PENSIL  or PENCIL.  It wasn’t a clear decision about which was correct (I thought for sure they’d be able to tell which one looked right), so I took it to mean we needed to learn something new.  So we started talking about C and how it has a soft sound and a hard sound.

Now…being me and doing what I do, I didn’t just start saying something like “Now these are the rules for hard C and soft C and when the C proceeds these letters it’s this and when it’s these it’s that,”–you get the idea.  Instead, we started making  a list of C words and put them in the correct column together.  Almost immediately, Makayla noticed that there were lots of Os on the hard side.  We kept going and pretty soon we noticed that the letters on the soft C side were E and I and that the other letters were on the other list.  Voila! We had a rule.  Well at least a conjecture that we thought we could use and teach our friends.

So…being Rm. 202 friends and doing what we do, we thought another sign was in order.  This one they decided to hang on the word wall–right by the letter C. 🙂  Hopefully we’ll finish soon.  Who knows?  We’re working on at least 3 other interactive writing projects and we’ve only got 15 more days!  Oh well, guess there’s always next year!

Whew! That was a long one. Ok…so I know that it looks like Nate is just being a super-silly 1st grader in this picture, but he’s actually posing like that for a reason. I tried to kill 3 stones with this one picture and show you: the yummy (and tiny) chocolate bar and SUPER cute gift card he brought from Whole Foods today (yep, I said CUTE–there’s a picture next to show the detail) AND the tooth he lost on Monday. Ok, I guess he didn’t actually lose it, he had to get it taken out but it’s gone nevertheless and you can finally see his big ‘ole grown-up tooth coming through!

See, I told you it was cute! It’s funny because without the scale of that bag to Nate in the previous picture you don’t see the funny size of these 2 objects. It will be hard to spend that gift card because it is seriously one of the cutest things I have ever seen. I told the kids I’d probably ask for it back after I redeem it and save it in my Writer’s Notebook. Um…just because that’s what I do. 🙂

C.J. and I worked really hard with build a castle with the Lincoln Logs during choice time today.  It’s the first time I’ve done that.  So fun!  The rest of the class was really impressed too, I guess, because they kept coming over to take pictures of their own!

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Um…yeah, so this happened during choice time, too: Emily made me a bonnet! She came over at one point and had to measure the string so she’d know the strap was the right size, and she pointed out how she put a little tag in it, too, so I’d know what way was the back. First graders are kind of amazing, I’d say!

Alright, two more, and these fit into the I’ve-officially-lost-track-of-how-many-teeth-we’ve-lost category.  I am pretty sure it’s over 20 now, but needless to say, 1st grade mouths are VERY HOLEY at this time of year.  So cute!!

Charlie requested this picture because I was behind. Hee hee, tough crowd!
Amelia had to join in on the fun. 🙂

Pictures of the Day: May 4, 2015

Sorry for the blurry pictures today, but hopefully you get the idea that my Teacher Appreciation Week started out with a bang!

C.J. and his mom presented me with a scrapbook that everyone had a hand in making. 🙂 Each kiddo wrote a favorite memory of me and our class. LOVE!

Amelia’s family added a Target gift card to the mix. Wow! This is too much already. 🙂

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You guys know that school supplies are the way to my heart! (Thanks, Charlie!) 🙂

Ok, so we had to stage this picture today, but you get the idea that these guys both brought in Starbucks treats! They even had my coffee order right–down to the whole milk and agave! I’m SUPER impressed, 1st grade! Thank you, Nate and Landen. 🙂

Whew!  As if these fabulous kiddos and families don’t make me feel appreciated all the time, they’re outdoing themselves already!  THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU!!