Keeping Students Motivated Through the Winter Blahs


Hello Readers!  Carla from Comprehension Connection here to share ideas on how to survive and get the most from your students in the coming weeks.The holidays are approaching, and we are sure to see a decline in student motivation to read. The kids have one thing on their minds, and let me tell you, it is not homework!  So what are we to do to keep them on the right track? How can we mix things up to get the kids to buy in to our plan? What are the secrets to motivating them even when we are not able to remind them daily?  
One option many teachers try is to have vacation packages that include activities to keep kids busy over the break.  We've put together holiday packs with reading logs, project ideas, and math practice pages in the past, and one option you might try is to include options that get the rest of the family involved and that are different from the routines at school.  My students love to do book related projects, and if the directions are not that complicated, parents might actually appreciate materials that keep kids occupied and engaged. By involving other family members, kids will be kept on track with completing the work.

If families are part of the plan, one important thing to remember is to include them in the planning. We need to make the packets easy enough and small enough for the kids to not be overwhelmed by them.  They also will not be thrilled if it looks like "homework" to them, so including in the packet activities such as cooking, websites, writing, and art projects that are easy for families to do with the student may make a difference too. Kids can use critical thinking and creativity in these types of activities which keeps the brain stimulated.
For some students, incentives make a difference.  Having a surprise for work completion and effort goes a long ways with little people, especially if they get to celebrate with their classmates too. However, keep in mind that not earning the prize can be defeating, especially if it's not entirely the child's fault or lack of effort that causes him/her to fail in meeting the goal.  If incentives are used, I would recommend making the goal attainable for all so that it's a win-win.  
Make Reading Plans and Goals for the Break
As a group, brainstorm a reasonable plan for the break and set a goal together.  Include the goal in the packet that goes home as well as a plan to meet the goal. Good readers make plans, so mapping out when and how to reach the goal during break will be easier if the plan is developed with the group.  

Encourage the kids to visit the library and/or set them up with books for break
Now is the time to solicit parents for book donations.  Have the kids bring in books to trade with their friends, let them borrow from books that are donated, and/or borrow from your library.  Students need to be set up for reading, so sending them off with a great selection and perhaps a new book (gift from teacher) will make them excited to dig in.  Encourage the parents to give books as gifts too.

Give your students an author list to check out and give them a teaser before break begins
Just like a movie trailer makes you WANT to see the movie, we need to do the same with books. Showcase the best winter reads and share a little bit of each book to get your kids started.  I am giving my kids Shiloh (5th grade) and Stone Fox (4th grade) for Christmas (Sh!  Don't tell them.), but these two titles were $1.00 per book from Scholastic, so I was thrilled to find them.  I know the kids will enjoy them.  If they've read them already, no worries!  I have alternate books I can trade with them once the gifts are opened.

Talk about Great Books to Read
Invite your librarian and principal in for a little book talk.  Discuss their favorites and let the kids just talk about what they've been reading and what they'd recommend to friends.  That will build enthusiasm.  It's amazing how the reading bug spreads when we just let the kids talk with each other. My little guy, Gary, is the inspiration in my room.  He comes in each day bursting with energy (literally) and can't wait to share with me what he's reading and what he's finished.  He is a reader, and that is spreading among the others.

Make Sure Your Kids KNOW this is Important
Talk about your celebration plans with the expectation that ALL will meet the challenge, but also emphasize the greater importance...becoming a reader and enjoying it.  Share your reading plans and how much you look forward to the time off to read.  Share how schoolwork often gets in the way of time to read (nothing wrong with that as the kids are very important), but that you look forward to a few books you've had saved for the time off.

Match Interests to the Reader
Find out what your students are most interested in and help them find books that will "call them". Kids need to feel in control (and if they're "getting" to read what they want to read, then motivation increases), connected to the common goal, and confident they'll be successful with the plan.
The "best" books for winter may be tough to identify, but as teachers, we love to find great books for a bargain price. These books are what I could find available for a dollar each from Scholastic and from my other favorite vender, The Reading Warehouse. If you order soon, you should be able to get them on time.  These choices are available from both companies for $1.00 per book.  They are from the December, November, and October listings with Scholastic and the Bargain Bin with The Reading Warehouse. Some months are not appropriate for purchases now, but this is what is available at this time and are subject to availability I'm sure.  
Kindergarten:
    
First Grade:
    
Second Grade:
    
Third Grade:
    
Fourth Grade:
    
Fifth Grade:
Bargain Books from The Reading Warehouse 
*Note-there are many Curious George book titles available...perfect for primary.
    
    
  
Certainly, we may need magic to keep some kids going through the winter break and on those snow days, but if we build a culture of reading and involve our students in the planning, we are sure to be more successful than if we just dole out the packets and hope for the best.

If you have ideas that work, please take a moment and share them, and I wish each of you a wonderful holiday filled with time to curl up with your favorite book.  

Until next time...happy reading (and relaxing!)

Working Walls with Guest Blogger Pixie Anne

Welcome to another guest blogger ~ Pixie Anne with some ideas to help you with 

Hello!

I'm Pixie Anne from Growing Little Learners and I am delighted to be blogging here at the amazing Adventures in Literacy Land today to share how we use a Working Wall in Literacy in my classroom.

 

Working Walls are such a great way to have an up to date, relevant, child led display that supports learning in the classroom and helps the children to see the bigger picture and learning journey they are on! 

An added bonus is that they are so easy to throw together throughout the week as you are doing the work in class anyway - no extra cutting and laminating at home, no hunting for the perfect image or trying to be super creative with ideas! I love mine! 

So today I've decided to share how my most recent one came together and there's a freebie for you at the end so keep on reading... 

The Working Wall always starts with an example of what we are aiming for by the end of the week (What A Good One Looks Like).


We began our week of instruction writing (inspired by George's Marvelous Medicine) by Gathering Content. We investigated bossy verbs and adverbs by playing some simple games (Simon Says and Adverb Charades) and then looked at a whole bunch of different instruction texts to hunt for examples of each to add to the working wall.


To understand and explore the features of the genre and create a Success Checklist I brought in lots of recipe books from home. They were out on tables with post it notes when the children arrived in the morning and I challenged them to work in pairs to find and label some of the features they could see. 


We had a class discussion about the features they spotted and I jotted them down on strips of paper to refer to in the next activity. I gave out copies of recipes for them to annotate with the features. This was a perfect chance for me to gather a bit of reading evidence too - understanding the features of a non fiction text!


The wall so far...


Next came the Planning. We had a lot of fun coming up with disgusting ingredients together in some shared writing (my poor Learning Support Assistant was looking a bit green by the end of the session!),


This girl had lots of good ideas!


We also planned ideas for the method using time connectives and all the bossy verbs and adverbs we had previously generated.


 Here's how the wall was looking at this point. I desperately need a bigger wall but have no space in my classroom so I have to squash it all in as best I can!


Then comes the Drafting! We recapped what we had learned so far (using the wall!), I modeled my own recipe and then asked them to work on their own. 

My support group still really struggled to set the instructions out correctly even with a writing frame and had the method written in the 'you will need' section but the content and what they were trying to write was good!  Here is one from one of my stronger writers and this was added to the wall as a best example.


We ran out of time and I couldn't squeeze on the Editing and Improving heading. We will bring to a published form for a class recipe book next week but for now the working wall is complete and shows the learning journey we went on when writing our instruction texts!


I really do love these displays and strongly feel they support the learning in the classroom. 

I feel a little embarrassed by the tatty headings I have on the board, so I have created some new ones to use which I want to share with you! Click here or on the picture below to grab your freebie! There are different choices of headings depending on how you phrase things in your classroom.


I hope you've found some inspiration or ideas here that you can use! I'd love to hear how you use working walls in your classroom or any tips you have on how I can improve mine so please leave a comment or contact me over on my blog (Growing Little Learners)!

Thanks again to Adventures in Literacy Land for having me join you for today - it's been great!

Take Care

Phonological Awareness with Tara from Looney's Literacy



We are pleased to have another guest blogger with us today!  Tara from Looney's Literacy Blog is here to help us all with some phonological awareness activities!

Hello, Adventures in Literacy Land friends! My name is Tara Looney from Looney's Literacy Blog and I'm pleased to be a guest blogger here where I can meet new literacy lovin' bloggy buddies!
I'm here today to share a little bit about phonological awareness and the part it plays in literacy learning. Since the National Reading Panel's research on the six basic components of literacy learning and my own personal experience with my child with developmental delays in speech and language and  proprioceptive sensory disorder, I've made it my mission to discover the literacy learning process and share it with others so that we can reach as many kiddos as possible. 

By the time our kiddos reach us in Kindergarten, especially if they've not had pre-school, it is important to teach explicit phonological skills to those who seem to have not mastered them yet. 
Phonological skills are closely related to  language and listening skills (All strong indicators of future literacy learning success).  A quick check at the beginning of the year is simple  and  can be done  within any normal "getting accustomed to school" routines. 

As an intervention teacher, I spend the first 2-3 weeks observing whole group instruction and independent activities. I try to keep record of observations that raise the red flag of possible learning difficulties. Language, listening and phonological awareness are  among the top five "literacy look fors" at the beginning of the year.

What Do We Look For When Checking for Phonological Awareness?

I like to look at phonological awareness as an umbrella. The solid upper portion containing the "developmental" foundation for listening and language. Research states that rhyming awareness occurs around 3-4 yrs of age  and syllable awareness around 5-6 years. One of the first things I focus on is language and listening, which is going to tie into phonological awareness. Kids come to us at the age of five at varying levels of literacy learning. Listening to them them talk is a strong indicator of where to begin their literacy learning with you.

Easy Checklist:

1. Do they speak in complete sentences?
3. Do they hear rhymes?  Teacher says,"Do cat and sat rhyme?"
4. Can they produce rhymes? Teacher says, "Tell me a word that rhymes with car."
5. Can they hear syllables? (In words with 1-4 syllables - 1 syllable words are sometimes the hardest because they want to break the word into phonemes)

How do we address phonological awareness with the whole class and students who still need practice?

Addressing phonological awareness activities with the whole class can be done by choosing books that have a rhyming pattern for class read alouds, including rhyming activities to work on independently during word work time, and discussing how many parts are in a word during shared writing time. This can and should happen throughout all content subjects. For kiddos who need additional, more explicit teaching I extend their learning opportunities into small group time. As an intervention teacher, I've created some extension activities that are based off of classroom read alouds. Just recently, one of our Kindergarten classroom was studying Lilly's Purple Plastic Purse when they were learning about the letter P. So I took that story and created a fun syllable activity to go with it.
Click image to see my post on "Literacy Look Fors" 
It's kind of hard to see but when you close the flaps it makes Lily's purple plastic purse.

*Disclaimer: Remember not to stay on any one literacy component for too long, you can always "spiral," or loop skills back into learning as needed.*

I want to again, thank all you friends over at Adventures in Literacy Land for your generosity by allowing me to share some of my knowledge.  If you would like to hear more from me click on my blog button at the top and you'll be directed to my blog. 






Tara