February 22, 2011
Glogster
Today in class we learned how to use Glogster, an online resource that lets you design an informational “poster.” We will each be making “Glogs” to share the information from our expository reports. This can be accessed from home, and many students are really excited to do this as their ten minutes of writing tonight.
To access the Glogster site, go to: http://edu.glogster.com. Each student has their own nickname and password that they should have in their planners (LEAP students will be “trained” tomorrow).
Have fun using Glogster!
October 6, 2010
In a routine!
We have officially made it through two word study cycles in my classroom and have started our third, and things are finally running smoothly! Students have almost mastered all of the routines, and I am definitely seeing some learning taking place.
Here are some things that I think are going very well right now:
- Using our word study contracts for accountability
- Assessing kids in a small group (I’m doing this instead of Spelling City this year because it’s a little easier for me, but I like both ways!)
- Have 4 groups that meet every other day
Here are some things I’m still working on:
- Assessing with mystery words (my students are still doing very well with their word sets, but frequently make errors on these words)
- Integrating grammar in a meaningful way (interactive writing is going well for me, but it’s SO SLOW!)
- Reaching my most outlying students
What is going well for you? What would you like to continue working on and discussing?
September 9, 2010
Sharing Resources
Thank you, thank you, thank you to Jennifer A. from Long who sent me all these great resources to share! Some of these she tracked down, and some she made herself. There are a lot of really excellent tools and resources here! Hope you’ll check them out!
strategy instruction word study
If you find or create anything that you would like to share, please send it to me!
September 7, 2010
Communicating with Parents
Here is a copy of the letter I created to send home to parents this year:
I usually just leave the date due line blank and have the kids fill it in, and as I make them this year I am keeping one blank copy in the file with that particular sort.
If you have a letter you’re using, please send it to me (svalter) so I can share some different versions on here!
August 31, 2010
My first day with small groups
Today was my first day meeting with small differentiated groups, and my first reaction is this: It WILL get better!
I have broken my class into four groups total (one middle within word pattern, one early syllables and affixes, one late syllables and affixes, and one early derivational relations). I do have a couple of “outlying” kids this year who just didn’t seem to fit well into any group, but I placed them with the closest group possible and keep reminding myself of this: I will be able to differentiate enough within the group to hopefully provide appropriate instruction AND just knowing this child’s developmental level and trying to teach him there is light years ahead of where I was in providing instruction a few years ago. Bottom line? He will undoubtedly continue growing where I have placed him AND he will be a huge asset in helping the other learners in the group become aware of things as we go along.
Today I simply introduced my power point that explains where each group goes the current day (the 30 seconds it takes to go over this at the beginning of each class saves precious minutes during my actual teaching time). I had my very lowest group meet with me first to cut and sort while my second group cut and got ready to meet with me. My third group also cut their words out and stored them today, and the fourth group continued working with last week’s names and will cut out their words tomorrow while I meet with the third group. (And I’ll be honest, because I gave the highest group the Upper Level inventory, I didn’t send their sort off to copy center in time . . .)
At the table, there was A LOT going on today with both the kids and what I was observing. I made sure that for each group I had a set of words cut out that matched theirs (I have my own envelopes labeled “Group 1”, “Group 2” and so on). As we started, I had the kids lay out their words in a “word cloud” (my terminology) and just scatter the words in a small area so that they could see all of them face-up. I used the words “word cloud” because when I didn’t they started lining things up and trying to make columns, which took WAY TOO MUCH TIME! I then introduced what we would be working on (i.e. This week we will be looking at words with long and short a sounds. What does short a sound like? Long a?) I then gave them enough scaffolding to get to “How does short a look in a word?” When they identified this, I had them pull out the category card (CVC) and start a column. I then asked them to find a bold anchor word with short a and we put it right under the column heading. We repeated this with both of the long a categories (CVCe and CVVC). THEN I had the kids sort independently to see what they could do. Whoa. Lesson to us all: No matter how “just right” we think a sort is, it can be absolutely shocking to watch the kids actually sort the words (and miss half of them!). Sometimes I intervened to make a kid question where they placed a word, but the strategy I found to be much more effective was to wait until they had placed all of the cards and ask them to read down the list of words to check that they look and sound like they belong. They were able to self-correct some of their errors, but not all, and the oddballs completely confused them. Then we went over all of the words as a group and put them in their correct spots and had a discussion about the meanings and the placements. Then I switched groups and asked the first group to sort again at their seats.
Overall, here is what I got out of the first day:
- The power point made it very clear what the kids were supposed to do. No “What do I do?” questions were asked!
- The resource books throw in a lot of homophones, which can be very tricky. This might be something to think about as we go along. I know I’ve written pair and pear in my writing before, but never have I used the word “pare!”
- 20 minutes just didn’t work today, and I don’t think it will be happening for at least a few weeks. It was more like 30-35 today, but I keep telling myself I’d rather keep the pacing appropriate and teach all the routines and skills they need NOW instead of being sorry I missed something later. I know by the second cycle that I will be able to get it down to the appropriate amount of time.
- I now know specifically who I need to keep a very close watch on as we go through the sort and who is very strong within the group!
If you’ve already started your instruction and have ideas to share or “first real day” concerns, please share as a comment!
August 25, 2010
WTW on Facebook
Wow, thanks to Tammy R. and some other friends who found this on Facebook . . . Words Their Way has their own page! It’s full of podcasts, some videos, notes, and questions to get teachers sharing how they use WTW in their classrooms. It’s supported by the publishers of the books, and seems to have a lot of great info!
If you’re on Facebook and want to check it out, click here!
August 14, 2010
Word Study Contracts
Here are the word study contracts I assign to my students:
Spelling Contract first quarter
Spelling Contract second quarter
For students who need more support (or for younger students), I have taken some of these activities and converted them into a “tic-tac-toe” board so there are fewer choices.
August 12, 2010
Spring PD Power Point
Here is a copy of the power point Jennifer and I shared on the May PD day: Words Their Way.
PD Presentation
Here is a copy of the power point presentation shared at today’s PD session: Words Their Way Aug 2010.
July 27, 2010
Making Your Own Word Sorts
A lot of great word sorts are found on the CD, and even more are in the resource books (that we will hopefully be getting access to this year), but sometimes you just want to make your own sorts. If so, here are a couple of ways you can do it . . .
First, if you subscribe to The Mailbox magazine, a blank word card set is one of the extras on the website and you can just type and print in about 30 seconds. To find this resource, look back at one of the 2009 issues (which are still available). Under Language Arts, click on “BONUS: Language Arts Helpers” and you will find it there. Once you’ve located it, you can save a blank copy to your desktop to use anytime. (I would love to upload it here, but I don’t want to violate copyright laws!)
The second-easiest way to make your own word cards is in Microsoft Excel. All you have to do is follow these steps:
- Open a new Excel document.
- Type one word into each cell (little box). I would recommend doing 3-4 across and 5-6 down, depending on how many words you have.
- Click and hold your mouse and drag it over all the boxes with words in them to highlight them. Then change the font size to something larger and click to center the words in each cell.
- At the top of the screen, click the tab that says “Page Layout.” About 3/4 of the way across the screen you will see a box that says “Gridlines.” Check the box that says “Print.” (This puts each word in a nice little box that the kids can cut out.
- Preview your document to make sure it looks the way you want it to look.
- Print and send to copy center.
You can also create a table in Microsoft Word and save it as a template if you are more comfortable using this program. If you’d like to use this format, here is a blank template I created.
Words Their Way at Lindbergh 