My students on Valentines day

It's the 100th day of school!

my wordle :)

http://www.wordle.net/show/wrdl/3487792/Untitled

Student Teachers as mentors

Today I was talking with my collaborating teacher and she told me about a mentor program some teachers want to start at J.J. Harris Elementary school next fall. They want to match up student teachers with one student from a different class/grade. The idea is to have a student teacher become another students mentor for the semester and spend an hour a week with them. The student teacher will tutor the student as well as just be there for them.
 I think that this is a great idea because it not only allows the student teacher to see what its like to work with a child in another grade. Also the student will have a reliable person that they will see on a daily basis. I hope that this gets put into action next fall because I think that it would be beneficial for both the student as well as the student teacher.

#Comments4kids

I really enjoyed reading these posts!

http://kidblog.org/2017Purple/alekk/knowing-the-truth/#comment-2351

http://kidblog.org/MrReutersClass/Lukas5/passion-3/

http://jefferyk10.edublogs.org/

Cluster Fair

At my elementary school we have something called clusters. Every Thursday students switch classes for one hour and are able to go to another classroom that has a specific concept. Some of the different concepts are top chef, tiger tales, bird watchers, scrapbooking, etc. At the beginning of each semester students pick their top three choices and are placed in a certain group. My teacher, Mrs. Brown, has tiger tales which discuses different cultures and learning how to accept everyone.

Last Thursday night we had a cluster fair. This is when the students as well as parents come up to the school (6:00 pm) and the students can show their parents what they did in their cluster. They can also go around the school and see what the other clusters were doing. Each cluster had a table which we decorated the day of the cluster fair. Our table had pottery, t-shirt, and paintings that my students had done throughout the semester. I think clusters are a really great idea and the students seemed to really enjoy it. I hope that other schools will catch on with this idea and have clusters in more elementary schools.

Units of Study

Chapter 12 it talks about have unites of study. Since I am only in my field experience classroom two days a week I don’t get to see much of the beginning of their writings. By the time I get there on Thursday they are usually finishing up with fixing their errors and making a final draft. Nevertheless from what I have seen there is certain times where students are allowed to free write, and then there are times that they are given a prompt. Chapter 12 talks about the importance of both of those.  Its important to let students pick topics because they are learning how be a good writer and by giving them some freedoms they could enjoy writing more.  I know by observing my kids they seem to move a lot faster when they are able to write about something that interests them.

                One thing that this chapter talks about that I have never seen before was the idea of taking a hour slot every other week where they practice writing to a prompt as they would if it was a test. Hopefully I can see this during my full week of teaching. I’m sure some of my teachers have done this I just have not been in the classroom at the time. I also really liked that the idea of letting students spend some of their writing time reading and sharing about a genre/author so that they can gain a better understanding of that author/genre so that when they write they can really understand the topic.  Lastly, I really liked the 2^nd to last sentence in the chapter there it says that, “Any lesson we teach, any conference that we have, has both a history and a future in the life of the workshop.”

PUBLISHING!! :)

Chapter 7 talks about the three main things needed when planning workshop management. The first being presence. The teacher needs to make sure that they are up and walking around the classroom while the students write. I think that is a good idea because students would easily get off task if the teacher is somewhere else trying to catch up on her own work. Also this would be a great time to conference with students and see where their writing is going. The second part was room. Allowing students to work somewhere beyond their desk. Many students will have lots of materials so it may be easier for them to spread out on the floor or on a big table. This could also help with people talking because they won’t be crowded in a small place. The third management idea was about supplies. Teachers need to make sure their supplies are in a place that the students can get to them without the aid of a teacher. In my field experience classroom I see a lot of these ideas. The students know where all their supplies are and get them as they need them. Also my teacher walks around the room while the students work and read over what they have written so far. Another good point the book made was making sure not to have a “no talking” environment. I have seen that in past field experience classrooms and it didn’t work as well as the other classrooms I observed where they were allowed to talk.

Chapter 8 talks about writing workshop kits and how they are really a “cop out”.  They try to make it look like writing workshops are easy and all the same by having handouts for both the teacher and the student.  It also talks about how the teacher has to let the students control it because it is their writing. My field experience teacher right now does some of this. They may read a book or talk about a certain subject, but then the students are allowed to take what they want from it and write however they want.  The main thing I got out of this chapter is that writing workshop can be hard, but it is also really rewarding.

Chapter 19 starts out by saying that publishing is not an option. I agree with this and I have seen publishing while observing many classrooms of different age groups . one thing that I found interesting was the idea of giving deadlines far in advance. I think that could work sometimes, but I think its also important to be flexible in certain situations. Nevertheless it made it a point when it said that “the one thing that can get a writer going and move her forward like nothing else is a deadline”. The chapter also talks about how some students don’t get to publish a lot because teachers make the writings very elaborate books and pictures. I couldn’t agree more. My students in my current field experience class publish almost once a week. They seem to enjoy that and they get to write about many things that they really care about. I also liked that this chapter talked about letting students have a lot of independent writing time. I think that it’s important to let them work on their own so that when the teacher is not around they can  still follow the process.

conferencing in my field experience classrooms

Chapter 14 talked a lot about conferencing.  I have not seen much of this in my field experience this semester, but last semester I conference with many different students. I think it is a great thing to do in the classroom. I believe that it helps the relationship between the student and the teacher. When I worked with my students I felt like I got to know them better as a not only a student but a person in general. They would write about things that are important to them and it gave me an inside look into their lives.  I also like that the chapter said to keep conferencing short. If teachers take a lot of time with one student it will take longer to get to other students which just stalls the writing process. Also after conferencing I like the idea of the teacher writing down what they talked about so that in the future the teacher can remember where they left off and have written record of what was said. We did not do this in my field experience classroom.

Chapter 15 talked about share time and how important it really is. I agree with the book that share time is very important. Last semester my students had NO share time. Because of this I feel like the students didn’t enjoy class as much, and the teacher and students didn’t really relate. This semester is totally different. My students have time to share many times throughout the day. They have free writing time in the middle of the day and if students want they are allowed to share their story. Because of time only a few students can share but it usually isn’t an issue.  Also my teacher allows fellow classmates to ask questions to the student speaking to make sure that other students are listening to their classmates as well as get to know each other better.

Chapter 17 talked about ways to evaluate your students by asking them questions. I have not seen this implemented in my field experience classrooms, but I think it would be a great thing to do. Most of the teachers I have observed ask questions about writing in an exam format but I think it would be just as good if not better to work one on one with a student and ask the student questions.  I also liked that the chapter used a scale for evaluating students. Not only do the teachers evaluate the students but they also get to evaluate themselves.

Writing Workshop in MY future classroom

These chapters really opened my eyes to what you really need in a writing workshop. I like that chapter 9 pointed out that curriculum guides and scope and sequence should just be used for support. I think that there are some teachers out there that just use those two things when it comes to telling their students what to do during writing time. I think I have had those types of teachers in the past, and they made writing uninteresting to me. I also liked that chapter 9 gave examples of group sharing and other writing ideas that can be used in my future classroom.  I also agree that there needs to be many resources in the classroom for students.  If students have many resources they can really “dig in” on a topic and have a deeper understanding. Also it talked about having one on one student conferencing. My field experience class does this and I think it is great. From what I have seen students enjoy the one on one attention and they have a better understating of their personal writing and what they need to work on as an individual.

                Chapter 10 talk more about what students already know and when is the right time to have whole class teaching versus one on one or small group teaching. One thing I found interesting about chapter 10 was the bullet points on learning “how to teach writing well”. I thought that they were some good points, but I think that there is a lot more that goes into learning how to teach well. Nevertheless I want to try out these bullet points and see if they help me become a better teacher.  In chapter thirteen there was a quote that states that “lessons only matter as much as they help students do that work and understand that work better”. I thought that was a great quote because teachers can plan lessons all day and the students could still not learn what they need to. What’s important is that the students can understand and learn from the lesson and become better writers.

Writing Workshop in my life

As I was growing up I do not remember a time when we had writing workshops. Many of my teachers gave us a certain concept and asked them to write a certain amount. I always knew that writing was important but I dreaded it every day. After reading these chapters I realize that when done correctly writing workshop can be a fun experience for children. The first chapter showed me that it is important to let students pick their own concepts most of the time.  They also should be able to somewhat talk during writing workshop.  The more laid back it is the more the students will write and be able to get their thoughts on paper. When I become a teacher I’m going to make sure that my students enjoy writing and do not dread it.

The part that I enjoyed in chapter 2 that states that if students write across the curriculum they never learn the important lessons that writing is also a way to get things done in life. Helps you follow your dreams or passions. Students should be able to write recklessly. If students are not able to do this in the classroom they probably won’t do it in their lives. Chapter 3 really hit home for me. I don’t know how many times I have heard someone say that some people just aren’t writers. For awhile I even started to believe it.  But really a quote “writer” can be anyone that writes often.  Amy Wilson once said last semester how it is important for teachers to write while their students write to show how important it really is. If the students are doing it the teachers will do it as well. The last chapter was probably my favorite. I like the idea that it should be treated like lunch. No matter what students have lunch every day, and just like lunch students should have writing workshop every day.