My Data Notebook 2

A few years ago I created a data notebook that I've been using in my classroom.  Since then, I have switched schools and several assessments have changed.  I have seen myself revising the pages and wished that I had other pages to record data for other topics.  So this summer, I dedicated my time to creating a new data notebook to compliment my previous data notebook.  Click on the picture below to find it on TPT.

The main purpose of using data notebooks is to increase student achievement. After giving my students their baseline assessments, we begin using the data notebooks to record the results and start setting goals.  There are several choices for recording literacy and math data.  You can choose between beginning/middle/end, quarterly, or every other month.  

 When implementing student data notebooks, it’s important to start with one subject area.  Figure out which subject you want to begin collecting data for and introduce your students to the data collection method.  I like to use the reading level graphs to track student reading levels.  In

My Data Notebook 2, 

there are several options to choose from when graphing reading levels.

 I have also included a reading conference form for you to use during reading conferences.  As your students are reading, look for things that your students are doing well and things that they might need to work on. 

Depending on what program your school uses for spelling, you may be able to use the spelling graphs for different things.  I have used these with regular spelling words assessments and with spelling assessments for words their way.

Students can keep track of the topic they are studying and the scores they received from their pre/post test.  Choose the data from pre assessments, observations, or other resources to see where improvements need to be made.  You can decide how long students need to work toward the goal and when to check in to see if the goal has been met.  After the post test, you will record the results on your form and decide which skills you need to reteach.

Once students begin to gather data, they will record their progress in their data notebooks using graphs or other recording sheets.  Students can reflect on their assessments by writing about which standards they mastered and which ones they still need to work on.  They can create a project to prove they have mastered the standards or they can take a video recording.

Most importantly, when implementing student data notebooks, it’s important to keep everything organized so they can take ownership.  Choose which organization method works best for you (I like binders!).  Introduce your data notebooks, let students color or decorate their front cover, and have them fill in their baseline data.  Start out small!  Don't overwhelm yourself or your will overwhelm your students.  

Have an awesome time implementing data notebooks! 

End of Summer Sale

  It seems like most teachers are enjoying the last few days of summer while the rest of families have one more month. Back to school for teachers means transforming our bare classrooms into a beautiful representation of how we want our students to learn. In order to help you prepare for the school year, I am offering your a 20% off sale so you can get your materials ready for the school year. This sale will be from July 28-31, 2015. Visit my TPT store to check out my best sellers, "My Data Notebook" and "Reading Strategy Posters."  Enjoy your last few days of summer! 

Personalized Learning and Understanding by Design: First Grade

This week I was introduced to yet another way of teaching...Personalized Learning.  I thought that Understanding by Design was a huge but rewarding undertaking, but OhMiGosh!! 

When I first learned about personalized learning, I thought that it was just differentiating skills between learning styles and the multiple intelligences...you know, giving kids the choice to learn the content in whichever way they like best (Musical, Verbal, Written, etc.).  

BOY WAS I WRONG!!

 With Personalized Learning, we will no longer be teaching whole group and then moving into differentiated groups. No more "sit and git"!  No more "falling through the cracks".  Our students will move through each standard little by little until every aspect of that standard is mastered. 

Personalized Learning begins with the LEARNER!  

What skills do they know already?  Where do they need to go? 

I'd like to think of it as a pyramid: 

The top of the pyramid is the starting point and the bottom (or near bottom) is mastery.  Students take a pretest at the beginning of the unit and based on those results, they are placed on a certain level of the pyramid.  If Johnny did great on his pretest, then he will start toward the bottom of the pyramid.  His learning will be challenged...just like we said with Understanding by Design but now, the focus is on the learner:

"LEARN a mile deep and an inch wide"

INSTEAD of 

"LEARNING an inch deep and a mile wide"  

 OhMiGosh!!  Complete epiphany!  This totally makes sense! Right??

Johnny (who did great on his pretest) will stay on the same standard as everyone else but he will be able to dig deeper by completing challenging activities, games, or a project based learning assignment.

For Suzie, who didn't do so great on her pretest, would start toward the top of the pyramid and work her way down toward mastery.  

As a teacher, I know your mind is absolutely boggled right now!  Like, how the heck am I going to get all of my students to learn if they are all at different places on the pyramid...I'm only one person!!  Well that's where the rest of personalized learning comes in.  Students are put on a "pathway" where they will work at their own pace through the standard.  Each pathway is kind of like a road map (in the pyramid) or a video game, where each level needs to be mastered before moving onto the next level.  Once all levels (or until your expectation of mastery) are completed, they complete enrichment activities until you are ready to move onto the next standard.  

As I sat through this Personalized Learning training, I didn't know how this would work in my classroom.  My colleagues and I thought that a good place to start was with the standards and the developmental process that students should go through each standard.  And then....

This is where I'm thankful for Understanding by Design!!  

 WE ALREADY DID THIS!!  

We have our UbD units planned out in a developmental sequence with all of the activities .  Now, all we have to do is take the UbD sequence to make the learning pathways.  

Last year was a learning process for my grade level because the teachers at my new school had never done UbD units before.  We basically took all of my previous units (created back in 2012-13) and revised them.  At the time, we still used Investigations Math so some of those resources were added throughout the unit.  Some components of the UbD were updated: advanced assessments, and a new journal entry process;  Some components were added: Paideia Seminar, exit tickets, and a scoring sheet.  Check out our October math unit from last year (2014-15) on addition, subtraction, and word problems.  Click on this link to download the 38 page file for FREE.

The next step toward my Personalized Learning process will be to take our UbD units that were created last year, and drop those activities into a pathway.

As summer is coming to an end, I am excited to get to work on these pathways and see how it all turns out in the classroom.  I'm scared about trying something new, but change cannot happen without being scared.  

I'm sure you know where I'll be the rest of the summer!  HA!  I will be posting my Personalized Learning resources and pathways here when they're done!!  Stay tuned... 

Understanding By Design Success and Unknowns Assessments

Anyone who knows me professionally knows that I'm very passionate about curriculum planning and Understanding by Design.  I was introduced to UbD about 3 years ago and each year I have learned more and more about the process.  

This year I took on a huge project of introducing the UbD process to 50+ teachers at my new school.  Most of the teachers had never heard of it before and were scared to make this change.  I understand that change is scary but I tried to reassure them that the process really does work.  

The UbD process allows teachers to teach content developmentally and with rigor to ensure that every child meets or exceeds the required content.  The most important thing about UbD is to "begin with the end in mind".  If you know what you want your students to learn...then lay it out!!  Show your students what you want them to know!  If you see that they already know a specific skill, then you don't need to spend as much time teaching that content.  You can spend more time focusing on the skills they are lacking and have plenty of time for remediation and enrichment. 

The next unit that we are working on is for Missing Numbers (Unknown Equations).  My students took the pretest this past week and there were several students that knew the simple equations and word problems.  The majority of the class struggled with "start unknown" equations and word problems.  Analyzing this data will show me what I need to teach in order for every student to master the concepts that I want them to know by the end of the unit.  Once students master those concepts, then I can enrich them with advanced content.  The pretest that I created in pictured below.  Click HERE or on the picture to download the pretest and post test.

At the end of the unit, it's important to reassess your students using the same format or types of questions.  You want to see if your teaching really worked and that your students really mastered the content that you taught.  I like to keep the test format the same and just change to numbers or words.

If your school is contemplating the implementation of Understanding by Design, please accept the challenge!!  It really is beneficial for teaching and learning!!  

Seminar in the Classroom

As educators, we like to chat with each other about things that go well with teaching and things that we can work on to make our teaching better.  Our students can do the same thing during a seminar.  Some call it Socratic or Paideia Seminar but all in all, it's about the same thing.

When I first heard about doing a seminar, I was completely overwhelmed.  I didn't know what it was and I certainly didn't know how to do it.  Over the past few weeks I have been researching, as well as working with my team to develop our first seminar for our first graders.  I like to have careful guidance when I'm doing something new with my students so they feel comfortable learning and communicating with each other, even though I may not be comfortable with trying something new.  I came up with several resources that made this transition helpful for me (and my team) to conduct our first seminar.  

Here are a few of the resources that are included in "Talking with Friends: SEMINAR":

I have included an explanation of what seminar is (in kid friendly words), reasons why seminar is so great, seminar procedures, tips to conducting a great seminar, seminar guidelines, student goal choices, student reflection on goals, talk helpers (in case students get stumped and can't think of anything else to say), teacher question stems (to help guide the conversation in the right direction), and participation logs (to keep track of how the students talk with each other).

Your students will love having the opportunity to talk to each other as they develop speaking skills necessary in everyday life.  If you have tried seminar, please leave some feedback on things that work well and things that are a challenge for you.  I would love to get more teachers on board with this collaborative teaching method.  Give it a try and share your thoughts! :-)

Kids Can BLOG Too!!

I've been thinking about incorporating a blogging program
into my classroom and then I had an epiphany....

Kids can BLOG about the books they READ!!

We all know that responding to reading increases reading comprehension and we always have our students respond in a reading journal using paper and pencil.

BUT........

Why not have our students respond to their stories in the form of a blog post??

Blogging about the stories they read will allow collaboration between students and even parents. Students will be able to reflect on their stories and get excited about learning.  See below for resources on how to use reading responses as blog posts.

I will be using Kidblog (a free blogging site for students) this year and let me just tell you that the set up process is super easy.  It doesn't take long at all but if you start it now, then once you get your class list, you'll be able to get your students blogging sooner.

Click on this picture for set up instructions:

Technology makes anything fun!! We have to get our students to read and have fun at the same time. Blogging about reading will allow us to do that.  Set up an account with Kidblog and get your students started early so they can blog independently by the end of the school year.  

I know that starting anything new is always scary, especially when it involves technology, so.....

I have created a few products to help you with the process. 

Blogging for Little Learners will help you implement the blogging program.  You can give your own blog prompts, use the ones included in this product, or just let your students blog about anything they want.  Just be careful to set your blog settings where the teacher has to approve blog posts before they are public.  

Click on the link below to take a closer look at Blogging for Little Learners.  

You can also download the preview for some FREEBIES.

 

"Blogging for Little Learners" provides you with everything you need to start blogging:

Purposes of blogging - explanation about why blogging is beneficial
About blogging - information for parents about blogging
Teacher duties - everything you need to know to get the ball rolling
Parent permission form - you must have permission before starting
Internet safety guide - students need to know how to be safe online
Blogging guidelines - instructions about how to blog
Password cards - students need to know where to go to log in
How to make a blog post - labeled picture showing how to post
Guidelines for commenting - instructions for how to comment
Blogging Rubric - grading blog posts will keep students accountable
4 Choice boards - ideas for blogging about reading
Graphic organizer - "My First Blog Post"

If you want your students to be consistent with what they're blogging about, then you could have them blog about what they are reading.  Students read a book, respond to the reading using reading response sheets, and then use that sheet to drive their conversation for their blog post. 

Your students can use these Reading Response Sheets before heading to the computer.  They can be used individually (if you prefer not to do the blogging thing) or along with "Blogging for Little Learners" (if you decide to take the blogging plunge).  

The reading response download contains:

4 choice boards along with response sheets for each choice:
Back to school - easy "make a list" prompts
Fiction - 9 responses to any fiction text
Nonfiction - 9 responses to any nonfiction text
Opinion - opinion prompt template

 I have the BUNDLE available as well:

 I encourage you to step into the 21st century and give your students the opportunity to write their VERY FIRST blog post!!  I'm sure it will make your students feel important and parents will have something to brag about as well.  :-)

End of Summer Sale

As we are all aware, August is creeping up on us quickly. The race will begin soon (if it hasn't already) and over the next several weeks we will be preparing our classrooms for open house. 

In order to help you get your classroom ready, I am offering my last sale of the summer.

Enjoy 20% off at my TPT store and 30% off at my Teacher's Notebook store.
My TPT sale will end July 30 and my Teacher's Notebook store will end August 28.

Get your data notebooks ready now so you can start the process right away.
My #1 Best Seller:


Some other back to school fan favorites are:

My #2 Best Seller: 

Use these reading strategy posters to teach decoding skills at the beginning of the school year.  Your students will be able to relate to the animals and remember the strategies to figure out tricky words.

 Use these lettered labels for your book bins or for your word wall.  The bright colors will make your room colorful and inviting.


Start your year off right with these monthly themed reading logs.  Your students can use these logs to track the books they read during workshop time or at home for homework.  They will love the themed pictures they can color in as they read or when they're finished.


Use this lunch box poster FREEBIE to label the area for your students to put their lunch boxes.  This colorful poster is sure to brighten your room.


These circle labels come in "table" and "group" titles.  It's another FREEBIE!  I like to use these signs on my group baskets.  It adds some color to the student desk area.

Enjoy getting your classroom ready!  I'm counting down the days until I can get back into my classroom to start decorating. 

NEW and IMPROVED Data Notebook

I'm very proud to announce a NEW feature added to my #1 best seller "My Data Notebook".  You will now be able to edit the pages in order to personalize them for your individual student needs.  This feature was inspired by a special education teacher who needed space to write her students' goals.  You will love all of the possibilities that come with personalizing this product.  

Download this data notebook for K-2 students, as well as students with specific goals.  

Check it out here:

Keeping your students accountable just got BETTER!!

HOT Summer SALE and a Pizza Party

I'm beyond thrilled to be home for the summer!  In the 2 weeks that I've been home, I've been able to accomplish so much!  As a teacher, I find it difficult to do "spring cleaning" because that one week we have off in the spring is usually devoted to actually breathing and taking a mental break.  

So far this summer, I've completed 95% of my spring cleaning, had several trips to our community pools (been trying to find out which one we like best), spent some quality time with my boys and husband, I actually got to lay outside to try to get some color on my white skin, AND I was able to finalize this product that I completed at the end of the school year.  

I hope that you might be able to use this super cool pizza unit, "Pizza Party," sometime during the upcoming school year!!  It's definitely a good one!!  There are 13 literacy activities that include a variety of different skills to practice.  Your students will enjoy sorting pizza themed nouns, writing about how to make a pizza, and building words using the letters in the words "pepperoni pizza".  There are 12 math activities ranging from addition/subtraction games, measuring pizza themed pictures, and counting using base ten cubes.  I was able to use these activities with my students and they LOVED learning with pizza.  We had a pizza party at the end of the week to celebrate the end of the school year.  Click on the photo below to check it out:

I am running a sale on all of my products to celebrate summer relaxation.  There are 2 sales running between my Teachers Notebook store and my TPT store.  

Enjoy 50% off all products from my Teachers Notebook store from June 23-July 23.  

Enjoy 20% off all products from my TPT sale from June 27-June 30.  

My new unit "Pizza Party" has been posted at both stores...check it out now for a GREAT price!!

Have a wonderful summer and don't forget to take some time for yourself.

Reflections and Under Water Graphing

As we are approaching the end of the school year, I have been reflecting on my year as a teacher, a mother, and a wife.  It has been a different kind of year for me with many changes:

TEACHER

I am about to finish my first year of teaching at a new school and I'm so happy that this opportunity fell into my lap.  I have made some great friendships and am fortunate to have a wonderful grade level that supports my opinions and decisions.  I can't wait to find out what the next school year will bring. I'm already thinking about how to rearrange my classroom. :-)

MOTHER

My son, Gavin, started kindergarten this year and will soon be a big first grader.  He continues to amaze me and reminds me every so often that he's growing up.  I guess he thinks it's funny to see my reaction of grief, because I just want him to stay little.  He continues to tell me that after first grade, he will be in 2nd...3rd...4th...5th...and so on!  Landen, my 3 year old, is always trying to be like his big brother.  He is intrigued in whole "going to school" thing and can't wait to come to the "big boy" school.  He's my challenge but always keeps life interesting.

WIFE

My husband and I bought a house right next to my new school and I couldn't be happier to be so close.  It makes my commute to and from school much easier!  I was recently diagnosed with epilepsy and that has caused the most changes in my life.  It has really been a challenge to deal with but my husband has been so supportive and gentle.  I am so grateful to have him right by my side, taking care of me and really focusing on my well being.  I think that this has had a great impact on me as a wife and it has allowed me to take advantage of each day that is given to me.

Now onto the Under Water Graphing smart board lessons!!  

I just recently finished this smart board presentation to go with our graphing unit.  It's one of the few products that I have posted this year.  Click on the picture above to check it out in my TPT store.  I'm hoping that I will have more time this summer to get caught up and make some new and exciting products for you to explore.  There are some really cute and engaging slides that will keep your students excited about graphing each day!  Here's what's included:

There are several videos and video clips embedded on each of the pages.  I have also included a link to an online graphing website that will allow you to create your own graph!!  It's super cool!!  

 Your students will learn about the different kinds of graphs and how to read them.  They will learn how to create a graph and how to compare the data.  The best part of the presentation will be the last two activities!!  Your students will love the spin and graph game!!  You can use this game as a math center and they can click on numerous links to play some graphing games.

I hope you all enjoy your students for the next few days/weeks of school!  Hopefully they aren't too crazy for you!  Just remember that you are leaving your mark on each and every one of them.  They will remember you for the rest of their life.  That's one of the best parts of being a teacher!  

Have a wonderful week!  Summer is almost here!