Building Fluency with Poetry Books

Poetry is one of my favorite ways to help students build their reading fluency, develop a love of poetry, introduce new words, and build vocabulary. (Don't you just LOVE all the great words that Jack Prelutsky uses?!?  Amazing!  He is a model of word choice.) Anyway, I started reading stations this week and wanted to include a fluency option for my kiddos.  I decided to "steal" the idea of a good friend who teaches 5th grade in Washington.  Hence...student poetry books. (Thanks Lisa!)

This is my example.

The poetry books are simple and straight forward.  I folded two sheets of construction paper and stapled.  

Students decorated the front of their poetry books and wrote simplified directions on the back cover so that they don't have to interrupt my small groups.  Here are more detailed directions that I glued to the center folder.

1. Cut out poem and glue into poetry book
2. Read the poem to yourself silently 
3. Track your thinking.  Write 1 or more thoughts you have about the poem. (I think..., I wonder..., It reminds me of..., I figured out..., etc.)
4. Read the poem to yourself in a whisper voice.
5. Read the poem aloud to 3 classmates. Each person that listens to the poem must sign your poetry book.

This is an example of how kids track their thinking about the poem.

 When students are finished they have read the poem at least 5 times.  They are always amazing how much better they sound in the end.  At the end of the week, I will often use the same poem for a choral reading and the kids sound great because they have been practicing all week. 

This is my favorite station and my students. I love how easy it is to maintain and the students love reading the poems to each other. Plus, their fluency is really improving and they cheer instead of groan when we talk about poetry.  Everyone wins!

Area and Perimeter Song

During my student teaching (6 years ago...yikes!) I noticed my students were really struggling with area and perimeter.  When the skills were isolated, they did fine. However, when the skills were mixed they had trouble remembering the difference.  

My solution was the following piggy-back song: 

The lyrics are sung to the tune of "Frosty the Snowman"

Perimeter and area

can be tough to figure out.

Perimeter is the fence around

so add the sides you found.

Permeter and area

can be tough to figure out.

Area is the squares inside

so you have to multiply.

 My 5th graders loved the song and memorized it right away.  It seemed to really help them differentiate between area and perimeter. Since then it has been successfully taught to my class every year (3rd, 4th, and 5th graders) and to many of my colleagues classes as well.  

  I always smile when see them sitting at their seat humming while they do their math.  The kids love it,  it really helps, and they won't forget.  In fact, I recently received an email from a past student (now in 7th grade) who informed me that she used the song that week in math class. Clearly, it has stuck with them.

So, if your kids are struggling to remember when to add and when to multiply with area and perimeter, it might be time for a sing-a-long.

Science Safety Videos

As I was catching up on all my favorite blogs, I noticed that I completely missed science week.  Dang!  So, I thought I would quickly share 2 videos that I showed my students this year regarding safety. The kids watched these videos before discussing and signing their safety contracts.
Thank you Sandy (our amazing science facilitator) for finding these great videos!

October Books

I love sharing and learning about new books.  So, I was delighted to see that Mrs. Parker had started a linky party just to share October books.  What a terrific idea!

 Here are some of my favorite October read alouds:

 

What are some of your favorite books for this month?  Link up with Mrs. Parker or add your comment below.  I would love to learn about even more great books!

Beginning with the End in Mind: Class To Do List

Whew!  Another week has come and gone and I have completely neglected my blog. Sorry! I have been so exhausted this week.  I tell ya... my fourth graders really take it out me.  We rock in the morning! Like, really, we're amazing.  It's impressive how productive and smart we are.

In fact, I totally have to brag on my class for a second.  Imagine a class sitting on the carpet for the beginning of a math lesson.  The teacher draws a rectangle on the board and writes 56 in the middle of the rectangle.  Then, writes 7 on the left side.  After the teacher draws the array, shes asks,"What does the number in the middle represent?" She gives the appropraite amount of wait time and then calls on a student.

Student 1: "It's the amount of squares in the array."

Teacher: "Good. Can anyone say it another way?"

Student 2: "It's the product."

Teacher: "Another way?"

Student 3: "It is a multiple of 7."

Teacher: "Wow, anyone else?"

Student 4 (who struggled in math last year): "It represents the area." 

Oh my gosh... TOUCHDOWN!  We haven't even talked about area yet this year, but she remembers from my class last year and our area and perimeter song.  Boo-yah! Where was my principal for that?!

See... we rock in the morning!

And then... 12:30 hits and they become a different class.  They can't stop talking, they can't sit in their chairs, they can't complete their work, and they start driving me a little bit crazy.  I started getting stressed out at how long things were taking and how little was actually getting accomplished.

I was expressing my frustration to a wonderful colleague of mine and she had the best idea.  She said, "Amanda, they're kids.  They don't have a list of things they need to get accomplished today in their head.  They're just at school. They don't know your list of "things that need to be done."  What good advice.

So, I created our class to do list. I make a list of everything we need to accomplish for the day including activities, lessons, worksheets, etc. At the beginning of the day, I go over the list with the class. We begin with end in mind.  As we complete things, kids check things off, which they love.

If we finish, we get extra time at the end of the day for a free choice activity.  I love this because kids see it as a way to earn time.  If we put first things first and complete our work, we get more time for fun class activities.

Now, we have only been doing this for a day, but it worked really well on a Friday, so I'm hopeful it will work everyday. I think the class likes knowing exactly what they need to accomplish for the day and they feel good about getting things done.  I've got my fingers crossed.