It has been a long time since I have made a post. Over the last wee while I have had the Year 3 students come back into my class and over the last two weeks I have had 3 new students join. I have found some challenges in going from 7 students up to 15 (even though this isn't a huge number the learning differences are rather large). I can now say that my programme is running much smoother after having made several adjustments.
Reading was quite easy as my Year 3s knew my expectations and how Daily 5 works in Room 6 so that was easy. The 3 new students were buddied up to Room 6 classmates so they have picked this up fast. I currently have 6 reading groups and ensure I read with 4 groups each day.
Writing has been a bit harder to manage as there have been so many needs in my class. I had an observation by my principal and together we decided to just bring it back to the basics and just focus on one thing at a time. So that I am not overwhelmed and students are not overwhelmed. Each lesson I have a whole class focus (this changes each day) and then I work with one group only per day.
Maths has been going good. I run my maths similar to Daily 5 where children are in their rotation and I just pull them out depending on their needs. I have had to adjust activities to meet students with higher or lower needs.
Monday, 22 June 2015
Tuesday, 12 May 2015
Week 3/4, term 2
I have had a busy start to the week. We have had a re-jig in our school to even out class sizes etc. So I am now teaching a Year 1-3 class which I am pretty pleased about because I was struggling a little to get conversation flowing with only 7 students.
Over the last two days I have spent time reintegrating the Year 3's into the class and going through what is expected, routines etc. They have picked it up fairly quick as it was only a term ago that they were doing it.
In writing my goal was to have children verbalising what they are learning and their next steps. My Year 2s, and some Year 1s can, however I will need to work on this with my Year 3's. I have created a visual set of posters similar to the butterfly lifecycle which I plan to have them using tomorrow. I also was working in allowing time at the end of a lesson for reflection. Which I have done a couple of times but need to make sure I do it more often.
For reading we have been making use of the word wall and I have noticed my students also using it a lot during writing which is awesome to see. My next step in reading is to develop some independent activities for my Year 3 students that aren't to easy.
For maths my focus was to have students practicing their basic facts each day which I have achieved - wahoo. My goal for the next 2-3 weeks is to get my maths programme running smoothly with 5 extra students who have a range of learning needs.
Over the last two days I have spent time reintegrating the Year 3's into the class and going through what is expected, routines etc. They have picked it up fairly quick as it was only a term ago that they were doing it.
In writing my goal was to have children verbalising what they are learning and their next steps. My Year 2s, and some Year 1s can, however I will need to work on this with my Year 3's. I have created a visual set of posters similar to the butterfly lifecycle which I plan to have them using tomorrow. I also was working in allowing time at the end of a lesson for reflection. Which I have done a couple of times but need to make sure I do it more often.
For reading we have been making use of the word wall and I have noticed my students also using it a lot during writing which is awesome to see. My next step in reading is to develop some independent activities for my Year 3 students that aren't to easy.
For maths my focus was to have students practicing their basic facts each day which I have achieved - wahoo. My goal for the next 2-3 weeks is to get my maths programme running smoothly with 5 extra students who have a range of learning needs.
Monday, 4 May 2015
Week 1/2, term 2
We have had a great start to term 2.
My goals at the end of term 1 were:
My goals at the end of term 1 were:
- Writing - to have students being able to voice what they are learning, how they will know that they can do it and their next steps.
- Reading - to add follow up activities after chn have read with me.
- Maths - complete an inquiry/stick to it.
So far in writing I am doing well. We have a great collaborative teachers facebook page that has heaps of awesome ideas. My principal 'tagged' me in one that had visual cues for writers. I printed this out the next day and put it on my wall. It is super easy to understand and my students know exactly what they are learning and where to next - so I can tick that one off.
My focus for week 3-4 is to ensure I allow time for reflection at the end of each writing lesson. I use to do this well and it makes it easier that we visualisers.
My focus for week 3-4 is to ensure I allow time for reflection at the end of each writing lesson. I use to do this well and it makes it easier that we visualisers.
On reflecting on my end of term reading goal I don't think it is necessary for me to change this as I do the Daily 5 programme and this has heaps of follow up activities that the kids learn from. My focus for week 3 is to make use of the word wall and ensure I or a buddy goes through cards with the kids.
In math I have been doing whole class teaching of measurement. However I have gathered my data and made a range of basic fact games to do with children. Today I set aside 5 minutes after maths calendar for my target students to play the game. My goal is to have students play their basic facts game everyday for the next 3 weeks.
Wednesday, 1 April 2015
End of Term reflection
Term 1 has been so busy but it has been great. My class is really lovely and they are all eager to learn.
For myself there is still so much that I am learning and each day I find myself reflecting and making small changes to my teaching.
My writing programme is going well. I have made slight adjustments but I still run this in a fluid manner so that I can pull students out based on their individual needs. Next term I want to do some more work around students being able to voice their goals, next steps etc. Now that learning journals are all set up I think that they will work well.
In reading I continue with the Daily 5 - which I love. The kids always seem to be engaged and the 3-4 weeks I spent setting it up have been massive in terms of my students being able to run it independently. Next term I plan to add more follow up activities after a group or student has seen me.
For maths we have been doing some great work. I spent 5 weeks on number, 2 on geometry and 2 on statistics. It was good having most students coming back to school and remembering their learning from last year. My focus for next term is to take time to complete my inquiry (practicing basic facts before a guided lesson).
For myself there is still so much that I am learning and each day I find myself reflecting and making small changes to my teaching.
My writing programme is going well. I have made slight adjustments but I still run this in a fluid manner so that I can pull students out based on their individual needs. Next term I want to do some more work around students being able to voice their goals, next steps etc. Now that learning journals are all set up I think that they will work well.
In reading I continue with the Daily 5 - which I love. The kids always seem to be engaged and the 3-4 weeks I spent setting it up have been massive in terms of my students being able to run it independently. Next term I plan to add more follow up activities after a group or student has seen me.
For maths we have been doing some great work. I spent 5 weeks on number, 2 on geometry and 2 on statistics. It was good having most students coming back to school and remembering their learning from last year. My focus for next term is to take time to complete my inquiry (practicing basic facts before a guided lesson).
The Water Cycle
We have made it to the end of our unit. We had lots of fun experimenting and finding different ways to make the water cycle.
I started off by teaching about water. We learnt what water is important for and where we can find water. This then led into finding out where the water in the clouds comes from.
We first started by making a water cycle in a plastic bag. This was a good starting point as we were able to look at what happened at each stage. From this we wrote and drew about what happens at each stage. I also showed my students a water cycle video so they could see in another way the water cycle.
The second experiment we did was making a rainstorm. We discussed the water is sucked up by the sun and meets up in the clouds. When there is to much rain in a cloud then it rains, hails or snow. To do our experiment we filled a jar with water and then slowly added blue dye - the blue dye was to act as rain and showed that when only a little bit was added it didn't rain but the more water added the fuller the clouds became and the more it rained.
During the term we were doing paper mache. I linked this to the water cycle and we made a large paper mache water cycle. It looked great once it was finished.
I started off by teaching about water. We learnt what water is important for and where we can find water. This then led into finding out where the water in the clouds comes from.
We first started by making a water cycle in a plastic bag. This was a good starting point as we were able to look at what happened at each stage. From this we wrote and drew about what happens at each stage. I also showed my students a water cycle video so they could see in another way the water cycle.
The second experiment we did was making a rainstorm. We discussed the water is sucked up by the sun and meets up in the clouds. When there is to much rain in a cloud then it rains, hails or snow. To do our experiment we filled a jar with water and then slowly added blue dye - the blue dye was to act as rain and showed that when only a little bit was added it didn't rain but the more water added the fuller the clouds became and the more it rained.
During the term we were doing paper mache. I linked this to the water cycle and we made a large paper mache water cycle. It looked great once it was finished.
Our water cycle video of our learning!
Week 8, Term 1 2015
Week 8 was good. We were back into our normal routine with minimal interruptions.
My goal in literacy was to use more hand on activities that children could talk about and then transfer into their reading or writing. I achieved this goal by doing 2 water cycle experiments with my class. Children got the do the water cycle and then they had to talk about what was happening and then they wrote about it. I could feed in heaps of vocab and lots of WOW words so I got some really good writing. I plan to continue this structure for Term 2. I will also be inquiring into how I can encourage students to use the word wall.
My goal for Maths was to use more technology in maths. I was teaching about shapes so I found this quite easy. I made a whole heap of QR codes that linked to shape videos and activities.
My goal in literacy was to use more hand on activities that children could talk about and then transfer into their reading or writing. I achieved this goal by doing 2 water cycle experiments with my class. Children got the do the water cycle and then they had to talk about what was happening and then they wrote about it. I could feed in heaps of vocab and lots of WOW words so I got some really good writing. I plan to continue this structure for Term 2. I will also be inquiring into how I can encourage students to use the word wall.
My goal for Maths was to use more technology in maths. I was teaching about shapes so I found this quite easy. I made a whole heap of QR codes that linked to shape videos and activities.
Next week we will be having our whole school art week for some collaborative learning.
Monday, 23 March 2015
Week 6 & 7, 2015
Week 6 went by super fast with me only being in the classroom for one day. For Monday and Tuesday I was on a course in Auckland and Thursday and Friday I had release days - one of which was spent observing technology in a junior classroom.
My goal in literacy was to add in some more hand on activities. I did this on Friday by having a bubble themed day with my class. We made, wrote, read, made art etc and it was all themed around bubbles. You can see my blog post about this. I think that it worked so well that I am going to continue to have a Friday themed day. The day will consist of hands on activities that children can experience and do for themselves during this time I take the opportunity to feed in as much vocab as possible.
I have changed my maths calendar back to a similar way that I ran it last year. I find that because it is right beside one of my teaching spaces I also use it and refer to it much more. This week I am moving onto geometry in maths. My goal is to incorporate more technology into the learning of geometry.
After observing technology in another class I have made some adjustments to my own use of technology. During daily 5 my activities are organised into days of the week so that learners are using a variety of apps. I have also started using picollage in maths and I hope to use it in more curriculum areas. I was amazed at how quickly learners were able to use an app and its features!!!! Don't under estimate their ability.
My goal in literacy was to add in some more hand on activities. I did this on Friday by having a bubble themed day with my class. We made, wrote, read, made art etc and it was all themed around bubbles. You can see my blog post about this. I think that it worked so well that I am going to continue to have a Friday themed day. The day will consist of hands on activities that children can experience and do for themselves during this time I take the opportunity to feed in as much vocab as possible.
I have changed my maths calendar back to a similar way that I ran it last year. I find that because it is right beside one of my teaching spaces I also use it and refer to it much more. This week I am moving onto geometry in maths. My goal is to incorporate more technology into the learning of geometry.
After observing technology in another class I have made some adjustments to my own use of technology. During daily 5 my activities are organised into days of the week so that learners are using a variety of apps. I have also started using picollage in maths and I hope to use it in more curriculum areas. I was amazed at how quickly learners were able to use an app and its features!!!! Don't under estimate their ability.
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