Weird Holidays and Explanatory Writing

It's that time of year when many of us celebrate the holidays. Old traditions are revisited and perhaps introduced to the newest generation and new traditions and celebrations are started.

I remember drinking from this fountain as a kid, my kids do too.
Now my grandblessings are getting their opportunity.
Maybe this is a new tradition...

These cousins are enjoying holiday celebrations together.

Adding some snow makes celebrating the holidays REALLY fun.

The Littles are enjoying finding all the Santas on their great-grandparent's tree.

Although the traditional holidays are now upon us, have you ever considered celebrating such holidays as Pickle Day, National Mutt Day, Waffle Day, or Lima Bean Respect Day? This link shares Weird Holidays for most every day of the year with many dates having multiple unique celebrations. 

As a tie-in to the holidays, I went through the links on this site and found a number of weird celebrations that would grab students' interest and be appropriate for them to explore. Using the Pages app where I had placed some of these descriptive links, students selected one, read through it and began an explanatory/summarizing writing activity. 

Here is the link to the template I used for this assignment. Weird Holidays Pages Template. 

I starred the articles that were a bit lengthier with their shared facts.

Students were tasked to address the following items within their writing.

*Introduce and explain what your holiday selection was about.
*Explain the history of this weird holiday.
*In your own words, tell some interesting facts about the holiday.
*In the conclusion tell how someone can celebrate this holiday.

To help students understand how to go about this assignment I modeled what I wanted them to do by  choosing the "America Recycles Day" link and read the article aloud while students followed along. Next, I demonstrated my thinking as I went item by item above, found the info in the article, and reworded it while typing it on the Smartboard.

Aluminum cans can go from the recycle bin back to the store shelves in two months!
Who knew?

This is the written example I modeled for students as we thought through the article together.

One of our technology specialists helping us use the Schoolwork app.

During the next session one of our district's technology specialists came into my classroom to guide students to use the Schoolwork app. Schoolwork is a way to share and collaborate with students. It gives me access to everyone's writing in real time so I can see what progress students are making. This app allows me to offer support and give direct student feedback immediately.

Students discovered a few things to make this writing activity flow a bit better.

Students were shown how to use a split screen to go
 back and forth between the article and their writing with ease.

The divider between the split screens can be adjusted accordingly.
Can we celebrate National S'mores Day every day?

Not sure what a word means? One student shared how she discovered that by tapping and highlighting a word, a dictionary definition of that words pops up to help with comprehension.

Another student found that an arrow on the top lefthand side of the keyboard has a formatting feature. When the "tab" option is clicked it formats the writing to automatically indent paragraphs.

As I popped in and out of various student screens to see how their writing was going via my iPad, I was super excited to try out giving immediate feedback. I first tried it out by recording a quick encouragement using the audio feature and discovered that the recording indicator pops up on the student's screen. Since the student wasn't expecting it, he viewed it as a "pop-up" distraction and deleted it right away. 

Next I sent a line of feedback text and found that a writing bubble comes up on the student's screen. The written line then pops up in the middle of their writing. Prior to starting a project on Schoolwork, it's a great idea to let students know how these feedback communications will look when they receive them.

I found this student was really interested in French fry Day! 
He shared that Americans eat over 30 pounds of French fries per person a year!

As a way for students to begin their editing process, they were introduced to the accessibility tools on the iPad, specifically focusing on text to speech. On the iPad it's called Speak Screen and Speak Selection. Since the Weird Holiday template had a lot of verbiage on it, students were shown how to navigate Speak Selection to listen to their writing. They utilized the CUPS strategy of Capitals, Usage/Understanding, Punctuation, and Spelling. Students are being taught to use these tools for learning.

The highlighted portion is what the text to speech voice reads.
Students are able to hear their mistakes and address them.

When asked if the text to speech tool was helpful, every student raised their hand. Students commented that they were able to hear when they had missed a word. Misused words also popped out. For example, a student could hear when they had spelled "they" instead of "the" because it didn't make sense. Someone said the voice paused in a place that didn't make sense so she knew she had placed the comma in the wrong spot. One girl commented that she "kept expecting the voice to pause and take a breath but it wouldn't stop, it just kept going like the Energizer Bunny!" She realized she needed to go back and figure out where to place punctuation marks.

Students were excited to read about the Weird Holidays that people actually celebrate. One student loved bacon so much, not only did he choose National Bacon Day but also just happened to wear the perfect shirt that day!

By the way, today is National Roof Over Your Head Day! 

Be sure to celebrate that roof!

Taking the Pulse of the Class

A few years ago I discovered a quick but very telling way to take the pulse of the class. Each time I am ready to change student seating, I give each student a little square of paper and ask them to think of the members of our classroom, and then answer these three questions:

1. If you could choose to sit next to anyone in the room, who would that be?

2. Who do you consider to be a student role model and why?

3. Who do you not want to sit next to and why?

For question 3, I tell students they may not write "because I don't like him/her". They must give a deeper reason why sitting next to that person would not work out well. I also assure them that I am the only one who will look at their answers.

Sometimes the results come as no surprise and other times they can be unexpected! I find it helpful to note how many times a particular student is listed as someone "not to sit next to" and the reason. For example, this year I have a student who was listed ten times as someone others don't want to sit with because of constant talking and bothersome distractions. With this information in mind, I start any necessary and helpful interventions. From time to time students have written down behaviors that had not been on my radar and needed to be addressed and/or referred to pupil services.

Often a name will pop up over and over and I pay attention to the given reasons and behaviors that will need to be retaught. At other times, students have been honest in stating they felt they would get in trouble by talking too much with a particular student.

Although some students write down their friend out of a sense of loyalty, it is usually predictable who will be recognized as a role model. And sometimes I am surprised by this as well. It's more valid to see a student listed by many.

One of the most concerning outcomes is when a student's name is never requested as one to sit next to. That's when I reflect on why this child is seemingly going unnoticed by peers. There could be friendship challenges and interventions may be needed.

I typically use this strategy about three times over the course of the year. It could be used more often as well. Names change on these lists as friendships evolve throughout the year. Having this information is one more way to be aware of the social aspects, needs, and culture in my classroom. And the pulse of the class beats on.

Cube image created by Word Art-Word Cloud ​Creator

"Can We Talk?" Teaching Dialogue

Personal narrative and fictional narrative is part of intermediate level writing, and along with this is the challenge of teaching dialogue. "Say what?" 

Over the years, I have read student stories written with multiple sets of quotation marks one set following the next on the same line and right into the next. Never mind there were several speakers somewhere in the mix (I think). By the end of the page I had long lost track of who said what and needed to grab some ibuprofen for my emerging headache!

"Let's go ride a bike" said Joe. "Okay" "where should we go" "Hey I want to go too" "Okay." "Let's all go." "I want to be in the lead." "no I do." "No. You can't." "Let's just all lead." "Okay."

Look familiar?

While I know there are tons of fabulous books that demonstrate dialogue, one of my favorite picture books to teach dialogue is My Rotten Redheaded Older Brother by Patricia Polacco. 

This is one of my favorite mentor texts for teaching dialogue.

As I read the story to the class, I point out how each time a speaker changes, there is a new indented line. We discuss how it's okay to leave white space if there is a new speaker. We talk about how sometimes there is an assigned speaker, but sometimes the reader is expected to follow the sequence for a short time to know who is speaking. I show examples of assigned dialogue, unassigned dialogue, and split dialogue. We also take note of all the words that can be used instead of "said".

Types of dialogue

Then comes time to do a bit of semi-independent practice. For this task I allow students to find their own partner and sit on the floor back to back. They each have a lap sized white board to write against, a pencil, one lined loose leaf sheet of paper to share between them, and they each have a copy of "100 Other Ways to Say Said" as a resource guide. One partner starts off the conversation using dialogue just as though they were speaking to one another. I tell them to start by writing about their weekend. I've never had any group struggle with what to write back and forth. I also tell them to feel free to help their partner by reminding them (via their written dialogue) to indent or use quotation marks, for example, if they notice they are missing.

Meanwhile I am walking around the room spot-checking to be sure each group is correctly indenting each time the paper is passed back and forth, the quotations are in the correct place, and a "said" word is used followed by their name. For this exercise, they must use assigned dialogue with their name each time they write so when I look over the paper later I can see who still needs help.

Let me tell you, for the duration of this practice there is silence. #YouCanHearAPinDrop. They could do this for a lengthy amount of time and still-silence! I am not kidding. Students LOVE this activity and beg to do it again. Depending on the outcome of their papers, which I use as a quick assessment, we may need to do some dialogue reteaching and/or do another round of practice before we jump into a narrative.

If you try this, let us know how it goes and feel free to share in the comments any strategies you have found to be helpful in teaching dialogue.

Word Goals-Thinking About Our Actions

Welcome Back Everyone!
Hopefully you have had a restful and relaxing summer and maybe even a new experience or five! 

Little Miss is all set to join my class, but we'll give her a few years until she hits 4th grade! 

For those of you new to the intermediate grades this school year, this blog was created as a collaborative tool for tier 4 in the Wausau School District. I am excited to once again share ideas, projects, and resources as the school year progresses. Please add your ideas, thoughts, projects, and pieces you have found helpful in context with featured topics in the comments below!

Summer Experience...

If you were to choose one word to focus on being "more of and better at" this school year, what would it be? Perseverance? Flexibility? Generosity? Whenever I have traveled abroad, I realize how much I take for granted and after my summer travel experience my focus words this year will be thankful/grateful. In this post I am sharing an idea I read/tried last year and  how I will start this September by having students choose a word to focus on throughout the year.  

My hubby and I decided to do a very different vacation tour for our 35th anniversary in July- we went to the equator in the country of Ecuador. This was a small tour group led by a friend of ours who has spent a lot of time there and gives these tours each summer. Ecuador is a very poor country but the scenery is gorgeous, the indigenous people were fun to interact with, and the food was delicious! They are in the same time zone as we are and their currency is the American dollar. And no, it wasn't hot because we were in high altitudes of 9,300 ft in the Andes Mountains. Here are just a few highlights...

Ecuadorian Dancers perform in the old town 
part of the capital city of Quito.

Incredible selection of all kinds
of fruits, some of which I've never seen before.

On the Equator...north and south hemispheres.

Looking into a volcanic crater near the
capital city of Quito, Ecuador.

Banos, Ecuador is known for its thermal baths with natural hot springs that are full of minerals and are said to have healing properties. There are four pools ranging from cold to super hot.

Otavala, Ecuador holds a large Marketplace each Saturday. Lots of wonderful spicy smells at this table! The Marketplace sells alpaca wool jackets, scarves, and blankets, panama hats, and many other hand crafted items. I came back with lots of fun pieces!

This "busy" pole was a common site;
many others were far busier!

An alpaca and its owner.

We toured this two year old's family rose farm.
Bouquets can be purchased in Ecuador for a few dollars.

We found the native Ecuadorians to be very friendly.

The "Notre Dame" of South America in Quito. We had to climb some steep ladders to get up to this point in one of the towers.

Pailon Del Diablo. 

This was the most incredible water fall I have ever seen! So much of staying "safe" from drop-offs without rails along with other safety issues are left up to the common sense of people. However, I never saw any car seats during the trip and many children as well as adults could freely ride in the backs of pick-up trucks (like some of us did as kids back in the '70's), larger trucks, or in their vehicles while they are being towed. I realized quickly there are so many other aspects of our daily lives in the U.S. that I am thankful for as well! And I am excited and thankful to share these cultural experiences with students as the school year begins!

Here is the Word Goal idea to get your school year off to a great start!

Happy New Year in September...

Every school year as soon as we come back from Winter Break, I usually have students think about what type of New Year's resolutions they would like to make. It's a great writing activity because students have to think of the details of how they are going to accomplish the goal and why they want to work on it. After we finish this task it ends up in their writing folder to be pulled out again during parent conferences. Most parents comment on how the goals of keeping a room clean or getting along better with a sibling certainly weren't happening any more (if they ever were).

Keeping the New (School) Year Resolution fresh all year....

It always bothered me that like so many adults, student resolutions are quickly set aside and the "same old" becomes easy to fall back into. So last January when I came across the idea of making a word goal, I decided to test it out. Each student chose a word from a list or thought of one of their own...such as thoughtful, helpful, appreciative, tenacious, considerate, flexible, etc. There were also some "do's and don'ts" to think about when choosing the word. They were asked to pick a word that they were not already awesome at doing and not to base their word on what others were doing.

Word Goal: Flexibility

Word Goal: Clean

Word Goal: Confidence

Next, they wrote why they chose the word along with three action steps to get them started on their word goal journey. On the back side they created a poster of the word. In order to keep this word in the forefront of their minds, once a week during one of our class meetings, each student revisited the word by re-sharing it along with some action they had done during the past week to move their goal forward.

It was pretty amazing in that students had to be thoughtful in thinking about the word goal for the rest of the week and throughout the remaining part of the year. Their shared action each week was mindful. The hope is that students develop their trait enough over the course of the year to continue them automatically. I also hope that by hearing each others goals each week similar actions were inspired.

Students worked on their word goals all year.

As I start this new school year, I am going to move the January resolutions to September and begin the year with our word goals. I intend to have students keep working on these goals the entire year. Happy New (School) Year...What is your word?

Here is the link to the original word goal idea:
Word Goal

Assessment Reflection Poem

Another year of state testing is in the books! Big sigh of relief from both students and staff. When the last of the exam sessions were over, I gave students the opportunity to reflect as well as have some moments to relax, create, and de-stress. Connecting to poetry month, students made an acrostic poem in their poetry books using the word "Assessment" written vertically down the lefthand side of the page. 

Students wrote test-related words, phases, or sentences starting with each letter of "assessment". 

Through the creation of their piece of poetry, lots of thoughts, feelings, and reflections were shared by students. 

Some true feelings coming out here!

Students found this simple task of creating an acrostic piece to be a positive way to end testing and enjoy poetry at the same time. 

There were a lot of happy smiles when they were done!