Reading and Viewing with a Critical Lens: Monday's Minilesson Magic

This quarter in readers' workshop, we have been working on reading informational texts (specifically opinion-based informational texts). We have focused on previewing, knowing whether a text is for, against, or neutral, summarizing, previewing to try to figure out the structure of the text, note-taking, and talking back to the text. Last week, we worked on reading and viewing texts with a critical lens. We learned to analyze the text with a number of critical questions in mind.

For our minilesson models, we have been focusing on the "chocolate milk in schools" debate. For my lessons on critical literacy, we analyzed two texts that we had previously used in other minilessons that have two opposing views on chocolate milk in schools,  an ad from the National Dairy Council and the Jamie Oliver Foundation.

We chose to read our Jamie Oliver article critically first because it would push us to think critically since we are leaning towards limiting chocolate milk in schools for our opinion essay. Next we analyzed an advertisement from the National Dairy Council titled "Five Reasons Why Flavored Milk Matters." We had previously used this text in our "talking back" to the text lesson. We realized that Jamie Oliver was biased (he says "chocolate milk does not belong in schools" AT ALL) because he is trying to fight the obesity epidemic and sees processed foods and extra sugar as a contributor to the obesity epidemic. The National Dairy Council is biased because their main goal is to get people to consume more milk and have specifically targeted increasing consumption of flavored milk. We discussed how the NDC uses fear to try to manipulate parents and schools into thinking that the main way to help kids get their nutrients is through flavored milk. ("Kids like the taste!") We discussed how this is the easy way out and does not require schools and parents to TEACH kids to like the taste of white milk and other foods that will provide them with the same nutrients.

For more practice, we used a commercial recently put out by Coca-Cola. I prompted students to think about what messages the Coke company was trying to send us and what they were trying to get us to believe. Next, I showed the video again and asked students to look for visual and auditory methods the authors of the text used to send us their messages. Through these lessons, I hope my students are getting more critically intelligent. I also shared with students the recent Fooducate blog post that brought this video to my attention. Fooducate is well-known by my students as we used the fooducate app in our science/nutrition unit last year. I explained to students that Fooducate typically does a great job with critical literacy. They are trying to help us navigate the world of food where food companies are trying to convince us that the products they make are healthy and nutritional for us.

I just found this video where someone has taken the Coca Cola commercial and put in the "real" information that we need to know in order to critically understand this video. Can't wait to show this to my kiddos this coming week to show them critical literacy IN ACTION!

For our unit, students have been reading opinion-based articles and blog posts on debatable topics (like athlete salaries, school uniforms, technology money spent in schools, e-readers versus books, single-gender schools, competitive sports for young children, etc.). Basically, they are doing the research for an opinion-based essay during our reading time so that writing time can be spent learning the techniques of essay writing and using evidence based terms within a researched piece of writing.

 I found a lot of the texts we are using through the Teacher's College Reading and Writing projects website if you are looking for Opinion-based articles. As students have honed in on their topics, we have also had to search for more articles on their specific topic through our handy-dandy friend named google.

For me, the whole point of critical literacy is to teach students to consider whether or not a text is trying to send them an ulterior message and to think about the goals of the author, company, or organization that has created the text. While I don't think critical literacy will stop us from having chocolate milk or soda now and then, I hope my students do not let the media convince them that these are HEALTHY choices.

By the way, you can download the chart above at my TPT store. It is in a one page format and 1/2 page format for student journals/reader response notebooks.

Math Practices Made Easy # 2

This is the second math practices made easy. If you missed the first one, you can find it here.

Today's teaching technique is one I found on the the teachingchannel.org. The teaching technique (routine graphic organizer) is called "Choose 3 Ways."

You can download the Choose 3 Ways word document from the teaching channel website. Check out the whole video below. This video is a solid example of how you could use the workshop model in math and I'm sure you will pick up on other useful techniques as you watch. Definitely worth the 5 minutes!

 

Why I LOVE Task Cards in Math: Top 10

Have you embraced task cards in your classroom? This year, I definitely have used task cards as one way to revolutionize my math classroom. Here is my Top 10 List of why I LOVE task cards in math.

10. Students think we are doing something fun because they get to move around the room. We are, but you'd think we were having a party sometimes. 

9. Students seem more willing to ask for help (maybe because the room is in action with everyone moving around and it feels safer than when they are only sitting at their desk).

8. ANSWER KEYS: easy checking! Immediate feedback!

7. If I am using them for two days, I can use the first day's results to create a small group for the following day.

6. My task cards usually provide two days worth of practice--easy, engaging, and effective lesson plans! I make more than enough task cards so that no one is able to complete them all in one session.

5. After using task cards in a whole group lesson, they are EASY PEASY to move to a station for more practice or review, use in an intervention group, or to differentiate for students who still need to work on the concept.

4.  Students seem more willing to persevere!

3. Self-motivated students have the opportunity to push themselves. (They often are less likely to do this when the instructional mode is...textbook pg...wait...discuss...next textbook pg...wait...discuss. Anyone else use Math Expressions and have this problem?) 

2. After I explain how to work a problem to one student, I can ask that student to be the expert on that problem.

1. When it's time to go to recess, the kids yell "No. I don't want math to be over!" So rewarding! I would love to skip recess and keep doing math, but they never agree to this trade-off :)

Click here to check out my engaging task cards (each on a theme that you can use all year long). Although task cards are great for centers and stations, I always use them in whole-group instruction first.

Tammy

All Over the Place-Linky's and Super Sale

Hi Everyone,

This blog post is going to be "all over the place" with Friday Funnies,Sunday's Super Sale, and some teacherspayteachers LoVe. Isn't teaching AWESOME?!?!

So my Friday Funny isn't exactly a funny, but an "awwwwww" that made me smile even more than a funny. So, I'll use Friday Funnies from Ashley over at Primary Teacherhood to share my warm-fuzzy moments from today.

1) My kiddos had to go to the gym today to practice "Man in the Mirror" with the rest of the 5th graders. (We have a partnership with Habitat for Humanity in our county and have a now annual Moms vs Moms basketball game. The game is NEXT WEEK!! Our kiddos perform a few songs during the bball game as their contribution to the kick-off). Anywayzzz---it was 11:50 on a Friday in a classroom and they were all "Michael-Jackson-white glove-hat down--turn around-gonna make a change--jazzed up," after practicing at their seats before heading to the gym, so I reminded them that our music teacher would be trying to lead 80 kiddos in the gym and would need them to listen and follow directions. I made the comment "and when we get in there, don't buddy up with all of your friends like it's mix-up time at lunch." As everyone who is still wound up keeps on being loud and rowdy, one of my sweeties said, "But we're all friends." Busted---then I had to explain, "I agree, but you know what I mean." Our community and kindness stuff IS WORKING! :) Love abounds in our class! Here's more proof:

2) I had a few helpful kids come in from afterschool today to help me grade the quizzes we took in math. (These are my future teachers and always great assistants). I was also meeting with a parent at the time in the room across the hall. About 15 minutes later they came in looking for a broom with a long handle. "We want to sweep." Okay, I'm not going to stop you. When I came back to the room, I asked "What's going on? Are you guys just not wanting to go back to afterschool?" What they said is the best. "Ms. Russell, you told us to pass it on so we are cleaning the room for you." Ahhh, that melted my heart.

So, no funnies, but definitely reasons to keep on loving kids and what comes out of their mouths.

And, I'm sure you have heard that TPT is holding a SITE-WIDE Super Sunday Sale. Remember, TPT only holds a few site-wide sales a year, so this is a truly big deal. Many sellers will be putting their entire stores on sale. I am putting all of my items on 10% sale which means you can save 18% off of everything in my store by using the code SUPER at checkout for 20% off from tpt. I hate to be cheapy and only do a 10% sale on my items, but I really strive to reasonably price my products for the work that I have done and the longevity of the product. Only my Words Their Way Word Searchers are over $5 at 6 bucks each (which means that through this sale you can get them for $4.32. That's a steal in my book for something that I use ALLLLLLL year long.) And, did I mention my paycheck went DOWN this month? (Probably yours too thanks to a social security increase, but MAN, I didn't think it could get any smaller.) So, tpt really supplements my income in that it allows me to pay for things periodically that I wouldn't have been able to afford otherwise. Did I mention that I bought a house last February (and I'm single:)? After a year of homeownership, I am feeling the crunch. (By the way, do you LOVE this Sale button by Ashley Hughes? He's squirreling away his footballs. How CUUUUUUUUUTE!)

I will be making some purchases on Sunday too and will be so happy to send some of my payday cash to another teacher. I LOVE teacherspayteachers and feel that it has totally revolutionized the teaching profession. I mean the time and energy we put into creating useful lesson materials that are also engaging and better-than-the-publishers is just amazing to me. I get so much pleasure out of purchasing your great products. I know you are on the other end checking your daily statistics just like me. And, I know we work hard to make amazing products because of the encouragement and feedback we get from being a part of teacherspayteachers and the blogging world. When I am making new products, I feel like what I do is worthy of my time because it will not only be a great lesson for my kids, but for lots of other students.

Anyway.....what if we all showcase what we are planning to purchase on Sunday? I am going to work on my wishlist tomorrow and maybe I will have time to post what I am looking forward to grabbing up.

And for a little INSPIra-cion, here's "Man in the Mirror" for you. Enjoy!

Wow, did I say this post would be all over the place? Hope you had a great wrap-up to your week today!

  

Math Practices Made Easy: Technique #1

Welcome to a new Life, Love, Literacy blog series, Math Practices Made easy. This series is inspired by the Common Core Standards for Mathematical Practices. The Standards for Mathematical Practices are important because they "describe the varieties of expertise that mathematics educators at all levels should be developing" in our students. While we have specific standards in each domain at each grade level, we should be embedding the standards for mathematical practices in all that we do.

In this series, you will find a simple teaching technique, the math practices that the technique supports, and links to helpful videos and resources related to the technique. I hope you find simple ways to ensure that the mathematical practices are being incorporated into your math instruction.

Do you need a quick overview of the Standards for Mathematical Practices? Earlier this year, I worked to understand the Standards for Mathematical Practice. I created a free resource that summarizes the Standards for Mathematical Practice. (I needed this resource for myself to help me wrap my brain around the Standards for Mathematical Practice so I hope it is helpful to you too!)

Top 2 for Tuesday: Save 10%

The TOP 2 for TUESDAY items this past week were:

Multiplying and Dividing Fractions Word Problems (Cupcake Shoppe Themed Task Cards)  10 % off TODAY ONLY

If you like these, you should check out the Area House Plans themed cards for more practice with multiplying and dividing fractions. We are using these right now in our real-world math station.

Words Their Way Within Word Pattern Spellers Word Searches 10 % off TODAY ONLY 

(The other two sets of word searches have been selling like crazy too! Grab them up to make your word study more fun and add another level of word-pattern recognition for your students)
Words-Their-Way-Word-Searches-Syllables-and-Affixes-Spellers
Words-Their-Way-Word-Searches-Derivational-Relations-Spellers





These products were also hot-hot-hot this past week. Check them out if you have not seen them yet.
Adding/Subtracting Fractions with Unlike Denominators (Candy Shop Themed Task Cards)

Force and Motion Simple Machines Vocabulary Match Up Mats (lots of other science mats to check out)

 Theme in Literature Common Core Bulletin Board Labels (and list of books by theme)

Be sure to stop by later this week for an announcement about a new blog series I am starting. Math, common core, can't wait!!!!! :)

Also, I know you are crazy, super, insane busy (I mean it's January almost February right?), but have you joined the 2013 clutter-free classroom challenge yet? I would love for you to join in so that we can all help each other de-clutter and "Free Up" some sanity in our busy minds. It's week 3, but nevah-evah-evah too late to join :) I did one small thing today related to organizing and clutter and it made me smile. (I'll share later). 

Spy Reports Pictures: Friday Flashback: Linky

Today I am linking up with Amanda from Teaching Maddeness for her Friday Flashback Linky Party and Teaching Blog Addict for Freebie Friday.

  

I have been wanting to share some Spy Report (free download) examples with you and had time to take some pictures this week. We started these two weeks ago when we returned from winter break. Remember my new-found mission of making sure I focus some of our time on kindness and character---I was reminded that "Show, don't tell." is the best way to learn, meaning that I need to make sure that I give students opportunities to develop kindness, show appreciation, give apologies, and practice being the kind of person I want them to grow up to be.

Here are some of my beautiful favorites....and we are just getting started!

 This student used tagxedo.com (like wordle) to create his Spy Report. I really like the way he used the tagxedo to brainstorm and then wrote examples and reasons why he used those adjectives. (I think this is a great way for a student who has trouble elaborating to do their spy report.

 I love this spy report because it is creative, bright, and thoughtful.

 This spy report is a pop-up basketball because the recipient likes basketball. Very creative.

This student chose to write in the format of a real "spy" report. Notice the real fingerprints all around the document and the type-set that looks like it was typed on a typewriter.

 

And....this one is one of my FAVORITES so far. Is it because it is about me? I think so. Is it super creative? Absolutely. This student chose to write a Ms. Russell (that's me) pie recipe. (Have you read Enemy Pie? We did last year and used is as a creative writing possibility for our writer's notebook--write different kinds of pie recipes.) Look at that "It leaves an unforgettable impact on your tastebuds...It goes above and beyond the pie standard." What I LOOOOVE LOVE LOVE most about my kids' spy reports to me is that they really do get to know me and describe the "true" me in their reports. (I'm also crazy, intense, high strung sometimes--but they pick the best qualities to write about!:)

Why I love this assignment:

* This assignment really allows for student creativity. While I teach genre studies during writing workshop, Spy Reports allow students to write in whatever mode they want and express their creativity and voice as a writer.

* You will see amazing things happen with reluctant writers. As they feel the “warm fuzzies” of sharing what they appreciate about someone and hear good things about themselves, they really buy into this assignment.

* One week, you will have a student use a really creative genre, the next week, many students will have written in this same mode. Writing ideas spread like wildfire!

* Because this assignment happens each week, you should see major growth across the year. Things that you place importance on in your regular writing instruction (grammar, spelling, vocabulary, painting a picture, dialogue, etc.) should show improvement in spy reports.  

Grab my SPY REPORTS directions (including tips for the teacher) for free from my teacherspayteachers store. It is a word document so that you can modify it for your classroom.

2013 Clutter Free Classroom Challenge!

2013's Week 2 challenge for the clutter free classroom is to "share your plans," including generating a list of "non-negotiable rules." I started working on a Clutter Free Classroom in May of 2012. You can see some old, SCARY photos of my messy classroom. I am happy to say that some of these problem areas were improved tremendously last year, but now that I am over half a year away from that work, I know that I can go through the same process again and make even more improvements. (PS-If you want to check out any of my Clutter Free Classroom Posts, it's one of my labels, so they are easy to find.)

I LOVE the clutter-free classroom challenge because it BEGS us to STOP, take a look around, notice the pile-age and get to work on our environment.

A lot of my plan may look familiar, circa May 2012. 

Plan and Strategies:

* Have one goal/problem area to target each week. If I don't get it done that week, don't get upset. Move forward to the next week. (I am ALWAYS too ambitious with my to-do list :( )
* Work, work, work! Start small. Use music to make the process more enjoyable and time the work.
* When my ability to get rid of stuff starts to dwindle--stop for the day. (Ever notice the longer you work to get rid of stuff, the more you start to hold on to? Maybe I should be on an episode of hoarders...:))
* As I am working, continue to make lists of tasks that students can help with before the bell rings and after school

Rules for what I must get rid of:

(1)-If it has dust bunnies on it, LET IT GO. (Ha ha, makes me laugh. "Of course I will use this next year." Yeah right!)
(2)-If I know I can access it in my personal computer files or online (since we update things all the time anyway, I rarely just pull worksheets out of my folders and make copies anymore, so why hang on to the copies?).   


Old Rules from Last Year that I No Longer Need: (Success!!)
- it's not mine, it has to go (I have a tendency to hoard professional materials from the library in fear that when I need them, someone else will have checked them out...no more!)
-Get rid of it If I don't have a plan for using it (this will be tough! Don't we love to hold on to things, just in case...)
-Get rid of it If it doesn't fit into my grade-level (this will be tough since I have looped, but I'm sure there are things that just don't fit in either 4th or 5th grade curriculum.)
-If I have NEVER used the resource in my teaching career and don't foresee it being useful next year. 
 
What I Accomplished Last Year:
1)-Taking control of the mess on my desk: create a functional space for upcoming lessons (worksheets, materials, etc.) closer to my desk but separate so that it does not take over my desk  (This space is mostly functional, but could use some work.)
2)-Reduced file cabinets and get rid of one (Check! Now I'm going to work on doing it again and reducing the one that's left even more :) )
3)-Purged professional materials that I know I'm not using (Let's do this one AGAIN! Still have plenty on my shelves that I have not touched this year.)
4)-De-clutter wall space (This happened!)
5)-Reduce unnecessary picture books from my collection (My first strategy for this is to sort my books into two piles---I've EVER read it to a class and I've NEVER read it to a class. If I can see myself reading a NEVER book to my class next year, I can keep it. If not, I will be sending a gift of great books down to a lower-grades classroom.) (Got it down to one shelf, and made some donations to the lower grades' teachers!)

Lastly, I love the clutter-free classroom's rules to remember:

1) You can't organize clutter. (This reminds me not to buy a ton of things to ORGANIZE what I have, but to get rid of things that I do not need and buy organizational items when I know exactly what I need.)
2) Your trash is {quite possibly} another person's treasure. (If other teachers came into my room and said "Hey, I could use that," I would have no problem giving it away. So, when I was de-cluttering, instead of moving materials into our mailbox room, I sent an email with the resources I was trying to get rid of. They were taken up within the hour and I was pleased to be giving up something someone else might use.)
3) There is no value in an object that isn't being used. (This is harsh, isn't it? I think it means we have to get rid of gifts kids have given us and other cutesy things that are just sitting around with no purpose.)   

If you want to start organizing your classroom, don't forget to head on over to the clutterfreeclassroom blog  for awesome tips and inspiration. And, blog up and join the LINKY party (at anytime, no real time limit. Jump into the organizing fun!:)

Everything's 10% off: Top 2 for Tuesday

You read it right! Since I haven't throw a sale (pre-winter break), I thought I would get back into the swing of offering two products at 10% off by having an "everything is 10% off sale TODAY and TOMORROW.

Top Two for Tuesday. Everything is 10 % off TODAY and TOMORROW. That's a mouthful of t's :)

 

During this sale, you might want to check out some new things I have worked on in the past month. (All Common Core Math Products).

Multiplying and Dividing Fractions: House Plan Themed Task Cards 

(includes 24 multi-step word problems (on task cards), house plan "area" activity, and 4 multi-step extension problems)

  

Customary Capacity and Weight Word Problems: Farmers Market Themed

(8 basic capacity conversion task cards, 24 multi-step task cards, list of Farmer Wayne and Jane's goods and how they packaged them, 8 multi-step task cards that require students to use addition, subtraction, multiplication and/or division to solve

 

Multiplying and Dividing Fractions: Cupcake Shoppe Theme

(32 multiplying and dividing fractions task cards, Cupcake Shoppe Payroll problems (multiplying whole number/decimal), 4 Cupcake Shoppe Boxed Order Questions-modeling multiplication)

Adding and Subtracting Fractions w Unlike Denominators 

(16 adding and subtracting fractions (unlike denoms) task cards, 16 adding and subtracting fractions representational model problem)

 

All task card products include information for the teacher, student recording sheets, and answer keys. 

 

I hope you get to pick up some goodies at this sale! My kiddos are using the House Plan task cards right now in our real-world station and we used the Farmers' Market task cards this week to learn about Capacity and Weight.

Smorgasbord--There's a lot going on!

Wow! I have so much I want to share with you all.

It's a smorgasbord of what's been going on in the classroom, new teacherspayteachers products, classroom community and character ideas and updates, SNOW! SNOW! SNOW! on Friday (well, a dusting, but a day off!), stress about paying taxes on TPT earnings, excitement about the 2013 Clutter-Free Classroom Challenge, and a special announcement tomorrow's Top 2 For Tuesday that you WON'T want to miss! Yes, I have slacked off on Monday's Minilesson Magic and Top 2 for Tuesday, but I will get them rolling again, now that we are two weeks into our 3rd quarter.

For this post, I will focus on an update of Building a Classroom Community and Building Character. Read here if you missed my post about having my teaching heart split wide open. I spent the first week back focusing each morning of our reading time on building our classroom community and discussing kindness. I used three read alouds to create opportunities for discussions about having an open heart and sharing kindness.

We used:

 

First, I used Somebody Loves you Mr. Hatch by Eileen Spinelli (how exciting to read a book from Jerry's wife :). We mainly talked about how Mr. Hatch could choose to have an open heart or a closed heart. In receiving the box of chocolates, he had opened his heart to the world and was more aware and conscious of other people's needs. I talked about how we can choose to be conscious of other people's needs and that if we just pay attention, we will see places where we can choose to extend kindness. 

Next, I read Each Kindness by Jacquleine Woodson (author of The Other Side). This book was destiny! It was sitting on a shelf in the library when I went to pick up Mr. Hatch, and I thought, hmmm...kindness. Let me read this! If you have ever read The Hundred Dresses by Eleanor Estes, this is along the same lines, but in picture book form. From amazon.com:

"Each kindness makes the world a little better.

Chloe and her friends won't play with the new girl, Maya. Maya is different--she wears hand-me-downs and plays with old-fashioned toys. Every time Maya tries to join Chloe and her gang, they reject her. Eventually, Maya plays alone, and then stops coming to school altogether. When Chloe's teacher gives a lesson about how even small acts of kindness can change the world, Chloe is stung by the lost opportunity for friendship, and thinks about how much better it could have been if she'd shown a little kindness toward Maya."

After our read aloud, I talked about how Chloe wishes she would have done things differently and said a lot to Maya. We talked about apologies and forgiveness. Chloe doesn't have the opportunity to apologize to Maya, but we do. Then I did something AMAZING! I had students create a list of apologies for their classmates. They had to write them down on a sheet of paper. I gave everyone a list of classmates and they worked through it to think about anything they needed to apologize for. I also made a list of specific apologies for students (hey, I AM NOT PERFECT!) 

As students worked and thought, I voiced over. "You might need to apologize for something the person doesn't even know you did!" "Think about this year and last year." "The things we need to apologize for sometimes keep us up at night. As soon as we apologize, we can stop thinking about it." "You might need to apologize for something even if that person is your best friend." "If anyone feels like they need to apologize for something to the whole group, feel free to say it now." After about 25 minutes, I told students they would now have the chance to apologize to one another privately. I explained that they were not allowed to stand near someone who was apologizing and wait. This would be rude. I explained that it was important to give everyone who is apologizing space to feel comfortable to say what they needed to say and get it out. While I was going around saying my apologies, I also was being the teacher (and trying to overhear some of them). It warmed my heart to hear kids say things like "I'm sorry for when I talked about you behind your back." "I'm sorry for not always being a good friend to you."

It was AHHH-Mazing! 

AHHH-MAZING! A lesson I will NEVER forget. And, I don't think many of my students will either. I think I taught them something that a lot of grown-ups don't even know how to do right. I even explained to them that as soon as you say "but I did it because..." you have stopped apologizing and started excusing. Keep the excuses out of your apology and remember that you can't change another person, you can only change how you act and respond to them.

The next day, I gave each student a plastic heart from the dollar store. I told them, this represents love and kindness. Each of you gets to choose whether or not you hold it tight or whether you pass it on to another person. I told them that if they choose to pass it on to another person, they must tell them why and then explain 

"This heart represents love and kindness. You can choose to hold it tight and keep it for yourself, or you can choose to pass it on to someone else. If you pass it on, you have to tell them the same."

I explained to students that by holding on to the heart and not letting it go, we actually had less love. The heart is symbolic of what we have to pass on and by passing it on (with the plastic heart or in other ways), we are actually increasing the love and kindness in the world. By the time we got together the next day, one of our hearts had already made it through the after school teachers, to another two students, and back to a student in our classroom. How awesome!

Towards the end of the week, I read Oh, the Places You Will Go. This was my book to remind them of how tough life can be, and that sometimes we might find ourselves on a dark road where we can't even remember who we are (who we used to be). I told them, "you might not even know how you got on the dark road or how to get off of it. You might find yourself on the dark road and not even realize you were on your way down it." I told them it was hard for me to give them any advice about the dark road, because everyone's dark road will be different, but I had a few strategies for them. 

1) When you realize you are on the dark road, find those people who remember the YOU that you are right now. The people who see the good in you will be able to remind you of who you are. These people might be best friends, teachers, parents, preachers, grandparents. Decide who those people are right now. 

2) Read Oh, the Places You will Go for some advice. It might help you when you are in your dark place. 

On Friday, I introduced Spy Reports. (I'll post more about how this went and show some examples in a future post). But, let's just say they were SUPER DUPER EXCITED! We have had two Spy Report sessions since, and I can already tell they will be looking forward to it each week! 

At some point in the week, I told my students "Who you are is "good people." (I know this is not grammatically correct). The phrase "good people" is common around our town. You hear "They're 'good people'" or "They come from 'good people." "They's some good people." I told them, in my mind and memory they will always fall into the category of "good people." I know who they will grow up to be will be "good people," but we need to work on bringing out who we are on a regular basis. We need to let the "who we are" on the inside SHINE OUT on the outside every second, moment, hour of every day. Now, this is a TALL order (for me too, not just my kiddos), but our continued conversations and reminders or our goal to be who we are in the most positive sense will continue to help us all grow in how we treat the people we encounter inside the classroom and out.

I hope some of these ideas will help you to build a classroom community. This is just a taste of what we did for a week. Lots more is going on, but these lessons (in January of teaching kids for a year and a half already) have set a foundation for the rest of the year that we have together and hopefully for my students' transition to middle school.

Don't forget to tune in tomorrow for a special Top 2 for Tuesday announcement!