State Testing & Picture Books

It's coming! 

Take down those anchor charts!

Sharpen those pencils!

There's no escaping the . . .

STATE TESTING!!!!!!!

Yeah, that's kind of how I feel about state testing.  In New Jersey, my friends have to take the New Jersey Assessment of Skills and Knowledge, also known as the NJASK.  We will actually take it April 30-May 3.  Four days of testing for my little friends.

It used to be that my district had this sort of cram session where we would essentially spend the week before the test doing test prep.  I was never a fan of that.  By the time the real testing days came around, my friends were fried.  These days, we have incorporated test prep into all our reading and writing units of study.  This way, test prep happens all year long.  However, I think most teachers still kick it up a notch right about now.

Today, I thought I would share one of the ways I test prep with my friends.  It was shown to me at a workshop a few years ago, and I was pretty skeptical at first.  However, having used it over the years I find it really helpful.  It has really helped my friends understand the expectations and improve their writing and extended constructed math responses.  Let me explain.

Here are the rubrics used in NJ for scoring my friends test writing prompts and extended constructed math responses as they hang in my room.

I took a black and white copy of each rubric and enlarged it on regular copy paper.  Then, I took that to Staples (an office supply company) and had them enlarge them to poster size.  As long as you do a black and white poster, it's really cheap.  I took them home and busted out the colored pencils, coloring each grade and criteria a different color.

The next thing you need are colored Popsicle sticks like those in the picture below.  I took one Popsicle stick for each of the five colors in the literacy rubric (make sure the colors in the math rubric are those colors as well) and used a rubber band to make one set for each of my friends.  I got my sticks at the dollar store.


Before I go on, I should mention that I do take the time to go over the rubrics and explain them in kid friendly language so that they understand what the rubrics are saying.
So, how to use all this.  One of the things I find is that my friends don't really have a clear understanding of what a good response is for state testing.  For literacy, I take sample written prompts given to us by the state as examples of each level.  I project them on the board and we read through them together.  Then, I have my friends discuss with a partner if the paper is a 1, 2, 3, 4, or 5.  Then, I tell them to hold up their sticks (at the same time) and they hold up the appropriate color/grade Popsicle stick.  We do the same thing with the constructed math responses. 

When we first do this, it's a rainbow of Popsicle sticks around the room.  The grades they give are all over the place.  We then discuss what "the author" or "the mathematician" did, explaining why some gave it the grade they did.  I then tell them the grade the state gave the paper and explain why.  After doing this a couple of times, you start to see that the Popsicle sticks become pretty accurate.  Most of my friends will hold up one color with the other colors that might be up being the grade just above or below what the majority is holding up.  They become much more discerning as to what makes a good writing piece or a good math response.  The Popsicle sticks are important to this.  If I just asked my friends to say what grade they thought it was, you know some would just mumble something or not answer.  Having to hold up a stick forces them to think and commit to a grade. 

Over time, I extend this lesson using their own work.  When we start, I get my friends in the habit of talking about "the author" or "the mathematician" when discussing the work that is done.  I do this so that when I put up their papers, anonymously of course, we talk about what the author or mathematician did, not what he or she did, not what John or Sally did.  I tell my friends that we will be looking at their work anonymously.  Unless they give it away, nobody will know it is their work.  Honestly, I can tell they are a bit wary at first, but when they see it really is anonymous and helpful they are fine with it. 

The helpful part is most important.  When we discuss the paper, we critique what the author/mathematician did well and what they can do to make it EVEN better.  Not fix it, not correct it, but make it EVEN BETTER!  That's the term we use.  It keeps it all positive and makes my friends okay with critiquing honestly. 

What I can tell you is that this works.  I'm sure to show spectrum of work so they see the excellent work to the, let's just say not so excellent work.  My friends who need help always show improvement.  I think hearing how to make their work even better from their friends means more than hearing it from their teacher.  They also get to see the quality of work their peers are generating.  It is difficult for my friends to critique a response that is really good already, but that's where I step in as the teacher and offer some constructive criticism to the author or mathematician.  All done anonymously, of course!

These charts are up all year in my room.  It's pretty helpful because in meeting with my friends during conferencing, I can always ask, "So, where do you think this falls on the rubric?  A 3, 4, or 5? . . .  What makes you say that?"  It forces them to honestly critique their own work and gives us at least one teaching point for our conference.

Speaking of state testing, do you know Testing Miss Malarkey by Judy Finchler?

Just an amazingly fun book to read to your friends before state testing.  It captures the ridiculousness of it all.  Miss Malarkey is the teacher preparing her friends for the state test.  You have Principal Wiggins (who wears a bad wig) screaming on the phone as he orders the #2 pencils with the "good erasers!"  Then there is Mrs. Magenta, the art teacher, who teaches them how to fill in circles completely with no white spaces showing.  While we take the NJASK, these children take the I.P.T.U. test.  It is just a fun book that will make your friends laugh, and really it's a topic we could all use a good laugh about!

Miss Malarkey is a series of picture books.  Another favorite of mine that is great for the beginning of the year is Miss Malarkey Leaves No Reader Behind!

In this book, Principal Wiggins promises to dye his hair purple and sleep on the school roof if the students read 1,000 books.  Miss Malarkey goes about finding the perfect book for each of her friends.  Of course, there has to be one tough cookie in the bunch. There's one little boy who only wants to play video games and has no time for this reading stuff!  Don't worry, in the end Miss Malarkey works her magic and finds the perfect book for this rugrat!  I do a 40 book challenge with my friends each year and use this book as an introduction to the challenge.  I also warn my friends that, like Miss Malarkey, I will not rest until I find them books they will love.

So, what are you doing to prepare for state testing? 

We Found Some Fun!

Remember my post on Finding Fun?  Well, we found some!  My friends have been very busy with some projects recently, and I thought I would share.  We've been working on a couple of things.  First, my friends completed research reports and drew a picture of the person on their cover.  I think they came out GREAT!!

 

Love the jets hanging from the title

With Mickey on his shoulder!

A bored George Washington

A very stylized Meriwether Lewis

Jimmy Carter who was "as nice as his teeth were big."  Yeah, right out of the report.

Derek Jeter who "never married but has tons of girlfriends."

As I wrote, I think the covers all came out really well.  Happily, the reports were also great.  Well, except for my friend who insisted Martin Luther King Jr. worked hard to put an end to democracy.  Sigh. . . 

The other project hanging in my room is one I have done many times over the years.  For a reading log project, my friends had to make a mask of the main character.  Then, they had to give a speech explaining the physical and emotional traits of the character and how he/she/it! was important to the story.  To make the mask you stretch out a wire hanger, cover it with the cut leg of a stocking, and make your character's face using any materials you like.  Here they are hanging on my windows.

  Here are some of the masks that I thought came out well.

This is Isabelle from Fortune's Magic Farm by Suzanne Selfors.  Sadly, her nose fell off on the bus.  No, not in the book.  On the bus my friend rides to school. At least I know this friend made a nose for their character.  You will see later that someone didn't think having a nose or mouth was particularly important.  Go figure!  I like this mask because you can see the time and effort that went in to making the yarn hair. 

  

Here we have Zeus from D'Aulaires' Greek Myths.  You have to love the crabby face and lightning bolts in the beard.

This critter is Mrs. Frisby from, what else, Mrs. Frisby and the Rats of Nimh by Robert C. O'Brien.  This book is an old one but still a goody.  To be honest, it has never been one of my favorites, but my friends like it.

This mysterious veiled lady is Maddie Masterson from School of Fear by Gitty Daneshvari.  I thought the veil was a nice touch.  Sadly, her mouth and nose weren't done.  Really?!!

Above is the mask one of my friends did for the book Bad News for Outlaws: The Remarkable Life of Bass Reeves, Deputy U.S. Marshal.  The mask is not particularly detailed, but I wanted to show it to you because THIS IS AN AMAZING PICTURE BOOK!  Bass Reeves was a former slave who escaped to freedom in the Indian Territories and became a U.S. Marshal.  He was one of the most respected Marshals, making over 3,000 arrests in his lifetime.  This book tells his story and some of the more interesting arrests he made.  The boys in my class are nuts about this book, and after my friend gave his speech we now have a waiting list of girls who want to read it.  Winning!! (Yeah, I just got all Charlie Sheen on ya!)



So, that is what we have been up to lately.  It's been fun for us all.  Now, I'm knee deep in administering DRA2 reading assessments.  Gosh, they take a long time!

What have you been up to?  Find any fun lately?

The Continuum of Literacy Learning

Do you know  this book?

It's The Continuum of Literacy Learning: A Guide to Teaching

by Fountas and Pinnell.

The picture and link above is the book I have.  It was published in 2007.  This link will take you to the second edition pictured below, which was published in 2010.  Both pictures are for the grade 3-8 book, but there is also a preK-grade 2 edition.

If you do guided reading groups or any kind of leveled literacy instruction, I would say this book is a great resource to have on your shelf. So, what's the book about?  It focuses on seven continuum of literacy learning:
1.  Interactive Read-Aloud and Literature Discussion
2.  Shared and Performance Reading
3.  Writing About Reading
4.  Writing
5.  Oral, Visual, and Technological Communication
6.  Phonics, Spelling, and Word Study
7.  Guided Reading

The introduction explains that "This learning continuum. . . is designed to help educators teach from the specific body of understandings that students must acquire to become highly effective users of oral and written language.  With this foundation, you can set clear goals for learning and plan specific lessons across many instructional contexts." (From page 1 of the first edition)

So, what does all that mean?  Let me show you how the book is set up.  It begins with an introduction chapter that explains the seven areas above.  Then, we have the lovely tabbed sections! For the purposes of this post, I am really just highlighting the reading and guided reading information.

Behind the grade level tabs, you will find "a general guide to the kinds of understandings students will need to acquire by the end of each grade."    But, wait! There's more! (Don't I sound like I'm selling Ginsu Knives?) Each grade level give you specific, detailed information on "behaviors and understandings to notice, teach, and support" in bulleted lists.  It will do this for each continuum, 1-6, that I listed above.  As I said, it does it in great detail.  It will guide you in setting grade level specific learning goals, curriculum goals that will have your friends thinking within, beyond, and about the texts they read.

The glossary tab section defines pretty much any literacy term you might ever come across.  It's nice to have because, really, you can't expect every teacher to know every literacy term out there.

Here is my favorite section.

Each level gives you explicit information in several areas.

• It will describe what you can expect, in general, of readers at that level.
• There is also a tremendous amount of information on selecting texts for that grade level.  It goes into detail about genres, text structure, content, theme/ideas, language and literacy features, sentence complexity, vocabulary, word decoding, illustrations, and book and print features.
• Another area of information explains the demands of the text at this level.   Essentially, this is the area that is helpful in planning the different components of your guided reading lesson.
• The final topic of information covered is how to plan for Word Work at this particular guided reading level.

Honestly, I don't think you could ask for more.  This book is good for everyone.  I think new teachers sometimes have difficulty understanding just what students at different grade levels should know or are capable of.  This comes simply from a lack of experience in the classroom.  This book would give you a good reference of all that information.  If you are new to guided reading or any sort of leveled literacy instruction, this book explains it well.  In fact, in the beginning there is a nice chart explaining the structure of a guided reading lesson.  Finally, for those of us that have experience with guided reading, it's a good resource to have.  Sometimes, it can be easy to fall into planning for the same old learning goals.  This would be a good resource to browse through and see what we haven't focused on lately.  It would also be good for setting remediation or enrichment learning goals.

Here is a sample page from the book to give you an idea of how it is set up.  This is the first page of the section for guided reading level R.  I should note that if you are doing guided reading, but not using the Fountas and Pinnell leveling system, you can still use this book.  The grade level sections are very much on target.  There are also tons of level correlation charts around the web.  You can always just find what the Fountas and Pinnell level is equal to in the leveling system you use. 

I'm sure I have not done this book justice with this review.  There is so much more it's great for than the little bit I've mentioned here.  If you ignore the reading stuff completely, the writing information alone is worth the price of the book.  By the way, if you click the book links it will take you to Amazon.  The books run from  about $25-$32.  Not bad for professional reading!  I should also mention that I haven't seen the second editions in person.  I am assuming it is probably just a somewhat revised version of the first.

If you have this book, please feel free to comment about it.  I would love to know what you think.

By the way, as always, all opinions here are my own.  I am not being paid in any way to endorse this book.  I just like it a lot and wanted to share. :-)

My Room and a Mish-Mosh of Stuff!

Well, I'm finally posting some pictures of some of the changes I made in my room.  Here is how I set up my library.  It's actually been in this configuration before.  When I found out I was getting a new leveled library, I had to make room.  It turns out that going back to this set-up worked best.

That arrow and caption point out where I'm planning to put the new books.  I typed it in the picture, but it came out really tiny for some reason.  My library is arranged by theme, but I'm excited to add a leveled library.

The yellow shelf runs across the front of my room.  On the other side of my Pro Board is my math area.

I like my math area because it is organized and the vocabulary is posted up front and center.  My friends tend to incorporate the vocab in our math discussions more when they are visible.  That big blue cart is one of the two new shelving units I got.  It holds more math manipulative, but I turned it around because it is sort of messy looking.  Plus, I thought I could put a poster or two on the back blue side.  They were originally going to be bookshelves, but they turned out to be too deep for books.

Below is my new meeting table, otherwise called Big Bird by my friends.  Yeah, even they noticed it is really yellow!

I do love it, but I find it shows every pencil mark and grubby hand print.  I probably should have gone with a darker color.  The area behind the meeting table is a work in progress.  I'm still working on organizing my literacy materials in this area.

Finally, I'm showing you this area for one reason only.  Notice the arrow and bubbles I drew in.

See the bubbles on my whiteboard?  I had my VOICES board there before, but I moved it.  When I took the board down all the tape residue stayed behind.  It was fine for a while.  I knew it was there, but you really couldn't see it.  I also don't use the board for writing, so it wasn't a problem.  Then, I was out for a workshop.  A substitute wrote on the board and then erased.  Of course, it stuck to all the tape residue.  I've been trying to figure out a way to remove it without ruining the board.  The arrow points to a bottle of PAM nonstick cooking spray.  Someone told me that it will take off the tape residue without ruining the board.  I'll let you know if it works.  However, if you have any tips on how to clean this mess please share!!

So, here's an overview of the front of my room from the door. The meeting table is in the back.

One of the things I am going to do next year is tone down all the color.  I think it is all a little busy.  Have you ever noticed the difference between the classrooms of male and female teachers?  There are two male teachers down the hall from me and their rooms make mine look like I'm preparing for a carnival.  They have very spare rooms.  Not a lot of color, not a lot of fancy borders or posters.  Is this true in your school?  Next year, I'm going to find a happy medium between what I have going on and what they don't have going on!

Now, here comes the mish-mosh of stuff.

See these beautiful roses?  One of my students brought them in for me for the Chinese New Year!  Aren't they gorgeous?  I'm really not big on cut flowers, but these made me smile all week.  I hadn't really planned to do anything about the New Year, but I knew I had to. We watched a quick documentary on Discovery Education's United Streaming about the Chinese New Year.

I went to Staples Office Supply today and bought these.

Do you remember Paper Mate's Flair Markers?  I have love these since I was a kid.  It rivals my love of Mr. Sketch Scented Markers!  I'm hoping these will motivate me to attack the pile of papers I have to grade this weekend.  It's good to have hope, right?! ;-)

I also bought four of these Swingline Staplers.  They come in different colors, so I got red, purple, blue, and green.  Added bonus is that they were on sale for only $5 each and I had a 15% off coupon.

For some reason, my friends have destroyed every stapler I had this year.  And, I'm talking heavy duty staplers.  Why do they feel it necessary to make a fist and pound the stapler with all their might?  We are going to have yet another lesson on how to staple correctly when I break these out on Monday.

Finally, I found this anchor chart on Pinterest and had to share.

It is from the blog The Adventures of a 6th Grade Teacher.  It totally reminds me that I have been slacking on teaching Latin roots.  I love the chart and may just have to borrow it.  The blog is by a first year language arts teacher named Miss Klohn.  Judging from her blog, she is doing a phenomenal job for a first year.  I even noticed she is using the thinking stems I use.  :-)

I have another post on some professional reading for tomorrow or Monday.  Depends on how the rest of the weekend goes.  If you do guided reading groups, check back.  However, the book I'm going to share is great for anyone who teachers reading, guided or not.

Enjoy your day!

A Bit of a FACElift!

Well, I thought I was closer to finishing my room than it turns out I really am!   Did you ever look at pictures taken in your home and start to notice all these different things that you don't notice in real life?  That's what happened as I took some pictures of my classroom for my "after" blog post.  I started to notice all these little things that I still need to take care of, so the after blog post is on hold for a bit.   The whole room reveal will be coming soon.  Gee, that makes it sound much more exciting than it really will be!

But!  In the meantime, I am going to share a picture of the new spot I put my FACE board.  I first showed you my FACE board in this post.  It's the board where I post a quick summary or reminder for my friends of the mini lesson we completed.  I still get a lot of questions about this board from blog land and even a few teachers in my own building.  Because of that, I thought I would share how it has evolved since the beginning of the year.  Here it is in its new spot:

In the process of moving the room around, the FACES board ended up on a closet next to my meeting table.   Oh, here's a sneak peak of that table for you.  The meeting table that I was worried was going to be way too yellow?  Yeah, it's really yellow!

But, I love it!  Now, back to FACES.  I still use the board in much the same way I noted in that earlier post.  After a mini lesson, we put up a one or two sentence summary of what we learned.  The board is now, as before, next to my meeting table and it comes in handy.  I often have my friends refer to it when we are working in our guided reading groups.  Here are some of the different cards we've put up so far:

FLUENCY

ACCURACY

COMPREHENSION

EXPAND VOCABULARY

-Voracious reading got cut off!

I think you can see some of our nonfiction lessons making their way on to the board.  I do still wonder about it sometimes.  I know that from a distance, the cards are hard to read.  If you look at the first picture above, you can see what I mean.  I wonder if I should maybe print up the cards in a bold font to make it easier to see.  On the other hand, I mostly use the board with my friends at our meeting table where it is all perfectly easy to read.  For this year, I've decided it is what it is.  I just don't have the time to put in to redo all the cards.  It's something to think about for next year.

Do you have a FACEs board?  How do you use yours?  If you don't, any ideas on how to improve on mine?  I'm always open to suggestions!

On a totally different topic. . .  If you blog, how do you come up with blog titles?  Sometimes I try to jazz it up, as in "A Bit of a FACElift." but most of the time I just post the topic of the blog as its title.  Hence the exciting title of my last post, "Nonfiction Text Structure."  So, is it a downer when blog titles are basic and boring? 

Nonfiction Text Structures

Recently, my friends and I studied the different text structures of nonfiction.  Having limited resources available to me in school, I went to my old friend "The Web."  You might know my friend.  No matter what I need, he always delivers.  Okay, enough of the corny stuff.  What I really found on my search for more information on nonfiction text structure was this amazing site:

Literacy Leader

Have you been to this site?  The link above will take you to the page on text structure, but if you browse around there is a lot of other really good stuff there.  Their home page link is here.

This link will take you to their PDF packet on nonfiction text structure.  I used it to make some quick posters in my room to compliment the lessons I did.  If I had more time, they would be a bit fancier, but we are nearing the end of the marking period and I'm swamped with work.  Here is what the posters look like.  If you look at the PDF file, you will see that I enlarged some of the pages to make the posters.

The PDF packet has some fantastic resources in it.  One of the things I liked was the inclusion of signal words to help my friends identify text structure.  I added those to each chart.  Here are some other great things about this resource:

• In addition to signal words, it provides signal questions to help identify which text structure is used.
• It shows the different graphic organizers that are used for each type of text structure.
• There is a fantastic summarizing handout that pulls it together for your friends, sort of like a quick reference guide.
• The last few pages of the packet are five paragraphs on a common theme (crocodiles!) that you can use to have your friends identify the type of text structure. 

Since I taught a different structure each day as a mini lesson, I typed the paragraphs and projected the appropriate one on my ProBoard.  Then, my friends highlighted the signal words within the paragraph.  You could also just print the paragraphs and use them to assess your friends by having them identify the type of text structure and signal words.  I should also point out that my friends loved the content of the paragraphs, and we all learned more about crocodiles, alligators, caimans, and gavials.  I know my schema is larger because I had no idea what a gavial was before these lessons!

It can be hard to find real-life examples of the different text structures in books when you don't have the time to look around.  The PDF does have a list of books you can use, but if you have a social studies textbook you have a fantastic resource in your hands.  I find our textbook uses all five structures over and over again.  It was quite easy for my friends to work in partner groups to identify sections throughout the book that use the five different structures.  As we continue to work in social studies, I will throw out the question, "What text structure is being used here?"  I'm happy to say they usually know.

So, when I find a great resource, you know I like to share.  If you have no interest in nonfiction text structure, still take a look around the Literacy Leader web site.  It's a keeper!  I promise you will find something you like.