Lucy Calkins Writing Workshop - Realistic Fiction

Teaching students to write realistic fiction can be fun and so entertaining. To start the unit, I give each student a picture of a character to name. Then I have the students brainstorm the characters hobbies, likes, dislikes and even family life. Finally, we discuss how an interesting story always has the character face a problem. After a few days of writing, we discuss how we can make our stories more powerful with a strong solution. 

Each writing day starts with a mini-lesson from Lucy Calkin's Common Core and Writing Workshop Curriculum where I teach and model the expected learning outcome. 

Celebrating Martin Luther King Jr.

There are so many wonderful ways to celebrate MLK in the classroom. First, I like to read aloud Martin's Big Words to my students so they can have an understanding of who MLK was. After the read aloud we discuss his dream for the world and how he achieved it. Then I read We Dream of A World to the students and we brainstorm as a class, our dreams for the world. This is a great activity for students of all ages, I've done it with students as young as first grade. The discussion and end project leave me in tears year after year. My first year teaching I created a podcast with the students work and shared it at the school's MLK assembly.

MLK Podcast-We Dream of a World

If you can't locate the book Martin's Big Words, you can click on the link below for the book on video.
TeacherTube

Celebrating Black History Month

Black History Month is right around the corner. This is an important time for teachers and parents to discuss the topic of race with their children. Children are never too young to hear about the African-American Civil Rights era, and the best way to do this is through picture books. Here are just a few of my favorites:

Class Meetings

Class meetings have been part of my weekly lesson plans since my first year teaching. In the beginning, I started with 1 hour meetings once a week. They were productive, but too long and I knew they could be better. After taking a course in Positive Discipline, I was able to have two 30 minute meetings twice a week. These meetings were productive and effective. Class issues and individual problems were addressed, solved, and goals were set for the following week. I have included charts that i've used as visual prompts and a lesson plan/structure for class meetings adapted from Jane Nelsen, author of the Positive Discipline. 

Class Meeting Lesson Plan

Problem Solving: The Wheel of Choice

Tattling can get out of hand in any classroom and problem solving can take up plenty of teaching time. Taking the extra hour out of your day to introduce the Wheel of Choice to your students, will save you hours in your week and help tremendously with classroom management. This is a great activity for the beginning of the year in classrooms and can be adapted to work in the home too. It will also teach your students the life skill of problem solving independently, and will build one's self-esteem.

Click on the wheel of choice for the full lesson plan.

Expected and Unexpected Behavior

At the beginning of every year I read aloud You are a Social Detective, by Michelle Garcia Winner and Pamela Crooke. After being introduced to this book by the special needs teacher at my previous school, I used it only with my students who had difficulties in social settings. Then I realized, all children can benefit from the detailed picture stories in this book, and it became a go to book through out the year. I use this book to introduce rules in my classroom and what expected and unexpected behavior sounds and looks like. The kids love the pictures in this story! After we read aloud the first two sections, we discuss social scenarios and if the behavior is expected or unexpected. The whole activity leads children to understand that their actions affect all of those around them. They begin to be true social detectives thinking about what others are feeling about.

First Week Read Alouds

I love using picture books for team building during the beginning of the year.


On the first day of school I read aloud First Day Jitters, by Julie Danneberg, and as a class we discuss that we all have jitters on the first day, even the teacher! I also use this as a lead to a writing assessment and have the kids write using the prompt, My first day jitters are...

I use this prompt to assess my students writing and save it in their writing portfolio for them to compare to throughout the year. You can also visit First Day Jitters activity guide for some other great ideas for the book.

During the first month I love reading aloud The Crayon Box that Talked. This book has a beautiful
message for children. At the end of the read aloud, we discuss that we all have our own special gifts and we design a gift box labeled with the gift we are bringing to the class (kindness, sillyness, sense of humor, etc.). This is also a great activity to teach tolerance of others and makes for a great bulletin board!

Another story to help build self-esteem is Little Prickles. This adorable story
is written by seventh grade students, and helps children understand that we all are special and unique!




If you are looking for a picture book to start a discussion on team building, The Pout-Pout Fish in the Big-Big Dark is just perfect for that. This book helps trigger a discussion on team-work and how we all need others to help us.