Coins...Determining Importance

Each of these coin webs was made by 5-6 students that met with me in small math groups.  First, I passed out real coins to each of them to touch, compare and look at closely.  They each took a turn sharing one thing they knew or noticed about their specific coin.  They then wrote their observations on the chart.

Once we had all of the coin webs finished and hanging in the window (the only place left in my classroom to hang anchor charts...lol), we discussed how some of the information was really more important for us to remember than other information.  We had just finished a reading comprehension lesson on determining importance titled "What's in My Teacher's Purse".  In that lesson, they had to determine and sort whether the items I pulled out of my purse were "Important" or just "Interesting".  They got pretty good at this, so I thought it would be a good comprehension lesson to pull over to math.

I asked the students to tell me which things they thought would be the most important to remember when they are trying to tell the different coins apart.  Then I circled what we felt were the most important differences.

Math Strategy Posters

These are some strategies we've been working on when solving story problems in math.  I may have to repost if/when I make them cuter.  ;o)

Math Problem Solving Posters

Reading Genres

Here is the reading genre bulletin board I made last week.  When the kids are at independent reading, they take a sticky note and a pen with them to write down one of the books they worked on that day.  When literacy stations are over, they put their sticky note on the right "cloud".  The genre choices are "Fantasy", "Nonfiction", or "Realistic Fiction".  I plan to add more genres in the future...for sure "poetry".

Here is a close-up photo of the "Realistic Fiction" cloud with a few sticky notes attached.  In order to avoid "overcrowding" with stickies, I told them that when they put a new sticky up, they have to take their old one down.  That way each student has one book represented on the board at  a time.

Possible Daily Schedule!

Daily Schedule

Did It Dots

During our writing workshop time, I mostly use lessons from Lucy Calkins' Units of Study.  But this year, I'm going to start out teaching some of the conventions portion using an idea that originally came from Primarily Writing.  I'm going to take their "did it dot" idea and change it just a bit by using these little stickers that I found at the teacher supply store and Target's dollar spot.

The idea is that as you teach the conventions (spacing, capital letter, punctuation, etc...), you give a "did it dot" for each new thing you see the student using during their independent writing.  For instance, if you've just taught them that you want them to put their name at the top of their paper as soon as they start a new piece, you give a sticker with a happy face on it right beside their name that day.  If you've taught them to stretch out the sounds in a long word that they want to write (turtle talk), and you notice a child finally doing it for the first time, you put a sticker with a turtle drawning on their paper.  Primariy Writing suggests getting the colored dot stickers and printing an abbreviation on each of them to use as did it dots.  I decided to go ahead and make a few of the first ones extra special by getting these stickers.  The happy faces from the Target dollar spot will be for name on your paper.  The sun stickers will be for date on the paper.  The turtles are for "turtle talk".  And I'm still deciding how I'm going to use the star stickers.

Smellies!!

You know all those yummy smelling lip balms that are out there?  Well, I use them as rewards and first graders LOVE them!  Each day I pick a favorite...chocolate chip cookie dough, cotton candy, juicy fruit...and it's our "scent of the day".  Anyone who I notice doing a great job walking in the hallway, gets a SMELLY on their HAND.  As soon as you swipe it across the back of their hand, they bring it straight to their nose with a BIG SMILE on their face!  No one uses the "smellies" on their lips...they're for hands only.  They work especially well toward the middle to end of the school year when things need to be "changed up" a little.  They also work really well at dismissal time when we're trying to get the whole grade level quietly out the door!  ;o)

Behavior Clip Chart

About seven years ago, I came up with this clip chart for my first grade classroom.  I had used many other systems in the past...pulling color cards, a stop light with clips on the sides, etc...but none of them allowed for students to be rewarded for the positive behaviors.  I wanted a chart that they could move up, not just begin their day at the top and move down.  I wanted to be able to reward all those sweet, well behaved students who, up until then, just stayed on "green" all day.  That's when I decided to make my first clip chart out of construction paper. 

 I knew I wanted them to begin each day in the center of the chart...a fresh start on each new day.  I tried to make the positive consequences relate to the negative consequences.  For example, the first step up the chart is a verbal "cheer" of "way to go!  (See the cheers we pull from our Cheer detergent box here.)  Likewise, the first step down is a verbal reminder to "get back on track".  My original laminated construction paper chart served me well over the years.  But this past year I discovered Vistaprint!  And I decided to make a new chart out of their small banner.

Each student's clip goes on the sides of the chart.  I usually put the boys' clips on the left side and the girls' on the right.  It makes it a little easier to find their clip when I need to move it.  I've always moved them myself.  I don't let the kids move their own clips.  Recently, I've seen a lot of blogs and talk of a simlar clip chart from a website called New Management.  I was excited and surprised to see how similar it is to my system.  One thing I've seen some teachers add to their clips are jeweled stickers.  Each time a student reaches the top of the chart, they get to put a jewel sticker on their clip.  This is something I'm going to try this year.  The kids are going to love the jewels!  I'm heading to Hobby Lobby or Michaels tomorrow.  :o)