The Week in Review (January Something?)

Greetings, Earthlings!

Usually I give you a heads up as to what activities I will be doing with my students, but I thought it was time for a little recap.

I'm not even going to go into the havoc that holidays, teacher workdays, snow days, rain days, delayed openings, off-site swimming lessons and assemblies have caused with my schedule.  Some classes I have not seen in literally a month (never fear...they can come in and out of the library to check out, I just haven't had my "quality time" with them).

What do you do when this happens?  Do you try to get all the classes on the same  page, so to speak?  I've found that some classes, in the same grade, are just going to have to miss out on a project or two.

Soooo...LAST WEEK:

Kindergarten - We read our Caldecott nominees over the past few weeks.  Two of my classes were able to vote before today's announcement, so that's a little messed up (today was a snow day)...however, THANKS BE to the lesson plan Gods, we read two books that received Caldecott honors, so they will be happy about that!  Phew!

Firsties - Oh, we read the sooo sweet HOW TO TEACH A SLUG TO READ.  Before I read them the book, I asked them how they would teach a slug to read.  Their answers brought a tear to my eye, literally.  They mentioned rhyming words, repetition, stretching out the word like a rubber band, and teaching the slug the sounds that letters make.  I would have one request from the publisher...please create a .pdf of the slug so that I can print out slugs for them to read to ... HINT HINT.

Multiage - I used this a printout similar to this one (can't find the original!) and had my first and second graders visualize the illustration for Shel Silverstein's SHAPES (from the anthology A LIGHT IN THE ATTIC).  The kiddos had a great time - some of the illustrations were quite detailed.  I will reveal the "real" illustration this week, weather permitting.

Second - After all the hulla-ballo about Dewey at the ALA Midwinter conference, I was proud to say that my second graders Dig Dewey!  I introduced them to Dewey using this fantastic Dewey Wordle posters (scroll down) by this former (I'm assuming) library school student!  Thank you, Sue Bailey, where ever you are!!

Third - Now this is where we are so out of whack, I can't even deal...  I'm just going to forge ahead with this group and give a thesaurus lesson post-assessment next week to the whole lot of 'em.  I will post the assessment next week for you to steal.

Fourth - Oy.  Another grade that has suffered at the hands of all of the above.  Some were in the middle of book talks...some were done...some were learning about note-taking....  I'll need to reassess this mess.

Fifth - Oh. My. Gosh.  Did I tell you yet about our blog?  The fifth grade students are ON FIRE with this!  I am so proud of them!!  I also started a super adorable dictionary skills project with them that I learned about from...yes, Pinterest.  I'll post the "results" next week.

How are your classes effected by half-days, full-days or no-days?

Amy