Daily Five Literacy Rotation

      I introduced math rotations a few weeks ago and it has been going well, so I thought it was time to introduce the reading/writing version. The students handled it so well. They did not want to rotate out of some of the stations, and I might get to the point where we truly do the daily 5 where they can choose how long they spend in a centre but for now, 15-20 minutes is how long each rotation lasts. During the summer I won a management system from the awesome Ashlyn Ellsworth  and I use that to help my students know what station to go to.  There are 4 stations that the students rotate though, and the only one missing is "Listen to Reading". I may add that one in, as we have an awesome app for reading that I want to introduce. 

This is a picture of my rotation boards. Green and orange is math and yellow and teal is reading. You can buy a copy here

So in our rotations we go through: Read to Self, Work on Writing, Word Work, and Read to Someone. We use the acronym R.E.A.D. 

R is: Read to Self

In this station, students read to themselves and fill in a sticky note using a bookmark I adapted from Pinterest. They read and when they come to a part they want to respond to, they draw a symbol on their sticky note and leave it in their book, at the end of the session they put their sticky note into their reading response journal and write a sentence or two about what the sticky note is about. So for example if they draw a heart on their sticky, that means that they liked that part of the story. then in their journals, they write down what they liked. Some of them got it, but we will keep trying.

The E is: Exploring words

In this station students sort their words (we are using Words their Way this year for the first time) and then they do a word activity. In our first rotation we did rainbow words. 

A is for At Your Seat Writing: 

For this station the students were either working on finishing their fractured fairytales, or writing in their free-write journals. (I love how she was writing).

Finally, the D is for Duo Reading or partner reading: 

I have a few bins of books that I have put 2-3 copies of the same book in, and they can choose what books to read with a partner during this station. Eventually I will add in a response element but for now, reading together is our main goal.

I was so proud of how well they did, I can tell that last years teachers did some Daily 5 stuff, and the ones that didn't, those students caught on quickly. I am really enjoying how quickly most of them adapt and just get into the flow of the routines and expectations, and that I can trust that the majority of them are doing what they are supposed to do. It has been a great start to the year! 

First Month... WHAT????

HOW IS IT OCTOBER??

Haha, but seriously how?? This first month has FLOWN by! We have done some great things and we have started to settle into routines. Since I moved from second to third grade last year and kept some of my kiddos I felt like we did not have to take as much time setting up routines because they knew most of them. This year, I have to set up the routines again, and that takes a lot of time. I also have a full time aide this year and I need to get used to having someone in the classroom all the time again; as I haven't had one for a couple years now. This aide came back to elementary from high school and she is still trying to navigate the differences between grade three and middle school expectations and the way we learn.

So on to my topic for this post, MATH. We have been doing some great things in math this month and I thought I would share with you some of those things. I started interactive notebooks this year, and I must say, I am LOVING THEM. It shows me pretty quickly who understands the concepts we have been working on and who is still struggling. I think I will do more pages a week as we are still into place value and it is almost time to move on to addition and subtraction with regrouping (the subtraction section is never fun because it's just so hard for them to get!).

So we have been playing games, like expanded form dice games: students roll place value dice and use them to build 4 digit numbers which they record in expanded and standard form.

We did Place Value Scoot, which I made the task cards for, (thanks to Ashley Schroeder's Schroeshow Periscope on how to make task cards). The kids loved moving around the room, and they really showed that they understood how to represent a number 4 ways (in a drawing, in standard form, in expanded form, and by looking at a pictorial representation). It also showed me which kids need more direction and step by step assistance (which was only a handful, PHEW). If you don't know what scoot is, you can also go to Ashley Schroeder's website and there are posts about it there. There are cards placed around the room with different questions or activities on them that the students have to complete. They move from one question to the next and see how many they can get finished in the time given. I had 28 cards and 4 or 5 got them all done in 30 min. One person only did 4 (which I was a little shocked at, but they can be a day dreamer, so I know for next time to really monitor them). Student record their answers on a recording sheet whose numbers correspond to the numbers on the cards. So they look at the number on the card they are working on and then write their answer in that box (so if they are working on card 15 they write their answer in box 15 on their recording sheet). If you didn't have time to put them on the wall, you could put them on desks and have them move from one desk to the next. They don't have to wait for their classmates to finish a card before they can also work on that card, they just join them, so they can work at their own pace. It was so neat to see them all engaged and reviewing the concepts we have been learning!

I think that when we get back from Thanksgiving (I am in Canada so that is coming quick), I will take pictures of our interactive notebooks so you can see those, but for now, these are two of the fun things we have been doing in place value. 

Now to a freebie (it's my first and the only product in my TPT store).  My kids have been loving playing what I call "The Dice Game" They roll a double 10 sided die and add the two numbers rolled together to get the sum. Then they colour the sum in on their recording sheet to create a kind of bar graph. The goal is to see which sum will "win". It gets them practicing their addition facts as well as having fun playing a game. I will be posting a multiplication version soon as well.  Here is a multiplication version if you are interested. It's not fancy or cute, but it is fun and the kids are practicing math facts so that makes me happy!