Welcome Back toChocksett!

27 August 2014ELA –

English/Language ArtsRoom C2

An Overview and Preview… A Window into what our class will be like…

Objectives for our Opening Week• To define & practice “buzzing effectively”• To explore the power of “essential questions”• To explore classroom libraries & understand

“book commercialing”• To consider variety in your reading diet

“UMBRELLA” OBJECTIVES:** To establish criteria for effective classroom talk** To create a community of readers, writers, and

thinkers

Our Classroom:

Getting to know your way around!Book Bins by genre (F/NF)Homework postingsObjectives & AgendaPassportsExtra SuppliesPaperSubmission binsBathroom signout

What’s the Buzz on BALANCED LITERACY?

• The “PRODUCT”:– Balance of quality fiction & nonfiction

materials– Workshop format– Whole group, small group, & independent

learning

• The “PROCESS”:– Explicit modeling– Individual differentiation– Gradual release of responsibility

Listen… Watch me… Try It!

Ladder of Learning

You do, I help (GUIDED)

I do, You help (SHARED)

You do, I watch (INDEPENDENT)

NOT necessarily just a vertical climb!!

While reading, what do Good Readers do?

• Reading = Thinking!!– Ask questions– Infer– Make connections to the text– Determine importance & summarize – Predict

Part of strategic reading this year will be weekly Literature Logs• To establish a reading/writing connection• To allow for individualized written communication

between us

While writing, what do Real Writers do?

Developing Writer’s Craft… through:- Narrative Writing: Short Stories- Expository Writing- Poetry- Nonfiction: developing theses with support and

argumentative writing- Persuasive compositions

Immersion…Drafting…Revision…Editing

Reflect/Discuss…

• WORDS by Maya AngelouListen…

Think…Discuss…

Popcorn leaps, popping from the floorof a hot black skilletand into my mouth. Black words leap,snapping from the whitepage. Rushing into my eyes. Slidinginto my brain which gobble themthe way my tongue and teethchomp the buttered popcorn.

When I have stopped reading,ideas from the words stay stuck in my mind, like the sweetsmell of butter perfuming myfingers long after the popcorn is finished.

I love the book and the look of wordsthe weight of ideas that popped into my

mind.I love the tracksof new thinking in my mind.

READING = THINKING

• Our “WORDS” activity is an example of an Interactive Read-Aloud…

• Reflection• Discussion• Reading makes you THINK!!

Let’s Try It!

Is a picture worth a thousand words?

? ?

??

http://www.scholastic.com/scopemagazine/Videos.html

COMMUNICATION is KEY!!

Welcome Back!

28 August 2014

Day 2!

OBJECTIVE: to explore the power of

“essential questions”

Marble Composition Book

colored pencils

Pens & Pencils

Glue or glue stick

3-ring binderPost-its

Index cards

My Goals for you

• To be proficient at self-selecting books you can love and get lost in

• To find and develop your “voice” as a writer

• To build a Classroom Community of Readers, Writers, & Thinkers

My Expectations

• R & R!!!• Respect – for all learners & ideas• Responsibility – for your work & behavior

• BEST EFFORT every day – expect the best from yourself!

Interactive Read-Alouds & “Buzzing Effectively”

• WORDS by Maya Angelou• Can a picture change the world?

Listen…Think…

Discuss…

What’s Worth Buzzing About? What are Essential Questions?

• How do people communicate ideas?• How do people who CAN communicate ideas have power over those who can’t?

What do these people have in common?

Martin Luther King, Jr.

    John F. Kennedy

Alexander the Great 

Franklin Delano Roosevelt

Barack Obama   

Adolf Hitler Rosa Parks

Chief Joseph

Abraham Lincoln

Charles Dickens 

After the Bombing

• Possible Essential Questions?

MOVIE: http://scope.scholastic.com/Video-Archive

Banned BooksMOVIE:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WoiJ44nSP34&sns=em

EXIT SLIP…

• Write one thing that you LIKE about reading…

Welcome Back!

29 August 2014

Day 3!

OBJECTIVE: to explore the power

of Essential Questions & to

understand “bookmercialing”

What does Buzzing Effectively look & sound like?

What are Essential Questions?

What are the big ideas? What do the authors

want us to think about?Why are these texts paired together? What could be the

Essential Question?

Your Summer Reading• Book Commercials:

– advertising our summer reading books

– getting other readers excited about a book, author, series, or genre you have read

– directions/examples from me this week

– next week, you’re on!

Exit Slip…

Write one thing that you DISLIKE about reading…

Welcome Back!OBJECTIVE: to

explore our classroom library

& to understand “bookmercialing”

“Books Open Doors”

• What’s in our classroom library?• What’s a Book Pass?• How do you “sample” FICTION text?

Possible Fiction Reads

TITLE AUTHOR BIN

What does ACTIVE READING look like in FICTION?

• While reading fiction, what strategies do

we employ?

Welcome Back!OBJECTIVES:

- to explore classroom

libraries & understand “book

commercialing”- To consider variety

in your reading diet

“Books Open Doors”

• Continuing to explore what’s in our classroom library

• Effective Book Passing?• How do you “sample” NONFICTION text?

Possible NONFiction Reads

TITLE AUTHOR BIN

What does ACTIVE READING look like in NONFICTION?

• What’s on my nightstand?

Variety = utilizing different strategies = expanding your abilities = POWER!!

Exit Slip…

Write one thing that you LIKE about writing…

Welcome Back!OBJECTIVE: to understand and practice Active Reading, and to understand the differences between Retelling, Summary, and Reflection

What would REFLECTION

sound like?

What would SUMMARY sound like?

Space RockIn the story, the narrator lives on a farm with his

family. They are struggling for money – the whole town is. One day, a rock lands on their property. They discover it is a meteorite and worth lots of money. Many people come by to see it and to offer to buy it, but the narrator’s dad doesn’t sell. They do sell small pieces of it from the debris path in order to buy some things they need. After 3 months, Dad tells his family the town has offered to keep the meteorite in a small museum. This wouldn’t get them millions of dollars, but it would help the town. He lets the family vote, and they agree to permanently loan their space rock to the town. In the end, the narrator writes a poem about the meteorite.

CHARACTER ANALYSIS…

When the author develops the characters in this story, their personalities really come shining through. The 3 siblings are really different. Brother is science-smart and carries a magnet around, Big Sister is obsessed with the phone and her makeup, and the incorrect grammar really helped me “hear” the narrator’s voice (‘we couldn’t go nowhere”/ “she told me to git”)

= REFLECTION!!

MAKING CONNECTIONS…

I felt badly for the dog – after the meteorite hit, he “didn’t come home for three days”! My dog used to hide in thunderstorms; I’m pretty sure she would have had a heart attack if a meteorite landed!

= REFLECTION!!

AUTHOR STYLE…VISUALIZING…

The author used great imagery, with sound words (“Boom! Whump-whump-whump”) to describe the explosion and similes (“the magnet stood straight like a soldier at attention”) to help me visualize events. My favorite imagery described the mini-meteorites being collected by the characters as “buckets of little stars”. It made them seem like gifts from heaven!

= REFLECTION!!

THEME ANALYSIS…Dad sees the meteorite as a big responsibility and I like the way he lets the family in on the decision. He voices his opinion which seems like the central message of the story to me – telling them that “getting what you need out of something is better than getting all that you can out of something”. But he lets the decision be a family one, which showed me what a close family they were.

= REFLECTION!!

AUTHOR STYLE…

Voting with the rocks anonymously was a great way to keep anyone from feeling pressured, and the way they counted the rocks at the end added an excellent dramatic effect. “One…two…three…four…five!” This was a much more creative way for the author to end, rather than writing, “There were 5 rocks in the box.”

= REFLECTION!!

LitLogs = Reflection!!

• Character analysis• Connections• Commentary on author’s style• Visualizing• Theme analysis• Making predictions• Judgments on characters

Charles…Good readers track their thinking before, during, and after reading:

“talking to text”

Mom sounds

sad (the story is

from her POV) –

I remember

when my own

kids went to

kindergarten

He is rude to his parents, greeting Dad with “Hi, Pop, y’old dust mop” (p. 74)…FRESH mouth for 5 years old!!!

Did he learn these fresh comments from Charles??

Why aren’t L’s parents telling him how unacceptable this is? I think L’s parents better set some boundaries or consequences… he’s going to get fresher! The seem entertained by all of the Charles stories!

WHAT?? Who stays after to watch someone stay after?! “Charles yelled so in school they sent a boy in from first grade to tell the teacher she had to make Charles keep quiet,

and so Charles had to stay after school. And so all the children stayed to watch him” (74).

“Charles hit the

teacher” (73),

“Charles bounced a

see-saw on to the

head of a little girl”

(74), “Charles was

deprived of

blackboard privileges

because he threw

chalk” (74)

Bookmercial Recommendations

Title Presenter

Exit Slip…

Write one thing that you DISLIKE about writing…

Welcome Back!OBJECTIVE: to understand and practice REFLECTION for LitLogging

What did REFLECTION

sound like?

What did SUMMARY sound like?

REMEMBER:

Your Literature Log• Lit Logs will be your record of

your thinking while you read… These entries will be REFLECTIONS, not SUMMARIES

(WEEKLY assignments!)RED = Monday

PURPLE = Tuesday

GREEN = Wednesday

ORANGE = Thursday

BLUE = FridayLiterature Logs will give your reflections and thoughts a place

to breathe…

Charles…Good readers track their thinking before, during, and after reading:

“talking to text”

“On Friday Charles stayed

after school again and so

did all the other children”

(75) WHY are they all

staying?? I am getting

suspicious and thinking

that L. is lying about this

“Charles was so good today the teacher gave him an apple”(76) why the turnaround?? Is Charles plotting something bigger?

Laurie must BE Charles… what clues could I have picked up earlier?

The surprise ending was VERY clever !! “Charles? We don’t have any Charles in the kindergarten” (77) His mom must have been SOOOOO embarrassed!! Why hadn’t that teacher been calling them if it was their son???

“Charles” by Shirley Jackson9/6/14

When Laurie went to kindergarten, he brought home all sorts of stories about his classmate Charles. On the first day, he… On the second day,… On the next day,… One week it seemed that Charles was starting to behave. He passed out crayons and got an apple from the teacher. But then his bad behaviors returned. First, he… Then, he… In the end, Laurie’s mom meets the kindergarten teacher and asks about Charles. The teacher says there is no one named Charles in her class.

“Charles” by Shirley Jackson9/6/14Twice, the class stayed after to watch Charles stay after.  The first time, “Charles yelled so in school they sent a boy in from first grade to tell the teacher she had to make Charles keep quiet, and so Charles had to stay after school. And so all the children stayed to watch him” (p. 74).  This seemed suspect to me, and after the second occurrence - “On Friday Charles stayed after school again and so did all the other children” (p. 75) - I was really suspicious that Laurie wasn’t being truthful.  However, it still surprised me in the end to find out that Laurie WAS Charles.  The author did a clever job of providing clues while still creating a surprise ending! One of the ways she accomplished this was through point of view.  As readers, we never get to actually witness Charles’ behaviors because the story is told from Laurie’s mom’s point of view. When the teacher told Laurie’s mom, “Charles?  We don’t have any Charles in the kindergarten” (p. 77), I could just imagine that she started to put the pieces together.  I know that as a mom, she must have been mortified when she figured out that all those behaviors were actually performed by her son!  But as a teacher and a mom, I also wondered why that teacher hadn’t been calling home about all of their son’s disruptive behaviors!

Bookmercial Recommendations

Title Presenter

Welcome Back!OBJECTIVE: to practice Active Reading (talking2text) and reflective writing for LitLogs

ORGANIZATIONis the KEY!!

• You can lead a horse to water but you cannot make him drink!• Your required supplies have been carefully

chosen to help you stay organized…YOU need to keep your work in its proper home

• Your work area should NOT look like this:

Setting up your BINDER…

• Reading Strategies & Ideas• Writing Strategies & Drafts• Vocabulary• DLR Warmups• MCAS prep

Label your sections for:

“All Summer in a Day”by Ray Bradbury

Talking to Text can include…- Asking questions- Inferring- Making connections- Making predictions- character analysis- Reacting to setting or plot events- Making judgments- Visualizing text- Theme analysis- Your opinion of the author’s style

Bookmercial Recommendations

Title Presenter

Welcome Back!OBJECTIVE: to practice Active Reading (talking2text) and reflective writing for LitLogs

IR Expectations…(Independent Reading)

What should this look and sound like in the

classroom?

“All Summer in a Day”by Ray Bradbury

Talking to Text can include…- Asking questions- Inferring- Making connections- Making predictions- character analysis- Reacting to setting or plot events- Making judgments- Visualizing text- Theme analysis- Your opinion of the author’s style

“All Summer in a Day”by Ray Bradbury

- Title- Author- Date- 8 to 10 REFLECTIVE sentences- No summary/retelling- Use of T2T strategies- Text evidence

Your Writing Section “Every writer has a ‘tool

box’… (full of) words, imagination, a love of books, a sense of story, and ideas for how to make the writing live and breathe”. ~Ralph Fletcher

Writing binders will give your ideas a place to live and breathe.

A 2-year writing tool: your completed 7th grade binder will be a requirement for grade 8 Language Arts

“7th Grade”by Gary Soto

- Title- Author- Date- 8 to 10 REFLECTIVE sentences- No summary/retelling- Use of T2T strategies- Text evidence

Your IR book- Title- Author- Date- 8 to 10 REFLECTIVE sentences- No summary/retelling- Use of T2T strategies- Text evidence

Building a Classroom Community

Of Readers, Writers, & Thinkers

Buzzing Effectively • Helps us share different points of view,

connections, & ideas• Helps us trouble-shoot vocab, content,

figurative language, etc.• Allows for equal sharing of ideas

Exploring Essential Questions

• Forces higher critical thinking• Encourages discussion & debate• Leads to many answers & viewpoints• Expands the view of your thinking

• How do people communicate ideas?• How do people who CAN communicate

ideas have power over those who can’t?

Creating a Balanced Reading Menu

• Sampling fiction• Sampling nonfiction

Talking to Text: Post-It Based Conversations

Asking

QuestionsPredicting

Making

ConnectionsInferring

Determining importance

READING is THINKING

Sharing vs. BuildingSHARING

• Only saying your opinion• Jumping from topic to

topic• No flow to the

conversation• Not using evidence from

the text

BUILDING• Listening to all opinions and asking questions• “talking long” about one topic• Keeps conversation going (it FLOWS)• Uses evidence from the text• Gets you deeper into the questions• You learn more about the text and other’s opinions

And Finally…a Friday Joke for you:• Here is an explanation of the school homework policy:Students should not spend more than 90 minutes per night.

This time should be budgeted in the following manner:- 15 minutes looking for assignment- 11 minutes texting a friend for the assignment- 23 minutes explaining why the teacher is mean and just

does not like children- 8 minutes in the bathroom- 10 minutes getting a snack- 7 minutes changing Facebook status- 6 minutes telling parents that the teacher

never explained the assignment- 10 minutes sitting at the kitchen table

waiting for Mom or Dad to do the assignment