Fall Family Literacy Night (Reflect & Connect 10/21)

Dear Fall Literacy Lovers,

Last Thursday at 123-ABC Elementary school was fall family literacy night. Family literacy night is about getting parents involved with the school and teaching students literacy techniques to use at home. Every grade had their own literacy station. I worked with second grade and our literacy station was called Fall Comprehension Trees. At our station students from any grade level could come up with their families. They had to cut out leaves and color at least two. Next, they would write a comprehension checkpoint question on their colored leaf. The comprehension questions were printed on 4 sheets of paper so that students had a variety to choose from. Lastly, they would glue their leaves to a tree trunk. I really enjoyed family literacy night because I had the opportunity to meet my students parents and get to know my students in a different setting. Teachers, students, and parents could come to fall family literacy night dressed as their favorite book character. I thought this was a really cool idea because it influences children to read so they can dress as their favorite character. My collaborating teacher dressed as Pippy Longstockings because that is the chapter book she is reading aloud to our class for fun. Another reason why I loved fall family literacy night was because I got to work with new children that I normally do not have the chance to. I noticed something about myself when a kindergartener and a fourth grader were at my station. I have a higher pitched voice with the kindergartner and had more of my focus on him because he needed help using scissors and with writing the comprehension question. Then my voice level changed when I was working with the fourth grader. She knew what she was supposed to do so all I was doing with her was telling her how good of a job she was doing and I asked her questions of why she choose the comprehension questions she did. I realized then and there that it does not matter to me what grade I teach. I love helping and teaching all children. I am still in the process of learning the differences of each grade level but I feel that teaching comes naturally to me and I would be thrilled teaching any student at the elementary level!

Here is a picture of second grade's Fall Comprehension Trees station.

During this week, 123 ABC Elementary had their book fair. I bought three books for my classroom library during fall family literacy night. I am so excited to share these because they are my first books I have collected for my classroom library. I bought these books because for one the book fair had excellent prices, and two I instantly thought of a lesson plan when I began to read each book. I am going to share with you my favorite of the three. It is called My Teacher for President by Kay Winters. Here is what the cover of the book looks like. 

I think this book can be used in primary grades to teach children about the president's duties. We can have our voting lesson intertwine with literacy and social studies. I am very excited about this book because My Teacher for President gives great examples of what the president does and connects it to the classroom.

In Teaching Children's Literature we read a great article called Seven Rules of Engagement by Linda B. Gambrell. My professor separated us into groups and has us highlight our teacher takeaways. Then one by one we wrote our most meaningful takeaway on the board. Here is my group's teacher takeaways. 

I really enjoyed this article because it has ideas on how to motivate children to read. For example it says, "Access to books also implies that teachers should invite children to read by raising interest and curiosity about books and other materials." This paragraph is talking about having a variety of books in your classroom library. I completely agree with that statement and my Classroom Library board on my Pinterest page expresses the variety of books I want for my classroom. To get my students motivated by having a variety of books I would use a teaching strategy I read in the book Kindergarten by Julie Diamond. Diamond had a ritual, created by her students, that very Wednesday a student would read a book to the classroom. I love this idea because the child is presenting a book they enjoy and sharing it with the class will have students who have not read that book be motivation to try it out. 

This week has been a fun fall literacy time. I hope you guys are having a great fall season so far!

Sincerely,

Miss Hester

Reflect & Connect 10/14

Dear Rhyming Queens,

This week in my Teaching Children's Literature class, we learned all about poetry! We went over chapter 8 from Charlotte Huck's Children's Literature. I love how my professor made what we read in the textbook come to life in class. She lead be example by reading a few of her favorite poems aloud. Then she had us separate into groups and write our own poems. Here is a picture of what my group's poetry. Our task was to write about our experience so far in UTRPP.

Next, we practiced reading aloud to our groups and a few students read aloud to the class, including myself. I raised my hand to volunteer because I love, love, loved the poem I read to my group! I had so much fun reading it, so I decided to practice my read aloud and I presented the poem to the class. Once I started reading I remembered my voice being gone at the morning meeting in second grade. Ut oh, I thought, this read aloud cannot go well because my voice kept cracking and squeaking!  In the end everything was great. My Teaching Children's Literacy class had fun because I made the poem come to life with my different, weird voices. I even had some of my peers laughing. I learned so much in this class about having to teach students the love of reading. That is how my professor started the class and that is how I left the class. Before Tuesday I hated poetry. Now I want to read poems to my second graders and teach them the importance of reading.

Sincerely,

Poetry Queen Bee Intern

P.S.- I hope you like the poem my group made! I had a hard time with rhyming but they taught me a lot during group work. I love how the teacher residency program has so much group work because I already feel better prepared to work with my team in the future elementary school I will teach at! :)

Nickel & Dimed

After reading Nickel and Dimed by Barbara Ehrenreich, I have learned from her experience a new perspective for minimum wage workers. I think Ehrenreich's main point for putting herself in others shoes, concludes in the understanding of how the lower class lives. She wanted to tell America about her surprised findings at how workers were treated and about their home life. Ehrenreich intended this book to be for middle class citizens, like herself, to understand a different way of life and have respect for it. Nickel and Dimed had many different, positive and negatives responses. I feel as if Ehrenreich's main point of writing Nickel and Dimed was hit from many types of citizens from all classes and gave American's the knowledge to stand up for what is right. This main point it applicable to my practice as a  preservice teacher because it taught me the experience that some of my students parents may be going through. It has also taught me to be less judgmental because you never know how hard someone is working and what they have to do to get by.


I really like how Nickel and Dimed gave the reader discussion questions at the end of the book. This is great for book clubs! The discussion question that stood out to me the most was number 17. It asked, "After reading Nickel and Dimed, do you think that having a job-any job- is better than no job at all? Did this book make you feel angry? Better informed? Relived that someone has finally described your experience? Galvanized to do something"? I agree that having a job is better than no job at all because it gives people something to do with their lives and a way to earn money for their hard work. This book did not make me feel angry and did not make me feel better informed. I agreed with most of the topics Ehrenreich argued, but I feel as if I do not feel better informed because I have experience in a minimum wage job. Also, from my Sociology class I took last semester at USF, I learned a lot about the lower class and problems within that community. I was well informed of what her experience would be like before reading Nickel and Dimed. At first I was upset about how she talked about the stereotypes, but then I realized from her experiences the stereotypes are true. These are the same stereotypes I learned in my Sociology class and my professor always talked about how negative and horrible it is to believe these stereotypes, but in class she showed us evidence that they were true. An example of what type of stereotype I am talking about is that poor people in America eat a lot of fast food. From my sociology class I learned that was true because the environment that surrounds impoverished areas include many fast food restaurants. In Nickel and Dimed, Ehrenreich discussed eating out at fast food restaurants because its what she could afford and second because she did not have time during her work day to eat anywhere else. Nickel and Dimed was a good eye opener for personal experiences of the working class.

Reflect & Connect 10/7

Dear Flexible Teachers,

This week in second grade, I learned the true importance of being flexible. All of my professors kept mentioning this work in the first few weeks of our classes and implied that you have to be flexible to be apart of the UTRPP. Sunday night I received a text message from my collaborating teacher that she would like for me to take over the class on Monday morning when she will be in meetings all day. I was beyond excited, literally jumping up and down in my room. I felt comfortable enough to teach the class because I have been there every morning since September 3rd. After the excitement was over I realized that I do not know what I will be teaching them. I never make lesson plans with my CT because we plan out the week together on Mondays. She texted me saying that everything would be ready in the morning and I will be using a sub plan. I was very nervous because I am the type of person who needs to have a plan for everything, but when I walked in on Monday morning I was ready to be flexible or whatever the morning through at me. The sub plan my CT had for me was very simple for me to understand, since we were working on one story all past week. I kept the morning routine the same but just added my "teacher touch" into the morning meeting and lesson plan. During the morning meeting I had my students share something fun they did this past weekend and I was so excited to see my shy students sharing their stories. I gave extra time at the carpet so everyone had a chance  share what they did this past weekend. Now that my CT has let me takeover the morning meeting I really would like to add more ideas for the Morning Meeting book that I read for my Classroom Management class.

I love the whole concept and the way morning meetings can change a classroom. The problem that I am dealing with right now is that I am debating if I should incorporate sharing or an activity because I know our time is limited in the morning. We already have a morning message and a greeting but I am unsure if I should add a sharing section because the children are very close with each other since they have grown up at the same school together. But on the other hand I think sharing time is very important to teach social skills and to talk about the children's emotions because most of class time is dealing with academics. I would also like to incorporate an activity to wake the children up and have them be more excited about the school day. If any of you guys have a suggestion please feel free to comment below!

Flexibility is a very important concept to master as a teacher. I feel from the past weeks I have been in the second grade and my USF education classes I have learned how to be a flexible teacher. This has been a little bit of a tough time for me because I need to always have a plan, know due dates in advance, and I want my lessons to go perfectly in the classroom. The perfect planned teacher in me has change to now a more plan ABC teacher. I am flexible to expect things to not go as planned and my CT has taught me to always have a backup plan, (my ABC plans). I took on last Monday with not knowing the lesson plan and the sub told me I did an amazing job. She said she did not have to worry about anything going wrong in the classroom because of how confident I was with the children. This made me very happy and proved that I can be flexible.

Sincerely,
New ABC Plan Teacher

Reflect & Connect 9/30

Dear Busy Bee's,

This past week of classes and interning has been very hectic! I have gained a lot of responsibility in the second grade. I am in charge of BLC (Bull's Learning Club) focus groups, morning meeting, and a fluency station during centers. Also, I am trying to observe kindergarten, when I have the chance, because it is the grade I would like to focus my classroom management plan on. I love the second grade but I have realized from reading Making Sense of Phonics, that I am very passionate about teaching emergent readers. For example, when I read about teaching the alphabet I realized how important it is. I forgot about every letter representing a sound, which may sound insane to everyone reading this, but it's true. The english language is so natural to me I do not appreciate understanding it anymore, until I read chapter 2 in Making Sense of Phonics. In chapter 2 I really like this quote, “The alphabet allows speech and thought to become permanent,” it embraces the alphabet’s importance. During my Bulls Focus group I am going to teach my group of students how important the alphabet is and why we need to keep that fact in the back of our minds. Last Friday, when I observed kindergarten, I walked around the students working at their tables. One child read his sight words to me and I loved how proud he was that he had all the correct pronunciations. Another reason why I would like to focus on emergent readers is because, “If you would like to ‘see’ the differences in young children’s abilities to engage in the continuum of phonemic awareness activities", from chapter 2 in Making Sense of Phonics. I loved how the book taught me how to teach young children phonemic awareness. I like how at the end of the chapter the author gives the reader a chance to take what they have read and put it into real life!

Tomorrow will be a busy day. I am taking over my collaborating teacher's classroom because she will be working on the schools improvement plan. I am very excited for another hectic week with a bunch of readings, assignments, and teacher planning to do! I hope you all embrace your busy weeks and connect all the knowledge you will learn!

Sincerely,
Buzzing Intern