@rubberbootsandelfshoes Sharing books about penguins

Today's share is a collection of PENGUIN books that Sandi at Rubber Boots and Elf Shoes shared over on her blog ...perhaps but not only for kindergarten immersion in thinking about these waddling wonders.  I can't wait to talk about central messages in these books! I can't wait to share this before today unknown to me book with my students:)

http://rubberbootsandelfshoes.blogspot.com/2015/01/5-penguin-books.html

I Won't Ask You To Do Something I Wouldn't Do

I've asked my going to be master teachers to reflect on and write about some aspect of their own literacy learning .  It seems like such as an easy task, and yet they will go through the complex process of selecting a topic, determining a focus, finding a small moment of time, drafting, revising, rewriting, editing and sometimes, even discarding and starting over.  They will do the work they ask their students to do!  I too am writing about some of those who have shaped on my own literacy learning journey.

I worked hard to make sure everything I did for Mrs. Peters was perfect.  At night, she filled boards with impeccably written chalk tasks for us to complete each day.  Then, she sat at her desk and corrected work glaring over her glasses at anyone who dared to disturb the quiet.  I dreaded being called to her desk where certainly, you would be berated for handwriting deficiencies, calculation imperfections, or wrong answers. I dreaded read-around the room.  I dreaded raising my hand and asking the whole class if I could use the bathroom!  Yet, from Mrs. Peters, I began to learn what kind of a teacher I didn't want to be.

There were lots of great models along the way, like Mr. Jackson.  I would have done anything for him!  He always had a "point of praise" and shared a "point of growth" on anything you did.  He shared bits of his own life and modeled (what a novel idea) what he wanted those biology lab write ups to be!  We lived biology that year and I began to wonder if I should be a doctor when I grew up.  I loved that we "turned and talked" during his class!  I learned more than I needed to know about the subject and that I could make mistakes as well as about the kind of a teacher I wanted to be.  

I've taken more courses in person, on video-tape (remember that?) and online than I can count.  I've read more books, attended more workshops, watched more peers, and reflected on the process of literacy teaching and learning for the better part of years of my life.  The more I learn, the more questions I have and the more I realize I will never know it all!  

Yet, it was on the sidelines of a lacrosse (or perhaps it was a football) field, where I began to understand that effective teachers really serve more as coaches of learning.  Have you ever watched an effective coach carefully?  What they do is really hard and yet totally magical at the same time!  They first make certain their players are immersed in the sport, the plays and the options.  They spend time encouraging bonding, film viewing, and building muscle memory.  They demonstrate again and again and yet again through their own modeling and through mentor texts and videos the moves of effective players.    

Effective coaches do not expect their players to go into the game without trying out plays and positions. They make sure their players are fully engaged in playing the sport!  Even if a win is unlikely by most wise spectators' expectations, coaches expect players to give it 100% and maybe, even to win!  Finally, but perhaps most importantly, effective coaches give effective feedback. They pat players on their helmets if they have done their best even if their approximation of the play was far from perfect!  They don't waste time and airspace with empty words of praise like, "That was great." They clearly tell their players what they did right and what they did wrong.  They find words to encourage after defeat and words to celebrate what worked and what didn't.    

Along my own literacy journey, I've realized that reflective life-long learners learn not only what they don't want to be but also what they do want to be!   Effective teachers realize that everything they say and do can impact those they are coaching.  Effective teachers demonstrate, immerse, engage, encourage, and provide feedback as their students engage in real life reading, writing, listening and speaking activities. We know our actions, models, and words matter. 

Happy New Year

Brr........ing

It's 4:40 in the morning.
It's September 2nd,
It's hot and humid,
Why is that alarm bugging me?

Wait, 

Summer's still got 19 days.

I need one more day,

Maybe a few more.

It's dark, damp 

Not a nice morning.

I slept like a hummingbird,

Darting in and out of dreams.

It's a fresh start.

 Better exercise
So that dress will look good.

First, better check the email, 

Facebook, Twitter.
Sigh, time flies when reading blogs.

Not enough time to a walk

Maybe a few weights before I hit the shower.
I hope to be at school early.

Better hop into the shower,

Perhaps I have the stomach flu?

No, silly.

It's those old butterflies

Back again.

New skirt, new shirt.

It's stylish, I hope.

Blue and lacy.

Fun but maybe it's too young?

What if parents think

I'm trying to dress like them?

.Don't forget the new notebook,
The one with the  Steve Jobs quote.

Oh those butterflies,
I'll need a lunch,
Grab your  sneakers.

I will exercise this afternoon.

Coffee

Pumpkin spice just this one time.

Buses everywhere!!

Why so many this year?
Cars.
Where did they all come from?
Why is there a traffic jam?
Where are they all going?
Why so many trucks?
It's a celebration day

Today's the first day
Hope springs eternal
From every corner,
At the end of every driveway,
In every new outfit,
Within every new pair of shoes,
On every face

Happy New Year.

Staying Positive in Trying Times

Teachers: Staying Positive in Trying Times

This article, by Heather Wolpert Gawson, was published on Edutopia last year. It's one of the reasons I follow Edutopia even though I cannot possibly read everything they publish!  It's a sad, sad story about a teacher, a mentor, an innovator whose positivity faded away. We all know people who have suffered this fate.  If we've taught more than 2 days, we all know some of the feelings of anger and frustration described.  

Gawson wrote, her " heart was in the job, but that heart [had been] broken after years of professional disappointment....her talents were never tapped or appreciated..."   I've thought about those lines many times in the past year.  Certainly, I know about the feeling of being "unappreciated."  Certainly, I have watched teachers backed into corners and pummeled into submission.  Certainly, I have witnessed the impact of negativity.  

Truth be told, I found myself headed down the old negative path one day last week when my computer failed (again), there were no working printers in the lab, my desk was piled high with papers, and my room was still a mess! Fortunately, I  stopped and reflected on the day, the path and the road out of my "hole."

Gawsona had a few suggestions about how to avoid that giant, horrible pitfall that has eaten so many of our colleagues.  They are good ones. I'm going to hold tight to each one. Each one could be a tee shirt logo! Grab one or two.  You might need them this year!  

1. Pinpoint what you love about education and live in it.  Enjoy your students.  
2. Find others who can offer solutions, not just an ear.  
3. Pick and choose the news you read  Stop reading about the tests if it makes you crazy! .
4. Know your limits. Say "no" sometimes!  
5. Never close your door to collaboration. 
6. Be supportive of one another. 
7. Pick your battles. 
8. Don't get sucked in. 

Mastering the Teaching Game

Mastering the Teaching Game

Over on Edutopia this week, Tomlinson shared a post, Mastering the Teaching Game.  It's a good one for this time of year as we "gear up" and "psych up" for a new year with new challenges and all the potential that new learning can offer.

I spent some time in the past few days setting up my room.  There is a lovely, inviting reading area and the charts and books are ready to go.  While it may not be Pinterest worthy, I think it looks inviting and enticing.....and I was proud of how it looks.....and thinking I was all set.....until I read this article and was reminded that we also need to prepare our HEADS and our HEARTS to teach......and to learn.......it's not just about pretty spaces and images.....

This article, which you really should read, is based on a successful tennis coach, Coach Groeneveld, because as we all know, what teachers REALLY DO is to COACH learning!

"All human beings can achieve far more than they believe they can."

"Success comes from the desire to work hard to achieve a goal." 

"It's not enough to only teach skills."

"Make sure the player [student]takes responsibility for his or her decisions."

 
"Being a good coach [teacher]means dissecting the player's [student's] game"

"When there is resistance from a player [student], don't take no for an answer." 

"There's no single way to coach [teach]players [students]."

Reaching ALL Readers (Sight, Phonics and other Approaches)

I've spent a good deal of my adult life guiding, supporting and helping others find the joy and wonder in the printed word.  Sometimes, learning to read appears to happen like magic; however, there were years of experiences that serve as a foundation to the miracle of reading! 

Sometimes, learning to read is hard; however, if parents and teachers carefully analyze a student's relative strengths and needs, all students can learn to read.    

For many students, the "need" is opportunities to learn the phonetic code.  Programs like Fundations have made their fortune out of teaching the code.  Learning the complex ways that sounds can work in English offers all of us the means to read words and ideas we do not yet know.  While that may not seem like something we need, it does allow us to read scientific terms as well as names and the ideas of others outside of our experiences.  Some findings suggest students with language, speech and articulation difficulties, including apraxia of speech, may benefit from this type of approach.

Yet for other students, the need is opportunities to learn a fund of sight words.  There is some research that suggests diverse students benefit from structured sight based approaches. Students with Downs Syndrome as well as students with significant hearing/speech/articulation difficulties may benefit from a fund of sight words that can serve as a base for their own understanding of the code. I wrote about some of that research in this article http://journals.cec.sped.org/tecplus/vol5/iss3/art3/
Other students just find comfort in the predictable and repeated words that are found in sight word based programs such as these.

Some readers benefit from Language Experience approaches too!
Someresources to think about as we all prepare to return to school and face the need to teach ALL children to be readers!

• http://journals.cec.sped.org/tecplus/vol5/iss3/art3/
• http://pridelearningcenter.com/2013/01/29/childhood-apraxia-of-speech-and-reading-help/
• http://ereadingpro.com/ProductSeries-IWLD.htm
• http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3251281/
• Supporting Individuals with Down syndrome and other ... - DSAW
• www.dsaw.org/Data/Sites/3/media/resources/peer.../a11took-kit.pdf
• READING PROGRAMS/HELPFUL WEBSITES ... and for older non-verbal children ... grades 1-3 and 4-6 with games, sight words, teacher links, kids links and

• http://www.down-syndrome.org/practice/349/practice-349.pdf
• [PPT] Teaching Reading to Children with Down Syndrome 
• www.dsgsemi.org/pdf/TeachingReadingtoChildrenwithDS08.ppt 

• Providing Effective Literacy Instruction to Students With Down ...

  www.bsnpta.org/.../VOL.36NO.4MarApr2004_TEC_Al_Otaiba36-4.pdf

Matt Renwick and Reading Assessments

Matt Renwick posted on the Nerdy Book Club this morning and it's a post you should read and think about because HE is questioning what I do for a living, yet I totally agree!  
http://nerdybookclub.wordpress.com/2014/07/03/should-we-be-quantifying-our-students-reading-abilities-by-matt-renwick/

Matt proposes READING REALLY SHOULDN'T be quantified!  He says, "reading is not a skill that finds its foundation in numeracy," and I can imagine Marie Clay nodding in agreement.  Her running records were created to describe not quantify readers! Yet he acknowledges that assessment of learning, including its quantification, is not, and should not be going away!  So, what we need to do is to consider how we can collect powerful PERFORMANCE data to describe our readers beyond the numbers.  Matt suggests surveys, discussions, images, videos and audios will complete the picture.   I agree.  Those numbers or letters we get are just guidelines that do not tell us how to make readers stronger and motivated.  That data does exist, however, in lives the connections we make to our readers not in their numbers.   
                                                                                        

Looking Closely

I was thinking my year long focus on Close Reading was over as the school year wrapped up. My book club was done.  My teaching focus was finished. My thoughts and notes were secure in my APPR binder where no one was likely to disturb them. I had stockpiled my list of probing questions for the littlest readers. I knew, in my heart, that while the concept of closely reading and thinking was not new, taking time to stop, look, and reflect deeply in our busy world was a lost art that remained critically important to seeing the beauty in words and images.

I smiled as I tossed papers and never used materials into garbage bags, without looking closely, the way teachers do at the end of the year.  I smiled as I read (much too quickly)a tongue in cheek obituary by Dave Stuart, Teaching the Core.  http://www.teachingthecore.com/an-obituary-for-close-reading/  I was overwhelmed with heat and humidity as well as end of the reports, packing up the classroom, and saying goodbye, again, to colleagues! Like so many BUZZ phrases and phases in education, perhaps this one had served its purpose.  Perhaps it could be "retired."

Then, in the early hours of my summer vacation, I headed out to the mall.  We were not there long when I acknowledged that ol' "close reading" perspective.  We were looking closely at dresses from many angles and reflecting deeply, through repeated viewing at fabrics, styles, and prices.  We talked about how others would see what we were seeing.  We pondered how the dresses would glow in a grand ballroom on a snowy evening as we squished into the tiny dressing room on a hot summer morning.  We looked at similar and different fabrics and weighed pros and cons of styles, & colors.  We questioned how others might see them.  So much talking and thinking, deeply and recursively, about such a tiny part of the big day. It was indeed the "first" of many "reads" on dresses.


Then, I settled onto the porch for that first, real summer evening without the alarm looming in my horizon and noticed that the sunset was incredible.  As I looked, closely, I noticed the layers of colors and wondered if they painted, on purpose, just for us?  Did others see the reminder of cold Syracuse evenings in the summer sky?  I viewed the changing skyline closely for a long while and I must admit that my smile reflected the complex layers of thoughts in my own head.

So, on this, first morning of summer, I am confident that my year of closely viewing, thinking and reading has NOT come to an end!



.

#celebratelu2014 Finding Joy in My Happy Place

It's June and I guess my husband it right: it's a tough month for teachers. This wrapping up and packing up and preparing for next year while making every moment count....it's a busy and stressful time of year. So this celebration, like my writing this week, will be brief while I celebrate and remember this small moment. One of my colleagues walked by yesterday as I was doing what I do every day, sitting with kids, sharing books. I'm sure I was glowing with pride as I listened to this shining star proudly read.  As I glanced up, my colleague said softly, "I love to walk by this room.  It's such a happy place."  The student, oblivious to the visitor, kept on reading, engrossed in the tale of some dog named Maisey.  The colleague offered to snap a photo (it's APPR binder season). As I looked at the photo later, I realized I could not share the magic of a six year old who had discovered the magic of reading without showing her smiling face; however, I could share that my colleague had captured my "happy place." As I glance at this photo, I am celebrating:

• Possibilities for learning even when there are obstacles along the way
• Progress made possible with assessment-guided, differentiated instruction
• Professional reflection (even if I am not fond of paper filled binders)
• Passion for teaching that has not grown old
• Pillows (rescues from an abandoned sofa) that provide a platform for grounded learning
• Phones that capture moments in time
• Pride that I can still get down (and up) to meet my students wherever they are!  

Thanks Ruth for reminding me to stop, celebrate, and remember these wonderful small moments. 

Maslow: A new perspective

Interesting....makes you stop and think!
http://www.edutopia.org/blog/addressing-our-needs-maslow-hierarchy-lori-desautels?utm_source=facebook&utm_medium=post&utm_campaign=blog-maslow-hierarchy-image

Assessment-Guided Instruction

I sometimes wonder if our students realize how much we learn through reading and reflecting as we teach! As I finish up the paperwork after a semester immersed in assessment, thanks to "teaching" about it, I really need to document my thoughts.......  

It's easy to talk the talk and much harder to walk the walk in the area of assessment-guided, differentiated instruction. Knowing a student's strengths and needs is a lot of work, takes time and requires more than one assessment!  Yet, it is essential for effective teaching and supports learning for all students.  For our strongest and for our most struggling students, assessment-guided instruction makes all the difference in the world.  Programs and formats work best when we can use our students' strengths to support their needs.  

Classroom teachers use:

Pretests help us know what a learner can do before we start teaching a specific skill' however, they are rarely diagnostic in their focus and cannot, usually, spot weaknesses or holes that might stand in the way of new learning.  In addition, pretests measure progress at a moment in time rather than as learning occurs.  
Formative assessments is integrated into our teaching, seamlessly. Do-nows and exit tickets are some of my own favorite means of formative assessment; however, running records (the real Marie Clay kind), turn and talks and thumbs up are also pretty much integrated into every day teaching in most classrooms.   Some studies (Stiggins) suggest students gain much more in classrooms where formative assessments guide instruction.
Summative assessments are used at the end of a unit of study to measure student learning.  
Screening assessments help us to know which students might need more support.  They are typically given at the beginning of a year as a measure of which students might need support. They measure prior learning. 

Literacy specialist/special education teachers use all of these plus:

Progress monitoring assessment are used to determine if an intervention or a strategy is making a difference.  

Diagnostic assessments help us understanding how student's learn and identify strengths and needs. For students who struggle, this must be a part of what we do so that we can effectively modify/differentiate instruction.

Here are a few places to start:

Dibles    https://dibels.uoregon.edu/
Reading A-Z     http://www.readinga-z.com/assessments/phonics-assessment/
Los Angels County   http://teams.lacoe.edu/reading/assessments/assessments.html

SDE  http://www.sde.ct.gov/sde/lib/sde/pdf/curriculum/cali/elementary_assessments_4-9-12.pdf

K-12    https://eprcontent.k12.com/placement/placement/placement_langarts_2.html
Scholastic  http://www.senia.asia/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/CORE-Phonics-Survey-Scholastic.pdf
LINCS    http://lincs.ed.gov/readingprofiles/MC_Word_Analysis.htm
Fuchs: www.studentprogress.org/library/training/.../usingcbmreading.pdf 
Easy CBMs https://www.google.com/#q=progress+monitoring+assessments
RTI  http://www.rti4success.org/essential-components-rti/progress-monitoring
Intervention Central http://www.interventioncentral.org/curriculum-based-measurement-reading-math-assesment-tests
A Good Read: http://books.google.com/books?id=-30OYvQsfGMC&printsec=frontcover&source=gbs_ge_summary_r&cad=0#v=onepage&q&f=false
Fountas and Pinnell