literacy this week

Morning Meeting

Our greeting during morning meeting is a time to reinforce and support the children's developing skill of listening to the parts or syllables in a word and showing how many. 

We have done this with our own names and the names of our peers by clapping the parts in a name, patting the floor like a drum, feeling how our chin moves when we say a name, jumping to show how many parts, and using cubes to show how many parts. 

During our morning greeting we can practice essential literacy standards, like listening for the parts in a word, and math standards, counting and showing how many. Once a child shows the parts in their name, we say their name back to them with a wave!

Our names are a meaningful way to introduce the concept that words are made up of parts. We can notice how many parts in Reid's name compared to how many parts in Oliver's name. We can then listen for the parts in words of things around our classroom, like window or table. 

You can do this at home with the names of your family. You can do this with words in your home, too!

Our morning message continues to invite students to circle noticings, fill in missing letters or words, answer and respond to questions, and engage in choral reading. Below are a few pictures from this week of children circling a missing letter and printing the missing letter. 

The children have also taken on the responsibility of pointing to the words on our morning message and leading our choral read. This has become a very exciting new job in our classroom!

Reading Workshop

The children started the week continuing the reading of teaching books. They used sticky notes to share wow pages; pages with really interesting information! We practiced sharing wow pages with a partner. The readers were expected to introduce the topic of their book, show their wow page and tell why they chose their wow page.

Later in the week we transitioned to reading favorite storybooks and used pictures of front covers to sort books; Is this book a teaching book or a storybook? How do you know? What have we noticed about storybooks?

We have read and reread many storybooks this week! The children are practicing using the pictures and what they know about how the story goes to read the story to their partner. Next week we will practice acting out favorite storybooks.

Writing Workshop

The children have published so many powerful pieces of work this year, including their leaf animal alphabet book. Using examples of their work to empower them as writers, we launched the writing workshop. They designed a front cover for their blue writing folder, using pictures to show the many things they want to write about this year.

We talked about how we all know about a lot of different things. The children used their interests and passions to choose a topic to teach us about for their first piece.

Below is Maia's example. She is writing a teaching book about art, because she knows a lot about art. Maia is teaching us different information about art on every page. She used her zones of regulation to write the color words on her drawing of crayons! 

self-portraits; acceptance, confidence, and love

The children have worked hard to define and develop a classroom community. They've set expectations and practiced routines. They've represented what our school rules of being safe, kind, and responsible mean to them. They've embraced titles such as reader, writer, and hiker. 

We have started the process of filling our classroom and our schedule with materials and workshops. We have celebrated our growth during these initial weeks of being together.

Togetherness and community are important words for us to explore and cultivate at the beginning of the year. We connect back to this essential work throughout our time learning and growing.

Understanding a classroom as a living system provides a context for each child to self-reflect and celebrate their important place. We all have an important place. This week, we are using a collection of read alouds to support the process of exploring, representing, and celebrating our unique selves.

We are all important. We are all enough.

1. Look, reflect, and represent

Children use mirrors and pictures to look and reflect. They notice their details; eyelashes, freckles, wavy hair, straight hair, and little teeth turned in. They then use whiteboards to practice representing what they see. Emerson shares that his conductor hat is an important part of himself, because he wears it everyday and it helps other people to recognize him- even with his mask on. Speaking of hats, Beckett loves his hat. He looks at the design and tries to replicate the marks on his practice portrait. 

2. Second drafts; the more we practice, the more we grow. 

Like in the story The Dot, make your first mark and see where it takes you!

3. Share and discuss - I Am Enough

Following our read aloud the children share that they feel happy and calm. Nora says that the author is trying to tell us that everyone is enough just the way they are. Yes, Nella agrees, our bodies are enough, too! We are all important and we are all enough. 

What is something important about you?

My club foot, I was born with it. 

My words are important.

My hat is very important.

I listen. That's important.

My beauty mark on one arm and my freckle on the other, it also helps me know my right and left.

My ears, because I listen with them.

My calm body.

I don't lie. I tell the truth.

My eyes.

My brain.

My neck, because my daddy told me that my neck is very fragile.

My arms, because I use them to grab things.

My clothes.

My skin, it's part of you, you would probably die without it.

My belly.

My heart.

My heart is important, too.

My work!

4. Like time, I'm here to be, and be everything I can.

Below is a small collection of the children's colorful portraits made out of different shapes and lines. They worked on adding details like the straight or wavy lines in their hair, teeth, eyebrows, and freckles. We talked about blending watercolors together to try and create colors that look you-ish. We noticed that everyone tried to blend colors together and that it was a challenging process! Before hanging their portraits we went on a museum walk and celebrated the details in the children's work. It takes courage to draw and paint a self-portrait.

When signing their portraits I offered the choice of writing their name or writing the word by and then their name. I said that like on the front cover of a book, many artists will write by and then sign the front of their work. I wrote the word by on the morning message. 

Lily presented the problem; What if we all want to write by and we don't have enough space when we all come to the morning message to write it?

Beckett quickly responded; The word by is on the front cover of your Letter I book, maybe we could all just use our books at our tables and copy the word by? 

The rows of children erupted with silent cheers for Beckett the problem solver. We can use our classroom to find and write new words!

Every student chose to wrote the sight word by. They used their Letter I book to copy the word by from the front cover. Later, during snack, Beckett smiled at me and said, "My mom isn't going to believe that I figured that out!" 

The process of drawing self-portraits is full of little powerful stories like this. Stories celebrating growth and self within the context of a learning community. We are important, our work is important, and our stories are important. 

meeting a beloved author

On Monday morning we met with Chris Gluck, the author of the beautiful alphabet book Art from Nature. The children were so excited to meet Chris and bravely shared thoughts with her and asked her questions. 

"We love your book 100%" 

"I like the picture of the fox, because it is jumping over the grass" 

"I love the peacock" 

"How did you get the idea to make animals out of leaves?" 

"Do you have a favorite page?" 

"I just want to say that we appreciate you" 

Chris shared that the elephant collage in her book looks so real, because she used wrinkled pieces from an old wasp nest! Chris said that she was inspired by an author to create leaf animals- like we were inspired by her to create Our Leaf Animal Alphabet Book. 

Chris then shared another kind of art we can create in nature and in our classroom; mandalas!

 

Introducing Kind Notes -

A kind note is a note you write to someone to share feelings of love.

A folded note has a front cover, like a book. When adding a picture to the front cover of a note, you need to think, who is this kind note for? Draw a picture of something they will connect with. Use what you know about the person to draw your front cover.. 

Chris Gluck took the time to meet with us. She answered our questions and told a little story behind some of her artwork. What will you draw on a kind note to Chris? What will Chris connect with?

An elephant, because she told us about the leaf elephant in her book!

Leaves, lots of colorful leaves.

Animals, because she loves animals.

A peacock with leaves all around!

Maybe a picture of me and her under a rainbow?