Every Student, Every Day

A passionate literacy researcher, Richard Allingtion, shows that the best way to motivate and accelerate reading growth is to have every student, every day do the following:

• read accurately;
• read something they have selected;
• understand what they have read;
• talk to others about their reading and writing;
• write something that is meaningful; and
• listen to a fluent adult read aloud;

Simple, yet how do we fit that into our reading block. Some suggestions that are aligned to Common Core are:

• talk to students about how their work is meaningful to them
• talk to students about their book choices
• listen to students as they talk purposeful

 

Make Your Day More Fulfilling!

With so much going on in our day to day lives is there a way we can do more? William Ward has five thoughts on how each of us can do more. Are you willing to take the challenge and make your day more fulfilling?

 

Do more than belong: participate.
Do more than care: help.
Do more than be fair: be kind.
Do more than forgive: forget.
Do more than dream: work.
~William Arthur Ward

Student Friendly Search Engine

Wanted to share a newer student friendly search engine, SweetSearch: http://www.sweetsearch.com/

With Common Core requiring students to actively search the web for research. SweetSearch is the perfect place for student to start. It searches only the 35,000 websites that the staff of research experts and librarians and teachers have evaluated and approved. They constantly evaluate their search results and "fine-tune" them, by increasing the ranking of websites from organizations such as the Library of Congress, the Smithsonian, PBS, and university websites.

SweetSearch helps students find outstanding information faster. It enables them to determine the most relevant results from a list of credible resources, and makes it easier for them to find primary sources. They exclude not only obvious spam sites, but also marginal sites that read well but lack academic or journalistic rigor. Just as important, the very best websites that are often buried on other search engines appear on the first page of SweetSearch results.

 

 

Audio Books

Hearing a book read on tape helps students see how the words on the page can come alive in a fluid, expressive way. It helps them focus on the sounds of words read without interruption and provides a model of fluent reading. Audio books also give your students an important introduction to listening — a skill that she must master in order to learn to read. Listening to stories also helps develop imagination and attention which is important skill for them to learn. Not to mention it fosters a LOVE of WORDS.  Below are two sites worth checking out.

http://www.memfox.com/mem-reads-aloud#

http://www.storynory.com/

Illustrative Mathematics ~ Website

llustrative Mathematics is a website that will help you implement Common Core State Standards. Click on K-8 Standards and browse by your grade level or peek at standards by domain. Available illustrations will give support to teachers by providing clear activities that meet standard objectives.

http://www.illustrativemathematics.org/

College Bound what a Message

"Your child is college bound, start saving now!" What if we told each parent this at parent conferences. What an amazing message this would be.

With the standards shifting to Common Core students will have the knowledge and skills to be successful for college and careers. Students at all levels K-12 are expected to:

• Become strong readres and writers
• Read large amounts of fiction and nonfiction
• Read books of interest at a high level independently and comprehend what they have read
• Think deeply and respond to text, recognize themes of literature, and determin author's purpose

8 Mathmatical Practices

Common Core Standards brings to us: The 8 Standards for Mathematical Practice that are being using K-5. These practices place an emphasis on student demonstrations of learning…

1. Make sense of problem solving and persevere in solving them

• make meaning and look for starting points to its solution
• analyze what is given and the goal of the problem
• develop a plan
• monitor and evaluate progress and change course if necessary
• check answers to problems and determine if the answers make sense

2. Reason abstractly and quantitatively

• make sense of quantities and their relationship
• represent symbolically (equations and expressions)
• manipulate equations
• understands and uses different properties and operations

3. Construct viable arguments and critique the reasoning of others

• understand and use definitions previously taught when justifying results
• attempts to prove or disprove answers through examples and counter examples
• communicates and defends their math reasoning using objects, drawings, diagrams, actions, verbal, and written communication

4. Model with mathematics

• can solve everyday problems
• can apply assumptions and approximations to simplify complicated tasks
• use tools such as diagrams, two-way tables, graphs, flowcharts and formulas to simplify tasks
• analyze relationships mathematically to draw conclusions
• can interpret results to determine whether they make sense

5. Use appropriate tools strategically

• can decide which tools will be most helpful (ruler, calculator, protractor)
• can detect possible errors by using estimation and other math knowledge
• can make models that enable visualization of the results and compare predictions with data
• can use technology tools to explore and deepens their understanding of concepts

6. Attend to precision

• can communicate precisely to others
• can use clear definitions in discussions with others
• can state the meaning of symbols consistently and appropriately
• can calculate accurately and efficiently

7. Look for and make use of structure

• can look closely to determine a pattern
• can step back for an overview and shift perspective
• can see complicated things as being composed of single objects or several small objects

8. Look for and express regularity in repeated reasoning

• can identify calculations that repeat
• can look both for general methods and for shortcuts
• can maintain oversight of the process, while attending to the details
• can continually evaluate the reasonableness of results.