Learning is fun!
Posted in fourth grade, picture book lesson, Seesaw, and writing
In the library, fourth graders listened to the read aloud Strong to the Hoop by Coy, found the active verbs in a Seesaw activity I created, and wrote their own exciting introduction to a narrative. Several wrote about their recent aquarium field trip. Check it out!
Posted in character education, displays and deco, fifth grade, poetry, TTESS 1819, and writing
Last week in the Jackson Library, fifth graders researched famous African Americans. They synthesized research information into an acrostic poem highlighting important contributions of the person. Click through to see the people, A to Z!
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Posted in bilingual, fifth grade, picture book lesson, Seesaw, and writing
Today in the Jackson Library, fifth graders practiced using active voice during writing. First, we read Chall’s Up North at the Cabin. During the story, I pointed out the author’s use of active voice, personification, and imagery. I used Jeff Anderson’s Patterns of Power book, lesson 6.5. Then the kids used a Seesaw template I created to sort sentences from the story by active or passive voice. After that, I gave them dry erase boards and they wrote an active voice sentence about the school camping trip. As you can see, it rained during most of camp this year!
Jeff Anderson – Patterns of Power- 6.5 What Do Verbs Do? Finding Your Active Voice
“The sunshine sits in my lap…”
“The river spills over rocks and whispers to me…”
“The [boat’s] motor sputters softly, waiting…”
“The boat roars forward…”
“blood thumps through my head…”
“when frosted windows cloud the sun”
Puddles of ink stained the blank paper.
Little dots of paint sketch a beautiful dog.
I just ordered the bilingual edition of the book but it hasn’t shipped yet, so I talked to our bilingual team leader and we guessed at how to translate this lesson for the bilingual kids:
El libro fue liedo por Juan.
Juan lee el libro.
Posted in fourth grade, picture book lesson, reading skills, technology, and writing
Last week in the Jackson Library, fourth grade analyzed the actions, dialogue, and personalities of the characters in Helen Lester’s Me First! to pinpoint descriptive character traits of the main characters. They used a Seesaw bubble map I created and chose between Pinkerton the pig or the Sand Witch templates.
Me First!
Posted in fourth grade, holiday, technology, and writing
Last week in the Jackson Library, fourth graders proofread a letter from a turkey. They worked in pairs on a Seesaw template I created to find the errors. I threw in a few extra ‘mistakes’ to make sure they were thinking! It was a fun activity and helped me gauge which skills need more reinforcing in the future.
ANSWER KEY
Posted in fun events, grants, and writing
The Plano Education Foundation prize patrol just visited the Jackson Library! I won the grant I submitted for The Masked Writer: Using Mentor Texts as Springboards for Writing and the group grant I co-authored with Connie Matthews for more EV3 LEGO Mindstorm robots. Woo hoo! So excited!
Posted in fourth grade, picture book lesson, and writing
Fourth graders used a Seesaw template I created to match dull “telling” sentences with their “showing”, descriptive counterparts. I found the descriptive counterparts in various library books. The kids worked in pairs to match the quality description from the books to their simple counterpart. To prepare them for the lesson, we read Moonlight and admired the vivid imagery the author created. Then we read a story I wrote about camp and discussed the ‘show, don’t tell’ strategy. For independent practice, they worked in pairs on the matching Seesaw activity.
Mentor texts used:
My Camp Story Sample Sneak in the Setting
Posted in fourth grade, picture book lesson, poetry, and writing
Fourth graders were inspired by a read aloud from the Eric Carle book, What’s Your Favorite Color? I found this gem at the last year’s Scholastic book fair. After reading the story, the kids thought about their favorite color and used my template to brainstorm how their color might sound, taste, and feel. I love the imagery they used! As they wrote, we played the video of Hailstones and Halibut Bones for more ideas, since it has a similar theme.
Green Example: Read Write Think
Posted in fifth grade, poetry, technology, and writing
Last week was a short three-day library week due to the holidays so during quick check out, fifth grade quickly created a spooky poem. They used the Chromebooks to access my Seesaw spooky poetry template. This was fun to create and fun for the kids too. Grab the template below!
Posted in technology, third grade, and writing
Third graders used their five senses when reading the story Twister! As we read the story, we emphasized finding the five senses on all of the pages, admiring the beautiful paintings. After the story, the kids dragged the phrases to the correct sense box in a Seesaw activity I created for them. “Natt’s eyes look big and round and full of tears.” This is a beautifully written and painted story! The kids liked how the illustrator painted the swing at the end of the story to match the text: “The sight of our porch swing stops me. An arm is broken, a slat is missing, it’s sloping on one chain.”
