Plot

I recently discovered this awesome book for teaching plot.  It is so cute. The class loved this book!

 

This book is also a great resource to use for teaching writing.

 

I used this anchor chart about plot that I found on Pinterest:

 

I always make a small version of our anchor charts for the students to add to their reader's notebooks.  Sometimes I run out of wall space for all of our anchor charts, so it's nice to have it to refer to in the reader's notebook.

 Here's my mini anchor chart:

 

Plot

 

 

Studying a Character's Traits and Motivations

Discussing a character's traits is not new to my third graders, but we started by reviewing a list of character traits. 

Then we discussed some traits that we might use to describe ourselves.  After splitting my class into small groups, I handed them a bag of character trait cards.  They had to work together to decide which character trait might be used to describe each of them.

 They had to give evidence to their group about why that character trait could be used to describe them.  Each student used this sentence stem:  A trait that describes me is ___________ because __________. 
Then, each student glued their character trait in their reader's notebooks and wrote the sentence stem.

Here's the character trait cards we used:

Character Trait Cards

 

 

 

The next day I read this book to the class:

 

 

This is a super cute story!  It was a hit with the class! It's a good example to show how characters can change throughout a story.

 

 

Another day I read aloud:

 

 

This is another great read-aloud to show how a character's traits can change throughout the story.  We discussed what the problems and the resolutions were in the story to cause the character to change.

 

As we read these stories, we filled out a chart to document the traits and evidence from the text. We added this chart to our reader's notebooks.

 

Character Traits Chart

 

 

 

That's all I have for now!!

Leaving Tracks of our Thinking

This week we are working on monitoring comprehension.  I have been modeling how to stop and think about reading and also write about what we are reading.

I used this book:

Strategies That Work

By- Stephanie Harvey and Anne Goudvis

This book has a lot of great lessons geared towards 3-5.  I used a lesson called "Following the Inner Conversation."  We used the mentor text: Gleam and Glow by Eve Bunting.  I love this book and the kids really enjoyed it too!

After a little modeling, the kids began to keep track of their own thinking on sticky notes.

A few days later, we went back to the text to dig a little deeper.  We did a close reading activity with just a portion of the text. I just took the very last page of the text. I read it aloud to them first as they followed along.   Then, each student used their own copy to read it again on their own and highlight the sentences that were meaningful to them and important to the story. The kids then used sticky notes to write about why the highlighted portions were so meaningful. We added this to our reader's notebooks.

Later, we went back to the text and read it one more time and just thought about why the fish were so important in the story and what would have happened if the fish were not there when the family returned home.  The class wrote their own responses and turned it in for a grade!  I used a rubric to grade the responses.

Here's the Gleam and Glow pages we used!

Gleam and Glow

I used this page as a guide for discussion during the lesson.

Gleam and Glow Discussion Guide

Here's the rubric I used to grade their responses.  (I use this rubric to grade most of our reader's responses.)

Reader Response Rubric

iPad Power with Menus!

Throughout the year in my classroom I introduced many apps to the class.  We used these apps at stations and to create final products for our research and personal writing.  After the class was familiar with the apps, I created some menus so they could choose the app they would like to use and sometimes even the culminating activity they wanted to complete. This was a big hit...especially with the GT group! 
Here are the menus we used and some of the extra resource pages that were helpful in getting their thoughts organized.

Research Menu

 

Research Page

 

 

Book Club Menu-Fiction

 

Book Club Menu-NonFiction

 

 

Here's one more menu that my husband made. Check out his blog HERE!

 

Blackout Menu

 

 

Here's a few pages that we used to organize our thoughts before creating the final project.

 

Chatterpix Character Traits

 

 

Chatterpix Summary

 

 

One more thing!! 

Here's a fun way to use the iPads right away on the first day of school!  I did this last year and it was a big hit! The kids pair up and interview a friend.  They use this page as a guide.  They use the Tellagami app to insert a picture of their friend and record the new facts they learned about them.  We shared them with the whole class when we were complete!

 

All About My Friend

 

 

End of the Year Activities!

I have just enough time to post a few activities that we are using during this crazy end of the year time!

Our school theme this year is "Sweet on Success."  Everything is decorated with candy...so that was the inspiration for this activity. 

I'm A 2nd Grade Smartie!

 

The students wrote some things they learned this year in school to be a "smartie." 

 

I'm a Smartie

 

 

Here's an example I made:

(This download includes pages for - 1st, 2nd, 3rd grade smarties.)

 

My Bucket List!
 

We are also thinking about what we want to accomplish next year, so we made a bucket list!  This is a list of goals or activities we want to accomplish next school year.

 

Bucket List

 

 

Here's an example I made for the class to see:

 

(This download also includes pages for 2nd, 3rd, and 4th grade bucket lists.)

 

One last activity...

 

We read the book, Oh The Places You'll Go by Dr. Seuss.  We talked about our goals for the summer, next school year, and even the future.  We also discussed how to reach those goals.  On this page the kids wrote the places they'll go (their goals) and what they needed to do to get there!

 

The Places I'll Go!

 

 

That's all for now!  Have a great end to your school year and a relaxing summer!

 

Favorite Apps and Activities!

Here's a few FREE apps that we use a lot in class and some ideas of how you can incorporate them into your curriculum!

30 Hands

FREE!

 

This app allows you to create slides and add pictures.   You can narrate each slide and create a final presentation!

 

You can use this app to...

*Create a final research project

*Summarize a story

*Narrate a published story

*Literature Circle final projects

 

We used this app to record our research on Thanksgiving.  Here's an example!

 

 

 

Tellagami

 

FREE!

 

This app is a favorite in our classroom!  This app lets you create and share a quick animated video called a Gami.

 

You can use this app to...

*Create a final research project

*Interview a friend (beginning of the year project)

*Summarize a story

*Discuss character traits

*Literature circle final project

 

We used this app at the beginning of the year as a getting to know you activity. Each student interviewed a friend.  Here's an example!

 

 

 

Chatterpix Kid

 

FREE!

 

This app was a huge hit when I introduced it to the class!  We laughed all day when we first used this app! You can take any photo, then draw a line to make a mouth, and record your voice. It makes your object or person talk!  So cute!

 

You can use this app to...

*Create story summaries

*Discuss character traits

*Create a final research project

*Object poems (make the object of your poem talk!)

*Literature circles final project

 

We used this app to summarize a familiar story.  Here's an example!

 

 

 

 

I hope this gave you some ideas for your classroom.  I have a few more ideas on how to incorporate the iPads and other apps into the classroom that I hope to share with you soon, so check back!

 

Non-Fiction/Fiction Text Features

I'm a little behind on posting to this blog!  I finally found some extra time to post a few things that I used for our non-fiction text features lessons.

Here's a few things that I used to check for understanding.

Fiction/Non-Fiction Sort

 

 

Fiction/Non-Fiction List

 

Non-Fiction Text Features Quiz

 

Click HERE to view a previous post that has more non-fiction text features ideas.