I’m not going to talk much about what’s going on in the world. It makes me anxious (anyone else?). Instead, I’m going to focus on sharing what’s working for us and invite you to do the same.

I am the type of person who thrives with structure. When it’s missing, I feel stressed and uncomfortable. Planning keeps me sane, and I love knowing that I have planned way too much when children are involved. For me, part of the plan is always following their lead (and sometimes ignoring half the plan to learn from their discoveries!). Conveniently, this seems to be really helpful for my family too. Please know that everything I’m sharing here is to help provide the structure my family needs to continue feeling as normal as possible. Your family may need something different. I think one of the things we can celebrate about sheltering in place (which I hear we’re about to do) is that we’re getting to know ourselves and our families better. So, you do you, I’ll do me, and we’ll love each other from 6 feet away.

Weekly Plans

We had fog the other day, and my preschooler was so excited and curious about it! I have been learning about Reggio-Inspired teaching recently, and this sounded like a great way for us to follow his lead and make some discoveries.

I created a plan for the week, focused on weather. (I always over plan when I’m first trying something, so this level of detail is comforting to me!) Feel free to use as much of it as you’d like. It’s completely free – just click anywhere in this sentence to get it.

So far, we’re halfway through Monday, and we’ve done less than half of what I had planned! That’s just fine with me. Now I have more in my back pocket for the end of this rainy week!

I’ve also planned out most of our meals, because we are trying to avoid shopping as much as possible. By planning ahead, we know what we have and are using up the things that will go bad.

The plan includes lots of links, because my brain keeps trying to focus on Covid-19 related things. Having the links keeps me focused on what’s happening here in my house, rather than trying to keep those ideas in my head!

Daily Schedule

We started this last week, and it has honestly been the best thing ever. It helps us remember to keep up our daily routines, like getting dressed and ready for the day. We are also less likely to sit in front of the TV all day if we have other ideas. I’m not a huge fan of screen time, but at times like this, there’s a definite temptation to just let that go. The daily schedule reminds me that our goals still exist, and the things we enjoy are still fun!

I made a simple set of printable cards we’re using at home. They’re very similar to the cards I’ve used in the classroom, so they are great for keeping things similar to how they were before we began social distancing.

Centers

Having play-based centers set up throughout the house has been really helpful, because it means Dad and I are able to keep up with our work (he is full time currently from home and I am part time and always work from home). Those are on the second page when you grab the file.

For us, it’s been helpful to have our centers spread out throughout the house. It allows us to see more than the same four walls all day and keeps things feeling normal. I would use the same centers for a preschool weather unit at school, so you could certainly do the same!

As with school centers, I put out the supplies I want to use for whatever skill I’m looking to work on (mostly fine motor), and anything the child wants to add is welcome. Today, we started with paper, glue, and cotton balls. My preschooler taught me that paint was essential for making his clouds look like today’s sky.

There are as many possibilities for creating as I can come up with. In addition to making this more fun and allowing the child to lead, it gives them the opportunity to express whatever is on their minds.

Practical Life

I recently learned about this in researching Montessori teaching techniques. (Can you tell I’m using this time to learn about everything I possibly can?) We’ve been having a hard time keeping the food contained with a spoon, and this practical life activity seemed like the perfect way to address the issue! Bonus: it got 2 thumbs up from the preschooler!

Art Displays… Kind of Like School

We’re working to balance adult and child needs, and I think it’s working pretty well for us right now. We’ve created an art gallery to display works of art. We’ve given each one a title, and we are practicing writing our name on each one. It looks similar to a classroom display, so that creates some extra comfort in terms of school routines. We are also cleaning up the centers that are in the main living areas at the end of the day. So, that helps with adult needs.

Elevating the Everyday

Andrea Dekker has a great blog post about elevating the everyday. She posted it ages ago, but it has been a game changer for us right now. We’ve brushed our teeth by candlelight, created faces with our snacks, and made celebrations out of cleanup time. Rainy day picnics have taken place in our living room, and the families in our neighborhood have done shamrock hunts for each other. Basically, we are doing whatever we can to keep growing together, enjoying each day, and letting go of the parts of the day that are less than perfect. At the end of the day, I think the most important thing we can do right now is continue to foster emotional stability and maintain physical health. Everything else is a bonus.

Confession: One of my favorite series on almost every blog I read is the weekly links post. I love checking out what other people are reading, and I find the posts often stretch my thinking and help me discover sites I would never have found on my own.

So it should come as no surprise that we’ll be doing some links here. They probably won’t be every week (at least not at first!), because I just feel like that would be a bit much. After all, we’re just getting to know each other!

My links will be a mix of everything – some education focused, some things I’ve just found interesting, and some I just liked. I hope you’ll share what you love too!

Incorporating Play-Based Learning in the Elementary Grades

If you’re passionate about play-based learning but not sure how to effectively integrate it while still effectively teaching the standards, this is a great place to start.

Why Self-Care Isn’t All About Bubble Baths And Champagne

A great reminder of what self-care is (and is not). Always good to remember that we must be good to ourselves in order to be good to others.

It’s Playtime

This article from the National Association of Elementary School Principals inspires me to continue searching for the balance and finding ways to bring meaningful play into my classroom, because research tells us we should! My favorite quote from the article: “The Common Core State Standards do not preclude play for kindergarten students. And they should not serve as an excuse for removing it from preschool classrooms even though anecdotal reports indicate that that is happening.”

What It Really Means When We Say A Neighborhood Has “Great Schools”

I don’t have the answers to this, but it’s something I’ve thought about since I unearthed the truth about school funding in college. It was a mental question when I was in my first years teaching in one of the wealthiest school districts in America, and it troubled me when I intentionally moved into a Title 1 school a few years later.

As a parent, I think about these issues often, especially since we’re in the middle of a move and have become quite familiar with the resources mentioned in the article. I have found it frustrating (but sadly not surprising) to see how heavily test scores are weighed on some of these sites. There is so much more to consider than the scores students get on their tests! Are they playing? What are the class sizes? How much time is given to recess? The arts? How is the social-emotional curriculum? How are students being taught to think? Which is given a greater priority in the school district – thinking or correctly answering a test question?

One Of My Favorite Blogs Recently Turned 20!

I have read this blog for as long as I’ve known there were blogs, and I loved his book The Sweet Life in Paris.

A quick picture snapped. A brief, silent prayer. A joyful reflection on the day as we drift off to sleep. Each of these simple elements has contributed to bringing more happiness, light, and peace into my days, as I make a choice to express gratitude for the small things that make up the wonderful life I get to live.

Research indicates that regular expressions of gratitude can play a positive role in our health and well-being. In addition to fostering a positive outlook, a daily gratitude practice can help us build relationships, improve mental health, and even boost physical health.

If you want to turn your life around, try thankfulness. It will change your life mightily. – Gerald Good

Our classrooms are filled with children who are likely experiencing a significant amount of stress and anxiety, and we are working hard to create days filled with joy, wonder, and discovery. One way we can support our students is to help them create a daily gratitude practice of their own.

Thanksgiving is on the way, and teaching students about gratitude is a great alternative to the Pilgrim and Indian lessons we seek to correct, especially for those of us who love the idea of being grateful for what we have but seek to re-frame the holiday entirely.

Here are a few ways to incorporate gratitude into your classroom at Thanksgiving and beyond.

Daily Gratitude
The easiest way to implement daily gratitude with your students is to have a share circle at the end of the day. Gather as a full group in a circle (we do this complete with coats and backpacks). Go around the circle and have each person share something they’re grateful for.

You could also create a small journal for each of your students and have them write (or draw) what they’re grateful for at the end of the day. As part of your morning meeting, a few students could share what they wrote the day before, which would help set the tone for the day.

If you are a one-to-one school or have access to a good amount of technology, there are a number of digital resources that would work well for daily gratitude. Students could create a presentation in Google Classroom and upload an image from the day or write about it. You could do a collaborative gratitude board for your classroom using Padlet (Trello would also work, as would a word cloud generator).

Write Weekly or Monthly Letters of Thanks
In younger grades, this could be a center that’s always open. I would include a ring with the names of people your students want to thank, along with special paper, blank cards, envelopes, and a variety of writing tools.

In upper grades, this could be something you do every Friday. In my class, we do Weekend Journal on Fridays, so we might do Thankful Thursday letters instead. (An important note: I do these in addition to Writing Workshop, when students are allowed to write something of their choice, typically related to our unit of study. I sometimes borrow time from Writing Workshop when the schedule is tight, but I try not to replace their free choice time. If I didn’t have the flexibility to do this, I wouldn’t do both Weekend Journal and letters of thanks during the same week.)

Model
Students echo so much of what they observe from the adults around them. When we cultivate an attitude of gratitude, thanking others and expressing our gratitude for even simple things, we can help students do the same.

Have a Gratitude Circle
I’ve participated in a similar activity as an adult, so this could easily be part of a class meeting or a team/staff meeting. One thing that makes it run smoothly is to clearly set the expectations ahead of time. We sit in a circle and give a word of appreciation for the person sitting to our right. The person to the right listens and says thank you.

One thing I’ve noticed as both a participant and an observer is that hearing the feedback is more challenging for some folks than giving it. It’s important that we are able to receive the complements, appreciation, and love being shared with us by others. This is a skill that some of us (read: me!) had to be explicitly taught. For others, it may come more naturally.

With students, it is important to teach the difference between genuine appreciation and surface compliments. After all, there is a big difference between saying, “I like your new haircut” and “I am so grateful for the way you always help us see the strengths in our writing pieces. Sometimes, it’s hard to try a new skill, and I always feel better when you notice that I’ve tried it.”

Teach Ways to Show Gratitude

Co-create an anchor chart that you can use as part of your class meetings to help remember ways to express gratitude. Refer to it regularly throughout the year to help inspire you!

References:

Giving thanks can make you happier (n.d). Retrieved from https://www.health.harvard.edu/healthbeat/giving-thanks-can-make-you-happier

Morin, Amy. (2014, November 23). 7 Scientifically Proven Benefits Of Gratitude That Motivate You To Give Thanks Year-Round. Retrieved from https://www.forbes.com/sites/amymorin/2014/11/23/7-scientifically-proven-benefits-of-gratitude-that-will-motivate-you-to-give-thanks-year-round/#4165e9cc183c

Flannery, Mary Ellen (2018, March 28). The Epidemic of Anxiety Among Today’s Students Retrieved from http://neatoday.org/2018/03/28/the-epidemic-of-student-anxiety/

One of the keys to success in reading instruction is helping students identify as readers and develop a positive disposition to reading. Research indicates that when students are in a calm, supportive, non-threatening environment where they can have meaningful, enjoyable interactions with texts, they are more likely to grow as readers.

I’ve worked with several students who have gone from resistant readers to highly engaged scholars, because they went from trying for a score to becoming readers. They discovered there were books they would enjoy (hooray!). Often, the biggest change came when they discovered a book they desperately wanted to read (often because a peer mentioned it), and it was a little too hard. Suddenly, they had a reading goal that was personally meaningful, and they were committed to the work.

Here are a few things that have helped my students identify as readers:

Set the Expectation

I call my students readers as often as I call them friends. When we gather at the carpet, I say, “Good morning, Readers!” I reinforce this identity as we continue through our time together. It’s simple and may or may not have anything to do with our success, but it sets the tone, helping students know immediately that I see us all as readers.

I also make it clear that I am not the only person who can talk with students about a book. I’m a reader, just like they are. Although I provide a lot of reading coaching, I work hard to create a reading community within our classroom. It’s important to me that students are sharing book recommendations and reading tips with each other as much as I am.

Set the Mood

We work together to decide what mood we want for our reading time. Generally, it’s quiet, with soft instrumental music playing in the background. Students typically find that silence is distracting, because it’s startling when someone sneezes or moves. We’ve also found that it can be troublesome if you feel you need to get a tissue or shift around in your spot when the classroom is completely silent, because you don’t want to disrupt other readers.

I also allow snacks and water during reading time, as long as book boxes and the classroom are kept tidy, and I keep a stash of snacks and breakfast foods for those who need them when the district permits it. Because we often have reading in the morning, students who haven’t had enough for breakfast can struggle if those basic needs are not met. (And more importantly, I want their basic needs to be met!)

I also have book recommendations out in the classroom, much like you would in a library. These are tailored to current student interests and seasons. In upper grades, this area is often managed by students, and it’s fun to see what texts they’re loving and sharing.

Read Aloud

I LOVE reading aloud to my students at all grade levels, and when I’m reading, I’m ALL IN. We get lost in the world of the book as much as possible as I use voices, volume, and intonation to help students engage with the text.

The First Read Aloud

My first read aloud is probably the most carefully chosen text of the year. After all, I’m setting the tone for our class reading time, and I want to be sure students know that reading time is the best time.

Early Childhood & Early Elementary

I choose a highly interactive picture book to share with primary students. Ideally, it’s one that will make them laugh. At this age, reading is an easy sell. If it’s fun, silly, or involves movement, you’ve generally got a winner on your hands.

Young children are naturally inclined to love read aloud time, especially if I use different voices for the characters. I read softly and lean toward the students, pausing dramatically for effect. Together, we lose ourselves in the world of the text, and when we emerge, we find our reading bond has begun to solidify.

Upper Elementary

In the upper grades, I think about the students who are most likely to be reading champions in my classroom. These are the students who enjoy reading and may even identify as readers already. I also think about the students who are resistant to reading and may have named it one of their least favorite subjects. I try to find a text both will enjoy.

On the first day of school, I often begin with a picture book. This is especially helpful when I haven’t had the opportunity to meet students yet. I may invite them to vote on which book to read or share a recent discovery that is a favorite of mine.

My students often help me choose the first chapter book of the year. I model Book Talks using a couple different books, and students vote to choose which one we should read. I try to choose something highly engaging and suspenseful with a fair amount of action and lots of dialogue. After all, character voices have a huge impact on the quality of the read aloud!

Secret Reader

It is SO much fun when we have parents and other special adults who are willing to come read to the class. I give students clues to figure out who our secret reader will be, and we have a blast guessing. It’s a great opportunity to see that we have lots of readers in our lives. Plus, I’ve discovered some really awesome books this way!

Provide Opportunities For Choice

My students choose almost everything about their reading.

I allow them to pick their own books for independent reading, and sometimes we even vote on which book we’ll use for guided reading. The only limits are that the book is Just Right for them and that the content is school appropriate.

Students also choose their own seats. I provide various seating options (rocking chair, bean bag chair, carpets, etc), and students are free to make their own decisions about what works best for them. Some of my students have loved sitting in the rocking chair or beanbag chair in the middle of the room, while others prefer to cozy up alone in a quiet corner.

Behavior & Management

Almost every year, I have a group of students who decide they’ll hide under their desks to avoid reading when we first get started. I give them one day to “secretly” pass notes and books around in silence, visiting occasionally to redirect (as I do with everyone) and carefully observing each individual.

At the end of reading time, we reflect on our work and make decisions about where we’ll sit the next day. I’m always interested to see who decides they’ll choose a different place to read the next day and helps me figure out where to start with our reading conferences. It also gives students the opportunity to take responsibility for their choices and helps build trust in our relationship, since I don’t say anything if they continue to choose better seats from then on.

On the second day, I bring my book to join them. I read silently for a couple minutes, which motivates them to do the same. Within 5-10 minutes, most students discover that they are actually rather uncomfortable there and ask to move. I allow it, and point out that this is not a problem that should occur again. Typically, the issue is not repeated, and the one student who finds they love reading under the desk enjoys the solitude.

Once everyone is settled, I move quickly into reading conferences with students who were distracted. If they were really enjoying their books, we wouldn’t have this problem, so it’s important to address the root of the issue as soon as possible.

Note: I have tried book conferences immediately to start by addressing the root of the issue, but it actually enhances the problem. Students need active supervision, coaching, and support when they are getting started in reading workshop. Otherwise, undesireable behaviors are quickly exacerbated.

Pair Every Reader With A Book They Love

This is one of my favorite parts of teaching reading! I can’t think of a single student I’ve had who wasn’t a reader when they left my classroom. However, I’ve had lots of students who believed they weren’t readers when we met. Every time, the issue was not the student – it was the books they were reading!

I encourage my students to abandon books that aren’t right for them. There are too many excellent books in the world to spend time reading the ones we don’t enjoy. The key is to figure out what you don’t like about the book before you return it. If you don’t, you may find yourself in exactly the same situation with the next book you pick.

I am highly involved in the book selection process, especially at the beginning of the year. I ask lots of questions to help understand each reader and follow up with them when they try a new book. As I get to know each child, I connect them with other readers who have common interests, and soon students are recommending books to each other!

Here are a few questions I’ve found helpful in finding the right book for each student:

• Have you ever read a book you loved? Tell me about it.
• What books have you tried that you absolutely hated? Why did you dislike them?
• Do you like books with more text or pictures?
• What is your favorite movie?
• Do you prefer to learn from your books or read a story?
• Have you tried (genre)? What did you think?
• Are you more interested in fiction or nonfiction?
• What would you guess might be fun to read about?
• Do you like books that are serious, funny, gross, informative, or something else?

Workshop Model

The workshop model is absolutely my favorite way to teach. I find that anything else eats up our precious reading and conferencing time, and that’s a serious problem for me. My students are the most successful when I can give them dedicated reading time each day and short, frequent (weekly or bi-weekly) reading conferences that are tailored to their individual reading needs, in addition to mini lessons and guided reading.

Mini Lesson

At the start of the year, I often teach this mini lesson to begin the process. I find it helps students know what to expect during our reading time. Students who love reading can feel confident in knowing that they have found a kindred spirit, and those who are unsure know that they have entered a place where reading is valued. I find that it fosters curiosity from those who have not enjoyed reading and excitement for those who have.

References:

Duke, Nell K (3 June 2016). What Doesn’t Work: Literacy Practices We Should Abandon. Retrieved from https://www.edutopia.org/blog/literacy-practices-we-should-abandon-nell-k-duke?fbclid=IwAR0gFBtymZ5AUVyGd6gthlvYluAELWBSF2R99u9DUzYOQFLZe66bA8wW_68

Katz, Lilian (1993). Dispositions as Educational Goals. ERIC Digest. Retrieved from http://ericae.net/edo/ED363454.htm

NAEYC (last updated 11 Dec 2018). Why Children’s Dispositions Should Matter to All Teachers. Retrieved from https://eclkc.ohs.acf.hhs.gov/school-readiness/article/why-childrens-dispositions-should-matter-all-teachers

Noyes, Debbie (N.D). Developing the Disposition to be a Reader: The Educator’s Role. Retrieved from http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download?doi=10.1.1.543.1190&rep=rep1&type=pdf