Learning about Reading and Writing through Author Studies

Studying the craft of writing by looking closely at an author's life and craft is a wonderful way to grow readers and writers. This is a huge undertaking but always so worthwhile!  Here is a peek into how we went about studying these authors...

1.  Lots of prep work during our study of Jan Brett in December.  I did the study, they learned from me.  This is how I teach...first I do, then they do!

2.  I collected books from these authors and immersed them in a number of books from each.  Then the children picked the author they wanted to study. I continued modeling by studying the author Ezra Jack Keets with them each day before they went off to do the work in their groups.

3. Each day I gave them a different task to work on.  These included:  

• Reading the books for enjoyment.
• Noticing text features and common threads between the author's books.
• Researching their authors by reading book jackets, reading author blogs, and watching videos on the web.  We safely researched by using the kid friendly search engine KidRex.  

Finally, the children were given 4 options for their final presentations: 

1.  Creating a ShowMe 

2.  Making a video

3.  Developing a chart

4.  Writing a letter to their author 

Each group then presented to the whole crew.  This is as important as the study...learning how to create and collaborate in groups and communicate clearly to an audience. 

Our budding artist Ziva enjoyed writing a letter to Eric Carle!

Ask your child how they presented their information!  Each of them grew as learners through this experience!  

More Math: Counting Around the Circle and Using Manipulatives

 For months we have been sitting in a circle to practice counting.  At first we practiced counting by ones up and back.  Then by 2's, 5's and 10's.  This led to skip counting, going from 10's to 5's to 1's.  Very tricky business for some of us.  This was prep work for counting coins and learning about place value.

This past week we did 2 different count around the circle activities that helped us practice skip counting but also see patterns in place value.  The first time I gave each child one of these: 

The long is "ten", the cube is "one".  These are the base ten blocks we use.  

We practiced counting by tens and ones and we came up with a total number.  I scribed these numbers as we went along to show visually how the place value was changing. 
Then we counted the same pieces the other way around the circle, and finally we swapped pieces and counted again.

We discovered many things, including that our total sum was always the same regardless and we began to notice more patterns in place value.   The second time we did this activity I passed out dimes, nickels and pennies and we did the same process.  I think this is helping us learn place value in a fun and interactive way!

 In addition, as we counted the 3 different ways, I highlighted the movement on a number grid.  You can see the 3 different colors I used to show that we counted using different pathways but every time we ended with 113.  They loved this!  

Here are a few more pictures showing the crew using math manipulatives to help them solve problems. 

What's Up in Math?

As promised, I am going to attempt to find the time to share more of what is going on in math!  So much to say and share and never enough time to take the pictures and teach and blog!  

In first grade we use many different resources to teach from. I want to ensure that the children understand how numbers work.  Similar to my teaching of how words can be taken apart and put back together, I'm teaching the children how numbers can be composed and decomposed.  

We use many tools to accomplish this.  In our math tubs we have lots of manipulatives to help us discover how numbers work.  These include:  ten frames, base-ten blocks, unifex cubes in friendly ten wands, red/white counting chips. 

I will try to take more photos of these and how we use them, or feel free to drop by to take a look at them and learn with us if you get the chance.  Math is from 11:45-1:00 daily and I can always use more hands for differentiation!

We do critical thinking story problems every week and we are beginning to add 2 digit numbers in this work.  We also use learning games to help us grow, such as chess and checkers, number scrolls, fact game practice,  along with iPad math apps.

Abraham is working hard on his number scroll...a way to see patterns and create a number grid. Many are working on getting to a 1000! 

I think I'll close this note here and post another blog showing counting around the circle.  We love math challenges!