Having Fun Blogging in K-1

With guidance and support from adults, explore a variety of digital tools to produce and publish writing, including in collaboration with peers.

This is a line taken from the Kindergarten and First Grade Common Core Standards for writing. W.K.6 and W.1.6 to be exact.  I am sure I was not alone when I read that line and had no idea how I was going to implement that with K-1 students! Thanks to Lindy Hockenbary, Technology Integration Specialist for RESA4U I learned about the power of blogging in the classroom!

At first I liked the idea of blogging as a tool for creating digital portfolios. I save work samples throughout the year and then have my students compile them into portfolios to share with their families on the last day of school. I never felt particularly proud of those portfolios. They weren't exactly student centered since I was the one choosing the work to go in them. Often I would forget to save things for months at a time or the kids would feel so attached to their work that they didn't want me to keep it until the end of the year. I knew digital portfolios would reduce the paper I had to file and save until June. I also knew the students would have more say over what they featured. I knew it was a good idea. I just didn't know how to implement it.

Over the course of a few months Lindy shared a variety of blog apps and sites with me and finally sent me an article that helped me get started blogging with my students. She found an article written by a Kindergarten teacher who was not just blogging with students but using Twitter as well! My answer for how to get started was in that article. I needed to start small and introduce my students to the concept of blogging, the concept of digital citizenship and the practice of publishing on the Internet!

In the first part of December I used www.Kidblog.org to start a class blog. In the beginning I was the only user and the only one who posted anything on our blog. Instead of having the kids blog on their own we did “shared blogging” for the first month. We gathered on the floor in front of the Promethean each afternoon and talked about all the things we had done that day. As the students talked I typed their words exactly as I heard them. We posted their comments and just like that we were using digital tools to publish our writing! I created a link to the blog and put it in the signature line in my email. This way every email sent to parents had a link to our classroom blog. I asked everyone I could think of to visit our blog and leave us comments so my students could see how many people were reading their writing.

Our daily blogging ritual was fun for all of the students for about….three days. Then some of the more restless students wanted to do something else. It was important to me that blogging was always fun so I never forced anyone to do it. If students wanted to play math games at the end of the day they could and those that wanted to blog with me could join me in front of the Promethean Board. This went pretty well….for a few more days. I started playing with the Kidblog app on our classroom iPad and showed the students how we could take pictures and post those as well. Periodically, I would just take a picture of our art work, Science experiment or the thermometer and post it on the blog. This inspired the students to come up with other creative photos we could post. We had a very cold week in December and we were enjoying posting pictures of our class thermometer with the mercury below zero!

After Christmas I decided the students were ready to start posting on the blog. I created a job in our daily job chart for a “blogger.” That person would follow along with our daily data meeting and write the results on a piece of paper, take a picture of it and post it on the blog. We use our daily data meeting, also known as our routines, to track the weather, look at the calendar and count how many days we have been in school. The “blogger” uses a form I have created and placed in a clear sheet protector to write the results in dry erase marker.  While a photo of the daily data was probably not very exciting to our readers it did teach each of the students how to post on the blog. I had the first graders do it first and once they each knew what to do they took turns mentoring the Kindergartners through their own “blogger” responsibilities.

Today we turned a new corner in blogging! All seven of my first graders were added as users to our Kidblog site. I gave them usernames and passwords and showed them how to use the Kidblog app on the school iPads. (Thanks to our Tech Teacher Mr. Greenwald for adding it to the school iPads!) My first graders were elated! They could not wait to write their own blog posts. I left it up to them for our first attempt. I did not give them any requirements or a set assignment. Many of them chose to follow the topics we often wrote about during our shared blogging sessions. They told about the events of the day. Some of them took pictures of books they were reading or pictures they had drawn. Some of them even figured out how to comment on the posts of their peers! COLLABORATION! DIGITAL DISCUSSION! Amazing!

I showed the students how to access the Kidblog site at home should they feel the need to do more blogging. We had a brief discussion about digital citizenship at this point as well. We decided that to be a good digital citizen we must always remember to post things on the blog that are positive and appropriate for school. The rule of thumb is that if they wouldn't want me or their parents to see what they posted then it was not appropriate. We will have this discussion many more times as we continue our blogging adventures. The best part about Kidblog is that I have complete control over what is posted. I can delete anything I don’t think should be posted. I also have to approve all comments made to the posts before they appear on the site.

Now that the first graders have become bloggers I know the Kinders will be excited to try it as well. I will use the first graders as teachers to their peers as we help the Kinders begin to post their ideas. Now if only I had that 1:1 iPad ratio I have been dreaming about……..

Next up, Twitter! Stay Tuned!

Check our our blog and leave us a comment! www.kidblog.org/kinderfirst

A QR Code Listening Cener

QR Code Listening Center

My room is much smaller than most primary classrooms. I see pictures of classrooms with reading lofts, dress up stations, play kitchens and multiple art easels and I feel envious of all the space. My room is big enough for a few tables, chairs and three book shelves. I do what I can to make the most of it though.

I do have a CD player where students can sit and listen to books on CD. It is on a wheeled cart so the “listening center” moves depending on the space we need each day. It doesn't get used much though. Not since I started my QR code listening center, that is. Students use our iPads to scan QR codes on the books they want to listen to that day during our Reading Block. They can sit at the tables or on the floor. They can sit near a friend or on their own. This works for my small space since there doesn't have to be a designation “listening center.” It also works for my students who might want to lay down, lean against a cupboard or sit at a table to read. Often when they sit in front of the CD player they have to balance a book on their laps and stay awkwardly close to the machine because of the short spiral cords on the headphones intended for the CD player. Since our iPads have headphones with a longer cord and smaller ear muffs the kids would rather use them. Let's face it though, they would rather use the iPad for just about anything! That is the beauty of this device!

I started by choosing a few books from my classroom library and recording myself reading them. I used an app on the iPad called SoundCloud to record myself reading. This app allows me to post my recording as public to their companion web page www.soundcloud.com

I have a free account on the site that will hold all of my recordings.

After recording the audio I can copy a link for my recording and use www.qrstuff.com to create and print a free QR code. I tape the code to the cover of the book and put the book in a special basket in our classroom library where I am keeping all of the books students can listen to during the Reading Block. Students use an app called I-Nigma to scan the QR code. It will take them to my account page on the SoundCloud site. If I have made the recording public they will be able to press the play button and listen as they follow along in the book.

I figured the kids would get tired of hearing me read all of the books all of the time so I went on the search for other audio recordings for the book in our library. I discovered the Pete the Cat series by Eric Litwin website has audio for all of the books in the series! http://www.harpercollinschildrens.com/feature/petethecat/

I had a couple of those books so I created at code for that website. I used Scholastic bonus points to order the rest of the books in the series.

I still needed more sources so I asked the teachers in my building for help. A few of them visited my room after school and recorded an audio book for me. This added an element of surprise for the kids. They never know who will be reading the book when they scan the code!

My goal is to have a QR code on every book in our classroom library! So far I have about 10 books so it will be a while before I meet that goal! I try to record a couple new books a week.

Drawing Conclusions with K-1 Students

Last week I taught my K-1 class to draw conclusions while reading. I was so pleased with how well they did I couldn't wait to blog about it!

This was the second day we had discussed this reading skill. I used the Read Works web site to plan my lesson. 

Click here to check it out!

www.readworks.org 

I like this site because it gives me a place to start when teaching basic reading skills and comprehension strategies. It has a large library of passages for readers of all levels in both fiction and non-fiction. Everything is aligned with Common Core State Standards.  I use their lessons to think about how I want to deliver the content. I usually end up changing a few things based on the time I have to teach the lesson or the level of knowledge my class needs.

The lesson that inspired me today was this one,  Kindergarten: Drawing Conclusions Lesson 3 http://www.readworks.org/lessons/gradek/drawing-conclusions/lesson-3

I began by reminding the class about the previous days lesson when I introduced them to the skill of drawing conclusions. I mimed some emotions and activities for them to guess to get them warmed up. First, I acted very sleepy, then I acted like I was very sick. Then I pretended to run really fast. They picked up on these actions easily. We had done quite a few charades-like exercises the day before.

In my class we use “talking partners” during whole class lessons. I use name cards in a pocket chart to assign partners. They sit next to one another elbow to elbow, knee to knee. (EEKK) In some discussions I assign students as partner one and partner two. For this lesson I did not feel the need to do that. My class has learned to take turns talking and has been good about establishing their discussion order on their own.

I pulled the first passage called  Ssssssilent Hunter  up on my computer and projected in using my Promethean Board.

http://www.readworks.org/sites/default/files/lessons/file_270.pdf

The passage describes the appearance and actions of an animal but never states the exact animal.  The students are to use the clues in the passage to determine the type of animal being described. They should arrive at the conclusion that the animal is a snake.

My instructions to the class were to listen to me read the passage trying very hard not to shout out the conclusions they were drawing as I read but to keep them ready to share with their talking partners. As soon and I had finished a dramatic reading of the passage I told them to draw conclusions with their partners. They figured out the animal was a snake very quickly. I called the group back to attention and asked them to show me the evidence in the passage that helped them draw the conclusion about the animal. I used the desktop annotate tool on my Promethean Interactive WhiteBoard to highlight the evidence in the passage as the students dictated it to me. I reread the passage two more times until they had directed me to highlight all of the evidence that proved the animal was a snake. I purposely used the term "evidence" throughout the lesson in an effort to expose my students to academic language.

During the next phase of the lesson I sent the students to the tables with a half sheet of plain white paper. I instructed them to listen while I read them a different passage and told them to quietly sketch the animal they thought was being described. This passage was called In The Night It describes a cat who gets into trouble with a dog.

http://www.readworks.org/sites/default/files/passages/k_drawing_conclusions_lesson3_direct_teaching_example_passage.pdf

I was surprised when half the class did not start drawing cats. I assumed the clues were obvious and that they had heard them all the first time I read the passage. Some of them began to draw owls, bats and snakes. I had each person share their drawings with their table mates. Even after discussing their conclusions those that hadn’t chosen to draw a cat were convinced their drawings were accurate. 

I brought them to our gathering place in from of the Promethean Board on the rug,to talk to their talking partners about their conclusions.  Then I reread the passage and had them talk some more. During the second and third reading of the passage I saw students start nodding and smiling. Those who had guessed the animal was an owl, bat or snake began to see the clues they had missed.

I called on specific people, those who had not guessed the animal was a cat at first, to tell me which evidence they heard me read the second time that changed their minds to thinking the animal was a cat. I used the desktop annotate tool to highlight the evidence. By the end of the lesson the students learned the importance of reading closely and paying attention to all the clues in a text before drawing their conclusions. Many of them said things like, “I didn’t hear you say it had paws the first time you read it” and “If I had heard you say it lived in a house I would have known it wasn’t an owl.”

I was pleased with this lesson because other than reading the passage and giving some instructions about where to sit, when to talk to their partners and what to draw, I didn’t do the lions share of the talking. The students gathered the information they needed to learn the skill by talking to one another. In my mind, this lesson exemplified the rigor and depth of the Common Core State Standards through inquiry learning and collaboration. As the week continued students happily reported to me when they had drawn conclusions in other texts. They even cited evidence!  If you drew the conclusion that I am proud of my class--you are right!

Writing on the wall

I put transperancy paper on the wall with clear packing tape so my students can use that space for wiring words and numbers during the Daily 5!

Organizing Word Work and Write the Room Activities

I was getting tired if having messy piles of papers for students to sort through when they did word work pages or write the room pages. I created these binders to organize the papers. 

Write the room pages with abJanuary theme. I foound them for free on www.teacherspayteachers.com. 

I copied sight word word searches from a Scholastic printables sight word practice  book I've had for years. 

Students can choose to work on these pages during the Daily 5. They can also choose to use the puzzles, letter tiles, magnetic letters and other hands on tools we have in the room. They can write in notebooks, on an assortment if paper or on white boards a well. Some really like doing worksheets so I always make them an option. 

QR Codes in the K-1 Classroom

QR Codes