Launching the Writer's Workshop

My Kindergarten team is on our third year of using Lucy Calkins' Writer's Workshop program.  Not only do we love it, our kiddos fall head-over-heels for writing every year!  Their writing is also just incredible when using her system.
However, when I first "launched" the writing system three years ago, it was a little bit of a disaster.  Since it's just me with my 17 (which I realize is tiny compared to a lot of school districts) the kids and I ended up being incredibly frustrated when we would come back to the writing and have absolutely no idea what it said!  Lucy Calkins' suggestion of starting them drawing and labeling their experiences is great, but I found I needed a little more scaffolding.
I start the Writer's Workshop with a book called "My Friends."  It starts on the second day of school with the leader of the day being featured and the text, "This is my friend Amanda."  The students and I practice reading using a one-to-one touch on the words. We then discuss how the picture will match the words and I model drawing all of the body parts and real colors of the leader before giving them time to work.  While we work on getting through the class roster over the next few weeks, we talk about using the writing center for materials, storing writing in the folders, and adding details to their illustrations.  I interview the leader during the "meeting" part of the Writer's Workshop structure and we brainstorm ideas for details to add, such as the leader's dog, drawing her wearing her favorite color, using real hair and eye colors, etc.  Throughout the few weeks, we move away from drawing what I lovingly refer to as "spider people."  You probably see lots of "spider people" in the beginning of the year; those charming little people who have just a face, arms, legs, and possibly a Seussical hair or two. :)
I LOVE beginning my writing each year this way.  I realize it's a bit teacher-centered, but in the end, I feel like it's a solid, successful way to launch the workshop and gets a lot of them understanding the importance of adding details.  In the long run, I find their writing becomes more detail-oriented as well.
Take a look at our finished products! 

First pages

Final pages

Happy Birthday to Me!

The saying "work smarter, not harder" has never been one to describe me.  I am always a work-harder kind of girl.  I wish I weren't.   I would be so much more efficient if I would be a smarter worker and, in the long run, probably a better teacher and most definitely a better wife.  My honey is always getting the short end (more like the crabby end) of my stick since I'm leaving it all out there for my students.  I don't know how teachers with kids do it.  I will never be a mother.

Last Thursday I was at school working much harder because I was having a sub the next day and of course my sub folder needed to be updated.  I was also working harder on putting together Writer's Workshop final copies and working harder on trying to get Monday's plans and papers in place because I was leaving for Chicago to be the matron of honor in my college best friend's wedding (whose toast I was working harder on in my head).  My sister was also expecting and I knew I needed all of my weekend free just in case my niece or nephew made their debut.  8:00 rolled around and I still needed to put Math Centers together.  The time to work smarter had arrived.

I plopped my weary body down in the math center and desperately tried to think of what I could quickly whip together.  I couldn't pull anything I already had since I'd swapped Chapter 1 in our math book for Chapter 3 and my old centers are all Halloween themed.  And then the light bulb (finally) turned on!  My friend Carissa had written a grant to receive materials from the Boxcars and One-Eyed-Jacks company and my next-door teacher-neighbor Lynne had been raving about how easy they were.  I jumped up and pulled that sucker out and there it was...a pouch full of materials, just waiting to be used, and an idea book brimming with already-done activities.  Ever so faintly, I could hear the Hallelujah chorus being sung.

I found Lynne's game, Counting Crunchies, and decided it would be great, but I needed Crunchies.  I had no Crunchies.  But what I did have were 6 ugly boxes of random mats and manipulatives I snagged when I was student teaching and have NEVER used.  This is the part where I sang Happy Birthday to myself.  There, in ugly box number 4, were tree mats and red and green pom pom "apples."  Don't worry, I'm not crazy, it really was my birthday on Saturday. I added some pinchers to manipulate the pom poms with because it made me feel better, like I had at least come up with something.

Roll die, put apples on the tree.  Easy as apple pie!

I had a cute "roll and write the number" paper from Angie that made up Center 2 and needed something else.  The Boxcars and One-Eyed Jacks had lots of card game ideas, but all a little complicated for this point in the year, except for one that sounded a little like War.  So guess what Center 3 became?  War.  Practicing number recognition?  Check.  Reinforcing greater and less?  Check!   All that is in the box for the center is a deck of cards that's missing the royalty.  It has cracked me up every time my kiddos have gotten it out this week.

Race to the Top!  Which number will you roll the most?  See that post-it labeling that ugly box?  Oh yes, nothing but the best in my classroom!  Sheesh.  Working smarter means realizing that sometimes cutesy has to wait, right?

Playing War.  I LOVE these tiny decks of cards; they are perfect for tiny hands!

Ok.  Here's where it gets a little nutty.  Obviously, 17 children cannot use three Math Centers.  But why not repeat the centers?  Center 4 is a repeat of 1, Center 5 is the same as 2, and, you've got it, 3 and 6 might as well be twins!  Right now I'm trying to teach the routines and procedures for math centers and review the numbers 1-10.  Instead, I feel like I'm often repeating over and over how to play six different centers.  Teaching three simple centers has freed me up to instill the procedures and every single group has been on-task all week.  Yes, they will repeat each game, but I find they actually understand the task/game and do a much better job the second time around.  Did I do it?  Did I work smarter in my prep-time and teaching time?  It's a birthday miracle!

In the end, it took me about 20 minutes to get centers set up and my kids grouped and displayed.  I use powerpoint to display where they need to go. 

Each slide is a rotation.  This year I've also added a "captain" who gets out and puts away the materials.  The child on top is the captain and they all get a turn in the rotation.  If you'd like to have it you are more than welcome!  Enjoy!  To make things extra-easy, you can turn my students' names into yours by using Find and Replace.  Simply decide which name you will swap (ex: my Dominic for your Suzy) and click "Edit", hover over "Find..." and choose "Replace..."  Then type the name of my student in "Find" and your student in "Replace" and you should have a display in no time at all!

While a bit of a work-ethic epiphany and ready-made centers may seem like a birthday gift enough, my sister gave birth to a handsome, healthy baby boy on Saturday.  Now that is a true birthday miracle.

In love! I might have to become a mommy someday after all.

A Zero the Hero Flop

Last year I decided I NEEDED a Zero the Hero for this year.  My friend Angie uses Zero and I thought that he was pretty cute and a great way to celebrate and practice those tens.  Zero the Hero makes an appearance on days of school divisible by 10 (10, 20, 30, etc).   Previously, tens days in my classroom were known as "Macarena Math Days" (or, more accurately, "Macaroni Math Days") and we would dance to Dr. Jean's "Macarena Math" and call it a day.  Effective?  Yes.  Adorable?  Not so much.  Memorable?  Probably not.

The other draw to using Zero the Hero was that Angie's Zero looks like this:

Isn't he darling?  Her mother-in-law re-purposed him from a chef puppet.  And, great news...Angie had two extra chefs!  She gave one to Lynne who cooked up (haha) this charming little Zero:

...and I was lucky enough to get the other.  Unlike Angie and Lynne, however, I cannot sew.  Strike two is I'm not too terribly crafty.  So here is Zero the Hero's before picture:

And after his makeover, he came out looking like this:

I believe he is the love child of Hulk Hogan and an extra from Aladdin.   Mr. T. is the godfather. 

Yes, he is wearing a du-rag;  I couldn't figure out Angie's wizard hat.  He also is completely held together with hot glue and if you look carefully, you can see part of his now-scraggly beard is styled with an accidental glue drop.  Hot stuff.




Because of his condition, this Zero the Hero zooms amazingly fast around the room to his song, Zero the Hero Celebrates by Jack Hartmann.  However, my Transition Train CD ended up having a scratch so there was no Zero song.  No zooming.  No singing.  What a flop!  The only good thing about my Zero the Hero introduction was this freebie book  from Inspired by Kindergarten Lynne found on Pinterest.  I read the entire post after presenting my dud and will do a much better job next year.  She had some cute stuff!

Amazingly enough, my kiddos LOVED Zero the Hero.  They practiced counting by tens very enthusiastically and checked on him all day long.  They can't wait for him to make his glorious return on day 20.

As with most failures, I learned a lot of things from my Zero the Hero debacle.  I learned hot glue does not pick out of puppet beards.  I learned Inspired by Kindergarten is a cute blog.  I learned you should always double check your CD's.   And I learned sometimes trying your best really is good enough.

Back to School!

We are now back to school and enjoying our first 3-day weekend!  The start of school is always crazy, but so much fun!  This year I decided to change up my go-to Gingerbread Hunt around our school.  We still made it around to all of the special helpers at our school, but this time we were chasing Pete the Cat from Eric Litwin's book Pete the Cat:  Rocking in My School Shoes.  Since each page leads to the next with the question, "Where's Pete?" I made rhyming clues using the same format. The Kindergarteners LOVED it!  They were so excited and some of them are still looking for Pete!  Unfortunately, Pete had to run before we caught up with him in the office, but we enjoyed a Meow Mix of cereal and Goldfish crackers that he left for us.

So that we could remember and review our experience, I turned the clues into a book featuring photos of the teachers and helpers we met.  I also created a matching game matching the teachers and the class they teach.  One copy of the game went in my letters center and another in the Leader Bag to go home.  The Leader Bag also got copies of Pete the Cat - both Eric Litwin's version and our class version so that parents could put a face with the teachers' names and continue the conversation at home.

As much as I loved the Gingerbread Hunt of yesteryear,  I enjoyed Pete's hunt even more.  If you're looking for a first day update, I highly recommend using Pete!  I put my version up on Teacher Pay Teachers and Teachers Notebook if you'd like an already-ready version for only 4 bucks!

Happy Back-To-School!
Amanda