Reinforcing HFWs

One of the things I really love about Explain Everything is that you can use it in so many different ways, limited only by imagination!  I identified a need for my learners to remember High Frequency Words as many are being held back in reading because they are unable to identify words such as "the" and "is".

I've decided to focus on three words each week with my learners and these are our "Star Words" for the week - we go over them multiple times a day and learners receive rewards for reading them when asked throughout the day - needless to say, they are always keen to be asked!

To further reinforce these words I've created an Explain Everything project which learners complete as part of our reading rotation.  We unpacked the project as a whole class earlier in the week and then all did it together - now they are able to complete it independently as part of the reading rotation and already, after just two days I've noticed an improvement in their reading when the star words are encountered!

Find the letters to make the word "the"

Write the word "the" three times

The last slide where a learner has to say the words

Using my H.O.T. template ... small beginnings

As I've documented in my blog earlier this term, my inquiry is focusing on creating Explain Everything projects to encourage Higher Order Thinking with my five year olds.

I've created a template which I want my learners to use with a variety of books and I want to see if continued use of the same generic template can encourage greater HOT and, if over a period of time I see improvement through its continued use.

Today we used my "Wanted" template for the first time as a whole class.  We read a shared Big Book and unpacked the four characters in the book.  I carefully scaffolded the activity with the learners and we completed the activity as a whole class, drawing on ideas from everyone.  Then there was the opportunity for learners to do it individually.

There was varying levels of success with the activity - some learners did really well with the drawing and writing but needed support with the recording.  Other learners' struggled more with the drawing and writing components but did an impressive job with their orally recorded explanation.   I now have a completed project for each learner and I will be able to compare progress over the next four weeks - it is my intention to complete the activity at least once a week until the end of term.  The beauty of it being an Explain Everything project is that I can add it to an existing project as an extra for my higher level reading groups!

Here is a small selection of some of the results from today's first effort - it is important to note that many of these learners have been at school less than a month!

This is Mr Bear and he makes me feel sleepy because he told the boy to go to sleep.

The bear made me laugh because it was silly.

The bear is scary and he made me so sleepy. (Why did he make you sleepy?)  Cos he was scaring me.

Using the first of my 'SOLO' Explain Everything templates

Today I tried using one of my SOLO Explain Everything templates which we created during our inquiry session yesterday, as an additional activity with one of my reading groups.

They had read "Hedgehog is Hungry" (a Red level PM Reader book) the previous day and taken it home to read with whanau overnight.  Before we did our guided reading session for the day I introduced the template.  We talked about some of the things we'd learnt about hedgehogs in our book and the learners came up with some great ideas, including hedgehogs were spiky, hungry and ate worms.  I showed the group how to use the template and unpacked what the word "describe means".

I then asked the learners to select their favourite picture from the story.  Using this template which I'd shared to each learner in the group using Teacher Dashboard,  they all easily took a photo of their favourite picture from the story.  We took turns recording our ideas about the pictures and once each learner had finished we listened to the recordings as a whole group.  We talked about how many ideas each learner had included in their description.  I plan to use these icons to assist them in working up to including at least three ideas in each description they complete.

Unpacking what they achieved today

Here are two samples of what the learners achieved today - the first time we used the template.

The hedgehog is waiting and he is eating the worm and then <undecipherable>.  
(One idea)

This is hedgehog and it ... This is hedgehog and he eats worms and he's hungry.
(One idea with a little elaboration).

Referring back to the SOLO taxonomy diagram, this activity would fall into the unistructural category with one main idea.  

It is hoped that as learners become more familiar with this activity and more comfortable with recording their ideas, that they will add additional ideas and move further along the above diagram.  I always like to blog about my very first attempt with an activity as it provides a value starting marker from which to compare after a few weeks of additional learning.  

The beauty of Explain Everything templates like this one is that they can be added or combined with other projects and can be used with any book that the learner is reading.  

iPads at every turn!

In just the third week of the new year I find myself naturally using the iPads to extend and develop activities and to incorporate that rewindable learning element.  Today we used them in a variety of difficult ways to meet the needs of different individual learners:

Follow-up reading activity - after careful scaffolding at the teaching table, one reading group completed the activity independently including a sentence they needed to put back together and three high frequency words which they had to listen to and copy (project created using Explain Everything).

Learning to write their name - again a scaffolded small group session where learners used a blank Explain Everything page and a name card which I created for each learner this year.  We practised copying their name from the card onto the screen.  While we have been working on copying "under" my writing with their name, this was the first try copying their name from the card onto the iPad screen - some great first up efforts!

Ordering and identifying numbers to 10 - one of the things the majority of my learners need to work on is numbers to 10.  While they are able to count to 10, they can't read the numerals.  I've created a project for them to order the numbers, with dots under each number representing how many that number is (eg seven dots under the number 7).  Today we used this at the teaching table with great success.  This video highlights how a learner was able to order all the numbers by checking using the dots under each number.  He is confident in his counting to 10 and uses this skill to help him identify the numbers.  

NB:  For those new to my blog, I don't insist on no noise in my classroom when learners are 

recording and there will always be ambient classroom chatter or the voices of others on the 

examples I use - I'm used to just focusing on the voice of the learner in any one recording.

Finally, to complete the day we focused on our inquiry topic for the term - the Pt England Way!  We talked about listening in class and used our iPad to take a photo to demonstrate this key skill.  It was great to see the creativeness of the learners in demonstrating this point!

Day 1 ...

I remember when I started "planning" for Day 1 in January having a "what did I do last year" moment?   I was lucky enough to have a mentor teacher and we discussed and talked about what we did last year, and I used this as the basis for this years plan.  Thanks to my blog, this won't be a problem for the future as I unpack what worked well today and what needed tweaking to be achievable for my learners!

Room 19 started with three learners today and I had an amazing day.  We started with a few tears with one child a little upset to farewell Mum on his first day at school, but he soon settled into the class and all three boys happily talked with me throughout the day.  Having only three learners I was able to spend time with them all as we completed our activities for the day.

• Alphabet and alphabet activities - we went over the whole alphabet today and then specifically focused on the first letter of each learners name with some colouring.  I was careful to model the colouring, although despite discussing what colour trees were we still ended up with a blue one!  The learners took much longer on the colouring than I had anticipated.  As they were finished we turned their pages over and I wrote their name on the back and encouraged them to copy over (or under) my writing - this gave me an idea of where they were at.
• Reading - I hadn't planned to do reading today but with only three learners it gave me an opportunity to group them together and introduce reading on day 1.  All the learners were really keen to take their books home and read to their whanau.  I was able to use my reading planning from Tuesday today and shows the importance of being planned for any eventuality.
• Reading Activities - we unpacked two of our reading rotation activities today - jigsaws and blocks - this gave me an opportunity to have conversations with each learner and learn something of their backgrounds.
• Maths - after morning tea we moved onto some maths activities, working on counting to 5 and then 10.  Again, an opportunity to assess where each learner is at before the more formal JAM testing shortly.  Having a workbook with numbers 1 - 10 to start working on was extremely advantageous.
• After lunch we were all pretty tired - we made some creations using the polydron and had a story before it was time to pack up and get ready for going home.  We also took our very first class photo!

Taking time to explore the school, include frequent water and toilet stops and explaining and reinforcing routines helped the day speed by.  These things will all continue to occur as our class grows over the coming weeks.  The learners are intrigued by the computers in the room and I look forward to unpacking the iPads with them over the coming days in a carefully scaffolded way.  

As I reflect on today, having name tags for learners to hang their bags on already prepared was a huge hit with both learners and their whanau.   Being prepared for the whole week and ready to launch into learning benefited everyone and allows for the best possible start for everyone.  Maths booklets, colouring activities and a selection of books to read to the learners all helped to make my day flow and ensured I had additional activities to integrate with the curriculum learning - bring on Day 2!