An Emotional End

As the year winds down, I have to take the time to reflect on a small group of students that I have truly grown to love.  They will be moving on to the High School next year, and I am very excited, yet anxious for them to go.

I have taught these students every day and sometimes twice a day for the past two years.  I am their core reading teacher and intervention teacher.  I requested to loop with them up to 8th grade after we had such success as a 7th grade "team". They all are students with specific disabilities, varying from learning disabilities to behavior disabilities.  All came to me as struggling readers, with some engaged, but most of them, disengaged, from reading.

We have 5 1/2 days left together and I am appreciating every minute of it.  Here are just a few of the things we MUST get done before summer...

• Engage in our last round of book clubs.  I recently ordered and received books by Saddleback. They are written at a lower lexile level, but with engaging content for MS readers.  We will be using our Notice and Note strategies to closely read and engage in discussions.
• Work on vocabulary through some activities on TV411.
• Celebrate our 40 book challenge (Thanks, Donalyn Miller!)
• Eat Pizza

I don't want to shut my instruction down and start the summer slide a week early.  I owe it to my kids.  I have 5 1/2 days left and I want to make the most of it.

Lethal Combination: Research and Close Reading

I recently merged information I gathered from two wonderfully written resources together to lift the level of learning in my classroom.  I have to thank Christopher Lehman and Kate Roberts for their work with research reading and writing, as well as, with close reading.

                                   

By combining the lessons from Energize Research Reading and Writing and Falling in Love With Close Reading, my students have been able to authentically write using their own voice from research they have done.  They have also been able to closely read both fictional and informational texts to gather evidence to guide their thinking.

My students read fictional stories related to themes of human rights.  They closely read these texts and developed inquiry questions.  From these questions they researched the issues and closely read to determine what information was valid.  They then began closely reading persuasive and argumentative texts using multiple lenses to ensure they were finding patterns to support their ideas.  Once they were fully immersed in persuasive texts, they wrote using the research they gathered and the techniques they saw authors using to complete a persuasive piece.

I cannot that the author's enough for the research they did to help me and my students grow as readers and writers.

Streaks, Goals, Resolutions

Well we have arrived at a new year and there is much talk about New Year's Resolutions.  Many people attempt them, but few succeed.  I, for one, have had many resolutions not make it through.

I just completed Runner's World's Holiday Run Streak.  I ran at least a mile from Thanksgiving Day through New Year's Day.  I ran in all kinds of weather: rain, sleet, freezing rain, snow, winter weather advisories, sun, dark, and too many sub-zero days.  I ran in the morning, after school and after I tucked my kids into bed.  I had to plan ahead for my runs and for my clothing!  I don't have a treadmill, so besides the 5 times I ran on the indoor track with my 7 year old, the other 30 days were outside in the elements.  I had never ran outside in the winter before, but was intrigued by @newbiechronicle's positive experience with it and had to attempt it.

I began on Thanksgiving and proceeded to grow my support system through Twitter.  I even encouraged another of my favorite PLN members @melwellnitz to give it a go.  It was very rewarding to enter in my runs following the #rwrunstreak hashtag and see what other streakers had encountered running that day.  I liked that I could run as far or as little (1 mile) as I liked everyday.  As long as I had 15 minutes, I could get my run in.  I had to borrow my husband's hunting balaclava and headlight and he had to install screws into my shoes to keep me from sliding on the snowy roads.

At the completion of the streak, I hopped into my rarely used jacuzzi for some well deserved relaxation and reward of completing a goal I had set out to do.

What does this have to do with my students?  As I was ending the end of my streak, I started pondering how this could relate to my struggling readers.  We are shooting for a goal of reading 40 books much like @donalynbooks does with her kids, but am I giving them the support they need to get there?  I think we all need support, guidance, and small steps built into our goal system to succeed.

This leads me to ponder how I could help my students reach their goal.

• Could I encourage them to start a reading streak of their own? 
•  Maybe they could read every day and the minimum could be 10 minutes or maybe a chapter?  
• Could they log their reading in a blog, or google spreadsheet?  
• Could they tweet about their experiences on our class twitter page @tasslersreaders?
• What is their reward in the end?  Is it all intrinsic?

I will be discussing my streak with my students and sharing how I think I can help them reach their goals.  I look forward to hearing their response on how we all can help each other succeed.

A Season To Streak

A season to streak is upon us.  For me, this is taking a couple of forms, but both are accomplished by keeping my clothes on!

Runner's World has encouraged runners to complete a Holiday Streak  http://www.runnersworld.com/cold-weather-running/the-2013-holiday-running-streak and follow it on twitter #RWRunStreak.  This entails running every day from Thanksgiving through New Year's Day.  You have to complete at least a mile a day.  I am relatively new to running.  I began the summer of 2012 after watching my husband get back into running.  He inspired me to attempt to run after watching him get healthy and gain a lot of hardware (his PR is a 19.12 for 5K).  Here he is running with our oldest this year...

Now, I am in no way a hardware chasing lady, as I can barely shuffle along at 10:00 minute mile paces, but I do enjoy the process.

So here I am two days into the streak, having run in 9 degree weather (didn't want to know the windchill) in my husband's blaze orange beanie (it is deer rifle season in W-don't want to be mistaken for a deer), and trying to stay accountable.

Another streak I am going to attempt is a reading streak.  There are only 15 school days until Christmas break, so, daily, I am going to read a holiday picture books to my 8th graders.  I looped with this wonderful group of 8 students in this supported reading environment this year.  We know each other well, but it is a continual struggle to keep them engaged in reading.  I am hopeful that with us participating in this holiday picture book streak together, we can share some wonderful stories, as well as, some wonderful memories together.

Here is my list, in no particular order.

                      

                       

                          

                       

                        

                         

                           



My Absolute Favorite...


Am I missing any from my list that you would recommend?

Are you completing any streaks this holiday season?

Cheers!