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Revisitiing The Reading Workshop chapters 7 & 8

Chpater 7 deals with 'reading as real readers' - independent reading, conferring, responding, and sharing. It provides great guidance and tools (checklists, story chats, suggested questioning, etc) to create a successful readers workshop. It says for teachers to share their own passion for reading (important in all subjects i think), creating an orderly environment, helping with book choice, how to have students read with each other, and successful story chats among students. It also talks about guided reading and flexible reading groups. The chapter continues with how to confer with students. It gives great pointers on how to keep track, different times and different types of conferring and how to have conversations about reading and how to respond thorugh writing. Chapter 8 is about assessment in the reading workshop. It has practical ways and tools for ongoing assessment - observation, anecdotal records, checklists, running records, analysis, oral retellings, written retellings, reading logs, and journal responses. It has exmples of rubrics, reading inventory. good ideas - good book!

Revisiting the Reading Workshop chpaters 4-6

Chapter 4 is about establishing routines. It gives 20 days of minilessons for setting up routines for the workshop. I wonder about the space?! I don't see having enough room for 19-24 students to create a 'good book nook' space without distractions, ample lighting, etc. The rooms feel so cluttered. And I wonder about the supply of books (within the classroom?). Other than these concerns the readers workshop has elements I am using and will use. I like 'the strategies you might use to choose a just right book' - pg. 61 Chapter 5 has minilessons on reading strategies and skills.Its nice to have some sample lessons and resource list. These lessons are very familiar and . . . similar to the ones we use with the basal. Chapter 6 has minilessons on literary elements ane techniques.Again it has some ready made minilessons to use and resource list.The chapter ends by saying some lessons carry over to the writing. I like the quote - saying - that 'read like writers' now, 'write like readers'.

Revisiting Reading Workshop Chapters 1-3 We have been fortunate this year in 4th grade that our schedule allows us to have a 30 minute block for DEAR time and conferencing. This is in addition to the 1 hour block for reading using the basal/trade books/DI. Because of this, I have been able to incorporate many of the elements of Readers Workshop. I read Nancy Atwell's Middle Grades that is mentioned in Chapter 1 and while working on my masters at Berry we were to use Readers Workshop/Balanced literacy approach during our clinicals/student teaching. We are also fortunate to have many elements of Readers workshop within our basal reading program. The mini-lesson or focus on a reading strategy, the previewing and building background, fluency checks, reading logs, teacher modeling and questioning are all apart of it. I feel my students are aware of and using reading strategies discussed and modeled in class. Some highlights of ch1 include: comp;arison of traditional/and reading workshop c lassrooms; and definition of reading workshop. Chapter 2 is aobut organization and management of the workshop - it includes expectations, sample rules. sample schedules, crating an inclass library with checkout procedures, as well as communicating with parents. Chapter 3 is about planning of minilessons - I need to go back and through through it again. I'd like to keep this book.

Teaching Student Centered Mathematics Chapters 9-12

Chapter 9 - Developing Measurement Concepts This chapter has some interesting big ideas - pg. 252. I like the ideas of exploring, comparing and contrasting, figuring out attributes. I like the activity 9.1 - changing units and 9.2 - more than one way and 9.5 - fill and compare and also 9.11 - one-handed clocks. I love the one-handed clocks - I want to try this with my class. I think this may benefit those that are still having difficulty. Chapter 10 - Algebraic Reasoning - I like the activity 10.6 and 10.7. This chapter deals with patterns, symbols, relationships.Some of the activities seem like some students would get too bogged down with the spreadsheets. I liked the 10.17 - function and 10.18 guess my rule activity. Many of these activites throughout the book seem to take alot of time - and discovery, examining, and reflecting . I already feel pressed with time in math. Chapter 11 - Exploring data Analysis - All kinds of graphs, charts, tables, and graph club are mentioned in this chapter. Some good ideas - all subject areas. Chapter 12 - Exploring Concepts of Probability - 4th grade Saxon has little to say about prediction so this was a welcome chapter. Making spinners, short runs and long run comparisons, and checking the theory are activities suggested in this chapter.

Teaching Student-Centered Mathematics Chapter 5-8

CHAPTER 5 - DEVELOPING FRACTION CONCEPTS The chapter begins with several ideas for models of fractions for students to explore. This chapter connected with the last math workshop 4th grade attended. At the workshop as in this chapter we were allowed to explore using different models the concept of fractions. It was quite fun . . . and could lead in many, many , many discoveries. CHAPTER 6 - FRACTION COMPUTATION Some good ideas exploring common multiples, adding, subtracting, mixed numbers, muliplication, division - very interesting - as the book notes - we should practice these examples. Some are very difficult to follow - require deep thinking from students. CHAPTER 7 - DECIMAL AND PERCENT CONCEPTS AND DECIMAL COMPUTATIONS This chpater deals with connecting the two representational systems. There are good activites I would like to find time and appropriate spot for students to complete. Activity 7.7, 7.8, and 7.9. are very good - easy to do-and lead to further understanding by students. Great closing activity! CHAPTER 8 GEOMETRIC THINKING AND GEOMETRIC CONCEPTS This chapter begins with van Hiele levels of geometric thought - level 0 visualization to level 4 rigor. Then it goes into the characteristics of the levels and instruction for the different levels. There is alot of exploration and examination and reflection by the student - good thinking. It refers to the NCTM website as a resource for manipulatives.

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