Thank You's AND Literacy n' Learning

First of all I just want to say THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU  to all of you who came out and supported your littlest Pintos at the PTO Fall Carnival and at McDonald's McTeacher Night.  Without the support of our awesome parents, events like these could not be successful.  I do not have a running total of how much our individual class made on these events yet, but I am so excited {I could bust} about getting some much needed items for my classroom.  I have a variety of things I need {always}and it seems that my {want} and {need} list continues to grow as the year progresses.  Since I can't buy time (because that's what I need the most of right now) I'll have to stick to my list!  Here are some things I am thinking about purchasing with the fundraising money from these two events:  new CD players for Listen to Reading {some of ours have broken :( }, books for assessment during our reader's workshop {this is pretty much a must!}, table for computers, books, books, books {because you can NEVER have too many!}  Of course I just know there are so many more items that I know I need and want but my mind is drawing a blank on them right now.

We have read a multitude of good books this week to aid in the learning of our CAFE strategies.  I am IN LOVE with our little CAFE board.  It is so nice to see all of the strategies that the kids have on the menu.  They can pick and choose from so many strategies {all of which encourage reading and help us become better readers}.  I am so proud of the students' work as well.  They are really trucking along and using these strategies.  This week, I began to give some readers reading goals.  Eventually this will occur with everyone in the class.  Our CAFE board will be a working assessment board where readers will keep track of the strategies they are currently working on.

 

Students this week are using an awesome resource I found called Using My Writer's Eye to assess their own writing.  This week students  have been creating their writing goals based on their latest published piece.  I am so excited about this process known as self-assessment.  It is such a powerful learning tool that keeps the students focused on their goals as a learner and motivates them to achieve those goals.  We would LOVE to have some cheap glasses that we could put on when assessing our writing.  IF you have any to donate to the class we would greatly appreciate it.  They could just be cheap glasses found at the $ store or glasses left over after a 3D movie.  I think the students would really get into their self-assessment if they had some writer's eye glasses to put on.  This week in writing the students were also given a writing partner.  We practiced what it looks like to share and plan with our partners.  Eventually, the students will be asked to revise and edit with their partners.  I plan to post the awesome display of our published pieces from our first unit soon.  So come back!!

Sharing our plans with our partner.

Sharing with our writing partner.

More sharing...

Going back and adding to her piece.  Can you see some of the editing she has done on her paper?

We learned about verbs this week.

Our class has currently donated 133 books to families in need through Scholastic's Paws for Reading  program.  Remember this program will run until December 14, 2012 so keep up the good work.  I'm anxious to see how many books our class alone can donate to needy families.  I plan to post our Paws for Reading bulletin board we have outside of our classroom soon.  The children are tracking the number of books they have donated by placing a paw on the board.  Come back soon to see this neat display of paws.