Poetry Notebook Fun and FREEBIE

Today was our 8th day of school and we fully ran Daily Five today!!!  I was so proud of my first graders!  

I think this may be the earliest I have ever felt like my kiddos could do it.  We used our Smart Board to make our choices and I had kids reading to self, reading to someone, word work-ing, and listening to reading all at the same time.  I've decided to wait on work on writing because I have so many kiddos that just aren't ready to be independent with that yet.  

Then, in the middle of our Daily Five greatness we had a fire drill!  I was working with a kiddo on his DRA when it went off and the sound of the alarm literally made me jump.  I think I totally scared my little kiddo!  Oops!!

Something else I have already implemented in our classroom are our poetry notebooks.  We had our kiddos bring 3 ring binders this year instead of using folders like I have in the past.  I used my *FREE* Poetry Notebook pack for our binder cover, table of contents page, and poetry log.

I gave my kiddos a cover and wrote their name on it which is covered by the crayon in the picture:

This next picture is the inside and I hate that it's upside down.  I changed it when I saved it to my computer, but when I uploaded it here it went upside down.  :(  If anyone knows how to fix this I would love to know how!!

The purple paper in the front pocket is the parent log.  My kiddos take their poetry notebooks home every Friday and read their poems over the weekend.  I don't require this, but I do highly encourage and reward it.  This encourages reading at home over the weekend without officially assigning homework.  Parents can sign the log one time each weekend.  I don't care if my kiddos read 1 poem or 20 poems.  Once the log is filled up my kiddos get Class Dojo points.  The green paper attached to it is just an explanation for parents.  

The yellow paper is their table of contents page.  We give each poem a page number and then we write the title and page number on the table of contents.  It helps keep us organized.  I gave my kiddos 3 copies of this page on the front and back because we fill up our notebooks with so many poems that I don't want to have to add more pages later.  

Each week I give my kiddos 2 poems (front and back).  The first one is usually a phonics or sight word poem.  The one below is for our -at word family.  I have a notebook full of poems, but this year I decided to retype them so that I could make the font bigger, add an illustration, and add a place for my kiddos to write the page numbers.  I'm loving this idea.  :)

The second poem this week was called My First Day since we just started school.  The second poem is usually about a holiday or content area.  I will be using one on tally marks soon as well as apples as we begin our apple unit.  I typed this one up too and added a place for my kiddos to illustrate a picture.  This kiddo drew her at her desk and me in front of the room.  :)

I love our poetry notebooks.  My kiddos read these all the time during Daily Five and when they finish their work early.  They also enjoy showing their families how well they can read on the weekends.  :)

You can download my *FREE* Poetry Notebook pack here to get started.  I didn't include any poems because I use ones I have in books or have found online.  I'm not creative enough to make my own or I would totally share them with you!!  :)

If you have any other suggestions or ideas for a poetry notebook, I would love to hear them!  I'm always looking for new ideas to help my kiddos read.  :)

To read about what causes rain, follow my Facebook Fan Page and see what one of my kiddos told me this week!  LOVE first graders!!  :)

Inside Recess Center Labels FREEBIE

We had an in-service today and it was split into 2 parts.  In the morning we had a local university professor who travels the country helping kiddos read fluently.  

His name is Dr. Tim Rasinski.  He has written many books and participated in a lot of reading research studies.  He was very inspiring.  The two biggest things I took away from his visit were I need to be singing and reading poetry with my kiddos EVERY. SINGLE. DAY. and that my kiddos need repeated readings whether it is reading with me, their parents, or listening to reading on tape/computer.  

He shared so many stories of increased reading performance in kiddos who were well below grade level through the use of poetry and repeated readings.  Of course there was more, but those were the biggies.  He was such a great speaker!  

In the afternoon we had another speaker and she talked to us about SLO's.  She came from a nearby county and gave us some much needed info.  After her visit I feel much better about creating these SLO's.  

All in all it was a gooood day!

I shared my inside recess centers with you last year, but I have now created signs to go with them.  You can see my last year's post here.  

Here is my Inside Recess Center Labels Freebie to help you with the long winter days of inside recess craziness.

Here is how it works in my room:

I have 7 inside recess centers.  Each group has 4 kiddos in it.  This is because I only have 4 computers.  I rotate the centers every day so they only get to each center every 7 days...this helps keep them from getting bored.  

I have a small pocket chart that I got at Target.  I have a picture card at the beginning of each line with four kiddos following.  The first kiddo in each group is the one who gets the recess center out of my cabinets and puts it back.  This keeps my 28 kids from gathering  at my back cabinet and not being able to move.  

Each center has a certain place in the room.  The first person gets their group's things and takes them to their group.  The rest of the group goes to their spot and waits.  I have a larger size picture card matching the one from the pocket chart in my recess cabinet so my kiddos know exactly what they are doing and where everything belongs. 

These centers cut down on the inside recess craziness.  Now they don't argue over what to do or who to play with and there is no arguing over who has to clean up and put the toys away.  

Inside recess is soooo much more tolerable with centers.  

I hope you can use this freebie and that inside recess doesn't drive you crazy anymore!  :)

Here's to a quick winter so we can get back to outside recess!!