Planning How to Logically Teach 5th Grade US History

I need to finish my second post on ideas for teaching dialogue.  The month of June is already flying by...

Today I was working on making Scopes and Sequences for next year for the different subjects I teach. While looking at our 5th Grade US History curriculum I noticed they covered most of the US History topics and then covered US regions at the end of the year.  I understand the logic behind this, but I find having an understanding of the differences of the climate and geography of each region better helps students understand US History and the way people adapted to new environments. I decided we are going to cover the regions at the beginning of the year and then start with the Jamestown and the Colonies after covering the regions.  I think we will plan "a road trip across the US" as we study the different regions.  Maybe we will make a little "travel scrapbook" or write entries for a pretend travel blog.

Time to teach Social Studies each week is always limited.  I also think I like the idea of using an interactive student notebook this year.  I tried it some last year, but it did not really work.  My students work at different levels and paces so we are not always doing the same thing.  I like the idea of interactive student notebooks where they incorporate more visual notetaking and have a creative output to show their learning.  I want my students to learn how to take notes and take ownership of it. I think if I take on interactive notebooks I will have to make some templates for them to use and put a detailed guideline of what to do on my class website. I am even playing with the idea of just doing the notebooks in a binder instead of a composition notebook since my students have to work a little more indepedently.  I like the idea that in a binder you can move things around if they accidently get put in the wrong spot.  I am thinking instead of left/right thinking for inputs and outputs we could just do like front and back of the page.

When studying the US regions, I also like to touch on the Native Americans of each region so students can understand that often many of the differences in various tribes was largely to do with the climate and natural resources of where they lived. I decided that while we are studying the regions in Social Studies, we will complete a unit in Language Arts on Native Americans.  My plan is to have us read either Native Americans myths, legends, fiction, or nonfiction each week to go with whatever region we are discussing.

Then I spent a lot of time today doing research on lessons on Native Americans, projects, and book lists of Children's Literature about Native Americans. The other day I read Hiedi Raki's post about how she used Livebinders to create student portfolios.  It reminded me I had not used Livebinders in a few months.  I have found Livebinders to be a fabulous way to collect research on different units I want to plan. Today I made a Livebinder for a Native American unit. You can see my livebinder below.  I am going to make a Livebinder for each major unit I plan to teach with collections of sites and ideas I come across in my research.


What are some of your favorite books to use when teaching about the Native Americans?  Do you have a favorite way you like to organize your approach to teaching US History?

Common Core Writing Lesson Ideas: Using Dialogue

I have been trying to sit down and write a blog post for 2 days.  Tuesday was my husband's birthday and yesterday we had dinner with out-of-town family.  On top of that I am trying to balance work this summer (I'm working all summer reviewing curriculum and doing summer school), working out every day, and my first class for my Doctoral program. This first summer session I am taking the introductory statistics class.  Luckily so far, I have found it really easy.  I am trying to sit down and make a list of what products for my store I want to finish this summer and a list of some blog post series. Many of my posts will probably focus on incorporating the Common Core skills into the Content Areas.  I also want to start gathering lesson ideas for the Common Core Writing and Language Standards.

One of the skills my students have always struggled with when doing Narrative writing whether they were Middle School or Elementary students is how to use dialogue.  When using dialogue, students have to consider rules of punctuation, characterization, and paragraphing.  Using dialogue correctly is a higher level writing skill. (Using dialogue falls under CCSS Writing Standard 3 (Narrative Writing) part B at most of the grade levels.

This year I would like to spend a little more time on how to use dialogue.  Thus, I decided to search Pinterest and the internet for ideas on teaching dialogue.

Writing Fix has a couple lessons on dialogue. Here are some links:

http://writingfix.com/right_brain/Serendipitous_Dialogue_Scene1.htm

http://www.writingfix.com/Picture_Book_Prompts/GoodDogCarl3.htm

http://writingfix.com/Chapter_Book_Prompts/TomSwift3.htm

http://www.writingfix.com/Picture_Book_Prompts/webfiles3.htm

The last lesson is the one I wanted to use with my student's this year as a review of dialogue and I ran out of time. It uses the book The Web Files. 

We did a unit on mysteries, so I thought this would be a cute lesson to incorporate with mysteries.  They write a dialogue to describe the facts of a crime (sort of like the old show Dragnet.)

...So, now I return to this post several hours later after bootcamp, walking the dog, dinner, and a shower. When I find a ton of great resources, they tend to turn into really long posts and take forever to write.  Sometimes there are so many great things to share.  So I think I am going to have to sometimes split a topic over a couple days so I can share lots of things with you without the post getting way too long.

If you have followed me for awhile, you know I love all things Read Write Think.  Here are a couple links to some lessons on dialogue from Read Write Think that look great:

http://www.readwritethink.org/classroom-resources/lesson-plans/choosing-clear-varied-dialogue-291.html

http://www.readwritethink.org/classroom-resources/lesson-plans/character-clash-minilesson-paragraphing-117.html

Last for today, but certainly not least is a freebie on dialogue from Miss Nannini.  I can promise you this little unit is getting printed out and put in my Common Core Language Arts binder under dialogue. If you click on the picture below, you can go see her blog post about this freebie.

 

What are some of your favorite lessons and ideas to teach dialogue?  I always like to have students look at their own books they are reading to help them see how dialogue is organized and punctuated.  I have always found it resonates with them when they see examples in their own books.

Fractured Fairy Tales: Text Suggestions for Little Red Riding Hood

So one of my goals this summer is to finish all of the products that I started this year and only finished about 50-70% of the way through.  One of the units I really enjoyed this year was studying Fractured Fairy Tales.  Fractured Fairy Tales are such a fun way to challenge students to think creatively and practice all of their comprehension skills. There are so many ways you can use Fractured Fairy Tales to meet the CCSS. Here is a link to a post I did earlier in the year on Fractured Fairy Tales with a freebie story map for fractured fairy tales.

Today I have a couple text suggestions for you for doing Fractured Fairy Tales with Little Red Riding Hood.  Aaron Frisch has written a new book called The Girl in Red with illustrations by Roberto Innocenti. 

The Girl in Red is a new version of Little Red Riding Hood that takes place in modern day in a large urban city.  The illustrations are beautiful, but have a dark undertone.  I would use this picture book with either grades 4-5 or even Middle School.  I actually think this would make a fabulous mentor text to use with Middle School or even High School.  The way the illustrations are drawn it alsmost reminds of me of graphic novels. You could have your students make a graphic novel version of a fractured fairy tale.

If you haven't really explored the Common Core Exemplar Texts, there are some fabulous texts on there. You can click here to get a copy of the Appendix B from Common Core State Standards website.

One of the Common Core Exemplar Texts for Grades 4-5 is Little Red Riding Hood and the Wolf by Roald Dahl. In this narrative poem version of Little Red Riding Hood the little girl shoots the wolf at the end.  This poem would also open the door to getting your students to explore the idea of writing a poetic version of a fairy tale. I read this poem with my students this year and they loved it.  I had wanted to use the poem again but never got around to it. The poem comes from Roald Dahl's book Revolting Rhymes, which are all somewhat naughty versions of fairy tales. 

After Revolting Rhymes was written, some short videos were made of the poems.  You can find them on Youtube.  Here is the video for "Little Red Riding Hood and the Wolf."



Dahl also has another book called Vile Verses.

I would look through the books carefully before handing them out to your students.  Some of the fractured fairy tale poems in the books probably are not the most appropriate choices for lower grades, but there really are some great fractured fairy tales with a lot of humor. Both of these books would be great sources of text for Grades 5-8 for a unit on Fractured Fairy Tales.

Another great text source for a unit on fractured fairy tales is the book Newfangled Fairy Tales by Bruce Lansky.

Hope you have a great weekend!

Common Core in the Content Areas: Charley the Female Stagecoach Driver

Following our thematic unit on biomes, we spent the last couple weeks of school focusing on Westward Expansion.  As the last couple weeks are always hectic and filled with last minute items we forgot to do, I did not have as much time with this unit as I wanted. I wanted to have them do a web quest on different locations on the Oregon Trail and write a journal as a pioneer moving west.  The other thing I really wanted to do was one more read aloud.

While reviewing the novel units earlier this year at www.readworks.org, I came across a book called Riding Freedom by Pam Munoz Ryan.

It sounded like a great book and since Readworks already had a free novel unit to go with it I thought it would be perfect.  The novel is an easy read that is only about a 127 pages. It would be perfect to read with grades 3-5 as the chapters are short (which also makes for a great read aloud). The book is about Charley Parkhurst, who was an orphan girl who disguises herself as a boy to become a stagecoach driver. The historical fiction novel is based on a real story. As the Gold Rush commences, Charley moves West with some other stagecoach drivers to find opportunity.  She ends up losing an eye in an accident and still is able to drive a stagecoach with one eye.  She disguised herself as a man most of her life and built a reputation as one of the best stagecoach drivers in California.  She was the first woman to vote in California (even though she really voted under the pretense of a man.)

In order to integrate this book with Common Core, you could compare settings in the novel, you could discuss theme, you could look at Charley's development throughout the novel, and you could also discuss point of view in the novel. Readworks does a great job with their novel units of emphasizing the CCSS.  You could choose to write an informative essay about the life of Charley Parkhurst or stagecoach drivers.  Students could write a persuasive essay about whether or not women in the West should get the right to vote.  They could write their own narrative inspired by the story.

Another great book on Charley to pair with Riding Freedom is Rough, Tough Charley by Verla Kay.  This biographical picture book includes the story of Charley's life but is told in poetic verse.

This would be a great book to pair because you could discuss any differences in details about her life between the two.  You could also compare and contrast the portrayal of Charley.  Rough, Tough Charley would be a fabulous book to discuss narrative poetry.  I love the idea of even having students write a biographical poem of a historical figure.

I hope you are having a great start to summer.  I look forward to being able to get back into a blogging routine now that the end of the school year is over.

Slept, Read, Shopped, and Got Accepted

So...I have not blogged in almost 3 weeks.  I apologize for the absence.  I had been in a great routine in the month of April. I was eating great, exercising like 5 days a week, blogging, etc.  Then, I got sick and the routine got thrown off.  Yeah, then I just realized I was tired and had been running on empty.

In the month of May, I have slept and read a lot and just tried to push through to the end of the year.  The weekend before last I had a great time with my Big Sister from Big Brothers Big Sisters.  We celebrated our 17 year anniversary since we got matched.  She has been an amazing part of my life since I was 12. (It really is a fabulous organization that changes lives.) We had a lot of fun in Fredericksburg. We shopped at the trade days and visited some wineries. I bought a dresser for $85!  It looks great in my dining room with my farm table (that I love).

Memorial Day Weekend was very relaxing.  I got to go to the Taylor Swift concert. She is really amazing, but I felt like other than the moms of Tweens I was the oldest person there. I visited with the in-laws some and slept a lot. The house got cleaned, and I read about 4 books this weekend.  I kept thinking about blogging or grading, but then went back to reading.

I also spent a lot of time in May trying to get all of my application requirements in to apply for a PhD program in Educational Psychology. I saw this on Pinterest and thought it was hilarious.

I found out last Thursday that I have been admitted to a PhD program in Educational Psychology with an emphasis in Gifted and Talented Education at the University of North Texas. I start in the Fall for sure, but I hope to even take a class or two this summer. I will still be teaching and just working on my PhD part-time.  I am excited to see how my classes and research inspire my teaching and blog posts.  So stay tuned - I promise I really do blog regularly.

Mother's Day and Writing Motivation

Just for fun I realized today is my 200th post.  Have you ever had one of those days that would have been stressful if so much of it wasn't just funny?  That was my day...  It did end with happy hour though. 

I still need to have my students do something for Mother's Day.  One of my favorite lessons I have done for Mother's Day is from www.writingfix.com.  The lesson is to write poems modeled after the book I Love You the Purplest. You can read the lesson, download handouts, and also download student samples for the lesson here. Students write a poem about their moms using color to describe them and what they associate with that color.

Sabra had a cute suggestion to make word clouds for moms and then mount them on scrapbook paper.  We are definitely going to do this.  We will also make cards.  I am going to give them a large envelope to put their word cloud, poem, and card in.  They can decorate the envelope.

I have a freebie in my store to make Mother's Day coupons, awards, and cards. I usually have my students write their moms a thank you letter.

Today is also Workshop Wednesday.  The topic is how to motivate your students to write.  Here are a few things I have found to be pretty successful.

1) Allow students to type when possible -  Many of my students have been more successful typing than when they have to handwrite. (We do still handwrite though as well).

2) Give students choice  -  I love love RAFT (Role Audience Format Topic).  It is a fabulous way to get kids writing, use higher order thinking, and allow for structured choice.

3)  Model your thinking -  I have mentioned this before, but I have seen more growth from my students when I model my own writing than even just through using mentor texts.  Students like knowing that you write, too.  It helps to see how writing really works.

4) Choose random points of view - My students get so excited about writing from the point of view of small animals or random objects.  Why be a pilgrim on the Mayflower when you could be a rat on the Mayflower observing everything?  Why not describe light from the point of view of a shadow? Why not describe the setting of a book from an object located in the setting? 

5) Allow students to write with a partner - My students love writing together or swapping journals and finishing each other's stories.  I have a couple students who have decided to start a daily comic together (that actually gets made like a couple days every other week, but they enjoy it).

These are the things that come to mind most when I try to remember what motivates my students to write.  I am off now to see if I can find some scrapbook paper and envelopes for Mother's Day projects. 

Biomes, Adaptations, and the Magic School Bus. Oh, my!

I realize I have not posted in a week.  I came down with a cold last Tuesday night, and since then it has taken all my energy to get through a work day and then go home and nap.  I also slept the entire weekend.  Apparently, this cold told me I needed rest.  I am ready to get back into my workout routine and even get back to blogging, etc.

I guess for this week, I am going to say my Tried It Tuesday is a thematic unit. We have been studying biomes in Science and English the last couple weeks, and so far it has been one of my favorite things we have done all year.  We have used lessons from Science, we have done a webquest, we have done projects, and we have done a lot of reading nonfiction.  I have been creating handouts to review all of the nonfiction Common Core Reading Standards while they read their book. We will do a major informational report next week after all of their research and reading for some more writing.  (Hopefully in the next couple days I will have a whole Biome research unit to post in my TpT store.  I am almost done with it.)  After this, we will spend the last couple weeks of school immersed in Westward Expansion.  I found it was too hard to do the Westward Expansion and Biome activities, so I decided to just focus on each for a couple weeks.

This is our last week of studying biomes. It really has been a fun unit.  I have loved watching my students practice their nonfiction reading skills, research skills, and the creativity they have shown.
For their final project on the unit, I gave them a menu of options. Their projects are due next Monday.  One of my students made a commercial for his biome (the temperate Deciduous forest) using iMovie.  You can click here to view the video. One of my goals this summer is to play with iMovie and Garage Band more to think of fun ways to use them next year.

Yesterday, we were talking about adaptations.  They spent some time reading their nonfiction biome books and looking for at least 5 plants with descriptions of the plant and the adaptations.  They had to make a 2 column chart.  You can see a picture of mine below. I usually try and do some of the same assignments they are doing.  I am reading about Grasslands and Prairies.



Then, we watched the Magic School Bus episode "All Dried Up."  The episode talks about adaptations and conditions in the desert.  In the episode, Arnold who is usually terrified of field trips is prepared for once.  He has created a field trip survival guide and survival kit.  I thought this was an awesome idea and felt totally inspired. Here is a copy of the episode:



My students are still reading and taking notes in their books about adaptations.  Tomorrow they are reading about animal adaptations. They will be creating their own field trip survival guides for their biome (just like Arnold did in the Magic School Bus episode).  I made a little booklet for them to fill out.  You can get a copy here.

Arnold made one for the desert, but each student will make their own guide for the biome they have been studying.

Today the students had to make a habitat for a polar bear that lives in a zoo in Arizona.  They had to create a model of their habitat and write a paragraph about it.  They had the option of drawing it, designing it on the computer, or trying to make it 3D.  Most of them opted to make it out of paper. This is one of my favorite student made polar bear habitats:



Make sure you check out Holly's 500 Follower Giveaway.  There are so many prizes, I got tired reading them all!  I am contributing $15 to my TpT store.

Like everybody else, my TpT store is on sale for 20% off today and tomorrow.  If you enter the code, TAD13, you can save up to 28% off.  What are your favorite thematic units for upper grades?