Valentine, Valentine, What do you see? Lots of Freebies waiting for me!

I love Valentine's Day and giving my grand kids lots of cute cuddly stuffed animals. My birthday is only 3 days later so I usually get roses on my birthday instead of Valentine's Day. (They are usually 50% off after Valentine's Day) There are so many wonderful books to read and free resources that I found to share with you. Let's start with some great books for Read Alouds. You can find a great list on Amazon by clicking on the images below. Students will love Gilbert's Funny poems in the book by Diane de Groat. I loved reading "Valentine Mice" to my ESL students. It was a great book for acting out and teaching verbs.

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Looking for some free valentine's crafts to make? How about this Candy Bear Paper Craft. Get all the directions by clicking on the image below. There are lots of other craft ideas to check out as well.

How about ideas for Valentine's Day cards. I found the one below at Education.com. You can download the  activity and find lots more ideas to make your Valentine's week lots of fun for your students.

You can find poems and fun activities and party ideas at apples4theteacher as well as DLTK. Well if that's not enough I have a few of my own to share with you. If you read my post on Readers Theater  2 days ago you saw my very first Readers Theater script called "The Symbols of Valentine's Day" for Grades 2-3 which you can check out my clicking on the picture below and my "Valentine's Edition of Making Sentences with Sentence Frames" for Grades 1-2.

Finally a freebie Valentine's Day gift from me to all of you. Just click on image below to download your freebie!

Hope it is a fun-filled Valentine's Week for you and your students! Thanks for all you do to make a difference for you students.

What is your favorite Valentine's Day activity?

Vocabulary Matters: Part 5: Strategies for Independent Reading Grades 2+

Last week we focused on "When to teach the Targeted Words" and "How many words to target during the Read Aloud and Independent Reading."  (Click HERE  if you missed it.)  This week I am focusing on Strategies for Independent Reading Texts for Grades 2+.  (click on the image below to download your Strategies for Independent Reading Document which includes all the images below)

The picture above reviews Part 4 - Pre-Reading Strategies. However for those of you with struggling readers or ESL students you may want to add the following graphic organizers to give them more practice with word engagement. 

  Word /Concept Maps

Vocabulary Word Webs

You can make copies of these for your students so that they can refer to them when they are reading their texts. Then use the After Reading Strategies to help develop In-Depth Knowledge of  targeted words.

It is very important to provide instructional activities after reading the text to get your students involved in using and thinking about the words and their meanings.  There are several different activities to choose from depending on the ability level of your students. When doing whole class activities I like to make sure that I can informally assess all of my students so I like to do "thumbs up" or "Thumbs down" with True/False Questions.  You can also use my "Whole Group Participation Cards" which you can download for free by clicking HERE.  You can use a Multiple Choice Quiz or Cloze Activity as a  formal assessment.  In case you missed any of the 1st 4 Parts you can click below:

Part 1

Part 2

Part 3

Part 4

I hope this was helpful and found a strategy that you will try with your students. Hope you will visit again next week for Part 6. Thanks for all you do to make a difference for your students.

Which of these strategies will you incorporate in your vocabulary instruction?

February is for Fun, Free Poetry!

Have you tried having your students write a "How to Be...." Poem? February is a great month for writing them because we read lots of books about animals, especially groundhogs, and teach about animals in winter. It's simple to do. Start with your Read Aloud.

Before reading give each student a copy of the note taking sheet below. While you are reading, students can write facts or verbs they hear. After reading, students can share their facts and make a class list on the board.

Then circle the verbs and create 6 phrases starting with each verb about the animal. Here is an example below:

Now students can use the sheet below to write their own about other animals. How fun to share them and put them in a class poetry book.

If you click on the "How to be a Skunk" Poem above you can download your free copy of "Writing a How to Be ...Poem" described above.

February is a fun month full of so many holidays. I loved creating poems for Groundhog Day, Valentine's Day, Presidents Day and Black History month and added this "How to Be..." Poem to  to my "Fluttering Through February with Poems" Packet.  It includes 6 poems, a fun Mini Poem Book, "Valentine, valentine, What do you see?", and Writing activities to teach students about these February holidays. Just click on the image below to download the preview file and you may find another free poem when you do.

Hope it's a fun February for everyone. Thanks for all you do to male a difference for your students.

What kinds of poems do your students enjoy?

Vocabulary Matters: Part 4: When to Teach Targeted Words

Last week was a critical week "How to Teach the Targeted Vocabulary Words" with step by step instructions- so if you missed it you can read it and download the files by clicking here. 

This week is about When to Teach the Targeted Vocabulary in Grades K-6:

                                                        click on image to download
K-2 teachers do Read Alouds as part of their daily routine. Did you ever think about targeting specific words when doing Read Alouds? I hadn't thought about it either until I saw Anita Archer demonstrate it during a workshop and I had one of those AHA moments. 

Here is a wonderful demonstration of Anita Archer doing a Kindergarten Read Aloud and introducing the Specific Tier 2 Vocabulary words for instruction. Just click on the image above to see the whole video-Vocabulary Instruction Kindergarten. What did you think? Hopefully it will give you some ideas when doing your next read aloud. (Don't forget to check the Dale-Chall list to see if they are Tier 2 words)

You can find other great documents from her by clicking HERE 

Wondering about how many words to target for explicit instruction? Here is a great chart to help you from my Vocabulary Handbook. I found this so helpful when teaching content text material. It is better to teach 8-10 words where students will be exposed many times and in different contexts to help them truly understand them than to try to teach too many and they may only understand a few. I know that it's not always easy to narrow the number of words but with practice it will get easier and easier.

                                          click on image to download
I hope this was helpful and you will use some of the strategies I have shared today and during the first 3 parts. If you missed any of the previous parts you can  read Part 1, Part 2 and Part 3. Hope to see you next week!!
Thanks for all you do to make a difference for your students.