Daily 5 Summer Book Study: Chapter 2

I'm back! And only a day late for my book study. :)Thank you to Brenda over at Primary Inspired for hosting this book study!  Ciera from Adventures in Room 129 is hosting the linky for this chapter. Chapter two is surprisingly packed with some great information. When I first read the title of the chapter: Our Core Beliefs, I admit I thought it would be a fluffy chapter. I was wrong. This chapter is essential in understanding how and why the Daily 5 works.  

Here are the Sisters "core beliefs": 

(Boushey, Gail and Moser, Joan. The Daily 5. page 22-23)

This really hit home for me. I wondered, Do I trust my kids? Or maybe a better question is, Do I show my students that I trust them?  I know I do a great job of treating my students with respect, but maybe I need to show that I respect them by giving them more responsibility and setting my expectations higher. They are capable of so much. I admit, I've done Daily 5 but not traditionally. I've always mixed it with centers, which is totally cheating and not the point. It always worked really well for me because I felt like it was a good mix. I have to admit, that I didn't trust that my students could handle it for the whole reading block. 

(Boushey, Gail and Moser, Joan. The Daily 5. page 24)

Setting the tone in your classroom is essential from day one. Creating that classroom environment that is supportive, positive, and kind has always been so important to me. In this chapter the Sisters talk about allowing kids to help each other by holding them accountable. This is the part that I know I've failed at. In my experience, kids are very sensitive when another student corrects them or redirects them. "You're not the boss of me!" What I've been reflecting on since I read this chapter is, How can I create an environment where kids can help each other in a positive way?  My students have always been very good at encouraging each other. It's just that they usually don't like when  a peer "tells them what to do." I'd love to hear your ideas on this one!

(Boushey, Gail and Moser, Joan. The Daily 5. page 25)

I would agree with this 100%. Kids love to have choices. I do think it also develops a sense of responsibly. It is scary to let go. One thing I've done wrong in the past is not spent enough time teaching my desired behaviors. That leads to choice time being more hectic than it needs to be. When I spent more time teaching procedures, expectations, and routines so that my students knew exactly how to behave, introducing choice went much more smoothly. Helping kids realize the responsibility that comes with that choice is key. It doesn't end there though. I definitely had my fair share of "conferences" with students who needed help with making choices or just needed to see the consequences of their choices. 

Here is a super old, blurry, dark picture of my Daily 5 board:

I didn't make those signs and have no idea where I found them! I 'm so sorry to the creator! Since then, I've made my own but I only had this super old picture. EEK! Kids would put their pictures on under the section to show what they would be doing during Daily 5. 

(Boushey, Gail and Moser, Joan. The Daily 5. page 28)

This really stood out to me. It's not just the fact that students are accountable for their choices and actions, but we as teachers are also help accountable. This goes back to what I was talking about earlier. We are accountable for how well we teach our students. They do need to know how each task should look, feel, and sound during Daily 5. It's important to remember we need to be help accountable, too. How many times have you gotten frustrated and complained about a lesson gone wrong or a students who were doing something wrong. Well... maybe it wasn't the kids. Maybe we didn't hold up our end of the teaching/learning bargain...

Here are some ways that I help students accountable when I taught first grade (warning, these pictures are old and dark.)

 

I glued these sheets into their reading notebooks. I taught them to record the title of the book they were reading and date. (They didn't have to fill this out every day if they were continuing a book from the day before.) I would often take time to have the class pull out their notebooks and celebrate their reading logs. 

Here's an updated version:

I had something similar for writing notebooks. It just has the month, a picture and that tab. Here is a picture of a writing notebook with the tabs. It was a quick and easy way to see how much they were writing in a month. 

Here's the updated version:

You can read more about these notebooks in this old post from 2012! 

OR you could get these updates notebook tabs here:

(Boushey, Gail and Moser, Joan. The Daily 5. page 31)

I love brain research. I have three books on my reading list this summer that have to do with brain research and teaching/learning/reading. I love that sisters take a lot of research into account when creating this model. I was super surprised with the research from Ken Wesson. Since we teach little ones, we are looking at 5-8 minutes of real focus time. This is so true though. We've all seen those glossed over looks. The sisters have taken this research and created their Daily 5 model with short, focused lessons between each rotation. It all makes sense now! Remember in my last post when I mentioned that I got sloppy with teaching mini-lessons between each rotation? Ahh! I was missing this great opportunity! 

(Boushey, Gail and Moser, Joan. The Daily 5. page 32)

I'll admit. I'm afraid of transitions. They go really well most of the time when your class is trained, but sometimes someone throws a curveball. Even though I've mostly figured out how to have successful transitions, I still have that lingering fear from my earlier years where transitions were a hot mess. Ha! Now that I do reading pull-out and I only have 4-6 kids at a time, I actually do TONS of transitions during my 30-45 minute groups. I find that it really helps my students. The transitions are super short. Sometimes it's just moving to a different place in the room. Sometimes it's changing gears and cleaning up some materials and doing a little brain break. So it made me smile when I read how transitions are actually helpful with

Daily 5. Transitions really are beneficial for our kids. I know when I'm working on something (like this super long blog post,) I get up a ton for snacks, a drink, a bathroom break, etc. Then I hop back in my chair and feel refreshed. Makes sense, right? Now what I need is tips on how to make these transitions smooth as possible. One thing I know for sure is that these transitions need to be modeled, practiced, and practiced some more.

So there you have it folks! Chapter 2. Head on over to my friend Ciera from Adventures in Room 129 to see what everyone else is saying about chapter 2. The linky to other blogs is there! :)