Ruby Arrives

In the last few days during read aloud a new character joined Ivan at the Exit 8 Big Top Mall.  Ruby is the new baby elephant brought to sell more tickets.  I hope that ours students are talking about this book with you at home.  The book is really starting to pick up pace and I think the students are starting to enjoy the book a bit more than before.

Today we took our claim card that now contained the students first claim and three pieces of evidence to support their claim and started to write.  Before I let the students go, I let the students grade me as I wrote my claim about going back to school.  To grade me I handed out a criteria list for the students.  We talked about how a criteria list can be used to grade almost anything.  To prove the point we made a criteria list for chocolate chip cookies and grilled cheese.  Once I thought the class understood the idea of a criteria list I wrote.  I thought I did a nice job but I am biased.

The students have a copy of this Back to School Criteria List that they can use to help them as they put together this first claim.  Hopefully you can find this criteria list and their actual claim in their writing folder.  The criteria list as I explained to the class is going to be what I use to assess the students writing.

And now I get to talk about the conversation calendars that we started this week.  I love conversation calendars.  After reading time each day this week and next week, students will have a conversation with me about their reading.  This conversation is done on paper.  Students tell me about their thinking as they read and then I take the paper home and respond to what the students are telling me about their books.

The conversation calendars allow me to have five conferences with each student in a two week period.  One week the students will respond to me on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday and then the following week they will respond on Tuesday and Thursday.  The calendars also allow me to see how the students are using the thinking strategies we are discussing in class during their reading time.

These conversation calendars will come home the Friday after we finish the two week cycle, so keep an eye out for them in the Friday Folders.  You can also talk to our students about what they are talking to me about on these conversation calendars.