Anchor Charts

Hello Happy Workshop Teachers!

I thought I would send out a post (this will be a topic I will revisit) talking about the many wonderful aspects and uses of the reading and writing workshop Anchor Chart. It has always been a staple in my teaching and it can also be a great independence builder for students during that independent portion of your workshop. It can also serve as an assessment tool if you set it up with student expectations or if you set it up like a continuum, where students can check their work against what you have created (most likely together) and posted as a reference. Here are just a couple of tips to making your anchor charts kid friendly, user friendly, and a meaningful workshop teaching tool!

Charts should be visual evidence of the current reading and writing work being done by the teacher and students in the classroom (this means that anyone should be able to walk into your classroom and know what students are learning in reading and in writing…it also gives you a visual reminder during conferencing with students)
Charts should be co-created within the context of one lesson or over a series of lessons
Adding a photo or picture or graphic can offer extra support for students (like…a picture of what a student’s writing paper will look like through each of the steps on the chart or an actual photograph of two children doing each of the steps on your “Partner Reading Process” chart or if you want to post an example of the kind of sticky note response you are looking for students to do…a student having some trouble can bring their sticky note to the chart to check to see if they are on track to reach that goal and if they are not they have a mentor text in front of them to help them get there)
Your anchor charts should be accessible to students throughout the day and especially during workshop time (therefore sometimes it is nice to take a small picture or make a smaller version of the chart for students to have at their tables, in their book boxes or baggies, or in their writing folders for them to be able to reference up close and personal)
At the end of a unit of study…”retire” your anchor charts to make room for the new ones…however if you find it is a chart that some of your students still need take a picture of it and give it to them or you could keep a binder with pictures of all of your “retired” anchor charts in plastic sleeves divided out by units. You can leave the binder out for students to reference or you could even take the binder along with you as you sit down to confer with students during reader’s and writer’s workshop.
RESOURCES: Of course Pinterest has MILLIONS of examples of reading and writing anchor charts (I too have spent hours lost in Pinterest land!!) but make sure, as I like to call it, you are going to “Pinterest with a Purpose”…what I mean by this is that you know what you want skills and strategies you want to teach students before going and looking…this way you won’t just find a cute chart that you want to remake even if it doesn’t exactly match what you are teaching, you will instead find a chart (or part of a chart) that can support what it is you want to teach because you have already identified that…you are navigating through Pinterest with a different lens
RESOURCES: The book Smarter Charts by Marjorie Martinelli and Kristine Mraz (two staff developers from Teacher’s College) is a great book to reference for anchor chart uses and ideas and helpful tips…it was written for K-2 however I think a lot of the information in the book can be helpful for all grades!

Hope this gives you some anchor chart inspiration!

Conferring During Launching

I am hoping these first couple of weeks have gone well with establishing routines and getting your readers and writers up and going! It is so exciting to walk into classrooms and see kids so focused on a book, building up their stamina and glancing in to see pencils furiously moving to get thoughts down on paper. Here are a couple of tips as you start to dig in and get to know your readers and writers during perhaps the most critical part of your workshop time: conferencing with students.

Reading

You are probably in the midst of doing assessments to get a diagnostic view of your students as readers and to check to make sure you can accurately get each of your kids into just right books. The other, very important, part of conferring during this launching unit is your chance to sit down with each of your kids to get to know them. One suggestion to make these conferences be a bit more powerful and purposeful is to think about the following:

have a list of questions that you want to ask each of your readers when you sit down with them…Like: Is there anything you want me to know about you as a reader? What would you say is best about you as a reader? What do you think you could use some help with? What kinds of books do you like to read?
if you have access to where they left off level wise at the end of their previous school year or if you have had a chance to assess them and get a current level, take a bin of books at their level, and maybe one level below, with you as you sit down to confer…this way as you are checking in on their just-right book choices if you find they are having some trouble in this area you have a bin of books right with you for them to choose from and they can do a just-right check right in front of you so you can coach them and strengthen this process
ask them to read a part they liked from the book they are reading and ask them to tell you why it was a good part for them

Writing

You may have done an on-demand assessment where you give your writers one workshop day and tell them to use all they know about good writing to write you a story of something that has happened to them or that they have experienced. Then you can collect this and look them over to see what you notice your writers already doing. This gives you some insight on where you can start with them as writers to help them move forward. You can also consider the following as you observe them and sit down with them as writers:

you could set up a checklist of “launching behaviors” that you want to look for as you support writers workshop…things like get’s started right away, focuses on one idea, can re-read writing, knows what to do when they think they are done, etc.
have your own writer’s notebook to take along with you as you sit down with kids so you can show them how you are a writer too and you can have entries in your notebook that match what it is you are asking your students to do (or in k-2 where you normally don’t have a writer’s notebook you could have a writing folder just like theirs and use it in a similar way)
have some mentor texts ready to go…it could be the ones you are using to teach from or other ones…that you have tabbed for places you can show students to help them keep their writing going or to spark a new story idea

Happy Conferring!

Mini-Lesson Tips

Hopefully you had a great first week setting up some very necessary classroom routines, especially in the areas of reading and writing workshop! As we move into week two it might be time to start thinking a little more carefully about our mini-lesson timing and language. Over the next couple of weeks your workshop will start to feel like a routine that has always been there and you will start to notice that you can begin to do more and more with your readers and writers! To help you do that, here is some helpful language to try to remember when planning and delivering your mini-lessons. Although time consuming, it is so helpful to write out your connection and your teaching point and make sure you have your teach and active engagement ready to go. Being prepared for your entire mini-lesson before delivering it means you can pay more attention to your students and be responsive to their needs instead of wondering about what you will say next or how you will engage them to try out the new skill you are presenting to them.

Mini-Lesson Language

Connection (the time to hook your readers/writers)

“I’ve been noticing…”
“I’ve been thinking about your reading/writing and…”
“Yesterday we talked about…”
“Yesterday I noticed…”
Start with a metaphor or a story to connect the new learning to…
END the connection with your teaching point: “Today I want to teach you…”

Teach (time to model what it is you are asking them to do as readers/writers, this is where YOU are teaching and your STUDENTS are listening)

“Watch me as I…”
“Did you see how I…”
“Let me show you what it looks like to…”
“Let me show you what I mean…”

Active Engagement

“Turn and talk about what you just observed me doing as a reader/writer…”
“Now it’s your turn. Listen to this next section of text and…”
“Let’s observe the next part of this text together, pay attention to what you notice the writer doing….”

Link (close up the lesson by renaming the teaching point)

“Readers/Writers you know so many ways to…”
“As you go back to your seats one of the things you might try as readers/writers is…”
“Today we learned…”
“Today I’d like you to…”

The four parts of your mini-lesson should be deliberate and well-thought out so that you can get the most out of your mini-lesson! Happy teaching!!

A Few Launching Tips

Tips to Launching the Reader’s Worksop…

For your students to be able to practice and get right into the independent reading portion of the reading workshop it is helpful to be prepared and there are many different ways you can do this: have some bins of books (really any books or magazines at, a little above or a little below where your kids should be coming in at reading level wise beginning of the year) ready to go, look at their spring reading level data and go down a level and pull some books for them to have in their book bins or baggies ready to go for them, for some of your older readers ask them to bring in the current chapter book they have been working on at home for the independent reading time for the first week, teach them how to choose just right books early on and be with them when they “shop” for their books to help monitor that the first time around
Have your students take the time to reflect on themselves as readers (you can even reflect on yourself too!) and have them practice setting small goals for themselves or as a class. Your stamina chart is great for this…set a class goal to up your stamina each day by one or two or even three minutes. Make sure you celebrate even the smallest of successes.

Tips to Launching the Writer’s Worksop…

The Teacher’s College Reading and Writing Project suggests that on day one of your unit, get a baseline assessment on your students’ abilities to write in that particular genre. This baseline will help guide your entry point into the unit and will help guide your instruction along the way. It will also be a great comparison tool to monitor growth in the writing abilities of your students. On the last day (or almost last day) you can do another similar assessment so you can compare the two pieces to check for growth and understanding and application of the unit goals
Give students a chance to personalize their writing notebook or writing folder. My son and I have had a blast going through pictures and stickers and magazines to find things to decorate his writing notebook with. I even got my own writing notebook out for him to see and we picked some things I could add to mine to help inspire some more writing. During the year kids can always add pictures or stickers to their notebooks or folders to keep the inspiration going. As the third grade narrative for launching the writing workshop reminds us: “Everything that a person sees, does, thinks and feels can remind us of stories we have to tell.”