Ask Me About Thursday October 29, 2015

Our day started with a big surprise!  Mrs. Kanter brought in McGruff the police dog to say good morning to us.  McGruff brought each child a special gift too!  Ask me to show you what McGruff left for us!  I grabbed my camera as fast as I could and got a few pictures.   

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We thought on our own about this quote, then did a Turn and Talk with a partner and talked about whether we agreed with the quote, and why or why not.  We had a good discussion about trying new things, making mistakes, and sometimes having things not turn out like you wanted them to.  At the end of the discussion we all agreed that mistakes are good, however it's easier said than felt for some kids, so we do have a big reminder in our room that reads "Mistakes Allowed Here!"  We followed up on this idea by reading the book Ish, by Peter Reynolds.  This book is about a young boy who loves to draw.  His drawings don't turn out as he wants them to, and when his big brother asks what he drew, Ramon gives up and throws away his drawing.  In fact he throws away many pictures.  But his sister Marisol has been collecting his pictures and has hung them all over her room.  Ask me to tell you what Marisol told Ramon about his pictures.
We continued to talk about making mistakes in Writing Workshop today as we edited.  Young writers are fragile, and like everything we do, we try to build on what they can do.  So today we looked at their writing from yesterday and tried to make it better by fixing it up.  For now, my expectation is for most of our writers is that they have a picture that matches their words.  I know that many children are just beginning to read and write, so it is not my expectation that they will be spelling correctly or should fix up every word.  For now, I expect the word wall words we have been practicing are spelled correctly.  Please understand that some children may not realize the word we are practicing is the same word they are saying because they may not be saying it correctly yet.  A good example of this is the word "the."  There are children who pronounce it "da" so it hasn't sunk in yet that it is the same word we have been practicing in our word work.  The other expectation is that they will be putting spaces between their words.  As we move on in our instruction, the expectations will change.  For those students who are reading fluently, we will work more with fixing up spelling errors.  
We also read a funny poem about pumpkins today.  The poem is about why it's a good thing pumpkins grow on the ground.  Ask me to show you the poem and my two drawings that show what the poem was about. 
We had a fire drill today.  I know it's bragging, but I can't help it; our class was awesome.  They came out quickly, lined up quietly and stood quietly.  No one was looking for siblings or talking.  They waited patiently on the playground until the other classes returned to the building and were still quiet.  Mrs. Oglesby gave them a big compliment about how well they did.  The only thing we need to fix up is remembering to shut our outside door.  All our writing workshop papers from my desk blew all over the room while we were gone!  Sadly, we lost two.  You might see them floating around the neighborhood if you live close!
I hope to see you tomorrow at the Halloween parade and party.  I promise lots of pictures in case you aren't able to come!  


Have a nice evening!
​Juliet