The Power of Post-its and a Valentine's Freebie

We have been working on asking questions before, during, and after reading various texts.  I used the Comprehension Toolkit for an awesome lesson on questioning.  I cannot say enough wonderful things about this reading toolkit…it really gets my kiddos engaged in nonfiction texts. 

First, I read a nonfiction magazine which was included in the toolkit.  Students had two columns of sticky notes on their clipboards.  They had 2 post-its to write down “what they learned,” and two for “what they wonder.”  It’s amazing what the power of post-its can do!  As soon as I pass them out my kiddos get sooo excited! You can see how hard they were working sitting in different places throughout the classroom.  I often allow my students to sit at various places in the room (where I can see them of course) to really be able to think by themselves.

We met back at the carpet once I was finished reading the magazine and stopping for students to write on their post-its before, during, and after the text. Students then had a chance to share with the class what they learned and what they wondered. It is so neat to see my kiddos write their comments in complete sentences. What a difference from the beginning of the year to now!

We have also been working on counting money.  I just love when we get to this unit! So….I have created a Valentine’s Day money freebie that can be used as pre-test, post-test or simply just for practicing money.  There are three differentiated levels for counting money.  Students are to write the two values on the lines and then compare the amounts using >, < or =.  I hope you can use it with your kiddos!

Fiction or Non-Fiction?

This post is going to be short and sweet. We have our Fall Festival tomorrow night and I still need to get some last minute things done!

We have been working really hard  (Ok....I've been DRILLING) the difference between fiction and non-fiction. My kiddos have been doing great with this concept this year....until we discussed the difference between realism and fantasy. Now, when I ask what type of story we are reading I either get 'fantasy' or 'non-fiction'. So I decided to create a simple flow-chart to help my kids. It's nothing fancy, but hopefully it will get the point across. 

Think you might be able to use this in your room? Click on the picture to download. Leave us a comment below and share how you teach the difference between these various types of stories.

 

Non- Fiction Text Features

As many of us know, kids tend to struggle more with reading and comprehending non-fiction texts as opposed to fiction text. Because of this, we drill and drill and drill non-fiction text-features in second grade. We are finally at that point in the year where it is time to start discussing various text features little by little. I was racking my brain this week with some innovative ways to introduce our first handful of text features. Here is what I came up with:

First, I used these fabulous posters to quickly intro our text features for this week (table of contents, photographs and captions).

(If this is yours please let me know so I can give you credit. I'm not sure where we found these!)

Then we all pulled out our reading books and started looking for these features throughout our story.

Once we found some examples, I broke my kids intro groups of three. Using a post-it note, they had to write the text feature they were given, draw an example of it, and tell how that specific text feature helps us as readers. See our anchor chart below:



In the past I have found that my kids have been really good at identifying each text feature but have a hard time identifying its 'job' (as I call it). This year I'm really pushing for them to be able to understand how to use the text feature. 

Finally, after we have completed the anchor chart together, they will get to fill the corresponding page to their Non-Fiction Features Notebook. This will be kept in their Daily 5 folder to be used as a reference all year.

(If this is yours please let me know so I can give you credit. I'm not sure where we found this either!)

Have you seen or heard of this?

This is The Comprehension Toolkit

They have a separate book for various comprehension strategies that is complied with various lessons on that topic. There are even a few lessons on non-fiction text features. Our kids really look forward to these lessons. I think most of it is due to the fact that they freqently get to use post-its but -hey- who doesn't get excited about post-its?!

We would love to hear how you teach non-fiction text features in your classroom!