Interactive Notebooking

Interactive Notebooks...Who has started?  Whose district has required it?  Or who is doing them on their own?  Why the surge of interactive notebooking for students?  From what I've read, research shows it fosters creativity, organization, and independent thinking.  Who doesn't want that for their students?  I personally like them because they serve as great review tools, they are of high interest to my students, and students take total ownership in their learning!  Let's face it, some topics don't lend themselves to "hands on" learning.  Interactive notebooks ARE hands on no matter what topic you're teaching.  What they are NOT, is students listening to a lecture and taking notes (insert high school and college flashbacks here).  They're called interactive for a reason, right?  

Students are DOING.  So what are they doing?  They are cutting, bending, folding, coloring, drawing, labeling, creating, writing to explain, and quite simply "showing what they know." It goes without saying that if your students can explain it, they KNOW it!  My students have been "notebooking" for 3 years now.  They WE get a little better each year.  I also try to tackle a little more each year.  I started with ONE Social Studies unit my first year.  (Geography)  The following year I added another S.S. unit. (Government)  This past year I added Economics and am now full throttle with math notebooking. (addition/subtraction, numeracy, money, multiplication, division, fractions, geometry, etc.)  They are available as individual units or cheaper all bundled up.  I'm still creating and adding!


 The few things that stand out about notebooking with my kids is 1.) They love it!   2.)  They have no choice but to be organized!   3.)  Their parents love it because their child IS organized and has access to all of their notes in ONE place.  4.) They are retaining the information better!  (Test scores are climbing!)  5.)  It has helped ME get organized AND more excited about teaching some topics that could normally be considered "boring" or "difficult" to teach.
I'd love to say there was some magic road map that helped me start at point A with interactive notebooks, but there wasn't.  A lot of it was trial and error (and continues to be a work in progress)!! But I would say that the place to start is the curriculum.
A.  Know what you're responsible for teaching and teach it in a way that your students can respond to it!
B.  Get familiar with foldables!  There's nothing MORE FUN than folding paper in a variety of ways to motivate your students into getting information down!
C.  Let go!  You'll be amazed at how creative your students will be if you let them.  TRUE STORY:  I was using the Government interactive notebook template that I created with my students and there's a picture of an old scroll in there.  Students were to cut it out and glue it in their notebooks and add some of the rights we as American citizens have in our country.  I was monitoring their progress when I noticed a student wadding his scroll up.  My first thought was "That little STINKER..." (and I won't go any further with that).  When I asked him what he was doing, he informed me that he was making his scroll look OLD (like the REAL Bill of Rights image we had just seen).  Not only that, but when he was finished making it look 'old,' he wrote some of the rights he had learned, rolled it up to look like a real scroll, and asked me for a piece of ribbon so he could tie it like a real scroll.  :-) He wanted to "QUIZ" his parents about some of our American rights and let them unroll the scroll when he got home in his notebook to see if they were right.

Need some additional interactive notebook ideas?  Try this INB LINKY!    What have you tried?  Success stories you'd like to share?  We'd love to hear! 






NEW to the Interactive Notebooking Party....GRAMMAR GATORS!  Learning about the parts of speech is full of some Super Hero fun!  

Bananas for writing to explain, so you can truly tell "THEY'VE GOT IT!"

Fall Sale Blog Hop...Swing on in!

Happy Saturday!  The weather was cooler this week in Tn.  It's actually beginning to feel like fall in the mornings and evenings!  I can't think of a better way to celebrate than with a fall sale!  Join bunches and bunches of bloggers this weekend only for a 2 day sale...Sat. Sept. 22nd and Sunday Sept. 23rd.  Grab some Items for up to 20% off throughout our stores!  Some of my favorite items on sale this weekend include:

Go to Starbucks in your PJ's (drive-thru), come back for some Happy hopping and Happy shopping! 

Bananas for Blog Hoppin' fun in your PJ's with a Pumpkin Spice latte'!  

Spotlight Saturday & Birthdays

Why is it as a kid we LONG for our birthdays to come, and the older we get we LONG NOT to see our birthday show up?  I experienced that this week turning _____ (fill in the blank with anything you'd like as long as it's lower than 35)  NOT!     :-)   It didn't help with my own children thinking I was one year younger than I really am.  When I added that extra year onto the one they thought I was, they were like, "Hmmmm...REALLY?"   Thank heavens for 1st graders who honestly have no sense of time and age.  One of the 1st graders at my school heard it was my birthday and said, "Happy Birthday...are you past 25 yet?"  

Welcome back for another edition of Spotlight Saturday.  I've got some great freebies for you again today.  

Teaching by Hart has a cool math warm up for you in her "Spot the Imposter" freebie.  It's so simple, but so fun, and sparks some great math conversations.  Need a time filler?  Engaging warm up?  Thought provoking small group starter?  Grab Kim's imposter sheets where which are loaded with numbers.  All the numbers on a page have something in common.  There is one, "the imposter" that doesn't fit.  Students begin searching for odds, evens, multiples, etc.  Looking forward to the fun I can have with this one!

Sometimes you run into things and think..."Why didn't I think of that?"  I took one look at these and thought back to the years I taught Kindergarten and First grades.  Where were these when I needed something "magical" to motivate some of my kiddos to read?  Everybody needs some fun reading glasses, right?  Check out Tracy's Guided Reading Glasses for grades K-4.  You just provide the popsicle sticks and you've got yourself a class full of adorable little reading nerds.  :-)  

Second Story Window has 6 weeks of spelling homework for you, which can be used with any spelling words, in her Spelling Tic Tac Toe Homework pack.   Students use their spelling words to do a variety of activities.  It also incorporates a little student or family choice as to which parts are completed.  It serves 1-3 grades the best and is a nice alternative to the normally boring spelling homework sheets you usually see.  

In closing, I hope you were able to grab my "Writing a Paragraph Hamburger Style" freebie this week.  If you missed it, head back to my home page and check the post prior to this one to snatch.  

Bananas for birthdays even when the candles take up a LOT of space on the cake,

Writing a Paragraph Hamburger Style Freebie

I have been asked many times in the last few weeks what I think about my new job as Literacy Coach.  I love so many parts of my job, but like anything in the education world, it's challenging, overwhelming at times, and so fast paced that it's often 2:00 before I realize I haven't eaten lunch.  
Just when I was feeling a little lonely one day, a teacher asked me if I'd be willing to come into her classroom to model a revising/editing writing lesson.  I couldn't say "YES" fast enough!  I have tons of graphic organizers, posters, handouts, flipcharts, etc. on writing that I've used over the years, but I found myself with this incredible urge to go ahead and create something new.  After discussing what her class needs were, I put together the following freebie that is focused not only on putting a simple paragraph together (hamburger style), but putting a really GOOD paragraph together (BIG MAC style).  This little freebie is designed to be used with beginning paragraph writers.  It encourages them to plan ahead with a graphic organizer, attempt a first draft, practice editing together (which prompts great classroom discussion), compare/contrast the difference between a simple paragraph and one that is a little more elaborate and FAR more interesting, and finally, share what they've learned.  
The class that I visited had already completed their graphic organizers and first drafts, but were able to take it one step further and APPLY their newly acquired editing skills and edit their own papers with the correct editing marks.


I had such a BLAST going in her classroom this week and certainly look forward to reading their published BIG MACS in a few days!  :-)   If you need a quick and easy freebie that is easily modified to fit many genres, GRAB IT!   Either pic will get you to the link to download! 




What are some of your BEST writing instruction tips for teachers? 

Bananas for BIG MACS (Yum!) 

Spotlight Saturday Freebies

Welcome back to another Spotlight Saturday!  I took a 2 week vacation from blogging.  I'd like to say that I was parked beach front somewhere reading a good book, but it was actually due to some crazy schedules, a sick child, a trip "home" to see my parents, and a stubborn laptop. 
Hopefully this post finds you transitioning smoothly into the new school year, enjoying your new students, and tackling all the adventures each new school year brings.  How about some freebies??

Christina would love for you to check out one of her management systems where students are trained to use their non verbal cues to let you know what they need.  Needing the restroom, a sharpened pencil, a tissue, a drink, and having a question or answer to share are included in her "Show Me the Number" system.  This system can be used with any grade level.  Go check it out!



Ms. Soud knows the importance of parent communication!  She's sharing a Parent Contact Journal with you.  It includes an interest inventory for your students, Parent Contact Form, Parent Contact Log, Behavior Journal, and a Classroom Newsletter editable with Powerpoint.  The forms are nicely organized and the clipart makes you feel right at home as a teacher.  These forms are mostly suitable for K-2 grade levels.  Grab a helpful freebie!


Last, but certainly not least, we have Denise's literacy center using the BOOK ORDERS you send home with students all the time.  What a clever idea to put the extra book order forms (You know you get TONS)  in a center and let the students do some activities using those forms!  Reap the benefits from getting those forms out, utilizing them, AND sending them home for students to order!  Who doesn't love the bonus points from a book order?  You'll never get tired of these!  

If you downloaded a freebie today, don't forget to leave some feedback!  Sometimes that's all it takes to keep these fabulous creators going!   

ENJOY the rest of your weekend, friends.  Catch a good college football game, grill out, hang out with some friends, and schedule a nap!  Those lesson plans aren't going anywhere.   



Bananas for the nap I WILL make time for this weekend,

Robot baby and Spotlight Saturday!

Happy weekend!  This weekend I found myself with a temporary additional member of the family.  My daughter got to bring home her health project...a BABY! She's an adorable robot baby that acts like a real baby.  She coos, coughs, cries, and yes, SCREAMS when she needs to be fed, burped, or have her diaper changed.  HOWEVER, It turned into quite an ordeal for my daughter when nothing she did to help the baby seemed to be working!  She was doing all the right things...feeding, burping, rocking, cuddling, holding her head, etc. with NO POSITIVE responses from the baby...which I informed her was "REAL LIFE" sometimes.  After agonizing over this baby for hours and it continuing to bawl, I thought "Hmmm...something doesn't seem quite right."  The investigation began.  I viewed the demo videos online and discovered that every time the baby cried and she picked it up, there was supposed to be some kind of beep.  (Her bracelet monitor making physical contact with the baby was supposed to set off a sensor) Sure enough hers was NEVER beeping.  We looked more closely at this tiny tag on the bracelet only to discover the number on it and the baby didn't match!!   Sure enough, her sweet teacher emailed me back @ 10:00 on Friday night to inform me another student was having the same issues.  SO...the ole' robot baby accidental switcheroo took place at some point before she ever got home.  The story ends with an 'emergency shut-off' switch she led us to, and an A for effort from my precious daughter who took it like a real trooper.  It's amazing how a "robot baby" can bring a flood of memories back.  Mine just didn't have an emergency shut-off switch back then.  ;-)

Ready for some freebies?  I've got them for you!  

Sally from Elementary Matters has some great tools for your students' desks that she customized to fit her classroom needs.  She's sharing several of those with you.  She has a  number line counting with 1's, number line counting with 10's, a colorful 100 grid, some reading AND science tools too!  These items would "fancy up" any student's desk and are a nice alternative to the name tags I've always purchased in the past.  

Need some visuals for teaching the different types of sentences?  Addie has some adorable "monster theme" posters for you to do just that.  Make those big words...declarative, interrogative, imperative, and exclamatory a little less "scary" with her cute posters!  Click image to grab!  




This last one is especially for you Kindergarten and even Pre-K mommies or teachers.  Amanda has a K assessment ready to go...FREE.  Check your students (or own children) on letters and sounds using this handy tool available in her TpT store.  It comes with instructions, upper and lower case letter cards, a random letter check sheet, and a spreadsheet for recording your data.  

Enjoy the rest of your weekend.  I hope it's as beautiful of a day where you are as it is here!
  
Bananas for automatic shut-off buttons and gorgeous sunny days!  :-)

Push for Evidence-Based

As my district dives into Common Core a little more each year, my teachers are doing what good teachers do...looking for ways to teach kids how to be excellent thinkers.  Gone are the days of answering questions with one word, or answering with sentences so simple that they hardly require any thought.  Gone are the days of "Just because."  (Although as a parent, I'm claiming my parental right to use that one when I feel like it! tee hee)
Searching for evidence based anything for elementary students turned out to be more challenging than I thought.  Everything I did find was related to high school and in no way shape or form appropriate for teaching our young students how to write and cite evidence from the text.  So I did what I usually do when I can't find something... just create it myself. :-)  

I created 8 mini "kid friendly" posters to be used as a springboard for discussion and teaching students how to cite evidence and justify their answers.  These are EASY to throw on some construction paper and laminate!  I'm curious what your district or school is doing to help support teachers in this process of pushing kids to explain their thinking.  You know me, I LOVE to hear from you, SO....
I'll email a set of these mini-posters to the first 10 people that would be willing to share.  We all learn from each other!  Don't forget to leave your email address!  :-)  

Bananas for learning from each other,