3344: Memories!

Well, today in class we all took turns sharing some of our memories. There were some reallllly funny ones, and then there were extremely sad ones and I think we all got a little closer and understand each other a little bit more because of this. It was hard for me to decide which memory to share, but instead of explaining my sad memory I'll do this on a happy note and talk to you guys about my warm memory.

In class to represent my warm memory I brought an old card from my boyfriend that he had written a very special note to me in. Like I said today, we have been dating since I was 14 years old and he really is one of the most important people in my life (after all family is first and I do consider him family). I know we aren't married, but we have been through so much together and I really don't know what I would do without him. He has stood by my side through my toughest struggles and has seen me hit rock bottom, and then he has also been there and been the reason for many of my best memories! Whenever I am depressed or feeling down, he is always there supporting me and just is so caring that when I think of him and know he is there for me I just know everything is going to be alright. This is exactly the reason that I chose memories of him to represent warmth! He is my best friend, and he just feels like home to me....there isn't really words to describe it.

These memories really mean a lot to me because whenever he leaves for the Army in February these memories are all I'm going to have to keep me going and to give me faith whenever I know we aren't going to be able to talk to each other. I have a huge box full of things that represent our memories together....things from movie ticket stubs, to letters, to put put golf score cards, to old cards. You name it, and if we've done it together then I have some little something from that day or event in that memory box! I know to some of you, it may seem like "Oh my gosh, he's just her boyfriend calm down girl" because I am not married and I don't have children like many of you do, but if you have ever shared a love that is pure and great then you know exactly how I feel, and exaclty how Josh makes me feel <3

(I put two pictures of us at the top of the post....the one on the right was a goofy one when we were playing with my webcam our heads aren't really shaped funky like that lol)

3321 M&W: Author Eric Carle

This week I am going to focus on the great children's author Eric Carle. I grew up absolutely in love with his books, and to this day can remember being in first grade and reading his stories like the classic, The Very Hungry Caterpillar. Many of you are probably already very familiar with Eric Carle, and know about his books. His first book Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What Do You See? was pulished in 1967, and was a collaboration of his work and author Bill Martin Jr. whom I talked about last week. He is an author of over 40 books, some of which aren't even available to purchase in bookstores anymore. He not only writes his books, but also illustrates all of his work. His art work and illustrations are very distinct and stand out from all others. He uses a collage technique to create his artwork, and his books are all full of an array of colors. A couple of his books, such as The Very Lonely Firefly and The Very Quite Cricket come alive at the end with an "added dimension" such as a yellow light that lights up in The Very Lonely Firefly, and real life sound of a cricket at the end of The Very Quiet Cricket.

Some of his most famous stories, and my personal favorites, are Brown Bear, Brown Bear What Do You See?, The Very Hungry Caterpillar, Do You Want To Be My Friend?, The Mixed-Up Chameleon, The Grouchy Ladybug, The Very Busy Spider, The Very Quiet Cricket, Polar Bear, Polar Bear, What Do You Hear?, and The Very Lonely Firefly. I know that was a long list, but trust me.....these are CLASSICS that all children love! I truely believe that if you are teaching the lower grade levels that you should include these (or some of them) in your class library. His stories teach children about animals and nature as well as life lessons. There are so many of his books that I don't feel it is necessary to go into detail about them because that would take forever, and I am sure you are already familiar with many of his books!

3344 Personal Writing

I constantly do my own personal writing every single day, and in more way than one. Just to name a few I blog (for school of course), I write letters, text, makes to do lists, label my things, and make wish lists as well as keep a planner. The one that I would say I do the most is text, and I think that is because it is the easiest for me and my phone is always right there in my hand. It is a fast an simple way to communicate with the people that I love, or anybody I need to talk to. Besides texting I love to write letters, and have actually been writing a lot of letters this week. My boyfriend just joined the army so I have a lot of letter writing in my future!

Today in the all about me book, one of the things I wrote about was how I am an animal LOVER :) any stray that needs a home, I will take in and I feel like I have a special connection with animals. I wrote about my baby girl Callie (our picture is at the beginning of the post), who is a pit bull that I rescued from the pound two years ago. She is my life, I treat her like she is my little kid and I would do anything for this dog! So, for my creative personal writing I am going to write a letter to her!

My baby Callie,

I was doing my homework and I heard you barking outside so I had to take you on a walk just now, and you are tied to the tree until I finish this and can come back out! I wish you could come inside with me, but since I moved back home Aunt Cyndi and Uncle Charles won't let you stay inside with me anymore :( I just wanted to say that I'm so so sorry that I haven't been spending as much time with you these last couple of weeks as I usually do because I have been so busy with school and work. I'm so sorry I haven't forgotten about you I promise!!! I'll make it up to you and take you to go get a new toy or a big bone soon :) I know how much you would love that! I also just wanted to remind you how much you mean to me and how much mommy loves you....you are the best little girl ever! Although not everybody loves and understands your high energy levels like I do, I don't listen to what they say ;-) they just don't understand the bond that we share! Well I'm sure your attention has wondered off to something else by now, so I better say buh bye. Thank you so much for always being there for me, I love you so much Callie Bear!

~xOxOx~

Mommy

3321 M&W Ch. 3

Today in class we discussed chapter 3 from our book which was about understanding what we read. The big thing that I am glad Mrs. Pickett made a point to stress was the fact of how important comprehension is whenever it comes to reading. I have always known that comprehension was important, but after she talked about how comprehension really is the point of reading. Without comprehension we are simply decoding print, and nothing more, and I never thought of it like that. So at educators we have to make sure that our children are comprehending what they are reading.

I really enjoyed the part about the role that the teacher must take on, and that is the role of a facilitator. I feel that there are too many teachers who believe that because they have that name tag and desk that they are the boss, and they too often play the role of dictator whenever that is the exact opposite of what we are supposed to do. We are merely facilitators, and like she said in class, the magic happens inside the students minds.

Something that I plan to use in my classroom that this chapter talked about is structured retelling of the reading. A method that I believe is effective and plan to use is what some might call the popcorn method. This is where I would call on one student and have them tell me about one part of the story and then pop over to another student and have them tell me what happened next. Eventually all of the children in the room get a chance to talk about one part of the story and it is a lot less stressful for them than calling on one poor child and putting them in the hot spot in front of the whole class to retell the entire story. We could also make this fun by having something like a beach ball that the chidlren pass around the class and whenever you catch it you have to say what happened next in the story. Another way to do it is to write on different parts of the beach ball words like "who, what, when, where, why, etc" and which ever word their right hand lands on is what the child has to talk about. These are different methods that are testing and helping the children's comprehension in a manner that is fun to them :)

The book that I chose to share with you all this week is called Chicka Chicka Boom Boom by Bill Jr. Martin and John Archambault (the picture is at the beginning of the blog because I had no idea how to get it go be down here with this paragraph and could not figure it out!!). You guys may or may not be familiar with this book but it is a hit with children! I remember reading it whenever I was young, and I have it in my classroom at the daycare I work at. It is a book about the alphabet and each letter is trying to get to the top of a coconut tree. It is a book that is good for children Pre-K and K but can be read aloud to children even younger. The wording is almost like a chant and it is so fun for the cildren to read, even those who can't read the text yet love hearing it. It goes "Chicka Chicka Boom Boom. Will there be enough room?" and the children just love to say this line over and over again! I was babysitting a little boy just last night who is almost three and right before dinner he started saying that line from the book, and kept repeating it! It is the cutest thing, and I do recomend this book for younger children. It is very fun, and a colorful book that they will love looking through as they read!

EDRG 3344 "If I won..."

All my life I have dreamed about actually winning the lottery some day, after all don't we all fantasize about that at one time or another? I couldn't even imagine how it would feel, but if I won the Texas Lottery there is one thing that I am sure of and that is that I'll be smart with my new found fortune. It is very frightening to think of the kind of trouble that you can get yourself into with $55 million, and how fast you can completely blow that $55 million is even scarier!

I would try to be as responsible as possible and first things first I would meet with a financial adviser. I sure as heck would have no clue what on earth to do with that amount of money, so professional advice would be a must! After all, I would be able to hire somebody to advise me on what is the smartest thing to do. I would want to invest a majority of the money, maybe a little bit in stocks or what not. I honestly can't say right now because I haven't the slightest idea about investing, but I would definitely invest a large portion of it and my financial adviser would tell me where to invest it.

After putting away some in investments, I would want to of course put enough away to cover the cost of my future children's college tuition, as well as some for retirement. With the remaining amount (which should still be millions) I would build my dream home on acreage out in Texas and get those horses that I have always dreamt of having. I am an animal lover, and have always had a passion for horses but have never been able to afford one myself. I would have all sorts of animals on my ranch, and I would take in abandoned animals that have nowhere to go. It would be a dream come true if I could open up some sort of refuge for abused, abandoned, and mistreated homeless animals. Being able to give them the life and love that they deserve would be such an amazing feeling, and my money would be spent helping a good cause.

I would also give the money, and not keep it all for myself. I would help my family with financial troubles, help out my friends (although it might now be a little sketchy who my true friends are), and give to those who are in need and cannot fend for themselves. Giving is the best thing that I could do with this money, and I would try to be as unselfish as possible by giving those help who truly need it.

I could go on and on about all of the little bitty nick knacks that I would love to buy with my $55 million, but that would take forever! All I can say is that if I won the Texas Lottery I would pray to have the strength not to blow it all on meaningless things like so many do with their money. Living in luxury is not something that I plan on doing, and I would never let the money get to my head.

EDRG 3344 Blog #3: WRITING IS A PROCESS!

As we are all aware.....WRITING IS A PROCESS!!! In order to create a well written piece of writing, you must follow the five steps that are involved in the writing PROCESS . A lot of times students don't like to drag through all five steps, they just want to write the paper last minute and get it over with. But with doing this, they write something that could have been much much better if they had taken their time and gone through the PROCESS.

Step 1: Step one in the writing PROCESS is pre-writing. The is the starting point, and first things first you have to organize your thoughts. If we don't organize our ideas, then our papers can turn out to be a whole mumble jumble mess of mixed thoughts. A great way for students to do the pre-writing stage is by making semantic map or some sort of graphic organizer. There are so many different graphic organizer templates out there floating around, so make this creative!

Step 2: The next step is the writing PROCESS is drafting. Durnig this step, this will be the first opportunity that students have to put all of their thoughts onto paper. It will by no means be a completely error proof and amazing piece of writing, but the is the entire point of writing drafts! Think of it as the "sloppy copy" of the paper. There are many different ways that students can compose their first draft including by pencil and paper, on the computer, in a journal or composition notebook, etc. However, the best way to do it is the old fashioned way and have them handwrite it out on paper. Doing so will help the students be more focused on content than on editing, and content is the most important part.

Step 3: The third step in the writing PROCESS is revising. Many times people get revising confused with editing, and they are two entirely different steps so do not combine them.....always revise before you edit. In the revising step, students will focus on the quality of the content and maybe clear up some thoughts or expand on certain parts of their paper. They can change sentences, delete them or add completely new ones. The whole purpose of this step is to improve the content. A great way to do this is by having your students get into partners, groups, etc. Having their peers read what they have written will allow them to have a chance to bounce back ideas and ways that they can improve their paper.

Step 4: Our next step in this PROCESS is editing. Now this is the step where all of you red pen fanatics can go to town and mark away. Just remember that too many red marks on a paper is very discouraging to writers, so don't go overboard. You can have students get into pairs again as in step three, but it would probably be a good idea to have them pick a different partner than they had in the revising part. This way a fresh set of eyes will be of better help, and the more people you have read your draft, the better your final peice will be. Tell the students to focus on grammatical errors such as spelling, capitalization, and punctuation.

Step 5: Finally we are at the last step of the writing PROCESS, and it is publishing. If you are telling your students to write this paper, then you better give them some imspiration and let them know that it isn't going to be for nothing. Do not let their pieces be read by you once and then handed back with a simple grade on the top; publish them! This allows your students to be proud of what they have written, and most likely if they know that a lot of different people are going to be able to read their final piece then they will do a better job. You can do this by hanging up their papers on walls, out in the hallway for anybody to read, make a class book.......just do ANYTHING other than simply reading it once and handing it back.

As successful teachers, we should always have our students perform all five steps in the writing PROCESS whenever we have a writing assignment for them to complete. Going through with these steps will help them become a stronger writer, and they will therefor excel in their school work.

3321 M&W Ch. 2 Culture

Before being introduced to this chapter about culture in class, I wasn't aware of how big of a role culture plays in the classroom. It wasn't really something that I put much thought into before, but now I am well aware of how important each student's individual culture is. Whenever Mrs. Pickett gave us the example of how her friend helped the student who was from Germany (I believe), the teacher's actions were something that I would have thought of doing myself. After all, our first instinct as teachers is to help the students in any way that we can! But if you are not aware of the different cultures of your students, and the beliefs that they hace, then it is very eary to step on the toes of them and their famiy members. Even doing a kind act can get teachers in a tremendous amount of trouble, so we need to be aware and take the time to learn each of our studne's cultures and backgrounds. I am getting certified in EC-6, so because the number of children in our elementary classrooms is not too big, this shouldn't be too difficult of a task. However, it must be very difficult for those who are going to teach from 6-12 grades due to the vast amount of students these teachers have.

A simple way to learn our student's cultures is by doing the "All about me" projects the first week of school. Without directly asking "what is your culture", we are able to obtain information about our children in a manner that is fun for them. I know that whenever I was in school growing up, I loved to do the projects what were about me, my family, and my life. Like Mrs. Pickett said, it won't be a problem getting the children to talk about themselves and their lives, the problem can actually be getting them to stop! I look forward to doing these sorts of activities in my classroom once I become a teacher, and I know that every year I will have more and more ideas that are going to progressively get better :)

This week I chose three books that I recomend you read to your students! The first book on my list is Ramona the Pest by Beverly Cleary. This is a book about a kindergartenet named Ramona who is quite the little firecracker! This is a great beginner chapter book to read aloud in the class every day, and they will be excited to find out the adventures that Ramona will encounter next!

The second book that I chose is the classic Charlotte's Wed by E.B. White. Now I am sure we are all familiar with this story, and I personally couldn't imagine never having been taught it! It is quite the tear jerker, however it is a novel about friendship and the children are going to learn how they should treat their friends from reading this. There is also the move Charlotte's Web, so after finishing the book your calss can have a movie day to wrap it up!

The last final book I chose is Mr. Popper's Penguins by Richard and Florence Atawter. This is a classic children's book that has been around since the 1930's! This is just one of those fun silly stories that is really fun to read, and is great for first graders as well!

And last but not least, a great website I found is http://www.greatschools.net . There I found a tremendous list of books that are organized by grade level. I plan on going back to this site to learn more about which books are going to be good for me to incorporate intor my teafching, and I hope you will go take a look around the site. It is very easy to navigate especially since they organize it by grade level!

EDRG 4433 Blog #2 Part 2: Circular Stories

Well, since I didn't have the updated syllabus printed off, my previous blog was only about chapter 4 from our book, so now I will address the questions given to us in class today =)

Circular stories are fantastic!! My personal defination of a circular story is one where a noun, for example a mouse, pic, moose, etc., is given any particular object and giving them this object leads to other events that are all attached and it keeps going in a round pattern. The main character always wants more and is never satisfied! However the main point is that at the end of the story, your character ends up with the same object that was first given to him or her. The story that we read in class today, If You Give A Pig A Pancake is a great example of a circular story. Laura Numeroff is an increduble author who has written a handful of these circular stories including If You Give A Mouse A Cookie, If You Give A Moose A Muffin.....and the list continues. These are books that I already own and I do read them to my students and they have so much fun with them! I plan on having these available for the children in my future classroom to enjoy on their own, and to do curriculum with them as well. Children LOVE to read these stories, and they are the type of book that are easy to get the children involved in. We saw firsthand in class today how Dr. Harris got every single one of us involved right at the get go with the bubbles. Children have a blast reading these stories, and that is EXACTLY the response that we need from our kids whenever it comes to literature.

If a child, or adult, doesn't think reading is fun or enjoyable then they just flat out will not want to read at all. This is exactly what, as educators, we need to help stop! As a future teacher I value reading, and think so highly of it and plan on doing my best at making reading fun for my future students. First things first, if you expext your students to have fun reading and want to do it, then YOU have to be enthusiastic about literature. I plan to show good reading habbits, and whenever it comes to language arts time in class, get the children excited! The first step I am going to do in making that happen is by getting them up out of their seats and getting them involved in the story. Just like today, before we were even introduced to the lesson, Dr. Harris had us blowing bubbles and that was FUN! We as students didn't know that is was connected to a book that we were about to read, we just knew we were having fun! We can do this by bringing toys or objects that are connected to the book that the children can play with before we even begin to read. I also am going to make a promise never to just pass out a piece of literature to the students and tell them the reading assignment and go sit at my desk. That will not work! We have to show good reading habits! Other things like stopping throughout the story for illustration breaks, predictions, feedback, etc. are going to make the children stay involved in the story and help them to better comprehend what is being read. These are just a few things to start off with making reading fun, and as I become more experienced my list will grow and grow!

EDRG 3344-350 Blog #2: Chapter 4

Chapter 4 of our text was incredibly interesting, and as many of you said, this is a book that I am most definitely going to keep throughout my teaching career! I absolutely love how it constantly gives examples of how to incorporate the numerous literacy activities into different lessons. Right at the beginning of reading the chapter, I had such great esteem for the lessons that Mrs. Kirkpatrick did with her students involving the book If You Give A Mouse A Cookie. It is of such significance that as teachers we realize that you cannot just read a book aloud to a child (of any age) and expect them to comprehend and retain any valid amount of knowledge; it just isn’t that easy. While reading this, my mind kept referring back to the lesson in class where we listed out the pre, during, and post reading activities to do with the children to enhance any story. In order for children to preserve the story, we must get them ACTIVELY involved, and relate the story in ways that are significant to them. I definitely have the boxes on page 110 and 111 stared and will in some way use the ideas presented in my classroom!

I found the section about incorporating literacy play centers in the classroom to foster reading and writing so interesting. As a child I remember always playing teacher, doctor, grocery store, etc. and I especially remember how I just LOVED to get my parents old check books and pretend that I was writing out checks. Little did I know then (and had no clue until just now) that this was teaching and introducing me to reading and writing, and like the book said, the important role that they both play in our lives. It would have never occurred to me that such simple things, that are playful and about having fun, are really teaching children the value of literature. As educators of young children (first grade and below) we “teach children to sing the ABC song to that they will have a strategy to use to identify a particular letter”. I have found firsthand that doing this, and keeping it consistent in a routine manner is a very important strategy that is affective in introducing young children to reading and writing. In my classroom at work (I remind you I teach 2 year olds), I taught my children the ABC song, and once they had it memorized and can sing it on their own, I introduced them to the print letters. Then as we sing the song, I point to each letter and they are starting to recognize which letter is which in print. Don’t get me wrong, they by no means have the whole print alphabet memorized! I then took it a step further and matched pictures with the print letters (“A” apple, “B” bear, etc.). After repeating this daily over a period of time, I noticed that they were starting to, for example, see the letter “C” and say cat because they remembered that every time we look under the “C” it is a cat! This method was talked about in the book and it really does help the children learn their phonics. This experience of mine definitely supports the data in the book saying that children start learning literacy as young as 12 or 14 months of age. Well I better stop here before I write a whole paper about this chapter because I could go on and on! I look forward to reading everybody’s thoughts on chapter 4!

3321/ M&W: Chapter 1

Seeing how I still haven't gotten my text book in, I have no way of talking about information that I found useful in chapter 1! Therefore...it's on to my internet research. I have only really focused on two different websites so far, and I am loving the information that I'm finding! The first website that I looked on was not the greatest, its url is http://www.teach-nology.com/teachers/child_lit/authors/, it does list about 65 authors however I just didn't find it very helpful. A few of the links that I clicked on were either not up and running yet, or they just didn't give a whole lot of information on the author.

Now the useful information; I am loving the website http://www.childrenslit.com/childrenslit/mai.html because they have so many different resources. The list of authors to choose from and get information on is incredibly long, so you are sure to find the right one for you to do your Author Profile on! This site is very easy to navigate, and everything is labeled to direct you exactly where you need to go! As you can see, I am pretty excited about this site and am pretty positive that I will find my author on there. If you are having trouble finding an author, visit this site and I am sure you will eventually find somebody that you are interested in! Good luck :)