As a teacher, there are so many things to love about April. In many locations (including my own state of Iowa), the weather is getting warmer and the likelihood of a winter storm hitting the area dimi
Find 23 ready to use, effective vocabulary activities your students will love, by The Teacher Next Door!
Check out this free list of brain breaks for kids that you can do in your upper elementary classroom. Refresh their brains with easy and fun brain breaks!
Find some great tips, strategies, and resources for implementing Daily 5 into an upper elementary or middle school classroom!
POEMS? That 5-letter word will send shivers down the spines of middle school students. Add in the suggestion of "poetry analysis," and the moans and groans can be heard throughout the hallways! If all this sounds familiar, I have a few teacher tips to help you boost engagement with poems that middle schoolers actually enjoy!
complex sentences lesson ideas
This introduction to poetry gives teachers ideas on teaching poetry minlessons that make a difference in how your students think about poems.
Root words, Suffixes/Prefixes Bell Ringers are the perfect and super quick way to teach your middle school students this important ELA skill.
Save time and reach all your math students with this differentiated math worksheet bundle with scaffolding. This bundle features 146 differentiated math worksheets for Decimals, Fractions, Long Division, and Multiplication. Each of the 38 topics includes 3 levels for easy differentiation and the multiplication worksheets also include word problems. They are perfect for printing and using in class or using digitally with distance learning. Answer keys are included for easy grading. These differentiated worksheets would be great for Early Finishers, Homework, Test Prep, Review Sheets, Math Centers, Remediation, Morning Work, or Sub Plans. Great for homeschooling families too! This Math Worksheet Bundle includes: 1. Decimal Worksheet Bundle (Differentiated) (7 Topics) 2. Fraction Worksheet Bundle (Differentiated) (12 Topics) 3. Long Division Worksheet Bundle (Differentiated) (11 Topics) 4. Multi Digit Multiplication (with Word Problems) Worksheet Bundle (Differentiated) (8 Topics) Each of the 3 topics has 3 different levels of practice problems. Some teachers find it helpful to have students start with level 1 (easiest) then move to level 2 and 3 (most challenging) as they become more proficient. You could also use level 1 as classwork, level 2 as homework, and level 3 as review or test prep. These 146 worksheets each feature 2 options: 1. Printable pdf file with answer keys 2. Digital file using the Easel Activities tool The Easel Activities tool allows you to assign activities directly to your students using Google Classroom. Once the student accesses the link through Google Classroom, they will complete, turn in, and receive your feedback on the TpT platform. Take a look at the thumbnail images and the preview file above to get a better idea of what the worksheets look like. If you enjoyed using this resource, please leave some feedback. Leaving feedback earns you points toward FREE TPT purchases and I LOVE hearing from my fellow teachers. Follow me and be notified when new products are uploaded. New products are always 50% off for the first 24 hours they are posted. It pays to follow me! You might also be interested in: * Math Mega Task Card Bundle
For the most part, reasoning, deducing, inferring, and critical thinking are not skills that come naturally to our students. Rather, they must be nurtured and developed. We want our students to become critical thinkers so they can reason and apply logic to solve novel problems throughout their lives. These skills will set them up to...
I have used the reading workshop model for about 8 years now. It has changed a lot over the years! One thing that has stayed the same is the ‘Respond to Text’ station. This is a time where students get to write about their reading. The station stays the same all year, but the activities in the station change. Below is a list of activities you can add to your ‘Respond to Text’ station at the beginning of the year. 1. Bookmark Book Report At the beginning of the year, some students struggle to finish chapter books. I find that this bookmark book report helps them stay engaged in their reading. The students keep track of the pages they read, and complete activities as they read their book. There is a fiction and nonfiction version available for download. 2. Text Structures Tri-fold Students can use this trifold to ‘hunt’ for different text structures. Just put a basket of nonfiction books at the station and you are set! It’s a great way to get them reading nonfiction books. 3. Choice Board Students get to choose what activities they’d like to complete. This is great because it can be used for the story of the week (if you follow a basal) or the chapter book they are currently reading. You can have the students glue this page inside their reading notebook, or have them staple their responses to this sheet and turn in. Download the Printables: Click here to download the bookmark book report. Click here to download the text structures trifold and choice board. Add editing tasks to your reading workshop block! Math Resources: 1st Grade Tri-Folds 2nd Grade Tri-Folds 3rd Grade Tri-Folds 4th Grade Tri-Folds 5th Grade Tri-Folds Thanks for reading! I hope you will find these printable helpful :) Visit my blog @ Learning With Mrs S. Visit my TPT Store Follow me on Pinterest! Follow me on Instagram! Follow me on Facebook :)
Age of Montessori’s Elementary Curriculum Charts, color-coded by subject and year, show the progression of Practical Life, Math, Geometry, Language, Biology, History and Geography lessons from early childhood through grade 6. The Lower Elementary chart covers the preschool to 3rd grade curriculum and the Upper Elementary chart covers the 4th to 6th grade curriculum.
I created this graphic organizer to be used with any fictional story or novel. I also thought it would work well for the days my students e...
A blog full of tips, lessons, and ideas to use in the upper elementary classroom.
Author's Purpose PIE'ED Anchor Chart- take author's purpose to the next level for upper elementary students by using the PIE'ED Method!
We are knee-deep in our 5th grade historical fiction unit right now. This is always a favorite each year. We've blogged about our various HF adventures HERE, HERE, HERE, and HERE. In 5th grade, kids have already completed a HF unit when they were with us in 4th grade. During that time, they all read the SAME book. This year, to take them a little deeper, the kids main focus is studying the ERA they selected. Due to this, kids are all reading DIFFERENT books that are within the same era as their book club members. Our students also had to select a different era this year from the one they studied last year in our space. Eras we focused on this year: Colonial America, Revolutionary War, Westward Expansion, Civil War, WW2, and Civil Rights. Our favorite part of this, is that kids of all levels are in book clubs together, really creating fantastic discourse tied to era understanding and how their book fit together. A huge part of any historical fiction unit is nonfiction understanding of the era they are studying. We spent the first week+ immersing ourselves in nonfiction materials tied to our era. Kids shared ideas with each other and created a group timeline outlining important events from their era. As we have been working through our books and discussions, they started to bring up and share where their books fit into these non-fiction timelines. Last year, we made "double timelines", which were fun, but only one book could fit in that framework. This year, our amazing student teacher, Megan Leverence (she's looking for a job, people...anyone hiring?? :) found a great blog post. You can read it HERE. She took the idea and changed it up a little bit, and found a way to connect it to the timelines the kids created. Rather than write up "reviews," like the blog suggested, she had the kids create "book timelines" of the books they had been reading. She had them find 5-10 important events in their books (no spoilers allowed), and create a timeline "flipbook." Once the kids created their "flipbook timelines", they placed their books on the nonfiction timelines. This created a fantastic visual of where all of the books we were reading fit across history. We utilized a huge bulletin board in our hall to hang all the timelines and books on. It's been a great discussion and visual tool for all of our kiddos. How have you taught HF units? How do you bring in nonfiction? We'd love to learn with you! Happy Teaching, Angela
Learn six ways to help reluctant readers gain confidence and improve their reading skills in upper elementary and middle school classrooms.
Are you interested in getting your upper elementary students to spell more words correctly, understand the meaning behind more words and read more words independently? If so....then code based instruction must continue in the classroom. What is code based instruction?? This is when students are taught phonics skills in an explicit and specific sequence. Research tells us, code based instruction is the most effective way to teach students to read and spell. If a student is taught using this approach they will have the skills needed to apply learned patterns when spelling or encountering the unknown word in text. According to international literacy expert and co-author of LETRS, Dr. Carol Tolman, orthographic learning should continue beyond phonics concepts into morphology and etymology. Morphology is the study of morphemes. Morphemes are units of meaning in language (i.e. prefixes, suffixes and root words). Etymology is study of the historical development of words (i.e. identifying if the morpheme is of Greek, Latin or Anglo Saxon origin). Typically instruction on morphemes and etymology would happen at the end of third grade progressing into middle school and beyond, although younger students can easily learn basic morphemes. Dr. Tolman uses the hourglass figure below to clearly illustrate the multiple layers of direct instruction teachers should provide, progressing from phonological skills all the way into etymology. The video is about 20 minutes in length, but well worth the watch if you want to learn more about all of the layers. There is a sort of natural progression of instruction with morphemes. You will notice the progression goes from easier to understand to more difficult concepts that require background knowledge. One might first start with Anglo Saxon and Latin compounds which are free morphemes. A free morpheme is a morpheme that can stand alone and have meaning (i.e. dog and house alone mean one thing, but combined make doghouse, which means something else). Compounds are a great introduction to illustrate word chunks are meaningful. Next, one might progress to inflectional morphemes. Inflectional morphemes change what a word does, but doesn't change its meaning (i.e. ing, ed, etc.). Then, one might progress to irregular past tense plurals (i.e. catches, catch and caught). After that, one might teach common prefixes (un, re, pre, etc.) and then move to less common prefixes (macro, mono, fore, etc.) Next, one might instruct on derivational suffixes, which are suffixes that make a word change a grammar class. For example this means a word can go from being a noun (ex: pore) to being an adjective (ex: porous) by adding a derivational suffix (in this cause -ous). Finally one might teach Greek and Latin roots. Greek roots are not as common as Latin roots and are more scientific and technical. After a prefix, suffix or root word is explicitly taught there needs to be multiple exposures and chances to engage with the learned morpheme. Some great ways to further explore taught morphemes are by creating word webs, thinking of a visual or action that represents the morpheme, word hunts, graphic organizers, cloze activities or playing games. Ready to better instruct on morphology? Prefix, suffix and root word graphic organizers are a great way to deepen understanding of morphemes! Send me morphology graphic organizers!! We respect your privacy. Unsubscribe at any time. Powered By ConvertKit > Bottom line--the more students understand about the structure of words, the better they will be at reading them independently, understanding their meaning and how to correctly spell.
Anchor your students' learning using these story elements and story structure anchor charts and reference sheets for upper elementary.
Song Index
I’m here to share a fraction anchor chart freebie and a hands-on mini lesson idea I used with my math intervention students. When we started our unit on fractions and did our pre-assessments, I quickly learned that I have a small group of students who need quite a bit of intervention. Unfortunately, many of them...
A blog full of tips, lessons, and ideas to use in the upper elementary classroom.
Informational text structures... this was the ELA topic that scared me the most when I was coteaching in upper elementary classrooms. In fact, I wrote another blog post a couple of years ago describin
Hello everyone! Are you counting down the days until spring? I know we are! The students are getting a little touch of "Spring Fever" so I am trying to balance the wiggles we are experiencing with our need to really dig "DEEP" into our content. The Common Core really is asking us to push our students, and as I have been really working to immerse myself in the CCSS and the "intent" of it, I realize that there are few things that I think we need to keep in mind as we move forward. Perhaps you will agree--perhaps not--but I do think we need to really increase the level of professional dialogue about what the Core means to us and to our students. So--here are a few "blanket statements" I would like to throw out there! First, we need to remember that our number one obligation is to our students. They are just little people who put all their trust in us to take care of them, to teach them, and to make wise decisions for them! We cannot let our worries/stresses/frustrations get to them! (This is me doing a little "self-talk" as I feel my end of quarter stresses beginning to mount!) The Core has drawn a line in the sand--we need to be pushing our students harder, we need to present them with more rigorous texts, and we need to work to weed out some of the "fluffier" lessons we have added to our collection in the past. The Core doesn't really ask our students to be making text-to-self connections or other reflective tasks. . . it wants students to analyze the text itself so comprehension is deep. Several years ago I had an "AHA" moment with this when I read Eve Bunting's "Sunshine Home" to my class. I had the students write about the text when we finished and every single child made a text-to-self connection about having a grandmother. Not. Very. Deep. . . .and certainly didn't contribute to better understanding of the text! Students' self-esteem is fragile--but they DEVELOP self-esteem by being faced with challenging tasks, being properly supported through the tasks, and being recognized for their successes. Self-esteem does NOT come from giving students easy tasks or by throwing them into difficulty activities without proper modeling, support, or coaching. We can make a difference in how students see themselves as readers and thinkers! Digging deeper into texts is FUN for students! If we give them the tools they need, they can not only think more deeply about their independent reading, but book discussions can be more engaging and more interactive! So . . . I have working to find ways to really get my students engaged in reading, discussing, and writing about what we read--and I am REALLY trying to do a better job of modeling my own thinking! Here is my goal for the next week--I am going to work at helping students develop double entry journals about a series of picture books we are going to read to review key literary elements such as symbolism, foreshadowing, flashback, figurative language and the like. I have created an anchor chart to help us keep track of evidence we find in the text and our own thinking about the text. See what you think: I am going to work hard to model, model, model the difference between evidence from the text and my own thinking and try to scaffold their work along the way. Here's why--our goal for the next month or so is to have students write a series of literary essays, and I feel I need to beef up my students' skills before we tackle this. For the last few years I have used something I call "Pausing Points" in my class . . . sometimes before we read, sometimes while we read, and sometimes after we read. I try to get my students to tackle something related to the text that is just a LITTLE bit more in depth than they have done before . . . working toward getting them to be the kind of sophisticated thinkers the Core requires them to be! Some of you may have either used my historical fiction book study resource, my "Digging Deeper: Writing about Reading", or one of my novel studies. If so, you have seen the "Pausing Points" and have hopefully found them useful! If not, I have pulled one out of my "Character Studies" unit to give you as a freebie to see what you think. I am confident that we can raise the level of our students' responses to literature--if we take the time to coach them through! Interested in trying one? Here is the freebie! Pausing Point FREEBIE! Here are the links to a few of the resources I mentioned in the blog post if you want to see how I have used "Pausing Points" in different ways! Let me know what you think! Digging Deeper: Writing about Reading Historical Fiction Book Study Novel Ideas: No Talking Thanks for stopping by to visit! www.fourthgradestudio.blogspot.com http://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Store/Meg-Anderson http://pinterest.com/dmamec/ http://www.facebook.com/pages/Fourth-Grade-Studio/154102318070432 or find me on Twitter at @FourthGrStudio
Show, Don't Tell: A Writing Minilesson! This blog post focuses on teaching students to write showing sentences instead of telling sentences. It includes an anchor chart and a FREE Bingo game!
This figurative language foldable is a great introduction.Visit us!!
Author's Purpose PIE'ED Anchor Chart- take author's purpose to the next level for upper elementary students by using the PIE'ED Method!
Teaching the meanings of prefixes and suffixes is undoubtedly a skill that needs to be scaffolded over multiple grade levels. When I taught second grade, my main goal was to teach students how a prefi
A blog full of tips, lessons, and ideas to use in the upper elementary classroom.
I’m here to share some tried and true tips and tricks to convert your fake readers into real readers. To help our fake readers, we have to identify their coping behaviors that are helping them hide the fact that they aren’t reading. Here is a list of 10 Ways to Spot a Fake Reader: I...
Teaching narrative writing lessons can be SO fun! Here are my favorite lessons and activities for teaching personal narratives!
