Friday, March 2, 2012

Daily 5 Projects!

Today was a great day in Room 9! Since last week when some of the kids in our class started working on PIP during Daily 5, many of the other children have been anxiously awaiting the start of their Daily 5 project. Every day they've been asking about what their project will be and when they're going to be able to get started. Today was the day. Two more groups of kids started working on two new Daily 5 projects.

I decided to start these Daily 5 projects for a variety of reasons. First and foremost, projects like these provide kids with purpose and motivation for reading and writing. Each of the projects was tailored to suit a small group of students with similar strengths and needs. For example...

Personal Inquiry Projects (PIP)
The children working on PIP are independent readers and writers who are moving from "learning to read" to the "reading to learn". They are working on building their independence in both reading and writing, learning those life-long learning skills of finding information and asking good questions, and most importantly they are learning that if they are interested in something and want to know more about it, they have the skills to do it. As I watch these kids decide on their topics, ask to visit the library at recess time, take notes, share information, and take their notebooks home at night to keep on learning, I can't help but feel very proud. :)

The Recording Studio
The children that are working on recording some of our picture books for our listen to reading centre are working on solidifying the reading skills that they have. They are building their confidence as readers and working on fluency and expression. Recording books on a digital recorder allows them to hear themselves read, and gives them an opportunity to try again if they want to do something differently or if they make a mistake. Burning their recordings to CDs for the other children to listen to provides them with purpose and motivation to make their recordings their very best work. I stood back and watched these children work today and overheard a wonderful conversation between them where they made a plan, talked honestly and respectfully about how the recording went, and gave each other advice. It was one of those moments that I wish I had recorded!

Newspaper Project
The group of children working on the newspaper project are working on solidifying some of their writing skills like ensuring that their writing makes sense to other people, spelling high frequency words correctly, using their 'voice' in their writing and building confidence as writers. The are so excited to share thier newspaper with other people when it's finished. As I watched one of these kids sit and write out a list of questions for an interview (during choice time) and then take our digital camera, her reporter badge, and her notebook and head to the office to ask for an interview with Mrs. Caldwell I couldn't help but smile. Earlier in the day I'd watched this same child struggle and ask for help with a writing task... a little motiviation and a chance to feel very important made a huge difference.

Today the some of the grade 1 stared a project and it was newspaper. We had to talk to people and record or write what they said. We are taking pictures and put them in the newspaper.- Sydney R

I love watching kids learn to love learning. It makes my day :) Today during choice time more children chose to read, blog, play a word work game, work on their Daily 5 project, and write in their writer's notebook than chose to play Lego or with blocks... I think that is AWESOME.

3 comments:

Mrs T said...

Great ideas! Love the PIP

JH said...

Wow! I am so impressed with the work that the Grade 1 and 2 students are doing in your classroom! They inspire me to try new things with my Grade 3s - thanks for sharing, and keep up the great work!

Anonymous said...

As a parent it's pretty amazing too, for my child to come home bubbling over with excitement about being a reporter!!! Thank you for making Grade 1 so fun and stimulating for Kendall! It really is an AWESOME year! Mrs. Barnes