Get in the Fold!

Why We Love Patricia Polacco

2011-11-10T07:39:00.259-05:00

It is important for students to not only recognize how a character learns and grows, but to also understand how the story's unfolding events affected those changes. This Foldable® has students consider the underlying reasons of why a main character changed, supporting their ideas and inferences with evidence from the text.

We love to use Patricia Polacco's autobiographical books to teach this concept because she is able to express the feelings she experienced so vividly. It is obvious from reading her stories that she has been influenced by so many events and people in her life.

We used the book Mrs. Mack for our whole class model.

How a Character Changes Top-Tab Foldable®

Begin by having the students make a Top Pocket Foldable® with 11 X 17 card stock. Cut the left and right inside Shutterfolds® into 4-tabs. Label the tabs on each side with the following: What She Does, What She Says or Thinks, How She Looks, and How Others Respond to Her. On the outside cover of the left shutterfold, write At the Beginning and on the outside cover of the right Shutterfold®, write At the End. Write the name of the main character, in this case, Patricia on the front cover, too. We also glued illustrations from the beginning and end of the story, but you could have students draw their own illustrations.

In the middle of the inside of the Foldable®, glue a 2-tab made out of a half sheet of 8 1/2 X 11 paper. Label the upper tab "How the Main Character Changed" and "Why She Changed".

Have students fold a sheet of paper into fourths, hot dog style, and then into fourth's , hamburger style, creating a 4x4 table. Label the left column of the table with the following: Event, How Patricia Reacted, How Others Responded, and Why I Chose This Event. Have students fold the table so that it fits into the pocket of the Top Pocket Foldable®.

Introduce the whole class guided activity by discussing these questions, Think about yourself a year ago. Have you changed? How? How has your behavior changed? How have you as a person changed? Is there anything that you used to be nervous about and are not anymore? What made you change?

On an index card, ask students to respond to this question: "What makes people change?" Save as a pre-assessment. Tell students that they will be learning about why people change through characters in stories. This will help them better understand themselves, better understand others, and better understand the stories they read.

Read the first few pages of the story (to the second paragraph on page 14) and fill in the left side of Foldable® with evidence from the text. Using that information, discuss what it tells you about Patricia so far. What character traits does she have? What does she care about? What is her attitude? What is she feeling? How do you know?

Read the rest of the story. Go back and fill in the right side of the Foldable®, again using evidence from the story. Using that information, discuss Patricia at the end of the story. What character traits is she showing? What does she care about? What is her attitude? What are her feelings?

After filling in all of the information, open up the left and the right side tabs so that students can easily compare the character at the beginning of the story with the end of the story. Discuss, what has changed?

Ask, when did she change? Did she change all at once or did it happen over time? Which events do you think changed her? List those events on the board. Go back to the text and analyze the events. Discuss, which three events do you think made the most impact on Patricia's change? Why are those the most important?

Have each student determine his/her three key events, and then fill in all the cells on his/her table, (event, how she reacted to the event, how others responded to the events and why this event was chosen). After completing their tables, have students discuss Patricia's changes using all of the evidence they collected. How did she change and why? Students then write about Patricia's changes under the tabs the 2-tab Foldable®.

To differentiate and provide guided and independent practice, choose from the following Patricia Polacco autobiographical books. Students can work with partners, small groups or individually, making and filling in a How Characters Change Top Pocket Foldable® and events table for the character in each book they read.

Mrs. Mack

The Junkyard Wonders

Thunder Cake

Rotten Richie and the UltimateDare

My Rotten Redheaded Older Brother Story

Thank you, Mr. Falker

The finished Top Pocket Foldables® make a wonderful display as students share and discuss the comparisons and connections between the characters in the books they've read. An author study would be a natural extension, as students learn about Patricia Polacco's life, customs, beliefs, and values through her stories.

As a post assessment have students respond to the following questions:
How do people change?
Why do they change?
What does this tell you about people in general?
How does understanding characters and how they change teach you? How does it help you as a reader and a writer?

Check out any of Dinah Zike's Big Books of Foldables® at Dinah-Might Adventures for the directions for the Top Pocket Foldable^®and other Foldable^® ideas.

The Forces That Move Us

2011-08-13T16:17:00.153-04:00

Student teams in the process of creating their castles

I wanted to give my students an exciting science project to work on that would require them to apply all the team building skills they had developed during the year. My last unit in Science was Forces and Motion, so I decided that since my students are into fantasy, each team would need to create a castle, out of everyday "junk”, that uses forces, motion and six simple machines in its design.

I introduced the concept of forces and motion with the first chapter in the book, A Crash Course in Forces and Motion with Max Axiom, Super Scientist by Emily Sohn. The graphics and fast paced text kept my 4th graders engaged as we read about a superhero who uses the amusement park to explain the science behind forces and motion. I also purchased the Audible Audio Edition of the book for $2.95, which was used in a center, along with the book, as a way of reinforcing their learning.

Before listening to the first chapter, I asked my students, "Think about your favorite amusement park ride. What are some words to describe how you move when you are on that ride?" As they shared their responses, I asked, "What is the ride doing? What is happening to your body? How does it make you feel?"

The students were equipped with pencils, paper and clipboards. Their job was to write down science words as they were introduced in the story. I asked them to raise their hand when they heard a word and I would stop reading while we all jotted the words down on our paper.

We discussed our word list and narrowed it down to words that supported the concept of force and motion. Then, we counted up the number of words we had left and created a 3/4 Book Foldable^® out of yellow copy paper for each word. Students wrote the word on the outside of the tab and we talked about what we remembered from the book. Students stored their 3/4 Books in Ziploc baggies.

Science instruction for the next few weeks focused on students gaining a deeper understanding of the concepts introduced through the Max Axiom book. Students learned about force, push, pull, gravity, friction, inertia, and acceleration as they hunted for examples around the school, performed simple physics experiments and used print and multimedia as resources. As students learned the concepts they filled in the remaining spaces on the 3/4 Book Foldables^® with the following: Under the tab, a definition. Below the definition, real-life examples. To the left of the tab, a labeled picture.

After the students learned about the forces and motion concepts, we moved on to simple machines. Students had already been introduced to a few of the simple machines when they constructed force and motion science kits purchased from the Eli Whitney Museum website. They continued to learn about the six simple machines, the ramp, the inclined plane, the lever, the pulley, the screw, and the wheel and axle through a Bill Nye video, EdHeads, BrainPop and their favorite online game, Twitch. Using green copy paper, they made a 3/4 Book Foldable^® for each simple machine, writing the name of the machine on the outside, a sentence underneath, examples, and a picture. All of the 3/4 Book Foldables^®, the yellow forces and motion words and the green simple machine words, were glued side-by-side and bound together with a strip of scrap booking paper.

Finally it was time to do the culminating team project, the castles. Students referred to their 3/4 side-by-side Books as they created a castle that used all six simple machines.

Check out Dinah-Might Adventures for directions for the 3/4 Book Foldable^®and other Foldable^® ideas.

A Few of Our Favorite Foldables®

2011-07-07T15:34:00.008-04:00

Most of the time when it comes to what’s good for students, we only hear from adults. In this post, we decided that instead of hearing yet again from adults, we wanted to share some students’ thoughts on the subject of their favorite Foldables^®. The students in the video were all volunteers who gave up their free time on the very last day of school when most students were already in “summer” mode.

As you will see in the video, what the students say about why they like to use Foldables^® only reinforces what we already know and believe about this powerful teaching strategy.

What are a few of your favorite Foldables®? Please share!

Hero’s Quest Shutterfold Foldable® Project

2011-06-30T16:58:00.020-04:00

Where the Mountain Meets the Moon by Grace Lin, tells the beautiful tale of Minli, a "quick thinking" and "quick acting" girl, who has set out to change her family's fortune. On her brave journey to the Never Ending Mountain, Minli meets characters, each has a story to tell, imparting important lessons along the way.

This is an absolutely wonderful book containing a very complex quest with Chinese folktales and symbolism woven throughout the story, providing a cultural and historical context that deepens and enriches the reader's understanding of the characters and events. Also, you discover as you read that all of the characters in the story are connected in some way. Students used a Shutterfold Foldable® Project to help keep track of the places, characters, and folktales that Minli encountered, the Chinese symbols found in the story, and the items that Minli chose to take on her journey. Using the Foldable® was important because it provided students with a central location that they used to access information which helped them make sense of what was happening and better comprehend and enjoy this marvelous story.

The Shutterfold Foldable^® Project
Students first made a Shutterfold out of a 11 x 17 piece of cardstock. On the outside, they glued a copy of the cover of the book. This Shutterfold^® became the place that held the 3 other Foldables^® used in the project.

Foldables Inside the Shutterfold Foldable^®

Envelope Foldable^®: Minli's Blanket
When Minli left for her journey, she carefully packed a collection of objects into a blanket, tying the ends to use it as a carryall. In order for students to make predictions about how "quick thinking" Minli would use the items to get out of predicaments she encountered along her journey, they needed to have the names of those items close at hand. So, using a half sheet of 8 ½ x 11 colored paper, students made an Envelope Foldable^® to represent Minli's blanket full of the items she brought on her journey. Inside the Envelope Foldable^® they drew and labeled the items. This was glued to the left side of the cardstock Shutterfold Foldable^®.

Shutterfold Foldable^®: A Map of Minili's Journey

I introduced the idea of creating a map of Minli's journey by asking my students if they’d ever encountered maps in any of the books they had read. We discussed these questions "What kind of books have maps in them? Why? Do you think maps help you better understand the book? How?" Then I asked “Do you think creating a map of Minli’s story might help us better understand this book?” The students all agreed that a map would be helpful. I projected a few maps from books onto my SMARTboard for the students to use as models and I asked them what they noticed about the maps. I compiled a chart of their responses which included map features such as a compass rose, symbols that represent a mountain, rivers, and forests, labels, arrows, and important places and things from the stories such as a rock, a cave, buildings, bridges, and cities.

Here are some examples of maps from books:
The Shadow Realm from The Other Side of Magic series
Camp Half-Blood from the Lightning Thief series
Mouse Island from Geronimo Stilton Series

Students made a Shutterfold^® map out of a piece of 11 x 17 white paper. They glued the back of the middle section of this Shutterfold^® to the inside middle section of the cardstock Shutterfold^®.

Click on image to enlarge

8-Tab Foldable^®: Chinese Symbols
Students used an 8-Tab Foldable, made out of a piece of 8 ½ x 11 of colored paper for the Chinese Symbols found in the story. This was glued to the right side of the cardstock Shutterfold^®. On the outside of the tabs, they wrote the Chinese symbols and their meaning. The symbols are explained in the Where the Mountain Meets the Moon activity book , which is available for download on Grace Lin's website. Under the tabs, students kept track of the places where they discovered hidden symbols in the story.

Using the Foldables^®
As we read the story, students carefully drew their maps, adding important details. They recorded the places where the symbols appeared in the story on their 8-Tab Foldable®, drawing conclusions and making inferences. They referred to the items in the blanket to make predictions. The Foldables® gave students easy access to important details as we worked together to make meaning of the sometimes complex weaving of folktales within the story. They used the Foldable® to help support their thinking as they discussed the story in class or on our discussion wiki, WikiTalks.

This particular Shutterfold Foldable® can be easily adapted for use with any hero’s quest tale.

You can find directions for all of these Foldables® as well as many more ideas in Dinah Zike’s, The Big Book of Projects.

Learning About State History with a Class Timeline

2011-05-14T13:06:00.023-04:00

“What will you need to bring with you to the media center?” I peer down at the glowing faces of my 4^th graders.

“Our pencils, scissors, glue, and the social studies book!” My students reply excitedly as we prepare to begin one of the favorite activities of the day, working on our On This Spot: A Timeline of Connecticut History project.

One of the focuses in our 4^th grade Social studies curriculum is learning about the Connecticut people and events that contributed to the freedoms, rights, and quality of life, which benefit us today. Students are part of an online project entitled Connecticut: The Contribution State, where they each research a Connecticut contributor from history and they will publish their findings on the project wiki, sharing their learning through a variety of multimedia such as audio, images, hyperlinked text, digital stories, and video.

Setting the Stage

In order for students to really appreciate what people in history have accomplished, they need to also understand the times during which those people lived. Timelines are great visual tools for understanding the relationships between events and people in history.

I began this project by telling students that we would be learning about Connecticut History and asked them how we might go about doing that. The class brainstormed all kinds of ideas, including field trips, videos, books, the social studies textbook and guest speakers. I captured their ideas on chart paper. The students also brainstormed how they might be able to share their learning with others. Creative ideas such as creating books, videos, teaching other classes, webpages, podcasts, and timelines filled our chart.

Then, I introduced my students to the book On This Spot: An Expedition Through Time. This book shows the changes that have occurred on the spot of New York city, traveling back to the era of New Amsterdam and then the Native Americans to the age of the dinosaurs; then to cataclysmic geological upheavals, including volcanoes, mountains, oceans; and finally, only rock. The book answers the question, "What was here before us?", and helps make complex information immediate for children. After reading and thoroughly enjoying the book, I asked, “What did you think? What did this book help you understand? Does this give you any ideas for how we might teach others about Connecticut history?”

Bubbling with enthusiasm, the students talked about how the book helped them really think about how one place has changed over time. They said that it made them imagine their own town and about the changes in people and the land. Of course, a many students said “We could make our own On This Spot book about Connecticut!”

"What a great idea. Could it be both a timeline like Jaclyn suggested and a book? What do you think?" Of course you know their answer, and the rest is history…

The Accordion Foldable^® Timeline

Directions for making the Accordion Foldable^®
are available in many of Dinah Zike’s books

The Accordion Foldable ® Timeline uses sheets of 11 X 18 tan tag board which many schools already have in their supply closet.

The solid black line running horizontally through the center of the timeline is black electrical tape.

Dates were printed using Microsoft Word and glued to each section.

The purpose of the line being in the center of the timeline is to split the timeline using the top half to display significant events and the bottom half is reserved for our state’s important people.

Getting the Most Out of our Social Studies Textbook

What memories do you have of your history or social studies textbooks? Do you remember what you read about? Did you ever get through the textbook? We are fortunate to have a wonderful textbook, The Connecticut Adventure. It’s wonderful because it is a great resource; full of information, images, maps, and primary source documents. However, the textbook’s reading level and concepts are too high for most of my students to read and understand on their own. And reading through the entire textbook as it was intended would take up too much time.

Regie Routman in her book, Reading Essentials: The Specifics You Need to Teach Reading Well , suggests that we use our textbooks for shared reading experiences, with the teacher reading, thinking aloud, inviting students to read parts and guiding whole class discussions that help students comprehend the concepts.

After reading a chapter in the textbook through shared reading, I assigned partners an event from the book to reread and summarize in their own words. Each partner was given a slip of paper with the title and date of the event, and the page number in the textbook where they could find information about the event. Their job was to first reread the pages assigned, type up their summary in Microsoft Word, add a picture or two, and then glue the summary and pictures onto the class timeline in the appropriate location. Here is the Student Directions handout and an example of the assignment slips that were handed out to partners. Some students chose to find more information from books or the Internet before they wrote their summaries.

I supplemented a few of the chapters in the textbook, the one on the Revolutionary War for example, with additional resources. We first watched a couple of videos on Discovery Education about the Revolutionary War to help students gain an understanding of the bigger picture. Then, we read the chapter in the textbook, with a focus on Connecticut’s role during the war.

I chose not to read a couple of the chapters whole class at all. Instead we learned about that time in history through picture books or videos and students then used their textbooks to find specific information about their assigned Connecticut event.

Each time we finished one time period of the timeline, we would begin the next work session by first reading the student work on the timeline.
Not only did all of the students gain knowledge about each others' specific events, it was also a celebration of student work as students read their pieces and the rest of the class clapped and gave each other positive feedback.

Beautiful Oops!

When creating the timeline, it seemed that marking dates at increments of 25 years would be fine, so it read 1700, 1725, 1750, 1775, 1800, etc. After starting the timeline, it became apparent that this was not going to give students enough room to glue all of their work. Students became very territorial over the timeline, and some conflicts emerged as students were all trying to glue their summaries in the same place on the timeline. This is when my mistake became a beautiful oops! Students were encouraged to think outside of the box. How could we fit the event in? Could we make a tab or a Shutterfold that would extend the space, ensuring that everyone’s work could fit it? Conflict quickly turned into collaboration as students worked together figuring out innovative solutions to the lack of space.

The day after this happened I read about the book Beautiful Oops! on the Responsive Classroom blog in the post entitled Fruitful Mistakes. Of course, I purchased the book and read it to my class making the connection to our timeline. We now refer to the book often when mistakes are turned into opportunities.

Students loved this project. They were excited every time they saw Work on Timeline listed on the daily schedule. Today you can find their timeline displayed in our school library.

Ba-Da-Bing! A simple, quick writing strategy that produces POWERFUL results!

2011-03-06T14:37:00.026-05:00

The goal of good writing is to engage the reader so much that they can visualize the experience they're reading about. This requires the writer to use craft that helps the reader almost feel like they've "slipped into the skin" of the writer or character. We find that students leave out lots of details in their writing that would help the reader construct these images. Often, they simply tell that something was scary or fun leaving the reader to fill in the sensory details of that moment.

Gretchen Barnabei, in her book Reviving The Essay: How To Teach Structure Without Formula, tells about the revision strategy called Ba-Da-Bing! The strategy consists of three parts: where the speaker was physically, what they saw, and what they thought. We've taken the strategy and created a Ba-Da-Bing! Three Tab Foldable®.

Ba-Da-Bing! Three Tab Foldable^®

You try it!

Write down a simple sentence about something you did this morning. Do it quickly and keep it simple. Don't worry about elaboration and details at this point.
Print out the Ba Da Bing Foldable ®. Fold it like a hotdog. Fold the hotdog into thirds. Open it up and, with your hand under the top layer of the paper, cut along the two fold lines to make a Three Tab Foldable^®. You can find directions for three-tab Foldables® in any of Dinah Zike's books.
Now, rewrite your sentence using Ba-Da-Bing! Under the top tab (the shoe), write where your feet went. Under the middle tab (the eyes), write what you saw. Under the bottom tab (the cloud), write what you thought. Now write one or more sentences that includes each of the three parts. Here's an example: As I walked (shoe) through the wet grass towards the small pond in my front yard I saw (eyes) frog eyes peering out from the lily pads. "Please don't get scared!" I thought as I crept closer to the edge of the water.
What happened? Please share your before and after sentences in the comments.

You can either print out and use the templates or make your Ba-Da-Bing! out of a three tab Foldable^® with lined or plain paper.

Ba-Da-Bing! Portrait
Ba-Da-Bing! Landscape

Ways to Use Ba-Da-Bing! Foldable^®in the Classroom

What did you do this morning?
One idea is to do the same activity that you just did with your students. Ask them to think of something they did that morning and jot down a simple sentence about it. Then, have them fill out the Ba-Da-Bing! Foldable^®. Show them how they can combine their ideas into one or more sentences. Have them share their before and after sentences. Debrief the activity with questions such as "Was that difficult? What was different between the two sentences? How does this strategy help the reader? How does it help the writer? How might you use this in your writing?"

Elaborating Drafts
Ask students to go back to a piece that they are working on and find an important moment. Have them use the Ba-Da-Bing! Foldable^® to help them identify the three parts of that moment. Then, using the information written in the Foldable^®, students insert one or more sentences into their story.

Larger than Normal Ba-Da-Bing! Foldable^®
Create a large classroom Ba-Da-Bing! Foldable^® using poster board. As you do shared writing with your students, use it to create Ba-Da-Bings in the stories. This is especially good for helping students develop alternative ways to write about where their feet went or what they saw or thought. It can help build vocabulary for expressing sensory details.

Personal Narratives
Ba-Da-Bing! is a perfect revision strategy for personal narratives. We especially like the writing activity found in Corbett Harrison's Teach Writing Write blog, which uses the mentor text Marshfield Dreams: When I Was a Kid by Ralph Fletcher. After students imitate Fletcher's style in their short narratives about important gifts they had received, have them go back and use Ba-Da-Bing! to create imagery of really important moments.

As a Reflection Tool
Use Ba-Da-Bing! to help students reflect on a learning experience. Use it after team-building experience, a field trip, a hands-on science experiment or lab, or anything else that makes sense.

Additional Resources

Gretchen Bernabei website: Gretchen shares useful down-loadable documents and examples of student writing.
http://www.trailofbreadcrumbs.net/

Corbett Harrison's Blog:
Corbett, a writing teacher/trainer shares writing lessons on his blog.
http://teachwritingright.blogspot.com/

Using a Timeline to Collect the Seeds for "I Come From" Poetry

2011-01-09T16:13:00.000-05:00

ICE CREAM FOR THE FIRST TIME

By Sangita Burke, Grade 5

I come from a place where you never had a single scoop of ice cream

Until the day your American parents carried you away from that orphanage

In the mountains of Nepal to a new life,

And that chocolate ice cream made you feel so sick

Because it was foreign to your taste buds,

That you ask your new mother to throw it out,

And from that day you have never liked the taste of chocolate ice cream.

The following lessons/activities were used as part of a unit in
Donna Dufresne's 5th grade classroom in Pomfret, Connecticut.

We read The Hundred Penny Box, by Sharon Bell Mathis, emphasizing that biography and autobiography can be told in many ways, including timelines, photographs, quilts, songs, and, in this case, pennies. In the story, Aunt Dew keeps a hundred pennies in a box, each representing a year of her life. She has a memory attached to each penny.

We loved the idea that pennies could become a theme for a timeline. As a class literature response project, we created our own Pocket Accordian Foldable® timelines. Make this Foldable® by creating an Accordian Foldable® out of Pocket Foldables®. Directions for the Pocket Foldable® and the Accordian Foldable® can be found in most of Dinah Zike's books. We made ours out of colored 81/2" X 11" paper.

The timelines began with the collecting of pennies. The children had to find pennies with dates that corresponded with the years of their lives. For instance, if the child was 10 years old in 2010, they needed to collect pennies with the dates 2000-2010. The pennies were glued to the outside of each pocket of the Pocket Accordian Foldable® timeline. The years of the student's lives were also written on each pocket and a line was drawn to depict the timeline. Family photographs and other artifacts were placed in the pockets aligned with the year during which they occurred.

Then, we talked about different kinds of memories and read the book, Wilfred Gordon McDonald Partridge, by Mem Fox, which defines memories as being “something warm, something from long ago, something that makes you cry, something that makes you laugh, and something as precious as gold.” Students recorded personal memories based on those definitions onto "five different kinds of memories" forms.

This gave us the framework for recording the five personal memories onto their timelines. After learning how to write short anecdotes that reflected different kinds of memories, we then turned the memories into “Where I Come From” poems.

How to Write "Where I Come From" Poems

THE GIVING

By Shea Goudreau, Grade 5

I come from a place where the exchange of gifts happens

More frequently than the changing of weather,

And a gift from the heart is regarded as something more precious than gold,

Because the air is filled with warmth and love,

And when you give of your time, that is when you really give a beautiful thing.

The "Where I Come From" format is ideal for spoken word. It lends itself well to “Slam Poetry” because it can be turned into a very powerful performance, drawing upon light and dark experiences. Because it is meant to be spoken and performed, it relies upon an unconventional cadence and tempo, using commas to indicate pauses and breaths. This style of poetry reads like long, run-on sentences. If rhyme were used, it would sound like “rap music”.

In our class poems, we strung thoughts and images together using the conjunction “and” in the place of a new sentence or new line. During the final revisions, we worked on using author’s craft (figurative language – simile, metaphor) to paint vivid pictures. We discovered that some poems were all picture and no organized thought, while others were too much like a shopping list with no figurative language. Each poem was worked and re-worked by the whole class in revising sessions. We worked right from the computer, using the LCD projector.

The final poems were published into a Bound Book Foldable®. Each child glued a copy of everyone's poems into their Bound Book Foldable®, entitling it We Come From.

WHERE TEARS FALL LIKE SEEDS

ByWill Boudreau, Grade 4

Cocoa
I come from a place where hot cocoa isn’t the only warm thing,
And a cold shiver will walk up your back when you rush in from the cold,
And you know when you wrap up in your mom’s arms you will eventually fall asleep,
And that warmth is like you are on a layer of the sun,
And you just know that you are O.K.

The Hospital is Helpful
I come from a place where the hospital is helpful,
And it feels like the pain is worth it,
And everything will be all right,
Because the doctors are bees and you are the flower,
And you wish that you felt like this every time you go.

Seeing the Past
I come from a place where you really want to meet someone who is gone,
And it feels like you are the only one who cares about those old photographs,
And you know it is hopeless to shed tears that fall like seed memories onto your page,
And you just wish that he were next to you telling his stories one seed at a time.

Birthdays
I come from a place where birthdays make you laugh,
And it feels like it will never end,
While your hands act like shredders tearing the paper apart,
And you open your last present knowing you are DONE.

Teachers
I come from a place where your teachers are like your best friends,
And it feels like you could be with them forever,
Where equations and formulas are like playing with your friends,
And you know those teachers will help you with anything,
And you wish school would never end.

Say Something

2010-09-19T12:58:00.002-04:00

Say Something by Peggy Moss is a story written from the perspective of a young girl who learns that feeling sorry for kids who are teased is not enough.

Use Say Something in your classroom as a way to begin an open dialogue with students about how it feels to be teased or bullied and what they can do about it. There are wonderful resources at the end of the book about teasing and bullying and ways to stop it at school.

Begin by reading the following quote from the book to the students,
“If you think you are too small to make a difference, try sleeping in a room with a mosquito.” African Proverb

Ask, “What do you think that means?” After a short discussion, tell the students that will ask them again at the end of the story to see if their thinking has changed.

Explain to the students that you while you are reading them the book, you will stop a few times during the story so the students can Turn-and-Talk to someone sitting next to them concerning their thoughts, feelings, or ideas about the story so far. (You might want to model the process beforehand with a short selection of your choice by thinking out loud, using your own questions/connections.)

Start reading the book. Turn-and-Talk after the page with the text –and he hardly ever says hello. I don’t pick on him. I feel sorry for him.

Have the students Turn-and-Talk again a few times during the story. A really good place to do your last Turn-and-Talk is after the page, I wished I could disappear.

Read the next few pages. Stop after, He shrugged and asked, “Why? They didn’t do anything.” “Right,” I said.

Ask students, “Why is she mad at the kids?”

After some discussion, read the last page of the story and ask, “So, what happened? What changed?”

Read some of the information from the back of the book to the students asking their opinion about the suggested actions. Create a class When… Try… chart using the information found in the back of the book that students can continue to contribute to during the year.

End with a discussion about why the author chose to include the quote at the beginning and this one at the end of the book, “One person speaking up makes more noise than a thousand people who remain silent.” Thom Harnett, Civil Rights Attorney

Six-tab What Role do YOU Play? Foldable®

This Foldable® helps students understand the different roles that characters play in bullying situations. After reading a picture book or novel that has a character that bullies, students determine what role or roles the characters from the story played in the bullying incident.

Materials:

Six-tab What Role do YOU Play? Foldable®
A picture book or novel that has a character that bullies (See list below)

Directions:

After reading a picture book or novel that has a character that bullies, have students make the Six-tab What Role do YOU Play? Foldable® .
Choose a character and discuss the role or roles that character played. Have students write the name of the character and evidence from the book that supports the chosen role or roles. For example, in the book Shredderman, Nolan was a bully when he made a website that made fun of Bubba, he told an adult when he told Mr. Green that Bubba was bullying and he took a stand when he told bullies that his name was Nolan, not Nerd. Continue with additional characters from the story.
Ask students to choose one character and the role they played. Ask them to turn to a partner and discuss the following, "If you were in this character's situation, what would you have done? Why?"
After a brief partner talk, ask students to write their response to the question in the space below the tabs.

Children's Books With Characters that Bully

Novels

Crash
Loser
Bud, Not Buddy
Three Good Deeds
Stumptown Kid
I Am Jack

Escaping the Giant Wave
Roxie and the Hooligans
Drita, My Homegirl

Picture Books

Stand Tall, Molly Lou Melon

Enemy Pie

Other good picture books that deal with the issues of bullying and teasing by a different author, Trudy Ludwig:

Making Connections to a Character's Emotions

2010-08-21T15:08:00.000-04:00

A Bad Case of Stripes is a story about Camilla Cream, a young girl who is getting ready for the first day of school. Camilla is so concerned about what others will think of her that she breaks out into a bad case of stripes. Things go from bad to worse when Camilla changes in reaction to her classmates laughing and teasing. Experts are brought in to cure her, but nothing seems to work until...

A Bad Case of Stripes is a wonderful book for having students reflect on and make connections to similar situations or emotions in their own lives. This story is a good way to introduce the concept of how important it is to be yourself, and how other people treat us does influence our behavior.

Multi-tab Connecting to Feelings Foldable®

In this activity, students make connections to the main character's emotions during the story. This helps students to understand more deeply what is happening in the story and the underlying message.

Before Reading:

Ask the students to think of something that they like that everybody knows about, and something that they like that no one or only a few people know about. They can either jot it done or keep it in their heads. Pose the following question, “Why would you share the one like and not the other one?” and have students volunteer to share their responses.

During Reading:

Begin the story by reading the first paragraph. “Camilla Cream loved lima beans. But she never ate them. All of her friends hated lima beans, and she wanted to fit in. Camilla was always worried about what other people thought of her.”
Stop and ask the students "Why do you think that Camilla never ate lima beans if she loved them? Who do you think knew about how much Camilla loved lima beans?"
Finish reading the book.

After Reading:

Pass out a copy of the Multi-Tab Connecting to Feelings Foldable®.

Foldable® Directions:

Holding the paper landscape/horizontally, have students fold down the top of the page so that the upper edge of the paper falls right above the words, I felt the same way as…when…because…
Holding the folded paper portrait/vertically, have students fold it into thirds.
Putting one hand under the folded section, have students cut up on the creases to the upper fold (mountain). This will create three tabs.
Have students write Beginning, Middle, and End on the front of each tab.
Ask students "How did Camilla feel at the beginning of the story as she was getting ready for the first day of school?" Have them write her emotions under the Beginning tab.
Ask, "Why do you think Camilla felt that way?" Then, have them write down why they thought Camilla felt that way under the character's emotions.
Ask, "Look at Camilla's feelings. Can you understand why she would feel that way? When have you ever felt any of those feelings? Think of one time and write it down on the lines under the tab."
Then ask students "How do you think Camilla felt in the middle of the story when Camilla is in her classroom and when experts are coming to her house and trying to cure her?" Have them write down her emotions under the Middle tab. Ask "Why is she feeling this way?" Have students write down why under the emotions.
Ask, "Look at Camilla's feelings. Can you understand why she would feel that way? When have you ever felt any of those feelings? Think of one time and write it down on the lines under the tab."
Discuss what is happening to Camilla in the middle of the story and why it is happening. Ask, "Is the problem getting better? Why can't the experts cure her problem?"
Then ask students, "How do you think Camilla felt in the end after she admits that she loves lima beans and ate them?" Have students list the emotions under the End tab. Ask, "What made her feel that way?" Have them write why under the character's emotions.
Ask, "Look at Camilla's feelings. Can you understand why she would feel that way? When have you ever felt any of those feelings? Think of one time and write it down on the lines under the tab."
Discuss the following questions: "What did the old women mean when she said, 'I knew the real you was in there somewhere?' What do you think the author is trying to teach us?"
Student Reflection: Think about and write on the back of your Foldable® the answer to "What did you learn from this story?"

The Multi-Tab Connecting to Feelings Foldable® can be folded so that it has 2, 3, or 4 tabs. You can use it with any story where you'd like your students to connect to emotions. In this lesson, we used it to identify and connect to one character's emotions throughout the story. An alternative might be to identify different character's emotions during one event. Label each tab with a character's name. Then ask students to connect to one of the character's emotions on the lines.

This lesson used a Multi-Tab Connecting to Feelings Foldable® that is set up landscape style. We've also created one that is set up portrait style.

Check out Dinah-Might Adventures for other Foldable® ideas.

You Can’t Say No!: A Fun Vocabulary Challenge

2010-08-12T08:09:00.000-04:00

Hannah and the Homunculus

Homunculus knows the power of words... After all, it was a word that gave him life.

In this delightfully witty tale by author Kurt Hassler, Homunculus steals Hannah's word "No" and interrupts how Hannah interacts with her family.

Definition of the word Homunculus - a very small human being: a diminutive human being

Directions

1. Read the book, Hannah and the Homunculus to the students.

2. When you are finished reading, ask if anyone has some thoughts as to what Hannah could have said in response to her father and her mother instead of using the word “no”. Create a list with the alternatives that the students brainstorm. Challenge the students to try not to use or say the word “no” for the rest of the day. At the end of the day, have a discussion about the challenge. How’d they do? Was it hard? Why? Did it make us use different words that we might not use otherwise?

3. Try this with a few other words that are commonly used, keeping a visible list of all of the synonyms the students generate. This activity will turn into “Word of the Week”, an ongoing vocabulary building activity where students become word detectives, both finding and using new words in their speaking and writing. Here are some Word of the Week Posters to print out.

4. At this point, students should have the Six-Tab Side by Side Instead of... Foldable® so that they can keep their own book of synonyms and alternative words/phrases which can be used for writing. You can find directions for making Side by Side Foldables® in the first section (Introduction) of Foldables® and VKVs® for Phonics, Spelling, and Vocabulary PreK-3rd and Foldables®, Notebook Foldables®, and VKVs® for Spelling and Vocabulary 4th-12th.

Unsolved Mysteries from History

2010-08-10T10:38:00.000-04:00

Mysteries are a great way to get reluctant students excited about reading, thinking, and writing. As students become involved in what they are reading, they use deductive reasoning and research skills to discover solutions to the mysteries. Students also work on improving their questioning and inferring skills as they toss about possible hypothesis. Learning to read critically and analyze information is fundamental.

Unlock the Mystery of Mary Celeste

The book we chose for this activity is The Mary Celeste: An Unsolved Mystery From History by Jane Yolen and Heidi E.Y. Stemple. It is a true story of a clipper ship, named the Mary Celeste, which left New York harbor for London on November 15, 1872 and was found floating aimlessly near the Azores (islands near Portugal) a few weeks later. The crew was missing and was never found. Questions abound as to the fate of the people on board.

Materials

11" X 18" tag board (one for each student)
2 sheets of 8½" X 11" paper for each student
2-4 half sheets, 4¼" X 5½"(cut vertically) for each student
3-tab theory Foldables® Theories 1-3 Theories 4-6
Mary Celeste graphics
About the Mary Celeste graphic
Mary Celeste Shutterfold cover

Directions:

Introduce the Mary Celeste mystery to the students. You might want to hook students by showing a YouTube video or a video of the expedition that found the remains of the Mary Celeste or by reading an article that appeared in the New York Times in 1873.
Read the introductory page in The Mary Celeste: An Unsolved Mystery From History. Explain to students that they will be collecting clues as you read about the mystery. They will be using those clues to unlock the mystery of the Mary Celeste.
Create a 3-column chart with the following headings: Clues, Inferences, Questions.
Read the story, stopping to record the clues found in the text, any inferences made by either the narrator of the book or the students, and any questions that students have.
Shutterfold Foldable®: Using 11" X 17" tag board, have students create a Shutterfold Foldable®. You can find directions for creating a Shutterfold Foldable® in any of Dinah Zike's Foldable® books. Have students fold the 3-tab theory Foldables® (Theories 1-3 Theories 4-6) hot dog style so that the theories are on the outside of the tabs.
Glue these 3-tab Foldables® inside the left and right tabs of the Shutterfold Foldable®. Make sure you glue them so that the fold of the 3-tab Foldables® are aligned with the folds of the Shutterfold tabs.
Inside the tabs of each theory, students are to answer the following questions. Is this theory plausible? Why or why not? Use clues and your own background knowledge to support your answer.
Fold and cut the Mary Celeste Shutterfold cover in half and glue each half on the outside of the Shutterfold Foldable®.
Layered Look Book Foldable®: Have students make a Layered Look Book Foldable® out of 2 sheets of 8½ X 11 paper. On the cover, have students write the question, What DID happen to the Mary Celeste? Label the three tabs with the following: Theory, Clues, Final Theory. You can find directions for creating a Layered Look Book Foldable® in any of Dinah Zike's Foldable® books.
Ask students to choose the one theory that they believe to be the most reasonable. They need to write that theory on the first tab that says Theory and explain why they believe it to be the best theory. If they have a different theory, they can write that down and explain why. They must use factual clues to support any theory that they choose. Tell them that they are going to be researching additional resources to look for more clues to support that theory.
Either have students research on their own or provide them with another article to read. They need to be looking for and writing down clues that prove or disprove the theory they selected. They will record the clues on the second tab that says Clues.
After students research their theory, discuss these questions. "Do you still feel the same way about your theory? If not, how has your thinking changed? Why? Do you have another theory now?"
Students write down their final theory under the last tab and explain why they believe this to be the most plausible theory.
Glue the Layered Look Book Foldable® on the inside of the Shutterfold Foldable®. Be sure to leave room for the Mini Photo Album.
Mini Photo Album: Make a Bound Book Foldable® out of the 4¼" X 5½" sheets of paper. You can find directions for creating a Bound Book Foldable® in any of Dinah Zike's Foldable® books. Students can use the Mary Celeste graphics to make a Mary Celeste photo album. Glue the photo album to the inside of the Shutterfold Foldable®.
Mary Celeste Summary or News Article: The About the Mary Celeste graphic can be used to write a summary about Mary Celeste or an article that might have appeared after the Mary Celeste was discovered. Glue it on the back of the Shutterfold Foldable®.

Mary Celeste Resources
Mary Celeste Wikipedia article
Mary Celeste, Fact not Fiction

There are three more titles in the Unsolved Mysteries from History collection, The Salem Witch Trial, Roanoke: The Lost Colony, and The Wolf Girls.

What ideas do you have for using these books?

Shredderman: A Great Beginning of the Year Read Aloud

2010-08-07T16:20:00.000-04:00

Shredderman: Secret Identity by Wendelin Van Draanen is one of our favorite read alouds for grades 2-4.

The Shredderman books are great for reluctant readers, especially boys, and they serve as a good springboard for classroom discussions on bullying and tolerance. There are four books in the series and they should be read in order because they build upon one another.

Point of View Two-Tab Foldable®

A simple Foldable® to use with Shredderman is the two-tab point of view Foldable®. It helps students understand perspective and how point of view can change the way a story is told.

Directions:
(A more detailed copy of the Two-Tab Point of View Foldable® directions with images)

Print out the point of view window graphics and make enough copies for each student to have both the window looking in and the window looking out. Cut colored paper in half.
Have students fold a half sheet of paper like a hamburger and make a two-tab Foldable®.
Students draw a picture of the character who is telling the story looking in or out one window and another character from the story looking in or out the other window.
Glue the windows on the outside of the tabs on the two-tab Foldable® and put the name of each character under the pictures.
Under the tabs, answer the following questions. Window 1 - How does the point of view of this character influence the reader? Window 2 - If this character told the story, how might it be different?


This two-tab Foldable® explains how the point of view of the person telling the story influences the reader and how the story would be different if it were told by another character in the story.	.

More Parts and Even More Parts

2010-08-05T14:36:00.000-04:00

In More Parts and Even More Parts, Tedd Arnold creates a humorous and sometimes frightening story from a child's perspective. Students delight in the scary images that enter the main character's mind as he worries about sayings such as "I'll bet that broke your heart," "give me a hand," "Hold your tongue," and "screams her lungs out". These are "must have" books for teaching idioms.

Idiom Books

In this activity, students collect idioms and their definitions in a side by side 3/4 book Foldable®.

Directions:

After reading the book, have students make a 3/4 book Foldable® . You can find directions in any of Dinah Zike's Foldable® books.
Assign or have students choose an idiom from the book and do the following:

Open the 3/4 book, and on the outside of the folded tab, draw a literal illustration of the idiom.
On the tab to the left of the picture, write the idiom.
Under the tab with the illustration, write a sentence using the idiom that provides a clue to its meaning.

As students discover more idioms, they can create more 3/4 books which can be glued side by side. When complete, have the students bind the 3/4 books together and make a cover. We glued on a cover with Amelia Bedelia because we also read Amelia Bedelia books.

Helping Children Understand Positional Words and Opposites

2010-08-04T15:47:00.000-04:00

Over, Under and Through

Tana Hoben's wonderful book Over, Under and Through, is the perfect way to introduce positional words and opposites. Leap-frogging over a fire hydrant, ducking under "London Bridge," crawling through a pipe tunnel -- Tana Hoban's brilliant photographs of children transform these activities into a fascinating exploration of spatial concepts. There are twelve concepts in all -- and some surprising discoveries for the young child.

Larger Than Normal Foldable®

In this activity, the class creates a big tabbed book modeled after Tana Hoben's book. On the outside of the tabs are spatial concept words. Lift up the tabs and surprise! There are photos of a beloved class stuffed animal sitting under a table or high on a shelf.

Directions

To prepare, create a large eight door shutter fold Foldable® out of poster board. You can find directions for creating a shutter door foldable in any of Dinah Zike's Foldable® books. Turn the eight door shutter fold vertical or landscape and write the words above, high, over, and top on the outside of the top tabs and the opposites of each word on the bottom tab (below, low, under, bottom).
After exploring the spatial concepts through the delightful book Over, Under and Through, have students help you take pictures of a stuffed animal sitting around the room in various places to illustrate each word. For example, ask students "Where can it sit so that it is above? Where would it be low?"
Print out and glue the pictures under the corresponding tabs.
Enjoy reading the class book together and place it in a reading center for students to read over and over. You can also have students find and glue other pictures that illustrate the concepts underneath the tabs.

Zoom In, Zoom Out

2010-08-04T15:39:00.001-04:00

Zoom

In the wordless picture book, Zoom, the author, Istvan Banyai, takes readers on a visual journey full of twists and turns, one step at a time, as they realize that nothing is what it seems. At journey’s end, they finally see the “big” picture. Great for making predictions, then revising predictions based on additional information. Students/children will be amazed when they “discover” what they have really been looking at all along!

Zoom In!

Create a Layered Look Book Foldable® to zoom in on a concept in Social Studies or Science. Zoom in from the solar system to student's houses, zoom from the outside to inside the human body or cell, zoom into the forest or the deep ocean, zoom into a cave, or zoom from the outside traits to the inside traits of a historical figure.

Zoom Out with the Zoom-Focus Project

Just like the book Zoom, things may not be what they seem as you get more information. Use the Zoom-Focus Project to zoom out of photos of people, places, and things. Challenge your students to predict what they think the photo is and to confirm or revise their predictions as more of the picture is revealed.

The directions, a template and other ideas for the Zoom-Focus Project can be found in Dinah Zike's Big Book of Projects on page 67.

Character Map Foldable®

2010-08-04T14:00:00.000-04:00

Drita, My Homegirl

A sensitively written story of two worlds coming together, Drita, My Homegirl by Jenny Lombard touchingly explores the effects of war on a family and how friendship sometimes appears in the unlikeliest places.

This character map Foldable® helps students analyze the changes in the main characters, fourth graders Maxie and Drita, as well as their changing relationship.

Directions:

Print out the Character Map Foldable® (Word document) Character Map Foldable® (PDF) double-sided.
Have students fold and cut it to create a six-door Shutter Fold Foldable®. You can find directions for how to make a Shutter Fold in any of Dinah Zike's Foldable® books.
Ask students "Have you ever had a friendship that changed? A time when you are totally not friends with someone and then you become good friends? Or a time when you are really good friends and then you are not friends anymore? Write about a time that one of your friendships changed" Give students a few minutes to quick write. Then ask, "Why did it change? Did you change or did your friend change? Or, did something else change? Take a minute to write down your answer."
Explain to students that in this story, Drita, My Homegirl, the relationship between the two main characters, Drita and Maxi changes over time. Tell students that as they read, they are going to pay very close attention to how each character changes or not, and how their friendship changes from the beginning of the story to the end. Explain that they will be using this Character Map Foldable® to hold their thinking as they read.
Show students how to fill in the Foldable®. Under the tabs that say Beginning of the Story Drita and Beginning of the Story Maxie they need to write down each character's traits as they read the first third of the book. Tell students to write down evidence from the story that proves that Drita and Maxie have these traits. For example, in the story Maxie was rude because she made fun of Drita for being different. Drita is considerate because she helps her grandmother and responsible because she watches over her brother.
Before reading further, ask students to lift up the middle top tab that says Relationship Between the Characters. This is where they will show how the two characters relate to one another. Above the top arrow, students write words or phrases about how Drita feels about Maxi (i.e. wants to be friends) and they write words or phrases under the bottom arrow that tells how Maxi feels about Drita (resents having to be her partner).
After students finish the book, they need to repeat the steps with the bottom three tabs.
Students then answer the questions in the center of the Foldable®.