How to Get Started with Daily 5: What to do before the year begins

Oh my gosh, just the fact that you are reading my introduction to this series of blog posts warms my heart. I am honored that you are here. I am so excited to more "officially" write about a subject that is near and dear to my heart... literacy instruction. I have taught first grade for three years and I have used Daily 5 all three years. I've written small posts about some of my Daily 5 ideas and procedures in the past, but I decided to put together a more holistic look at how I use Daily 5 in my classroom.

Now, I want to put this out there right away, I am in NO way affiliated with "the sisters" or the Daily 5 in any official platform. I am simply a first grade teacher who utilizes the Daily 5 framework and I have adapted it to meet my own needs.

The posts in this series will include:

(links will be included as I write the posts)

Daily 5 Series: Setting students up for Read to Self success

Daily 5 Series: The key to an interactive Word Work round

Daily 5 Series: Variety and independence during Work on Writing

Daily 5 Series: Options for Listen to Reading

Daily 5 Series: How to develop peer reading coaches with Read to Someone 

Daily 5 Series: Climbing the Mini Lesson mountain

Daily 5 Series: How to guide readers and writers with Small Group Instruction

Now, I am in NOOOO way an expert. Each year that I have used Daily 5, I have made changes and tweaks to my structure and I definitely do things differently than "The Sisters." For those of you who don't know, "The Sisters" are the women who started Daily 5 and wrote the Daily 5 books (link the the Daily 5/ CAFE website here). I think that they are AMAZING!! Seriously amazing! But, we are all unique and some of the things that they do just don't work for me and my teaching style.

When I decided to start this series of blog posts, I took to social media... Instagram and Facebook. I asked real teachers what they wanted to see in blog posts about Daily 5. I was flooded with questions and great ideas so much of the direction that I am taking is coming from those fabulous questions. I don't have answers for all of the questions but many are things that I have worked through over the past couple of years.

Now, let's get started! This post is all about how to get your classroom ready and how to plan for implementing the Daily 5. Here's what you can do right NOW!

I have both of the Daily 5 books and I have to be honest with you. I have not read them in their entirety. I have read the majority of both books and they have been critical in setting up Daily 5 in my classroom. I highly recommend them! When I can't wrap my head around something or I've having an issue with some part of Daily 5, I go back to "the Sisters" and read about how they set things up!

When I read the first Daily 5 book, I thought that I had to fit all of the elements of Daily 5 into each day. The elements of Daily 5 include Read to Self, Work on Writing, Word Work, Listen to Reading, and Read to Someone. I was overwhelmed... I couldn't see how I could fit all 5 parts into each day.

Over the past three years, I have found a Daily 5 structure that fits my schedule, my teaching style, and the needs of my first grade students. I have found that my students NEED read to self and word work every day for about 15-20 minutes each. I have seen other blog posts and talked with other teachers who also include Work on Writing every day. I switch off every other day with Work on Writing (M, W, F) and Read to Someone (T, Th). You will notice on my schedule that I also have a writers' workshop time in my day (which is why I don't find is absolutely necessary to include writing in Daily 5 each day.

Below is my class schedule from 2014-2015. I highlighted my literacy time in purple.

Now that you can see how my schedule is organized. I broke down my Daily 5 instruction more completely below. You will see that I also have a Phonics portion of my Daily 5 time. Our first grade team places a huge emphasis on word families and phonics. I will write more about that in a future post, but I just wanted to make is clear that a "phonics round" is not part of the typical Daily 5 framework. You will also see how I break down the other elements of Daily 5 and my mini lesson focus.

Did you notice that "listen to reading" is not included in this schedule?? My students do "listen to reading" on a set of suuuuuper old laptop computers that I have in my classroom. Each student is assigned one 15 minute round sometime during the week. Therefore, "listen to reading" is happening simultaneously with these other elements and is not included on my schedule.

Now, this brings up a KEY philosophical question.... the element of student choice in Daily 5. In many Daily 5 classrooms, students choose what round of Daily 5 they want to work on. Based on this schedule, I obviously have my Daily 5 block planned out. Students rotate through Daily 5 at the same time, completing the rounds together. I have not had success with my students choosing their own rounds and here's why... PHEW... here we go!

1) My mini lessons are extremely intentional and I want the skills that I am teaching to be applied immediately! One struggle that I had when I was allowing student choice was that I would do a mini lesson about sentence structure and then no one would choose work on writing for the next round. I was afraid that my lessons were being lost because students weren't applying what they had learned after the lesson.

2) My firsties are LITTLE and INNOCENT and they LIKE THEIR FRIENDS. During my first year, I worked sooooo hard to help students recognize which part of Daily 5 they should spend more time on. Some students understood that concept and others were very driven by what their peers were working on. It was very frustrating for me and I had several frustrated, argumentative students who really struggled when I would have to step in and help them make a more appropriate choice.

3) My planning is easier when I have a set schedule. I differentiate for my students A LOT during Daily 5 and having the set schedule helps me to know when to pull different groups for "reading group." FYI... I call all small group instruction during Daily 5 a "reading group."

4) Tracking troubles! When my students chose their rounds, I had to keep track of which rounds each student completed each day. I needed to make sure that throughout the week, they completed everything that they needed to complete. I tried several different methods and found them cumbersome and time consuming.

Okay, now clearly I have a strong opinion about how I set up Daily 5, but I have seen other teachers in my school have GREAT success with allowing student choice. These teachers teach second grade or higher. I just find that my firsties are not developmentally ready for this responsibility and they really like Daily 5 the way that we do it!

I would highly recommend that you take a look at your class schedule and take a peek at the Sisters' philosophy for encouraging student choice. It is important for you to find what works for you!

Oh my gosh! I am so excited to share with you a FREEEEEEE resource from A Year of Many Firsts. She has a fabulous set of Daily 5 resource materials!! Here's a little peek at the ones that I use (below) but there are even more great things in her product!! Click this link to be taken directly to the product on TpT.

Now, I'm not going to share with you how I use all of these posters yet. That will come with my individual posts about each part of the Daily 5 framework.

Below, you will see my CAFE Board. The CAFE Board is a supplement to the Daily 5 and it is a collection of reading strategies for comprehension, accuracy, fluency, and expanding vocabulary. I have a picture of my board from the beginning of the year last year and a photo from mid-year.

Now, I created the headings myself. Here is a link to download and print them for free. Many of the strategies that you see listed on the board are part of a free download that I found on TPT two years ago. Unfortunately, I cannot find where I downloaded them from. I like to have my strategies ready to go and then I put them up as we learn about them throughout the year. The teachers suggest that you write the strategies on colored paper with the students as you put them on the board. Students could even write the strategies if you wanted. If you want pre-made strategies, go to Pinterest or Teachers Pay Teachers and search "cafe strategies." There are LOTS that come up and many are free! Have fun with this part!! Design your own!! I'd love to see what you come up with! Post a picture on Instagram and tag me @firstiefavorites so that I can see your set up!

Setting up your classroom for students to be successful is KEY for Daily 5. One of the most time consuming things that I did when I began teaching was organize my classroom library. My students choose books from the classroom library for their Daily 5 book bins. I divide my classroom library into "themed or author specific" baskets and leveled bins.

My themed and author specific baskets:
(Students pick their free choice or "read the pictures" book from these bins- MORE on that topic in my Read to Self post)

My leveled bins:

Student Book Bins:

I use plastic book bins for each of my students- this is half of my class (the rest are on a different shelf). My entire elementary school uses the Daily 5 framework so our school ordered book bins for every classroom. I'm pretty sure that these are from Really Good Stuff. Before Open House, I label each student's book bin and fill it with a few books that are at his/her reading level (our Kindergarten teachers send us some data before the year begins). At Open House, I have each student choose a book from the classroom library to add to their book bins.

I find that once I get Read to Self, Listen to Reading, and Read to Someone going, they are very self sustaining. I don't need to do a lot of planning throughout the year. However, I am constantly changing up my Work on Writing and my Word Work rounds. When I write my longer posts about word work and work on writing, I will include lots of ideas and resources you can use. However, if you have time now, start looking for some or think about how you can use already existing literacy centers that you have for word work. Take to Pinterest, Instagram, and Teachers Pay Teachers... there are great ideas out there! Here are a few of my previous blog posts that can get you started!

Wild About Word Work - includes many of the activities that I use for word work throughout the year

A Year in Review: Writing Portfolios - I use these on Fridays during work on writing

Blame it on the Blends - examples of the types of phonics practice that I incorporate into Daily 5

What's for Word Work? - a blog post that I did about word work organization in the spring of 2014

Now, GO! GET STARTED! Read the Daily 5 Books, research word work and writing ideas, think about your class schedule!! It may seem overwhelming at first, but this is a framework that I really love! Think about how you would like to use it.... how will it meet your needs? Your teaching style? The needs of your darling little learners?

Stay tuned for future posts in this series! Feel free to comment below with questions about this post and ideas that you would like me to pursue in future posts!!

A Year in Review: Writing Portfolios

As I sit here on my first day of summer vacation, I am reflecting on my most recent school year. I just finished my third year of teaching first grade. I can't believe how quickly the time has gone! As I reflect, my most exciting addition to my classroom this year was the use of writing portfolios. It greatly impacted the way that my students viewed their writing this year. We had many discussions and celebrations of students' progress!! As I continue to use these portfolios in years to come, I'd like to continue to work on improving the way that I have my students self-evaluate their own writing.

Here's a look at our writing portfolios!

I decided to start these portfolios at the last minute in August. I ran to the Dollar Tree and picked up twenty 1 inch binders... next year, I am putting these on our school supply list!

I labeled the spines and we kept the portfolios on a shelf in the classroom. Many students wanted to keep them in their desks, but I knew that they would be destroyed in the chaos of a first grader's desk.

UPDATE & FREEBIE HERE: One problem that I had with labeling the spines was that the labels peeled off throughout the year. This year, I am going to get the binders with the clear pockets on the sides so that I can slide a label into the spine. Grab my updated cover for the 2015-2016 school year and my spine labels here.

Our writing portfolios include 37 writing samples, one for each week of the school year. When I created this product, I mapped out each week and included a variety of different types of prompts. Here's a peek at the way I mapped out the 2014-2015 school year. (My product includes the same document, but I removed the weekly dates since I know that everyone's school year is a little different).

We completed an entry in our writing portfolios every Friday morning and students really loved the routine. We began on the first Friday of the school year. I made it a very serious deal and we even put up our "office dividers" to have a more private work space. This helped students to stay focused and think seriously about their writing.

Right from the beginning, I introduced my students to this checklist on the back side of their portfolio writing paper. Students went back and checked for various pieces in their writing. In the future, I'd like to differentiate this checklist a little bit throughout the school year.

I kept the writing pages very simple so that there are no distractions from the students' writing and illustrating. Here's an example of Week #1.

One thing that I love about using these writing portfolios is that they are such an EASY, SIMPLE assessment tool for me! Having weekly samples of student writing is a blessing and parents LOVED to look through them at parent teacher conferences.

Here are examples from two different first grade students. One writer is more advanced and the other is an intervention student.

My intervention firstie:

My advanced firstie:

It was so fun watching each of these darlings grow in their writing this year... along with the rest of my class!!

If you are interested in using writing portfolios in your classroom, please check out my Writing Center: Yearlong Writing Portfolio. It could be used in most lower elementary classrooms, including kindergarten, first, second, and third grade!

Communicating Progress to Parents: Sight Word Note!

Quick post alert!! I recently posted this photo on Instagram (@firstiefavorites) of my end of the year sight word note that I send home to parents.

Several people were interested in using it, as well. We expect students to spell 80% of the pre-primer and primer sight words in first grade. This is the note that I send home to communicate their child's progress. I always hope that parents continue to practice the sight words over the summer!

Here's a free copy for you!

Enjoy!!

Teacher Appreciation Blog Hop!

Welcome to the We <3 Teachers Blog Hop!!

I teamed up with some fabulous educators to offer you some free resources to get to through to the end of the year!

My exclusive freebie is my Zoo Field Trip Research Book!! I created this as a resource for kids to use on our end of the school year field trip to the zoo.

Grab it for FREE in my TpT store by clicking this link or clicking the image below!

Here's a peek at the pages!!

Some of the pages are designed to be completed at the zoo while other pages can be completed back in the classroom.

This is just what I needed to help my students make the most of their learning at the zoo!

Several people have downloaded this product already! Take a look at Kindergarten Days' Instagram photo of these research books in action! (mine is on the left)

To put these mini books together, you simply copy the pages back to back and staple along the center crease. Otherwise you can just cut all of the pages in half and staple in the upper corner.

Can't wait to try these out at our zoo field trip in June! I hope that you enjoy it, too!

Please hop over to My Day in K for another freebie!!

Wild about Word Work!!

Do your students just LOVE word work?? Mine do!! I try to keep a delicate balance between paper/pencil based practice and very hands on, interactive materials!! Take a peek at some of our favorites!!

In many of the photos in this post, you will notice small, laminated word list cards. These are our weekly spelling words. The little cards allow students to take the list around the room with them and they make it convenient for students to practice their weekly words. ALLLLLL of my spelling lists and homework are available for FREE in my TpT store. I created these lists in collaboration with my first grade team so I don't feel right about profiting from them. However, I still wanted to be able to share them with you! I hope that all of our hard work helps you to lighten your work load a little bit!!

Here are the links to my word lists!! Click the photos to be directed to these FREEBIES in my TPT store! Please help me out by leaving feedback!

BEADS:

Let's start with my students' favorite center! BEADS!

I started using beads in my classroom about a year ago. I went to Michael's Craft Store and bought two different kinds of beads. I also got these cute little organizers for the small beads. I took this photo before I used the beads in my classroom and these little containers did NOT work out... the covers didn't snap shut and I had many spills of the beads... all over the floor.... Also, because the sections of these containers were small, students had a hard time getting out the beads that they wanted to use.

After about a week, I moved the beads and pipe cleaners into old pencil cases. They have worked out well ever since!!

WORD SORTS for POCKET CHARTS:

This center is a new addition to my word work centers!! I use these pocket chart word sorts with my class as a whole group sorting activity at the beginning of the week. We revisit it during guided reading practice and I use it as an interactive word work center. Students sort the cards by word family. Once the cards are sorted by word family, students put the words in ABC order. Super simple and fun!

I have these available in my TPT store for both Long Vowel and Short Vowel words!!

Want to try these out before you purchase the whole set? Grab my LONG E word sort cards for FREE!!

FOAM LETTERS:

The other fun interactive center that I started using last year is foam letters. I found these on clearance at Michaels... not sure if they have the same exact ones anymore, but I know they have similar things!! I find that any letter manipulatives work well with my firsties!! The key is variety... I switch out the centers weekly so they don't get bored with the same ones! Then, I reintroduce the centers a few weeks later!

BUILD A SENTENCE:

This is one of my newest, most popular centers!! Students take color-coded word cards to build sentences! Nouns, verbs, adjectives, and other words (articles, etc) are all printed on different color cardstock and laminated. Students explore different combinations of the words to build sentences. This center also includes a recording sheet for students to write their sentences on after they build them!!

I also used these cards as a whole group... we took a "random" group of words in a pocket chart and arranged them into an interesting sentence together!!

To grab this fun word work, click the photo below!

BOGGLE WORD SEARCHES:

Here's a GREAT freebie that I found in Krista Wallden's TPT store!! Boggle boards!! Students search for 2, 3, 4, and 5 letter words and record them on a simple sheet! So fun!! Her freebie has 6 different boards!

INTERACTIVE NOTEBOOKS:

One of my favorites additions to word work and Daily 5 has been interactive notebooks! We use these notebooks for many language arts activities and WORD WORK is one of them!! During word work, we use our notebooks for long and short vowel practice! PHONICS! Earlier this year, I started using some FABULOUS short vowel notebook pages from The Sassy School Teacher...

Here are some of my favorite pages from her product that we completed!!

After seeing my students' success with these short vowel practice pages, I created some of my own for Long Vowels!! Take a peek!

Grab my entire set of long vowel interactive notebook pages here!!

MAGNETIC LETTERS:

We love using magnetic letters as a part of our word work routines!! These long vowel sorting mats are perfect for my first graders as we explore long vowel spelling patterns! The majority of these cards feature the CvCe spelling patterns. Students add magnetic letters to the beginning of the word families to create words. Then, they write their words down on a simple recording sheet.

These are FREE in my TpT store!! Enjoy!

SIGHT WORD STICKS:

I got this idea from Reagan Tunstall! She has a great set of Sight Word Stick sheets to go with her center!! Visit her store to see her product!!

Grab my Stick ABC Order sheet here!!

Oh my gosh! I feel like I've still only scratched the surface of word work!! I hope that you find these activities helpful and simple, just like I do! They have all been tested and LOVED by my students!!