Spring Break!!

WoooHooo!! Isn't vacation great! I'm so excited for this one because it is going to be our first vacation with our son! There is so much to prepare though so not really looking forward to that!

As I said goodbye to my kids today I tried to give them good tips on staying active with reading during the break.  When they come back they have to face 3 days of rigorous testing! (Unless they refuse to take it! - fingers crossed!)  I wanted them to have something to do over vacation that wasn't just busy work with them reading random stories and answering questions.  I put together a close reading pack with tons of stories of ocean animals!  I leveled all the stories (because ya know I have so much free time!!!).  This way each of the stories met the needs of all my students.  I'm really happy with how it came out!

This is one of the stories about crabs.  They have a close reading guide on the right side to help them locate important information.  On the bottom right is a small dot.  That is the lowest level story.  On the teacher guide for each pack it tells you the level of each of the stories.  They are leveled with a lexile and I used a conversion chart I found online to convert it to Fountas and Pinnell.  So the Fountas and Pinnell levels are estimates as there is no direction correlation between the two leveling systems.  

Check out the whole pack here!!

After getting home today I was so tired! I picked up my son from my parents house because I am lucky they can watch him for me during the day!  I definitely stopped for coffee because thats my fuel these days, that and the gym.  I haven't been to the gym in a few days so happy to get back tomorrow!  I settled in and decided to start working on a close reading pack on water pollution.  I figure its a great pack for Earth Day.  My class is doing another module from EngageNY at the end of the year and it discusses conservation so I thought this would be a great way to help my students gain a better understanding!

Make sure to watch for it!

I find it hard to work at home lately.  I feel guilty because I don't get to see my son all day while I'm at work so I really want to spend all my time with him but I also need to get work done!  Lately I have been having him sit next to me while I work on projects so at least I can interact with him while I'm trying to work!

Enjoy!!

Beach Bum Literacy Chick

Synonym Word Walls **FREEBIE**

I haven't really been writing due to the beginning of school! The first few weeks are always so stressful being a reading specialist. There are tests to administer and grade and schedules to create! Really looking forward to a successful year! After grading a quick assessment we gave I notice the students need to increase their vocabulary. They all use basic commonly used words when there are much better words out there!!

In my classroom I have a synonym word wall.  I leave it up all year and have the students refer to it when they are writing.  My students always find more words to add and really enjoy adding them to our wall.

This is the word wall I have in my classroom.  Each year I end up adding new words based on what I observe in my classroom.

I created a FREE synonym word wall starter set to encourage everyone to start this in their classroom.  The one I created is an ocean theme.  I plan on elaborating more on the file and include many different themes.  If you are looking for a specific theme please comment below and let me know!

To download the starter set click HERE!!!

Enjoy :)

Beach Bum Literacy Chick