Is “Tuck” everlasting?

So, I’ve been thinking about the books we read in language arts. We do not use a basal reader. We read novels (I don’t like the term “trade books” do you?) and teach skills through them. It’s 5th grade. We’re not reading “the cannon.” We, my 5th grade teacher colleagues and I, make changes here [...]

No More Assuming

So, I’ve been thinking about what I assume my students know. In my class, I explain fairly early on that we won’t assume anything, because when we assume “it makes an ass out of you (u) and me.”  5th graders love that I say this; I mean I say the word “ass.” And, it’s not [...]

When Parents Aren’t Impressed (Enough)

So, I’ve been thinking about conferences. We had our “spring” parent-teacher conferences a few weeks ago. I say “spring” because it was weeks ago and the temperature is still in the 40′s this week, but I digress. One of the pieces of work I shared with parents was the most recent essay each of my [...]

Put That Post-it on the Wall

So, I’ve been thinking about how my students organize information. We have practiced a couple of ways to gather information and then manipulated it this way and that. We have worked on this both formally and informally. So, I was interested to see what groups of students would do with this assignment: Note: I had [...]

Sometimes Plans Just Work Out

So, I’ve been thinking about how impressive 5th graders are sometimes. I wrote about my new unit plan the day before yesterday; I know 2 posts in 3 days?! You can read about the whole thing here. But, the point of this post is that yesterday my students were writing “This I Believe” type pieces, [...]