My plans for the week (and where to find them)

We have been BUSY with some Halloween fun this week, so I want to share a few things I'm doing in my classroom to celebrate while reviewing reading!

I love a good spooky story, and one of my favorite to do with fifth grade is The Legend of Sleepy Hollow. I got this pack from forkin4th last year which includes a version that is more level appropriate for my kids. I like that it still has a good amount of words that they are unfamiliar with. We read the story yesterday, and then split into groups to do a character analysis for Brom Bones and Ichabod Crane. Today, I had them compare the two men and predict what happened to Ichabod after his encounter. I read over them today and made comments. Tomorrow, they will actually work on a sequel to the Legend and focus on giving details. I can't wait to see what they come up with and will try to remember to take pictures!

For fourth grade, we're doing test-taking strategies this week with a GREAT freebie I ran across from the 24/7 Teacher. This packet has some great questions for review, and the kids enjoyed learning some new facts about bats!

First, I had the kids make headlines for each paragraph. Since there wasn't much space on the paper and they take their benchmarks and SOL tests on the computer anyway, I showed them how to record the headlines (or stop and jot) on a separate sheet. They did a pretty good job overall, but I have a good idea of who needs more practice on this.

I took a picture of the headlines up close, but it didn't work for some reason.

Once they finished reading and making headlines, they answered the questions provided and highlighted it in the article. I'm making a big deal about proving your answers because these are the kids who need to the MOST!

We've already been doing a lot with bats for third grade in the past few weeks, but tomorrow I will be reading Nightsong! They're learning about animal adaptations in class, so we will discuss how this relates to factual information about bats we have read in other books. Then we'll talk a little about the author's craft. I can't wait to share this book with my very first group!

Finally, I want to leave you with a picture of my door that I finished when I didn't have my camera phone. I finally took this picture last Friday. I think it's fun!