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Where the Wild Things Learn

Workshop Wednesday-Reading Workshop FREEBIES

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As soon as I switched to elementary from 6th grade, I knew the first thing I wanted to implement was Daily 5. I was so excited and I couldn’t wait to learn from the Sisters!

I am a huge proponent of each teacher having their own style and doing what works for them and their class. However, I love getting ideas from others and sharing things that work! I am linking up with the amazing Jivey to share how I I get Daily 5 and Reading Workshop started in my classroom!

I always start my talks about Daily 5 and reading time with these three books. They are perfect for covering the main structure for Daily 5. They are very simple, but leave room for a lot of discussion with my fourthies.

As we read each of these books, we work on creating our anchor charts for Daily 5. We talk about what each station should “look like.” Now I use Daily 5 for time to work 1 on 1 with students, or with a small group. When I work 1 on 1 I pull kiddos out while they are at Read to Self. If I do a whole group, I work with the entire group during the Buddy Reading station. So it is Buddy Reading OR Reading with Mrs. Cap!

When we’re all done I cut these up and hang them in the stations!

Next we talk about my favorite classroom management tool, MY CROWN! The kiddos just love it when I first pull this baby out! I’ve had it sitting out all year in my crate with my guided reading group stuff, and every kiddo has asked about it at least once. I tell them the crown means the queen is in the building, and we don’t interrupt the queen! We talk about how students need time with Mrs. Cap that is uninterrupted. We discuss problem solving strategies and make a list of ways that they can solve their problem without me. *Instead of classroom jobs, I have a class “VIP” each day. The VIP becomes the mini teacher when I have the crown on, so they help with any problems students can’t solve on their own.

“If you’re not bleeding or dying, don’t interrupt me!” I’m often known to throw that one in, too 🙂

I then spend 3 days building read to self stamina. We DO NOT do it for 3 weeks like the sisters suggest. In 4th grade I’ve learned they are a bit more independent, AND our 3rd grade teacher does Daily 5 the entire year in a somewhat similar way, so they come to me with some schema (how’s that for a little teacher word in there!;) )

The other stations I simply go over the directions with them. At read to self students can sit in the reading corner and read any book from their book bin. To get books in our book bins students can shop on their “Team day.” I have a team of the day each day of the week, and on that day they are responsible for making sure the entire Daily 5 is cleaned up and put back in order when they are done, and they get to book shop. So Monday is Team 1, Tuesday Team 2, and so on.

At Listen to Reading I use a few programs. We use:

  1. Bookflix and Trueflix
  2. RAZ Kids
  3. Study Island
  4. Schoology
Some days I tell students which one to sign on, others I give them the choice!
At Word Work, students go to the corner and pick up their activity materials. One student can work at the table, the rest take it back to their seat. I mix up Word Work A LOT. Some activities they do:
  1. Phonics lessons for spelling patterns
  2. Spelling choices (magnetic letters, stamp it out, rainbow letters, story with words, etc.)
  3. Boggle
  4. Other word games!

When students go to Work on Writing there are two things they do. MOST of the time, they pick a writing choice off of my Interactive Work on Writing Board.  They have to mix it up (can’t do the same one every time) but it’s a free choice. When they complete the writing, they show it to me and I just check for completion. If they don’t finish during the station, I have “Works in Progress” bins for each class and they put their paper in their to finish later.
When we are working on something specific in Writer’s Workshop (I will blog about this later!) I will mix up this station. My students LOVE when I put my Whole Class Writing Journals out and they get to choose one to write in, and they love the Monthly Writing Prompts for the School year. 
At Buddy Reading, I have a mini bin on my carpet for each of my groups with their group label on it. 
I use animal names, and the kiddos love this! If you want my tags, you can pick up the pre-filled ones with my group names here, or an editable version here. 
{Students sit on crate seats or on carpet during this time}
I do not give my students free choice of stations. I have found that for my class to be most successful I need a little more structure during Daily 5. We complete 3 stations on Monday, and two on Tuesday where they rotate in groups, and the same thing with Wednesday and Thursday. (We do not do stations Friday because we have Kindergarten buddies.) I do mini 10-20 minute reading lessons before and after Daily 5 each day.

If you like this file, you can pick it up here. It is a Smartboard file so you will need Smartnotebook to be able to use! All of the graphics are “locked” but you can right click and unlock them to edit it! The fonts are Kg Luck of the Irish and KG Second Chances Sketch (LOVE her fonts!)
Here are some pictures of my kiddos in action:

I hope this helped you in some way or gave you some ideas! I’d love to hear how you structure your reading workshop/Daily 5. I am also linking up with another of my BBB’s, Erin, whom I adore for her so fun Throw Down Thursday Linky party!

Reader Interactions

Comments

  3. Thanks for sharing how you run your Daily 5. I love your anchor charts and wish I had a Smartboard so I could use your rotation board (we have Epson projectors). I agree that my class runs better with a little more structure in where they are working and what they are doing – free choice has not been a big hit for me.

    Reply

  4. LOVE IT! We follow you on instagram so some of these pics look familiar! We use Daily 3 (our version b/c of time constraints) and it's my favorite part of the day. The Queen is in the building cracks me up, maybe I need a crown! 🙂

    Thanks for sharing, love all of the pics!

    Kerry

    Reply

  15. Amelia, I am thanking the Lord I found your post this morning. I am struggling with how to do all I need to do and still feel like I am teaching. I love Daily 5… I'm just so afraid the kids are not getting what's needed… can we possibly chat by email about schedules,etc? I teach third grade. lswafford@lcsbmail.net Thanks again for sharing!

    Reply

  16. Love the Smart file on Daily 5 rotations. Question about reading groups…when do you pull for guided reading? I teach kindergarten and our school is implementing the daily 5 and I'm trying to get a better understanding. I need that structured rotation as well but I gotta get the reading groups to my table. Do you pull groups during the rotations or after? Also are your groups heterogeneous or homogeneous?

    Reply

  17. Hi! Great questions. Hopefully I can answer them!

    I teach Language Arts to two different groups. I have them each for about 2.5 hours, and on Tues/Thurs I use a half hour to teach SS.
    I start off with a 15-20 minute whole group lesson on our skill of the week (introducing or reviewing). Then I do a 10-15 minute writer's workshop or grammar lesson. On Monday's/Wednesdays we do 3 15-20 minute stations (depending on the time we have.) I assign my students to Daily 5 groups based on their levels. They rotate through three stations on these days, and then on Tuesdays and Thursdays they rotate through the remaining 2 from the 5. Does that make sense? I call buddy reading "meet with the teacher" time, too. That's the time I pull students out for 1 on 1, or most of the time I work with the small groups on reviewing our whole group lesson or reading literature at their level.

    I hope that all makes sense!! Please let me know if you have ANY other questions

    Reply

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