Favorite websites: The Daily Cafe / Daily 5

www.theDailyCafe.com
With great in-class videos, printable templates and more for non-members and even more goodies for members.

This year I introduced the Daily 5 program in my class for the first time. It has been working wonders! A colleague lent me the Daily 5 book last year and I started to use it at the start of the new school year. Students are now reading independently, staying on task, loving the option of choice and I'm having the time to sit down with individual students and teach them to their needs.

The Daily 5 program is set up in a way it is hard to fail. Step-by-step the students get introduced to the 5 reading activities:

1. Read to Self
2. Read to Someone (I call it Read-Together in my class)
3. Work on Writing
4. Listen to Reading (I call it Listen-to-a-story)
5. Word Work

A big focus lays on building independent work stamina. Students start working on an activity for only a very short period of time in the beginning of the year. You increase the amount of time step by step, literally a minute at a time.

The other great thing is that the students get to choose on which activity they work at a given work time. They get to practice being balanced in their choices.

To make it work in my class I have made a "Choice board" in the class where I write down which activity each student does per session. This helps me and my Teaching Aid to have an overview of "who is doing what". The students have a "Planning sheet" that they color in after each activity. This helps them to see if they are balancing out the activities over the school week.

Since I love the Daily 5 program, I would now also like to learn more about the CAFE and I am also looking in at becoming a paid member to the website.

Favorite games: the Name Tag Game

I love to play short and easy games with my class. The simpler, the better. This game has been a favorite of mine for years. I've used it with 5 year old students, primary kids, teenagers and adult learners and they all love it.

Purpose: stress-relief, getting to know a new group, listening skills
Setting: in a circle (sitting on the floor or on chairs or standing up)
Number of players: 10 - 30 is the most fun
Time: 5-10 minutes
Needed equipment: none

Rules: Form a circle with your group. One person stands in the middle. The game-starter (usually me) calls out a name, e.g "Harry". Now Harry needs to call out a new name before the person in the middle tags him. If Harry is tagged before he calls out a new name, he gets to go in the middle. If he calls out a new name, e.g. "Noy", the person in the middle needs to tag Noy before she calls out a new name.

Variations:

1. With older kids and adults I sometimes use a newspaper to tag each other on the knees. Great way to stress-relief!
2. In stead of using names, you can give everybody a word to use. For example new vocabulary words you have been practicing, numbers, geographical names, animals, .....
3. To prevent that the same names are being called out all the time you can add in extra rules during the game: boys need to call out girls, you can't call out the person who called out your name, you can't call out the person you called out last time, ....

Have fun playing this game with your class. Leave a comment to tell me how it went.

Definitions of the PYP attitudes

In my class with 5-6 year old students we talk about the learner profile a lot. In my first years as a PYP teacher I found myself focusing mainly on the learner profile attributes (being Balanced, Caring, Communicators, Inquirers, Knowledgeable, Open-Minded, Principled, Reflective, Risk-Takers and Thinkers). Not only did the students need to learn the vocabulary, I had to get used to using these words myself.

Now that I have even started to use these words in my daily life outside the school walls, I have started to incorporate the attitudes as well in my daily teaching and assessing. In our current unit we focus on the attitudes of Empathy, Appreciation and Creativity. This week I had my students working on definitions of these words. This is what they came up with:

Empathy
- You think about other people's feeling.

- Caring about other people's feelings.

- You have to think about what you say, if it's good or bad.

- You think about what you do before you do it.

Creativity
 - Using your own ideas and put them into action.

- Try to make something new.

- Use it to make beautiful drawings and paintings.

- Use it to make sculptures.

- Think of new experiments.

- Think of new stories and jokes.

Appreciation
 - Something you like or love.

- Show is by telling people you like them or what they do.

 - Show it with your body (hugs, kisses, tickles)

- Show it by making cards.

- Show it by taking good care of things.

- Show it by taking care to do things properly.





These definitions didn't just fall from the sky into their heads. Before this activity, we had read many story books that had characters in them who demonstrated these attitudes. We had discussed these books and made connections to our own lives as learners. And now they were ready to describe these attitudes in their own words. We did this as a whole class activity, which was OK as I had only 15 students present that day. (In a class of 20 or more, I would have split them into smaller groups, tackling one attitude per group). All I had to do now, was write what they told me to write. And I put the comments in a more logical order after the students had given me their input.

I usually like to give the students credit for their work by writing their names next to their comments. On this blog however, I have blacked out the names for privacy reasons.

The learner Profile in Books: How my parents learned to eat

How my parents learned to eat
by Ina R. Friedman


Transdisciplinary theme:
"Where we are in Place and Time"


Central Idea:  
"Knowing about our family histories enables us to discover our cultural origins and develop historical awareness."


Key concepts: Form, Change, Perspective
Learner profile focus: Communicator, Risk-Taker, Open-Minded
Attitudes: Empathy, Appreciation, Creativity

Short synopsis of the story
This book tells the history of the parents of a little girl. They met when her mother was a Japanese schoolgirl and her father was an American marine stationed in Japan. They walked and talked every day, but the marine felt shy to ask his girlfriend out to dinner, as he was not able to eat with chopsticks. She was afraid he was not asking her out because she didn't know how to use a knife and fork. They both decided to learn each others way of eating and finally they went out to a Western and a Japanese restaurant. Years later, their daughter knows how to eat with knife and fork and with chopsticks. 


In Class
I read this book to my class of 5-6 year old students and asked them if they could make connections between the key-concepts of our unit, the learner profile and attitudes. These are the things they came up with: 
Change

• First they couldn't eat the other way, now they can.
• After the story they got married and had a daughter.

Perspective

• In America it is normal for people to eat with knife and fork, but in Japan it is normal to eat with chopsticks.
• In America people shake hands when they meet, in Japan they bow their heads.

Open-Minded

• The parents were Open-Minded because they wanted to learn the different way of eating.

Risk-Taker

• The father was a Risk-Taker by going to the Japanese restaurant all by himself to learn to eat with chopsticks.

• The mother was a Risk-Taker for trying to eat with knife and fork with her Great Uncle.

Empathy

• The mother and father were both thinking about what the other person was feeling or thinking about them.

Appreciation

• The mother and father did all those things because they loved each other.

Why this blog?

I have been a PYP teacher for almost 3 years now. I'm sometimes full of plans, ideas and knowledge, and sometimes I'm not. When I am full of "the good stuff" I am willing to share.

I love my students. I enjoy seeing them grow and develop every day. I take pleasure in guiding them through their inquiries and helping them become independent thinkers and learners.

I believe in the learner profile. If we all strive (students, teachers and parents) to be all these things, we will be able to make (a part of) the world a better place to live.

Through this blog I would like to take you aboard on my journey as a lifelong learner. Experience my successes, reflect on my mistakes and hopefully see growth and development.