How to... Comic Strips

Brr... baby it's cold outside!

To kick off the winter season and a new year, I used my love of art to inspire my students to explain how to make snowflakes by creating a comic strip. Of course, I couldn't just give them paper and pencils and expect artistic perfection. I spent some time teaching them the art of comic strip making. It was amazing to see the light shine super bright in some students' eyes as they realized that pictures are worth a thousand (well, maybe a hundred) words. First our art teacher taught a lesson on how to cut paper snowflakes. Then I taught a lesson on how real snowflakes form.

Next, students learned the basic mechanics of comic strip making like the purpose of narration boxes, panels and word bubbles and how to create original characters and draw block letters. They used those elements, combined with their knowledge of paragraph writing and created these awesome comic strips!

 Next students brainstormed, then draw rough drafts and finally published their work in color. Sounds familiar? Yep... it's the writing process! They peer-edited each other's work and checked to see if illustrations could stand alone without words or if words were necessary to help the viewer understand the action. I reminded students that their comics, like stories, needed to have a beginning, middle and an end.

Et voila!

While I read my students' work, I realized an amazing thing. Students explained how to make snowflakes from different perspectives. For example, some students told their story through a character's eyes. Other students students told their story as if the reader was a part of the story. Even more, one student explained how real snowflakes are formed in the atmosphere and included very scientific words in her comic. That's what authentic writing is about! I had so much fun that I created a TpT resource, How to Comic Strips, to make it easy for other educators to get started. 

click to download

It includes 

• 26 How to Comic Strip templates
• 1 rough draft template
• 1 blank template 
• a background information page with teaching resources and suggestions.

Check it out and consider following me on my TpT page.

As always, I'm proud of the zeal that my students displayed in order to complete their comics. I know that at the end of the day, what's most important is that they learn how to build their own intelligence because that can't be taken away!

Wishing you much peace, happiness and joy in 2018!

Wow... can you believe that 2017 is quickly approaching it's end! As we say farewell to 2017, have students look forward to the endless possibilities of 2018. With a growth mindset, help students envision what they think is impossible and create a plan to turn dreams into goals and goals in reality. One way to achieve this is to use My 2018 New Year's Resolutions printable to help students create a plan.

click to download

 After Winter break, I set aside time to help my students set goals. We display them on a bulletin board outside my room and then move them inside so that students can reference them for the rest of the school year. They actually encourage each other to persevere to reach goals and celebrate victories large and small. So, what are you waiting for? Go ahead, click download and get started now!

Fearless... My One Word

 Currently, I wear a bracelet to remind me to be fearless everyday. About two years ago I created a vision of one word that became a driving force in my life. As I reflected on what I wanted my vision to be, I thought about how I reacted to events in my life. Often times I was reactive, only responding after someone else put the wheels of that event in motion feeling like I was only along for the ride without a lot of say as to the direction that I would take. I decided that I needed to be proactive - the person who was starting or leading events. So my first word was pretty simple - LIFE. I wanted to remind myself to live, enjoy and relish life.  Later that year, I changed my one word to FEARLESS as a reminder to make decisions based on living life to the fullest... not being fearful.

 Around the same time, the leadership team at my school studied the book, One Word That Will Change Your Life by Jon Gordon. To begin each monthly meeting, we spent time reflecting on how we were practicing our one word and how it impacted our daily lives at work and/or at home. This school year, we decided to adopt one word for our entire school - #BELIEVE. We want our staff to believe that our students are capable of achieving at high levels. We want to empower students to believe that they can achieve greatness with work and effort. We want parents to believe that we truly have their children's best interest at heart.

 To kick off the new school year, I designed T-shirts to inspire us to #BELIEVE.  



I believe... do you? What word will drive you to be your best this year? Let's get started!

Happy 2017!!!!!

Happy New Year... I am truly thankful for all the blessings that I had in 2016 and I know that 2017 will be even better. As I grow, I realize that goal setting is a must to achieve dreams and reach milestones. If it works for adults, imagine how effective it is for students to set goals. Teaching them at an early age to set goals instills a practice that will have life long benefits. So as we start the New Year, help your students set goals for 2017.

In my New Year's Resolutions handout, students set goals for home, school and also think about a way that they can make a difference. For the last few years, I have encouraged my students to set goals at the beginning of the new year. I conference with each student and talk about the steps needed to obtain their goals. Then I post each handout in a prominent place in a my classroom as a visual reminder.
 

download  here

 

 

 

 

Enjoy... I wish you peace, love and serenity in 2017!

Self-Monitoring Bookmarks

Necessity is truly the mother of invention! Yesterday while planning guided reading lessons with a co-worker, we decided that a bookmark would be an awesome resource tool for students to use the self-monitoring strategy to determine unknown words. Well... that was easier said than done. We found tons of bookmarks but not one that included everything we needed to help our students. So, I decided to create my own.

I strongly feel that when students learn to self-monitor, they become stronger, more confident readers. I created two bookmarks. One to reinforce what to do when a reader encounters an unknown word and the other reminds him/her what to do when he/she is trying to better understand the text.

Hardly any work is involved in getting these Self-Monitoring Bookmarks ready for your students to use. Are you ready? First download, then print, next fold the bookmark page in half... and last use! Students can flip the bookmarks over depending on rather they are looking at unknown words or comprehending the text.

Self-Monitoring Bookmarks

Hi, I'm Back!

Confession, I haven't been the best blogger...

Can you believe that this is my first post in a little over a year but it's a great one. I've been pretty busy with life. Me? I'm great and so are my students. They are learning all about poetry. While using the reading strategies of asking and answering questions and visualizing to better comprehend poetry, an amazing thing happened. One day, one of my students said, "Can I read a poem from a book that I checked out from the library?" "Of course you can," I said. Over the week, all my students even the most quiet one asked to read poetry from books that they were bringing from home. Shel Silverstein's Where the Sidewalk Ends was a #1 favorite. Then a student asked, "Can I read a poem that I wrote myself?" Wow! That was all I could say.

All of a sudden, my entire class became budding poets. I thought it would be great to take their poems and have each student "publish" their work in a booklet that included an About the Author page. Needless to say, it was a smash hit. Many of my students asked to stay in for recess to write additional poems. As a result, I created a poetry packet that allows primary students to use the writing process to write six different types of poems and turn their masterpieces into a booklet. Each poem includes a detailed rough draft  and a publishing handout. Some poems include a brainstorming template, too!

I am A Poet Freebie!

Check out my I am A Poet freebie by clicking the caption under the picture. If you like what you see, you can purchase the entire packet from TpT. As always, happy learning!

The Seven Continents

     About 5 weeks ago, our 2nd grade team decided to do an extensive study of the continents and oceans. Each class would focus on becoming an expert in one continent area and present this information during a gallery walk. Teachers' names were thrown into a bucket... á voila, I pulled the 3rd largest continent - North America. My 18 students and I checked out books from our school and public library, enlisted the help of our media and technology specialists and jumped on our classroom computers to do research. I created a graphic organizer to help students with research. Check it out, it's a freebie on TpT.

My Continent Graphic Organizers

     They learned about geography, landforms, famous people, climate, animals and other amazing facts. We decorated our room with student drawn flags from each of North America's countries and the hallway came to life with an oversized map of North America. The bulletin board was adorned with their written and typed essays. Finally, each student memorized one awesome fact about North America. On the day of our gallery walk, my students stood like statues around my room. When a visitor touched a stamp on their hand, my excited students came to life to say that fact! We invited 3rd graders and all school staff to visit our continent gallery. Each person was given a handmade passport to take notes and get stamped as they walked from continent to continent. I have to admit I am extremely proud of what the entire 2nd grade accomplished.