May Planning Calendar

Most if not all of us coaches and teachers have some type of planning system to help us stay organized and on top of scheduled obligations and to-dos. Some of us prefer an online calendar system such as iCal or Outlook, while others prefer a paper based system…or maybe you’re someone who has uses for both! However you choose to organize and plan your time, a monthly planning calendar serves as the foundation for mapping out how to make the best use of your time during the week and from day to day.

I’ve been working on putting together a coaching binder of my own and thought I would share two versions of a monthly calendar I’ve created.  The first is a one page monthly calendar and the second is a two page outlook if you prefer more space.  Hopefully you can make use of them to enhance your personal planning system!

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Thanks for reading,

ms-houser

Tips for Facilitating a School Site Visit

Last week I facilitated my first school site visit.  Typically our school designer leads these visits, but she wasn’t available on this particular day which meant I would be in charge!  Here I share a few tips I learned in making the experience a successful one.

Seek Support

When my principal first asked me to facilitate this visit, I began to work through some planning on my own.  I quickly found out though that I had more questions than I had answers.  I am very lucky because I work with a terrific school designer whose experience extends beyond my own and is always willing to help.  She talked me through some of the pieces to be sure to have in place and provided a few resources to get me going.  If you have someone to go to for some initial support, definitely take advantage of this.

Plan Outcomes/Targets

In order to put together a supportive and productive agenda, it’s important to be aware of the needs of visiting teachers and what understandings you hope they walk away with.  In my case, I began by gathering some background information from the principal of the visiting school.  I then crafted two learning targets that I thought would support teachers and provide a focus for the visit.  I shared these targets with the principal to ensure I was on the right track and moved on from there.

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Create an Agenda

Once you have clear targets to guide your work, you are ready to create an agenda consisting of work and learning experiences that will support these targets.  Before heading straight into presenting targets and logistics for the day, begin with an interesting introduction/greeting to help break the ice a bit.

Agenda

Share Observation Norms

These were shared with teachers just to ensure that the classroom visits were as respectful and productive as possible.

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Just Keep Swimming

I arrived at school bright and early the morning of the visit.  When I walked into the building I was greeted by…dark and cold.  That’s right. No power, no heat, and no one to problem solve with.  This definitely was not a part of the day that I had planned for.  After my initial panic (!!!!) I pulled myself together, put a smile on my face, and just kept swimming.  The day got even crazier from there with an early dismissal and a fire on the roof (no kidding!), but I stuck it through and managed to wrap-up a successful site visit.   I must say though that I wouldn’t have been able to do this without very understanding visiting teachers and super supportive hosting teachers…thanks everyone!

I learned a few things from this experience.  First, always be as planned and prepared as possible.  I made sure that I had our materials and space for the site visit arranged well in advance of the visit date.  If I had waited until that morning to do this, I really would have been up a creek.  Second, even when you are well planned and prepared, you can’t plan for everything.  When unplanned roadblocks do present themselves in an untimely fashion, just keep swimming.  Our first grade teacher reminded me of this as we were sitting and observing her lesson in the dark and cold.  She told her students to have a strong mind and ignore the roadblock because there was still work and learning to be done.  Her little guys proceeded to present themselves as excellent models of what perseverance looks like in action.

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Follow-Up

After visitors have left and you’ve had a chance to take a breath, don’t assume that your work is done.  First, I sent a follow-up email to the principal of the visiting school with our captured notes from the debrief of the visit attached.  Then I wrote each hosting teacher a handwritten note thanking them for their time.  Sometimes a personal note like this can feel more meaningful to receive than an email.  Lastly, I followed up on the commitments I made to visiting teachers.  They asked that I send a few example daily schedules along with information regarding documentation panels.  I made sure to do this as soon as I could.

If you have any other tips or “just keep swimming” stories from school site visits of your own, please share in the comments section below!

Thanks for reading,

ms-houser

Common Core Lesson: Asking Questions

Earlier this week I modeled a reader’s workshop lesson in a Kindergarten classroom tied to the Common Core State Standard RL.K.1:

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This is a lesson that my coaching colleague, Katie, kindly shared with me as an idea for how to teach this standard in a reader’s workshop. Although the lesson was planned for Kindergarteners, it could easily be adapted for other grade levels by increasing the complexity of the text.

Rather than teaching, asking and answering questions in the same lesson, I planned to first teach students how readers ask questions about books.  The text I selected for this lesson was Grandfather Twilight.

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Hook/Introduction

The hook or introduction during a reader’s workshop serves several instructional purposes.  It supports engagement, motivation, and a “need to know” for learning.  This is also the time when you can connect to prior learning and introduce the learning target for the lesson.

In the hook for this lesson, I shared with students how excited I was to share one of my favorite books with them.  I then introduced the learning target and the words we would use to help us ask questions.

Mini-Lesson/Think-Aloud

During the mini-lesson I modeled the thinking I wanted students to do as readers.  For this lesson, I read the first few pages aloud and paused twice to model asking questions.

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After modeling, I asked students what they saw me do as readers.  I wanted them to notice how I read the words carefully, looked closely at the pictures, and used our posted question words to help me ask questions.

Guided Practice

Guided practice is the component of reader’s workshop in which you create a safe place for students to practice the task before sending them off to work independently.  It is also an opportunity to assess student readiness for independent application and address misconceptions.

To begin guided practice, I shared with students that it was now their turn to practice asking questions.  I read the next few pages on the visualizer and asked students to follow along with their eyes.  Allowing students to better see the text helps support fluency.

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Independent Practice

To support students with independently applying the target, I made them bookmarks.

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As students were reading, the classroom teacher and I conferred with students to see how they were applying the target to their own reading-level appropriate books.  I was able to make some observations during this time that I followed up on during the debrief.

Share/Debrief

After students have had time to work on applying the learning target independently, it’s important to honor their efforts with a brief share.  For this lesson, you might ask students to share one question they had about a book they read with a neighbor.  After students have had a chance to share, make a connection between the specific learning target for the lesson and the larger context.  You might ask students, “Why do you think it’s important we practice asking questions as readers?”

Continue to work on this standard using a variety of literature and make appropriate adjustments based on the needs of your kids.

A special thanks to Katie Shenk for providing the foundation for this lesson.

Thanks for reading!

ms-houser