Published Procedural Writing Projects

 It is no secret that I "heart" technology and I try to pass my love along to my students in numerous ways. I share their work on our blogs, use games and resources to teach, have "Video Friday", conduct real time research and inquiry with the internet, and utilize my wonderful Smart Board daily, just to name a few.

This year was the first year I tried using iMovie, not only myself, but with my students. We created projects showing their procedural writing pieces. Take a look at some of these wonderful How-To videos and pay attention to the sequence of step, wonderful details and use of transition words!

Carter wrote about How-To Surf...

 Grace wrote about How-To Sing...

Mimi wrote about How-To Play Every Sport...

Ville taught us How-To Make Pizza

Piya taught us How-To Swim

Sania taught us How-To Make a Mango Smoothie

 P.S. I can't wait to use iMovie with my students some time soon!

Similes Make Us Smile!

We have begun a unit on poetry and poetic language. Last week we studied alliteration and this week we are learning about and starting to use similes. A simile is a figure of speech that compares two things that are not normally alike using the words like or as. The kids came up with some great ones. Here are a few of my favorites.

Carter-Miss Irene is as lovely as a rose getting smelled by me.
Keenan- My puppy Max is as cute as a bunny running down a hill.
Grace- My friend Jay is as cool as a kitten riding a skateboard.
Piya- Cake is as sweet as a 10 pound sugar rush.
Anisa- Green broccoli is as juicy as an ice-lolly in summer.


And some personal favorites ;-)

Mustafa- My teacher, Miss Rorey, is as cute as a monkey.
Ella- My teacher, Miss Rorey, is as lovely as a bird singing to me.
Mimi- Miss Rorey is as pretty as a rose that just bloomed.


 

Stars and Stairs

This weekend I sneaked (or is it snuck?) away from life... this cold that has been hanging on, my piles
of reports, my personal list of emails to send, grocery shopping, cooking, tending to my neglected plants... you get the picture. I left it all behind and headed to the beach to celebrate a friends birthday.

While I was away from work, I still managed to bring along some educational journals to read. I know, I know. You are saying to yourself "Ms. Rorey, really, on the weekend?" But yes, they bring me joy and I find great teaching ideas like this one, Stars and Stairs, I am going to use in class just this week.

Stars and Stairs is a strategy to give feedback to students. It can be used in any subject and I am going to start off using it in math. This year my school has decided to send home math tests so that parents can get an idea of their performance in class. As a grade we have decided to incorporate this into our homework routine by having students reflect on their test with their parents, but I worried about whether this activity was positive and beneficial. Are students feeling good about their successes? Are parents only looking at the wrong answers? Can students find on their own the concepts they need to work on? My worries are still there, but now I have a tool for guiding the process.

Stars and Stairs is a way for me to give students an idea of things they are doing well and where they need to grow. Read more about it here. If you are a parent in my classroom, be sure to leave some feedback for me on how the new routine has worked for you.

Thanks,