Can You Believe It?

It is December! I can't believe it has been a week since I last posted to my blog, but we did have a holiday in there with no school. I hope you all had a great Thanksgiving. We did! I think I gained fifteen pounds.

We did a neat activity today and it is fairly easy to do, but the results are very pretty. We made Christmas cards (more practical reading and writing) using the iris paper folding technique. There is a very good website that I got my patterns from and they are not complicated at all. The demo instructions are easy to follow. The kids were excited, and I was too because I got them to practice letter writing inside the cards. Plus, I hope their families were excited about the beautiful cards that their kids created for them. I also gave the kids a packet of additional pattern so that they could teach their families and friends how to make them too!

The website for the Iris paper folding craft is: http://www.irisfolding.circleofcrafters.com/
sign up with your e-mail address, and they will send you a new pattern once a month. Have fun!
I have!!

Donna Smith

COMING SOON!!!!

I am so excited. We are working on writing reviews of our favorite fairy tales in class. I have several student who would like to post their reviews when they are ready. I hope that they will be ready some time next week.

I love being able to showcase student work and this will be a new venue for us. They were all very excited when I asked them if they would like to put them on my blog. They were so excited about being published where anyone in the world could see it. You would have thought you had given them a new Wii game or another bag of Halloween candy. Don't you love authentic publications? Watch the BLOG for their editorials!

Have a great weekend!
Donna Smith

Hank the Cowdog - Every Dog Has His day

Review: It's time for the big cattle drive, which means big responsibility for Hank. Meanwhile, what's Benny the cowdog doing on the ranch? Hank's got to find out quick--before he loses his spot as top dog. USA Today calls the hilarious Hank the Cowdog series "...the best family entertainment in years." Hank is a scruffy, smart-alecky supersleuth with a nose for danger and an eye for the ladies. And as Head of Ranch Security on a West Texas ranch, he's usually up to his ears in all kinds of amusing trouble. Whether he's called upon to bark up the sun, investigate suspicious goings-on, or defend the ranch against marauders, Hank's hilarious, hair-raising adventures will delight readers young and old alike. http://www.fantasticfiction.co.uk/e/john-r-erickson/every-dog-has-his-day.htm

Poor Hank, I feel so sorry for him. He just got ousted by a blue blood border collie. He has been banished from the cattle drive and tied to a post. Not mention, all of this happened in front of the beautiful beagle, Miss Scamper. Hank has to get himself out of the doghouse and back into the good graces of High Loper and Slim. Read the book to find out how he does it!

The students today had a great time carving their branding irons out of potatoes to get ready for the big round up. We branded paper cows with our potato stamp brands. The students designed their own brands so that everyone would know whose cows they were in case they got out of the paper pen. We had lots of fun! We read our books and left poor Hank tied to the hitching post.

(Teachers: We watched a video on cowboys and ranch life on United Streaming before we started reading the books to frontload the students. We knew that they had no background knowledge of that lifestyle. It really helped. Creating the stamp brands helped them to understand how ranchers were able to tell their cows from other people's. They really had a good time. They did require some help with figuring out how to cut away the potato so that their design would be raised to make the print. Plastic knives worked great!)

We're riding out on the next doggie.....yeee haaaaa!!! Until we meet again on the lone prairie,
Donna Smith and cowhands

Reader's Theater

How much fun do the kids have reading reader's theater plays? LOTS!! The kids today had a great day reading different versions of Cinderella that were written as reader's theatre plays. We took the two versions to compare and contrast how the same fairy tale can be told in different cultures. Somethings are different, yet there is always the underlying story---wicked stepmother and stepsister(s) who treat the child of the father poorly after he dies. Then a royal person has a dance, ball, etc.... and meets the poor misused girl and falls madly in love with her. She loses a shoe, of course, and the royal guy sets off across the kingdom to find her. AND you know when the shoe fits, she wears it!!! AND they live happily ever after much to the anger of the STEPS. We got a lot of good discussion and were able to use a VENN diagram to compare and constrast the two stories. The kids really liked changing up the parts and getting to be different characters. I particularly enjoy being the wicked step mother. You know you always like the roles you can get into and since I am NOTHING like the awful Steps, I had a really good time reading with the kids. They LOVE it when you get into the roles with them. It frees them up to be dramatic TOO!

I can't wait until tomorrow....we get to brand our cows! (Pictures to come!)

Have a great day!
Donna Smith

From the Mixed Up Files of Mrs. Donna C. Smith

You know E. L Konigsberg got it right on the nose when he described how unappreciated Claudia felt in the middle of her brothers in the humerous tale The Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler. She ran away to the Metropolitan Museum of Art and took one of her brothers with her. She didn't realize just exactly what she meant to her family and how much her parents depended on her to help with her younger brothers.

Sometimes I get wrapped up in everything I'm doing and forget to say how great I think the teachers at Langston are. They work very hard to try and move these kids ahead. Though, I'm just the Reading Interventionist, I don't want to fail to say THANKS FOR THE AWESOME JOB YOU DO!!!! I depend on the classroom teachers to help me better do my job, and I don't want them feeling unappreciated! (I really don't want them to run away!)

You are APPRECIATED!!!

Donna Smith

Hank the Cowdog Rides into After School at Langston

If you have never read any of the 42 Hank the Cowdog books written by John Erickson, then you are missing a treat. John R. Erickson, a former cowboy and ranch manager, is gifted with a storyteller's knack for spinning a yarn. Through the eyes of Hank the Cowdog, a smelly, smart aleck Head of Ranch Security, Erickson gives readers a glimpse of daily life on a ranch in the West Texas Panhandle. This series of books and tapes is in school libraries across the country; has sold more then 6 million copies; is a Book-of-the-Month Club selection; and, is the winner of the 1993 Audie for Outstanding Children's Series from the Audio Publisher's Association.....Hank the Cowdog made his debut in the pages of The Cattleman, a magazine for adults. An obvious favorite of readers, Erickson included two of Hank's humorous stories in Maverick Book's first publishing effort, The Devil in Texas (1982). Erickson began selling books from his pickup truck at cattle auctions, rodeos, and just about any place cowboys gathered.

When Erickson started getting "Dear Hank" letters, he knew he was onto something. So in 1983, 2,000 copies of The Original Adventures of Hank the Cowdog were published, and sold out in 6 weeks. Not long after that first printing, the book was recorded word-for-word on audiotape. Since then, every Hank book has been recorded, making Hank the longest running successful children's series on audio ever. (http://hankthecowdog.com/erickson.htm) To read the rest of the story go to the official Hank the Cowdog website at http://hankthecowdog.com/ .

After school tutoring in reading will be reading one of the 42 Hank books, Hank the Cowdog: Every Dog Has His Day. We are planning lots of fun activities to help the students understand what life on a ranch is like. We are going to listen to some authentic cowboy trail songs and see what life is like on a working ranch. One of the activities we will be working on is creating a brand so that we can brand our cows. The students will be designing a brand for their cattle ranch. We will then create a brand using a potato. We are also going to have the students make hats and cowboy bandanas (much safer than spurs!) Those are just a couple of activities we have lined up...

Yippee Ti Yi Yay get along little doggies, we are going to have some cowboy fun!
Donna Smith

Wow! What Busy Week!

Whew, I only thought last week was busy! This week has surpassed them all. With our after school tutoring group, my regular groups, my night classes, not to mention the election, I am pooped! I think everyone at Langston is.

Our practical cycle is in full swing right now. The students have created paper hats by following the instructions. They made pudding and popcorn balls by reading the recipes. They have written letters, notes, and cards and viewed e-mails, blogs, and websites for communicating with others....They are learning lots and having fun! LEARNING IS FUN!!!

Some of our students who did well on the NWEA assessment got to take a field trip to watch for the eagles. They got some really neat pictures. We also FINALLY finished our recipe books and took them home to share with our families. Yes, even I made one with my little friend Amaya. We had a great time! I will be posting some new pictures of our recipe books and hopefully the eagles trip too!

I will try to keep my blog more current in the coming week! Have a great Friday!!

Donna Smith

What a DAY!!!!

Wow! We had a great day today at Langston Magnet. We are learning about the parts of magazines and also celebrating being DRUG FREE!!! Did you know that a page number is not called a page number in a magazine???? A page number in a magazine is called a FOLIO. Is that weird or what? We also learned that the blurb (tells what a book is about) on the back cover of a book is like the DECK in a magazine. The deck tells what the magazine article is about. AND, the words in bold type are IMPORTANT to the article. Boy, did we learn a lot today.

We also celebrated being DRUG FREE today with our DRUG FREE peprally. All of our classes participated by making signs and coming up with their own class cheer about being DRUG FREE. Everyone got to perform at the peprally. Ms. Murray's 5th grade class got a POPCORN PARTY for best participation in the DRUG FREE activities this week. The kids and classroom teachers did a GREAT JOB!!! We hope that you celebrate with us and make a commitment to be DRUG FREE! Have a great weekend!!!

Donna Smith

RECIPE for Enrichment

The kids have been working on organizing an afterschool recipe book called Recipes for Enrichment. We hope to have it finished next week. Tuesday, we made popcorn balls from one of our recipes. Everyone in afterschool will get one Wednesday for snack (we didn't quite finish making all 100 popcorn balls). The recipe is so easy that we would like to share it with you here:

Afterschool Popcorn Balls

1/3 cup popcorn kernals (3 1/2 quarts already cooked popcorn)
1 - 10 oz. bag of Marshmallows (if you use the 16 oz. bag, pop more popcorn)
1/4 cup butter or margarine
Wax Paper

1. Melt the butter and marshmallows together in a bowl (we used the microwave). After the marshmallows and buter are melted, stir until the mixture is well blended.
2. Pop the popcorn and put in a large mixing bowl, this allows the marshmallow mixture time to cool some.
3. Pour the marshmallow mixture over the popcorn and stir until all the popcorn is well coated with the sticky stuff.
4. Form into balls and lay them out on wax paper to dry

(Hint - After the popcorn balls dry, we put ours in sandwich bags to keep them fresh)

We hope you enjoy our special Afterschool Popcorn Balls as much as we did!!! Pictures of us making our snacks will be up shortly!

Mrs. Smith, Ms. Clark and After School Students

Website

We are currently trying to update our website to be more helpful to the parents, students, teachers, and community members. If there is something that would be helpful to you or something that you would like to see included on the website, feel free to leave a comment and we will see what we can do to get the information included. Already, there are links to the district lunch menus, edline, the learning institute and other sites that may be helpful for keeping up with grades, food choices, and Benchmark and Chunk Test scores.

Please be patient as we are building the site, it takes a lot of time; but check back often to see what we have added. New items will be added daily. We are very excited about the website and the information and helps that will be offered for our school community members.

Have a great week!
Donna Smith

Parent/Teacher Conference

Woo-hoo, our first nine weeks is at an end, and we have had some outstanding reading going on in the classrooms and in intervention. We learned about narratives (texts that tell a story that's make believe). Some of these included fables, fairy tales, tall tales, folk tales, realistic fiction stories, mysteries, and historical fictions. Now we are into our practical and informational reading cycle where we are learning about brochures, newspapers, magazines, atlases, maps, and reading instructions as well as lots of other kinds of practical texts.

In after school, we are making recipe books, and next week we will be making popcorn balls for everyone involved in afterschool tutoring. Talk about FUN practical reading skills! I can hardly wait.

We are looking forward to seeing all of our parents and guardians at parent/teacher conference so that we can show off the neat things we have been doing. We hope everyone will come!

Have a great day!
Mrs. Smith and students

Animal Strike at the Zoo. It's True!

Animal Strike at the Zoo. It's True! by Karma Wilson (Author), Margaret Spengler (Illustrator) is a very cute picture book about zoo animals being tired of the same old day to day goings on at the zoo. They go on strike to try and get better conditions for themselves. It is really a very good example of a book appearing to be simple, but actually includes several different types of text. The book tells a story so is classified as narrative/fiction genre. It includes different types of practical text such as signs and newspapers within the narrative. Another twist to the story is that it rhymes! It is very neat and can be used for various lessons. Great descriptive language is included. Read and enjoy this book. Your kids will love it!

Donna Smith

Practical Reading in Narrative Books

Practical reading is our next cycle at Langston. We will be working with texts that inform and help us in our everyday life. We will be reading recipes (and cooking), looking at brochures, reading maps, instructions, and how-to books. One of the things that we looked at today is how books of different genres can be combined.

We read a book by Aaron Reynolds (Author) and Paulette Bogan (Illustrator) called Chicks and Salsa. It is a cute narrative book about some barnyard animals getting tired of eating the same old thing until a rooster helps them find satisfaction in some southwestern cuisine. The thing that is so great about the book is that it is a crossover between narrative and practical texts. After you learn about the different kinds of southwestern food that the aninals eat, they give you the recipes in the back of the book with a little humor built into the instructions. The recipes sound especially yummy! If you haven't read Chicks and Salsa, you are missing a treat. The students loved it, especially the quackamole! OLE'

Donna Smith

Lester Laminack

Today I was priviledged to meet and listen to author Lester Laminack. He is a wonderful author of children's books that include, my favorite, Saturdays and Teacakes. He schooled us on the craft of writing as well as how children should be taught the love of a good book. He was totally awesome. If you get a chance to see him or have him at your school, make sure you attend his seminars because you will laugh, cry, and be totally awestruck by the man. No wonder his books are such joys to read to children. He, himself, is a joy to be around. I could have listened to him all day! Pick up one of his books and enjoy his craft, then, pass it on or share it with a friend!

Here is Lester's home page. Visit his site!

http://www.lesterlaminack.com/

Donna Smith

TGIF

Whew! What a busy week we have had! We started after school tutoring, had space night and taken chunk tests in the 4th & 5th grades the last two days. I am certainly ready for the weekend.

Next week, we will have 2nd and 3rd grade chunk tests on Thursday and Friday. Then we will begin our practical cycle. I am really excited about that. We will be reading recipes, brochures, newspapers, magazines, instructions, cereal boxes, and how-to text. It is really a fun time for us as well as the students. We will be working on this in after school also. We are all ready to start something new!

Donna Smith

Chunk Tests

Our first round of reading chunk tests began today. We were assessing narrative reading to see how well the students have learned what we've been teaching since school started. The teachers and the students take the tests very seriously and try very hard to do their best. We will start analyzing the data that we get back to find out if we need to reteach any areas the students didn't perform well on the tests.

Tomorrow is the narrative writing. We'll be assessing how well our students can write stories. It may be a story about something that's happened to them or maybe having them make up something. We will be looking at how they put the stories together, if they included detail with descriptive language, and of course, grammar, punctuation and capitalization. I hope all the students write stories down as well as they tell them!

Good luck on the tests!
Donna Smith

After School Program

Langston's After School Program got off to a great start yesterday. We are serving 100 students after school in a variety of courses. We have the usual reading, math, and science, but there are also enrichment classes where the students do fun activities, field trips, cheerleading, etc.... The students are really excited about it and so are we.

Ms. Sharon Clark, the K-2 Intervention Teacher at Langston and I (3-5) have 18 students for enrichment class and 15 for reading. Our students are creating stories in a bag. They have to read a book and then create props from the story that will help them with retelling it. They are going to use the props to tell their stories to the 1st and 2nd graders in after school.

We are also planning on working in some practical reading in our enrichment class. Word has it that recipes are going to used to make some neat snacks for after school students on Halloween.

Read, Believe, Succeed, Achieve
Donna Smith

JUNIE B. JONES

WOW! What a busy yesterday and today. Our 1st and 2nd graders got to go to Little Rock to see Junie B. Jones. They had a really great time. The teachers were as excited as the kids were. I told them that my favorite Junie B. book is Sneaky Peek Spying. I think it should be the next show they make!

We had space night tonight. Students and their families came to Langston, and we got to share books on space. They got to make airplanes, do a communications exercise with legos, make and eat space cuisine, go into the Star Lab, and shoot rockets outside. We all had a really good time!

This week my students have been practicing test-taking strategies and getting ready for our chunk tests at the end of the week. We are working on narrative reading and writing. Our favorite narratives so far are: A Bad Case of Stripes, Amazing Grace, Chrysanthemum, Stand Tall Molly Lou Melon, Chicken Sunday, and The Big Orange Splot. If you haven't read them yet, you need to get them!

Donna Smith

Helps for Identifying Unknown Words

In my classes, we have been working on strategies that help us identify words that we don't know. The students came up with lots of good ideas, and I thought I would share those with you. If you can think of anymore, please add to our list.

Helps for figuring out words we don't know:

1. Break the word into chunks.
2. Sound out the word IF the word is a one syllable word OR sound out the parts after breaking the word apart.
3. Find a word within a word. example: demand (man, an, and)
4. Use your fingers to cover up parts that you already know and try and figure out what's left.
5. Look at the pictures.
6. Leave out the unknown word.....read the whole sentence without the word to see if you can figure it out. (Context Clues)
7. Use a dictionary.
8. For use only after 1 - 7 have been tried, ask the teacher or another student.

We hope this helps you as you come to words that you don't know!

Donna Smith and students

Read for the Record - Corduroy

Reading took front and center today at Langston because we were reading for the record. Teachers all over campus were reading and giving lessons on friendship using the book, Corduroy written by Don Freeman. This is a program by Jumpstart and takes place all across the U.S. The following is taken from the Jumpstart website:

"Jumpstart’s Read for the Record is a campaign designed to bring attention to the importance of early education. By encouraging hundreds of thousands of children and adults to read the same book on the same day, Jumpstart aims to break a world record and to make early education a national priority.

Once again, children and adults read together at events nationwide in an attempt to break the world record for the largest shared reading experience in history! This year’s campaign took place on October 2, 2008, in schools, libraries, stores, hotels, playgrounds, offices, and homes across the country."

For more information go to: http://www.readfortherecord.org/

We had a great time with a wonderful book. If you haven't read it yet, you need to!!!

Donna Smith

Christopher Paolini

Christopher Paolini was home schooled for his entire education. He graduated from high school at the age of 15, and immediately began work on ERAGON. He was able to complete his education through a set of accredited correspondence courses in Illinois.

In 2002, Paolini published ERAGON through his parent's publishing company. To promote the book, Christopher went to over 130 schools and libraries discussing reading and writing. He dressed up in a medieval costume which included a red shirt, black pants, lace-up boots, and a black cap.

In the summer of 2002, Alfred Knopf was shown a copy of ERAGON by his stepson, and he made an offer to publish it and the rest of the Inheritance cycle. The second edition of ERAGON was published by Knopf in August 2003. By the age of nineteen, Paolini became a New York Times best-selling author. ERAGON has since been adapted into a movie of the same name.

Personally, I didn't like the movie much because it did not stay true to the story. There were a lot of changes that didn't make sense if you had read the books. In this case, the old adage, "the book is always better than the movie" happens to be absolutely the truth!

As Paolini always says in The Ancient Language in ERAGON: "Atra esterni`ono thelduin." (May good fortune rule over you.)

Donna

Excellent Sequel!

For those of you following the ERAGON series, the latest book, BRISINGR, is as good as the first two, ERAGON, and ELDEST. Christopher Paolini began writing the first book at the ripe old age of 15. Now at 24, he is an accomplished author and speaker, and has had a movie made from one of his books.

BRISINGR picks up where the last book ELDEST ends with Eragon and Roran at Helgrind trying to rescue Katrina. The book is full of nail biting adventures that take Eragon and his friends to the brink of death. It is great and those who liked the first two books will not be able to put this one down.

If you have read the books, let me know what you think!

Have a great week!
Donna

Welcome to My Blog!

I am very excited about the prospect of having a new blog. It can really open up opportunities for my students, their parents, and my colleagues to share problems and solutions for those who have difficulties in reading. I also hope that others will share good books, book reviews, and lessons here. I intend to link this to my Edline page with help from our webmaster so that I can share this with our entire community. Please let me know what you think and share with us all your favorite reads. Have a great week!