I want to cry in my soup. This poor blog. Neglected. For almost a year. Is anyone even out there anymore? I doubt it. But I am going to try to revive it.
I have been teaching kindergarten for almost a whole year now. I feel like I have my stuff together enough now that I can actually share ideas instead of just blogging about how fantastic all of the products are that I've purchased from TpT. Which -- they are! I am loving Deedee Wills and Deanna Jump's Guiding Readers. And their Math Series -- which, by the way, my entire K-1 grade level just purchased, adopted, and are implementing now, thanks to yours truly. :) And PTL -- because our math series was a hot mess.
I have been focusing on small group instruction more recently. And also reflecting on how much damn cutting and laminating we all do as teachers. If I could create a printer that could laminate and print AND cut at the same time, I'd be able to retire, like right now. But alas, I digress.
I have been pulling my hair out trying to figure out what to teach NEXT in my small groups. We'll have a great week planned and the small groups will be rockin' and everything is wonderful and they've all mastered the skill I'm wanting them to learn and then Sunday night comes and I go into FULL panic mode because I don't know where to go next. Of course, I know that my lower group needs more remediation on mastering their sight words and they need extra practice with word families and stretching out CVC words, but what the heck do I do next with the other groups?! Full. Panic. Mode. Every. Single. Sunday.
I've been searching for the correct order in which to teach phonological awareness skills and I've seen many variations of this phonological awareness continuum pyramid, but I really like this one. {I made it, which is probably why I like it so much. Ha!} It makes the most sense to me and I understand it. It also drives my small group instruction because I know, developmentally, that onset and rime shouldn't come before students have been given practice with syllables.
So -- I have come up with a master scope & sequence chart that will allow me to have a good idea of where to go next. I also plan to go through all of my books this summer and put them in leveled order and choose the books for each level so that I don't have to scramble to find leveled readers for my lessons. We use Journey's at my school, but oi vey, it's all over the place and the small group lessons have ZERO phonics work in them. No thanks. I want my small group lessons to focus on balanced literacy, not just on comprehension work. But I will use their leveled readers. Ahthankya.
Here is the chart that I created. Click it to download it if you need a place to start!
I am SO excited about my small groups for next year. This year will continue to be a panicked mess, but I'm okay with that. I am working out what works best and figuring out the BEST ways to meet the needs of my sweet learners.
I am still working out the logistics of being a kindergarten teacher -- something I said I would never EVER do. But here I am, loving my kindergarten life! I have SO much stuff in the works -- so please stick with me. Hopefully I can finally contribute to the world of blogging and help someone who is as lost as I was am. Labels: Guided Reading, Literacy, Small Groups
