Daily 5 Chapter 3

1. A Gathering Place

If I do try and establish some form of the Daily Five next year (with my pre-K kids and with the limited amount of time we have each day), I will need to pick a gathering place. Even if I simply use elements of the Daily Five, maybe not just for literacy centers, but for our centers or Montessori time,  I do want to make the time, space, and habit of coming together afterwards and reflecting on what each child has done. I believe this will make their time spent with books and time in centers much more meaningful. So, I have to choose. Normally, for our Morning Meeting, we place circle carpets at the front of the room. However, a quicker meeting spot for this purpose would be the carpet in the book nook at the back of the room. I never called it the Book Nook until just now, but maybe this is a great name for it :)

2. Good Fit Books

I agree with some of the other teachers that my kids may not be ready for really picking out "good fit" books, as they mostly look at the pictures. Again, it is Pre-K and 4 to 5 year olds, so they can still get along well with most books, looking at the pictures and making up the story. However, it will also be important to include books with simple repetitive rhymes or statements that the children remember and can really start to read on their own.

3. Create Anchor Charts

I really like the idea of creating anchor charts, and I have been wanting to do this all last year. My problem is that my boss does not allow us to hang much on the wall, and our bulletin board space is limited. I'm going to ask about having some strings or hooks put in place this year so that I have more space to hang anchor charts and similar items. I think it really helps kids keep important things in mind. I always see the children looking around the room and pondering the work they've done before. I can see how the learning is cemented in their brains when they see it each day. 

4. Short, Repeated Intervals of Independent Practice and Setting Up Book Boxes

This year, the children had time to read after lunch every day. Usually it was about ten minutes, but some children can barely manage that without getting off-track. I would like to use one of the many stamina charts I have found through this Daily Five reading group. I think once we set a goal and purpose, it will start to be easier for my kids to build up stamina. Also, using good fit books will help, too!

As for book boxes, right now I just have some book display shelves, which I hate, because the books fall down all the time. I would much rather use boxes, and I'm hoping to convince my boss about this as well. 

5. Calm Signals and Check-in Procedures

I really like the chimes that the sisters talk about in their book. I was thinking about maybe buying a little music box and using that. I don't know if it will be loud enough, but if everyone's working quietly, it should do the trick. I definitely need to come up with a plan so that we can practice the procedure at the beginning of the school year. I'm so excited about this!

I actually started trying out the thumbs up check-in before school got out at the end of June, and I really like it. It's amazing how honest many of the children are. They also quickly got the hang of not worrying about others' thumbs. I am sure if I teach this procedure well at the beginning of the year, it will have a great positive impact on my class!

6. Using the Correct/Incorrect Model Approach 

I agree that modeling incorrect and correct procedures is very important. My assistant and I often model the incorrect behavior and allow the students to correct us. It was an interesting idea in the book to choose some children to model the incorrect behavior and then the correct. I might try it out and see how it works.