My Plan for the Literacy Through Project RE 5130 Dr

My Plan for the Literacy Through Project RE 5130 Dr. Green Fall 2010

I will be working with a K/1 combination class that has a concentration of ELL (Spanish speaking) students. This is an inclusion for the ELL first graders. The ELL teacher comes into the class one hour per day to help the students. I am retired so Mrs. Patrick has agreed to let me come into her classroom to do this project. All her students speak English and can effectively communicate orally in class. The study will be based on the book How Full Is Your Bucket? The teacher has a slightly different version called Did You Fill A Bucket Today? I also brought Ordinary Mary’s Extraordinary Deed. The theme is good citizenship, learning how to treat others, and learning that being good to others is actually good for you, too.

I chose SCOS objectives from first grade and will concentrate on those. In Social Studies I think we can address 7.03( Computer and other Technology), 2.01 (Citizenship in the classroom and school), 2.06 (Consequences of actions), and 3.04 (Members in a community affected by changes in a community). In Language Arts I think we can address 3.01( Information and events connect to life experiences), 3.04 (Sharing experiences by recording personal responses) 3.07 (Capitalization of first word in a sentence, proper names and punctuation), and 4.06 (Compose a variety of products using the writing process).

We will begin sharing the books to give them background. Both the teacher and I will share How Full Is Your Bucket? She has a camera and had begun to introduce photography before I arrived. I made a sorting game we will use to help them think about how to take a good picture. We will use her camera and, if needed, mine too. I plan to have them photograph each other. The photos will be of “filling someone’s bucket” either by placing a slip in a student’s bucket and/or actually in the act of doing that behavior. In addition we will take some photos of them in class during different parts of lessons (I hope!). Their writing will be theirs (sound spelling) and dictated writing done to fill out slips to fill other people’s buckets. They (at least first graders) will also write to express what they understand about how we fill someone’s bucket.

I thought of an additional idea for writing I hope we’ll be able to accomplish. I came up with a list of 8 bucket filling behaviors that I thought were needed in this class. The teacher approved the list. We will give the students a slip of paper with an idea on it. I suggested to the teacher that she might want to secretly match the behavior she gives each child to the behavior they need to work on. For example, their slip might say: Share with others. I will … They will copy what the slip says and finish by saying what they will do to carry out this behavior in class. The teacher wants them to do the writing here and use their own spelling as much as possible. Then I hope they will photograph each other acting out this behavior. I will also try to use their sheet to make a corrected copy so we can have correctly spelled sentences. On this second copy I’d like to have them illustrate themselves modeling that behavior. This correct copy with their illustrations could be used in class as a wall display to remind students of bucket filling behavior. These pages could also be made into a class book of good bucket filling behavior. They could practice reading it at school. Additional copies could be made to send home for practice.

I have struggled with how to be able to show enough writing for these students. They (many of them) don’t all know all their letters. They have to stop and think about how to make the letter and think again about what sound the letter makes. Learning the bucket filling concept may take time and experience to understand and adopt into their daily practice. I am talking with the teacher every step of our way through this. I will try to do what works developmentally and makes it meaningful for young students.

Dr. Green if you have suggestions please let me know!