Guided Math- Part 3 How to implement Guided Math Successfully

Guided Math- Part 3 How to Implement Guided Math Successfully

I told y'all that there are four parts and we are finally at part 3. The baby and I got super sick so we were both out of commission for almost a week. Let me tell you...a baby and the mom sick is pretty bad! I digress. 

I've got quite a bit of questions about how I implemented in the beginning of the year or even in the middle of the year. I will tell you right now that I tried so many things before I got to how I implement. There's a few things that I want to start off with.

1- it does not happen over night

2- your first implementing will drive you crazy but the second day you're going to be like oh my gosh my class is amazing and followed directions and they were so quiet!!!!(okay maybe by day 4 this happens)

3- Relax. We as teachers are all OCD and trust me...things will go wrong. Just do a minor correct and move on in your life.

Where do we start? We are going to call it the ABC's of getting ready. 

A. Always have your copies ready

B. Block your math block out. Plan out your time for your math block, when will you rotate? When will you see your groups? 

C. Centers are huge in Guided Math. Get the centers every week planned out. Remember that you won't want to things in the centers that are not taught yet. That will just get everyone frustrated.

D. Divide out your math groups based on levels

E. Expectations are key. Write your expectations down so you can remember when you are telling the students. 

F. Flat out say no. Remember it is your classroom and when your students try to be clever and go "can we..." you can say no. A lot of Some times, I will say hmm..let me think about it. I usually give them a time frame like give me until Friday or Monday etc. Sometimes they forget and I won't have to deal with it and sometimes I will make changes accordingly.

G. Giving up is super easy because in the beginning it is a lot of works. Don't give up. It's hard in the beginning but once you get the hang of it- you'll be fine!

H. Have a plan. Have a plan for all things you think you will come across, questions, rotations, how to move, the noise levels- ANYTHING that could "pop" up. 

I. Interruptions kill your time. Really they kill your time. Have students be your in the meantime teacher. If they need help with something they go to that student instead of you. I always include the rules of the hands on activities or how to "play the game."

J. Jumping in head first is how I do everything but if you don't like doing that then slowly implement portions. This will help you especially if you are in the middle of the year.

K. Killing time? No. Don't do this if you are one of those teachers who are just using Guided Math to kill time. Let me tell you-your little teacher heart is going to break. I knew a teacher once who did not teach. Merely she taught for 3 minutes on the skill and then gave the kids work. This is not to just kill time. This is a life changing model that will impact your classroom. 

L. Loud noises will distract me. If they can distract me then you know they can distract your students at your table or any other students around the room. I usually put the hands on activities in the farthest spot from me. Try it...it really does work.

M. Materials are extremely important! Have your center materials ready, your independent work ready, the passwords for computers ready (soooooo important), and anything else you need.

N. Notes. Take notes during your small group. I will be the first to tell you that I need work on this. Next year, I will have a binder for my notes(hopefully) but I always took notes on what the students needed but it ended up being always on sticky notes. That is no problem (for me) because I just had hundreds of sticky notes around until I was able to reteach or fix any mistakes that happened. One thing I did that popped out right which I feel like is a best practice was I knew that student B struggled on her shapes so I made flash cards and in order for her to ask a question, she had to tell me what the shape was. I did this quite often and often had success. 

O. Overzealous teachers will get burnt out quick. Don't go insane because you will 

P. Pinterest. I know you know what it is but pin everything you think would be good. I usually make several boards for each subject. For example one board for Operations, one for Numbers & Base Ten, one for Geometry & Measurement. Once we get to those standards I bounce over to Pinterest and voila half the work is already foreign for me. 

Q. Quiet is out the window. Seriously. I feel bad for those teachers who MUST have a quiet classroom. I'm not that. In fact, I love the conversations. I love that the students can interact with each other and use math language to talk. Do they have side conversations? Absolutely but I won't discourage it because then how will the kids be able to have conversations with others as they get older?

R. Relax- let your kids make the mistakes. They will figure it out. You could try to do everything for them but then they will ALWAYS need you for every...single...thing. By the 3rd or 4th day it should be good.

S. Setting up the areas is just as important as everything else. You need to make sure you provide everything for that group so that you don't have to be interrupted during your small groups.

T. Transitions are key. You need to make sure that you teach the students how to transition to each center. If you don't teach them how to transition, you will have LOUD chaos. 

U. Understand all the parts because if you don't understand then you will implement and be looking around like what's going on. 

W. Wait. Patience is key. Trust me your hard work will pay off. You are going to have success but not in 5 minutes. Usually for me it took a solid 5 days for the kids (they were 1st grade) to pick up on it. I am eager to see how the 5th graders do in the fall. 

X.Y.Z.- I don't have something here hahaha. If you do- let me know!

So listen- you may struggle. It's fine. Just pick yourself up and dust off your shoulder and try something else. You are going to do great and I'm here if you need me. If you have questions you can leave a comment here and I'll respond as quickly as I can!

Hopefully I have given you plenty of ideas for you to use in your classroom! 

xoxo Ronnie

What are the components of Guided Math?

Hey everyone! Last week I posted about what Guided Math is. If you want to read it then check out (here). This is a four week post about Guided Math. This is week 2. 

What are the components of Guided Math?

Y'all let me tell you... There are a lot of ways to do Guided Math. No really...there's a lot. I may have one way that is effective for me and another way that may be effective for you. There is so much that goes into Guided Math but once you get into the rhythm you'll be set. This will be a long(er) post so hopefully you can bare with me through it!

What does my math block look like?

If you have a different amount of time, then I would definitely recommend manipulating the times. I personally like to make sure that I get to all my groups daily but sometimes I do run out of time and will need to pull the last group later. 

How do I make the groups?

I break them up by levels. I have a low level, the middle level (which is usually two groups) and then the high group. I know a lot of people say to see your low group first but I don't do that. Wait! Before you freak out- hear me out. My math block in first grade was first thing in the morning. If I pulled my low kids first, I would have to make sure the rest of my kids are settled (which usually only happens in the first group) and then that first group lost out on time that honestly...they really needed. I pulled my second highest group because they are the ones that will move (or gain levels.) 

What are the other students doing while I'm in small group?

Interactive Notebooks, Math Journals, Hands on Activities, Independent Work, Xtra Math and Ten Marks. I don't have a rotation however I know there are many people out there that do have boards. One of my favorites is Sweet Tooth Teaching. I really like her work-it's nice and clean!

How do I implement?

Come back next week so you can read all about how to implement Guided Math!!!

Leave your comments below so I can hear different ideas about how you run Guided Math in your classroom. 

Guided Math

Hey everyone! This is 4 posts that will be extended over 4 weeks.  Be sure to come back each week to check it all out.

Week 1- What is Guided Math?

Week 2- What are the parts or components of Guided Math?

Week 3- How to implement successfully

Week 4- Where to get resources?

Let's start off with What is Guided Math?

Guided Math is a structure for teaching where a teacher supports each child's development within a small group setting. Guided Math also allows the teacher to increase the level of difficulty based on the students needs.
Why do I do Guided Math?
Honestly, I really do enjoy Guided Math. I was always shocked as to why teachers would change their entire teaching methods to try this program. Then I jumped on the bandwagon. I am not saying that you need to but I will tell you some of the amazing benefits that I have noticed. 
1. When a student struggled, I immediately saw the mistake that the student was making. I was able to correct the mistakes and lead the students to go back to check their work.
2. Which leads us to number two! They learn how to check their work. They also may realize...oh hey- the kid next to me got a different answer. What did I do wrong or what did they do wrong?
3. I always ask that my kids support one another (especially in guided math). If they did notice that they have a different answer then their partner they were to go back and check along with their partner.
4. I could see who understood the material or who would need remediation that day or later in the day.
5. Each student was provided a hands on activity daily to help them play with new knowledge during small group. A way to interact with the information on paper (still have to take state tests ya-know?), are able to work on a hands on activity from last unit to practice those skills as well, and work with technology to strengthen skills.
What do your other students do while you are working with one group?
My other students are working on skills that are structured just for them. For example, hands on activity, technology, math facts, math journals, task cards, word problems etc. 

I included parts of my Unit 1 Guided Math program here so that you can see what it looks like at a fifth grade level. There are 11 units, 2 pages of classwork, an exit slip, 2 pages of homework and a hands on activity for small group that you could use later during review time.

If you are looking for Fifth Grade Unit 1-Place Value click --->_-*HERE!*-_

Part two is all about the parts of guided math and we will see you next week!

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Thematic Units

I'm finally back in the teaching world. I had baby W. He just melts my heart!

Now I feel ready to get back to tell you all about what's been going on. I came back to work on October 12 and I hit the ground running! This year has been a little different because I'm implementing a theme every single week along with a blend each week. I started to create units based on what we are teaching each week and honestly, I feel like my students have made major gains. 

Why do thematic units?

Imagine a kids brain is like a computer. In the old days if you wanted to switch programs you would have to shut the computer down. It was a 10-15 minute project. That would be 10-15 minutes of learning time what we would lose. By the end of the year, it could be an entire weeks of learning that you've lost.

How do you do themes?

I choose a theme based on the book for the week. I will use the week of Halloween as an example for our themed week.

Theme: Witches

Blends/digraph- ch [ I have 1-2 a week]

Math-we were working on matching tens and numbers together so the game had a boiling pot with the base tens, and then a witch for the number. It literally just had the cute fun game with a witch on it.

Writing- we wrote a "how to" book on several things. 1- how to make your own stew [or potion] (if you were a witch, of course). 2- how to put a spell on someone 3-(not a how to but still works) how to be the best witch of them all. They were a lot of fun to write and we enjoyed reading what everyone's stew (or potion) would do to people.

Reading- during reading we read Piggie Pie. Have you read it? It's so cute! That was for our interactive read a loud. Then for shared I wrote a book called something witchy and we read that several times along with identifying the ch on each page. The kids love these little books because they add them to their "paper" Baggie and are able to read from there anytime they want. We then read a poem called Witches. I wrote it and we read it everyday and then we were able to place it on our poetry journal. 

Themed weeks are such a huge hit! At the end of each week, the students get a brag tag that they can add to their necklace that says they are an expert on that topic. All my kids get one because they all worked equally hard to learn about the topic.

October themes:

Bats, spiders, fire safety, witches

November themes:

Voting, Veterans Day, thanksgiving 

Come back monthly to check out our new themes!

Do you do themes in your classroom?What are they and what do they look like?

Keep Track of Data

One of the hardest things as a teacher is to keep track of all the data that is thrown your way. You have all of the math tests, science tests, text dependent questions, reading response, writing conferences... what did I miss? I bet I missed like ten different things, but you get the point. One of the things that I must have is a very well organized binder. I want to have all student's information in one place. This is how my data binder was born.

There was several things that I needed to have in my binder. Some of them I did not take pictures of because it had too much important information on it.

1. Way to keep their Reading Running Records information on one page

2. Any informal Reading Running Records

3. Any test scores

4. A way to track their Report Card information (Math, Reading, and Writing)

5. Rainbow Words

6. Rainbow Math

7. Student Information

8. Transportation form (it's a legal document in our county)

9. Any other pertinent data that shouldn't go in the student portfolio.

This is the front cover of the binder. I bought this from 1st Grade is WienerFUL. One of the things that happened this year was that in the state of Florida, we don't use CCSS. Unfortunately, I wasn't able to utilize the entire pack, BUT it's AMAZING!!

Once you open the binder, there is a list of all the students. I bought this from Office Depot and this is how I kept track of all the students. Each student has a tab and it is based on their letter (or number). 

 This is one of my favorite things in the binder. Before I have the students tabs (but after the label sheet). It is a master sheet that keeps ALL of my students information on their Reading Running Records {RRR}. This is every single student in my classroom. 

*How does this work? It's really simple. You place the students name at the top of the page. On the left side, you will see the information from the RRR book, AND what is the mastery level. Then you will fill in each box under the student's name and across from whatever they mastered. As you can see, some of them are in pink. The reason why they are in pink is because they mastered that specific section of the RRR. At the bottom of the page is the levels that the student currently reads at. I write the letter that they read on and then directly underneath the letter is the number that they answered the questions.

This is the individual student tracker page. I mark in this every time I work with the student and their RRR. I like to use this because then I have one for each individual student. As you can see there is a pink box which is for Trimester 1 and then the blue box is for the final trimester. On the left side I highlighted everything that was mastered. That way I don't go back and repeat anything that he already mastered. As you can see this is helpful as well because you can see how much he progressed over the ENTIRE school year. The first two things filled in are the scores and dates when they walked into my classroom. 

***If you want to purchase this document, you can do so in my store for $2.00. It's also a little different with nice borders and prettier font. Editable RRR is perfect for you!***

 This is not my product but I LOVE it! This is from Mrs. Jump's Class. I used this document all the time. There were other things that were very helpful in this file. I used this informal record all of the time. I tried to complete one per day. It became my goal. Once I got really good at tracking the students I was able to bump it up to 2-3 a day. I did this about 2-3 weeks after their latest RRR. I highly recommend using this!

I doubt you will have this, but I wanted to show you how I kept track of the math scores. The  way that we do this is all through the computer. We enter in all of our data to show what questions the students answered incorrectly. Then We print out the form to show what questions were answered incorrectly. Then I am able to highlight the standards that the students did not master. Now when I go back and do a re-teach, I am able to hone in on the specific skill they need help with. I currently use this tracker to keep track of what needs to be retaught. Unfortunately, it's only for first grade and it's LAFS & MAFS from the state of Florida. I have been thinking that I will create a CCSS for K-5. You may have to give me time though...Sorry!!

This is what I use to track what I entered on the student's report card. Each part of the report card is broken up by a specific benchmark which has 2 -3 standards in it.  I use the X or # to mark if the student mastered it or not. I use a bright purple highlighter to mark off which standards were not assessed. At the end of the year, I make a copy of the standards and send it home to the parents. I can show this during conferences and make notes on the page if I need to. I have one for Math, Reading, and Writing.

If you want a copy of this, just leave a comment below so I can email it to you.

The next part is from Jen Jones and it is called Rainbow Words. I love this!!! If you are working with kids on their sight words then you have to get this! I keep the tracker in their binder section and every Monday when I check sight words, I just open to their file for rainbow words and begin testing the students on their words.

 I know this is a super long post, but I appreciate you sticking around and reading all about my data binder! 

Summer Slide

Hello everyone!

I hope your end of the year events are going well. We ended our school year on June 4th and being 33 weeks pregnant- I COULDN'T WAIT! Not only did I end my school year but we also moved into our new house the week before school got out. It's been very crazy over here and now since school is out- I am getting the nursery ready. Although my personal life has so much going on... it doesn't mean my babies don't have work as well. I created a summer packet for my kids and this was awesome because it targeted everything we had learned this year. 

I bought gallon ziplock bags and put all of their little goodies inside of it. 

What was inside the bag?

- Addition & Subtraction Fluency Set

- Week 1

- Week 2

- Week 3

- Week 4

- Week 5

-Week 6

- A parent packet with websites and tips & tricks for reading & math

- A page for passwords

- A pencil

- A list of books to read for summer 

- Dolch sight words

The underlined items are things I found online and are not in the summer slide packet. 

So what is inside the Week's 1-6? Well each front cover is made to be printed one sided only. On the front is a cute little cover where they can write their name. On the back is a reading log. I made every two weeks the same color and then I switched to a different color. Once you open the packet there is different activities to do. For example each week has some type of writing exercise. [Don't mind my ugly nails.]

There are also math activities to do. [Sorry- I can't find out how to rotate it back.]

There are coins, ten frames, tally marks and many other activities based on the first grade curriculum. 

There are also two stories in each packet. One story is a fiction story. There are questions that go along with it. There is also a non fiction story-mainly about animals- and there are of course questions to go along with that.

Each week also has math word problems and if you need more word problems you can stop by my store and purchase word problems based on the months. There are also fill in the blanks for the correct verb tenses.

There are also some character traits pages and each packet has a sight word list. Then the students are to make sentences using the sight words listed above.

Hopefully this was super helpful to you and that you want to help your kids become even more successful! I can't wait to hear your comments below!

Math Word Problems

Hello everyone!
I have some great things to share today! One of the things that I have for you today is math journals! I was so tired of my kids not being able to understand a word problem, that I ended up creating math journals for my kids. The math journals are awesome because I can monitor them doing their math journals and word problems. 

I did create these for most grades. I am in the process of adding more for the grades so check back often for updates to see if there is a math journal for your grade.

1st Grade-

*Update 9/17*Includes September, October, and November

September-1st Grade

October-1st Grade

November-1st Grade

April-1st Grade

May-1st Grade

2nd Grade-

October-2nd Grade

November-2nd Grade

December-2nd Grade

January-2nd Grade

February-2nd Grade

March-2nd Grade

April-2nd Grade

May-2nd Grade

3rd Grade-

September-3rd Grade

October-3rd Grade

November-3rd Grade

December-3rd Grade

January-3rd Grade

February-3rd Grade

March-3rd Grade

April-3rd Grade

May-3rd Grade

*3rd Grade Bundle*

Update: July 17

September-4th Grade

October-4th Grade

November-4th Grade

December-4th Grade

January-4th Grade

February-4th Grade

March-4th Grade

April-4th Grade

May-4th Grade

Update: September 16 *sorry for the delay! Baby W came! <3

September-5th Grade

October-5th Grade

November-5th Grade

December-5th Grade

January-5th Grade

February-5th Grade

March-5th Grade

April-5th Grade

May-5th Grade

Rainbow Math

Happy Saturday everyone!

Over the last few days, I have been thrown many different things with our math curriculum. On of the things that came to our attention was that we MUST have all of the kids fluent with their addition from 1 to 10. They need to know it inside, outside, left side, right side, and upside down. Rainbow Math was born! I created this to help first grade teachers come up with better ways to enforce math addition skills. I'm sure I will create a subtraction version as well but for now this is it!

Rainbow Math-Addition is to help students achieve addition fluency by using a color system to track data. Students will be excited to learn their facts as they progress through the colors of the rainbow.

I created a folder (sorry about the glare)- and I labeled it Rainbow Math and their letter. That way we always keep track of who has what folder. I did give each kid the same blue folder, it keeps it easier for me when I say get the rainbow math folder out,  I can immediately tell just by the color of the folder.

Inside the folder is a plastic sleeve and in the plastic sleeve is 20 math sentences. At the top it says "Red Math Facts" so when you are testing the kids, you know exactly what color they are working on. 

In the Rainbow Math file, you will also get a file with all the math facts on it. They are double pages and you can do this in multiple ways...

1. Cut them and put them in a baggie and use these as flashcards

2. Cut them and punch a hole in them and then put on a binder ring and remove color after each level passed.

3. Cut them and punch a hole in them and keep adding colors to the ring to make many fact sentences.

After each student passes the fluency, they will be able to get a certificate (found in the download). There is also a cheat sheet for you. You can enter the kids name into your master checklist and check them off so you know who passes what color. That is great to use at conferences especially when you need to pinpoint the exact fact that they struggle with.

Rainbow Math  can be bought right on the link! I can't wait to hear all of your thoughts about rainbow math!

Numbers

Happy 4th of July!!! Okay-well it is the 3rd but tomorrow is the 4th! Of course as being a true American {and awesome shopper} I have decided to have a sale ONLY until July 6, 2014. Teachers Pay Teachers has my sale and it only lasts for 3 days!! Let's move forward.

I have a new awesome item that is on sale today! I am really happy to share with you the new item. Last year, I posted about BUILT which was modified from BUILD to fit my own classroom. I used it in my classroom this year and the games I created and printed last year were AMAZING!!! However, you can read about that later on and not right now {stay tuned for more} about BUILT.

This year-going into Kindergarten, I don't have the prior knowledge of what is being taught. With that being said, I have also heard through many people that the kids need to know their numbers. Of course this is where they get their foundational knowledge from. Since I can't create so many games over one summer- I have decided to change up my math block. Here it is!!! I will start off with a basic time like 8 am and I will show you how I do it in an hour or in 45 minutes. Be AWARE- BRAIN OVERLOAD!

Hour Block

8:00-8:15- I do-Teacher directed

8:15-8:30- we do- class & teacher

8:30-9:00 you do- students {centers/BUILT} **This is where we can cut off that extra 15 minutes**

*WHAT! 30 minutes of them working alone? UH-NO! It's okay! Relax! It will be fine! Are you a teacher that checks homework for completion or for the actual work? I, personally, check for actual work. I like to use it as an "intervention." I look to see if they understood it while doing their homework. If they understood it, then I do not call them over to me during small group time. I will pull my students who are not making gains on level and will do a quick reteach. But what are my other kids doing? I will show you! Usually, in 4th grade world, I would have educational games set up and worksheets based on what our particular skill is. However, in KindergartenLand, I worry that they won't come with the knowledge of how to work in groups (until maybe January). With that idea, {and totally mental break down for the thousandth time} I freaked and tried to figure out what I could do with 5 year olds during the time that I pull the other students. This is how my numbers program was born. 

After days of being OCD, I created this product. Once the kids finished their work in the math book, then they will be able to start working their "Mathematician Know It All Book." I thought it was a cute name to make them feel like real mathematicians! What is inside the book?

In this twenty page PDF (that you download from TpT)- you will be able to get pages just like this all the way up to ten. Don't worry... I will get you some up to twenty and even thirty. I hope you enjoy it!

xoxo!

Kindergarten Morning Work

Hello everyone!

I cannot wait to show you what great new thing I have created! One question that always floats around is Morning Work. And every time I want to SCREAM! I hate printing morning work. I feel like one of the kids who will literally stomp her feet every time she has to print. With that-I started searching last year for a way to stop being at the printer and to not get there early in the morning to run off twenty copies.

Last year, I created a folder labeled "Good Morning Work" and I will run off the copies for the week {or month} depending on what I chose. I used to find many different things from workbooks and of course the amazing Teachers Pay Teachers. However, I went to TpT to search for morning work and really didn't find anything that I LOVED or had to spend $12.00 on! Of course, now that it is summer time, I decided to make handy dandy morning work- {imagine I was singing that like an opera singer}.

Let's start off with the outside: 

Since this is a "prototype" of what I want next year to look like, I used my handwriting. However, last year I used folders and did write on the front. This year,  I will use spirals provided by my amazing parents!  I always like to label everything because then I know where everything is and I am not wondering "What's inside this folder?"

Inside my awesome spiral is my awesome worksheets. Take a look!

This is a set of the first week. I like to keep the weeks divided by a theme. Why? So I can find books and passages based around the theme. The first week is "Back to school." The students also practice their spelling of their first name.

This is my second week. My second week has two sight words that the kids will work on. In your download you will be able to choose from two different documents. Notice how it says in the Trace and Copy box the sight word {left side} and on the right side the students could work on numbers. I created these two so you could choose between them. The second weeks theme is "Superhero." It is intended to be for the week of August 25.

This is week 3. It still has the sight words and it is really for labor day week. The theme of the week is "Careers." It has the 2 sight words also incorporated. If you wait just a few weeks, you can also purchase books that will tie into the theme.

This week is based off of patriotism. I really love this idea because it is the same week as 9/11 and it teaches the students how to be patriotic. 

Week 5 is all about family. We will be doing a family unit {stay tuned}.

The last week is Johnny Appleseed themed which is September 26th.

If you LOVE it -like I hope you will.. then head over to Teachers Pay Teachers to purchase it. It is on sale for just a little bit!

xoxo, Ronnie