Monday, March 1st- Friday, March 5th

I'm behind on posts, so I'm going to condense some news here:

We began a new novel this week. The book is called Memory Boy and was written by a local author named Will Weaver- one of my former English professors! In the novel a family races to escape natural disaster by traveling from Minneapolis to Itasca State Park. I aimed to draw the students in to the local relevance of this novel, so I created a bulletin board which I titled " 'Roadtripping' Across Minnesota with Memory Boy." I put a map of MN up on the board and on Wednesday, after the students had read some of the novel, we mapped out with tacks and yarn the start of the characters' journey. The kids seemed to get a kick out of this activity, and were competing to volunteer information about the cities which they recognized. I enjoyed their genuine interest in the board and activities. On numerous occasions I even caught the students sneaking over to the map to point out to classmates where their home was located on the board- it goes to show that these guys really do pay attention to the decor of a classroom. 

I also included on the board an "Author Spotlight" section where I posted pictures of Will Weaver & information about his writing and life. We talked about the author before starting the novel on Monday, and I utilized the bulletin board as my visual. The kids seemed to listen contently and I appreciated their interest here. I'd say that the board and the introduction to Memory Boy were a success! 

Other highlights from the week:

- Students started the "Lit Circles" which I have planned to use for the rest of the book. We began with a rocky start as a lot of the kids seemed to be put off by this change from their normal read & take a quiz procedure, but by the end of the week they'd adjusted to the change and had begun to take advantage of the discussions. 

- More lessons in classroom management were acquired this week as I struggled to get students to adjust to many changes: a new unit, a new style of covering reading concepts, and a new "group" seating arrangement. The start of the week was rough, but after frequently explaining my expectations and behavioral consequences to students we shaped up by the end of the week.