Tomorrow is..........

Tomorrow is..........100s Day!!!  

Stop back to see how we celebrate it.....

ROOT STYLE

Interactive Root Journal

Something new that we have created is an Interactive Root Journal! This is amazing because it can be used in correlation with Reading Olympians or completely separate! If using separate from Reading O it still gives your students a glimpse into different greek gods and goddesses all while integrating roots into different activities to help students apply their understanding of each root word.

In my classroom I am using the Interactive Journal with Reading O!  My students complete this journal during a rotation of my reading groups.  We complete a set of Reading O in about two weeks so my students have 6 group rotations to complete the journal. Each group has the opportunity complete independently or with a partner.  So far we have completed 4 sets in our journal- Nike, Poseidon, Athena, and Nemesis.  Next week we will be completed the final set in the Interactive Journal!

Roots Are Going to the Dogs!

To continue sharing our Town Hall fun here is a little video clip or our Service Dog-Jewels getting into the root fun!  Who knew dogs could learn roots:)

Make Roots Fun

Teaching roots has taken a whole new look this year! Julie and I started by just introducing them through word wall card and were absolutely shocked how the students responded.  Children of all learning levels became obsessed with roots...and some may accuse us of being obsessed as well!  (Not gonna lie we are totally obsessed with roots!)  The more you incorporate and learn roots the more obsessed you will become!  Julie utilizes Reading O in her Second Grade class but since I am no longer in the classroom  (entered the dark side.....yep...principal...) I still wanted to bring roots to the children.  As I mentioned in the last post we are learning roots as a school.  Again, we started small and now it is a big deal.  Our school has a Town Hall each morning --which we will chat about in another post--but one component of Town Hall is "ROOT TIME!"  Believe it or not children will tell you this is their favorite part of Town Hall.  We even had a student who moved in from another school tell us she liked our school much MUCH more. When I asked her why she liked our school her response was "We learn roots here!"  This was a Second Grader!  

So we started our school wide root study utilizing the Scrapbook Julie and I created...but now the study has takin' fight more than we ever imagined!  

Sometimes a combination of teachers present or act out a root but it dawned on us we should involve kids more.  I am posting a picture of one of our students acting our the root "ped" meaning foot.  Here is one of our favorite guys riding a bike using the PEDals:

Please email us if you have questions about our scrapbook or how to bring roots to life in your school!  We love to talk roots!!!

Christmas Root Fun

This school has been so fun to teach roots! It's really exciting to see our whole school learning roots.  In my classroom we have progressed from learning basic prefixes and suffixes to finding and analyzing words that are made up with roots! It is so fun to watch my students attack words with confidence to break apart using their knowledge of word parts.

Before Christmas break we completed one of my favorite activities that I have done for the past couple of years both with 5th and 2nd graders! This year, again, didn't disappoint! We put a spin on Christmas using roots and called it Christmasology! We created a North Pole Dictionary using made up words consisting of roots and Christmas! It was super fun! It is just so exciting to see their understanding of the meanings of roots and be able to create and apply their understanding in these creations! Here are some their amazing creations! 

Hope you enjoyed them as much as I did! We made it into a class book and they have loved looking through it since we have gotten back from Christmas break! 

We are also continuing Reading Olympians through the rest of the year! We are almost halfway through the program.  We have gone a little slower through the program only because we are doing so much other amazing root work as an entire school! Here was the beginning of our word wall and one of my favorite illustrations from my student! 

We add bricks to our columns when we pass an Olympian Test! We almost have 5 columns around the room built! 

I just love this inspector! 

Check back next week to see some examples of our Interactive Root Journal that can work along with Reading O or independently from it! They kids are loving the fun activities! 

Happy New Year

It is a fresh new year and no better time to work in teaching those roots!  As anyone who knows us knows we absolutely love and believe in teaching roots!  We believe in it so deeply that our school participates in school wide root instruction.  This is done in a differentiated approach, but every child in our building is introduced to at least two roots per week!  We thought we would include you in the fun!!!

Different teachers and students act out the roots at our morning Town Hall and then we hang posters representing the root---here is a sample: