Read To Achieve: Run Down

This week, I am extremely excited because on Wednesday, I will get to teach my first whole group lesson ever!!!  I am going to be teaching "Adding Dollars and Cents".  I have worked really hard planning and preparing for this lesson.  I really hope that the kids are going to enjoy it and connect to the content.  I am also continuing to teach my small groups, but the student groups that I am working with are changing. However, most of the students that I have been working with will remain the same, and I will gain a couple of others.  Today, I had a lesson that I felt really confident about because I could see how the students were making those important connections.  The article that we read and discussed was called the "Perfect Pet?" and the students were engaged, participated, and accurate with their responses to my questions throughout the entire lesson.

Read To Achieve is a third grade state required portfolio that tracks student's progress for math and reading throughout the year.  This helps to provide evidence for a student who may not pass the End Of Grade test, but may be considered to be promoted to the fourth grade.  The state uses this portfolio as a back up plan, or another way to evaluate the students academic skills.  My CE takes this task seriously and took the time out of her instructional block to explain to the students exactly what they were about to do and the purpose behind these timed test.  My CE took this subject matter, hoping that the students will do the same when approaching these tests throughout the remainder of the school year.  I really appreciate how my teacher has structured her "Read To Achieve" standards.  She also gave me a run down of how this would be implemented all year.  On Mondays, she will do an instructional passage, which will take up half of the reading block, but she reads the passage aloud and models their reading strategies to help answer the questions at the end of the passage.  Today being the first day they have started Read To Achieve, I observed and was amazed at how well she made the reading passage exciting.  I loved the different ways she used her vice when reading the passage, and how she constantly stopped to discuss or ask the students questions in order to keep the students engaged.  My Ce has a really good balance of stressing how important it is to do their best on all of these tests, but she also encourages them that it is doable and lets them know that she believes in them.  The third grade teacher team is hosting a Read To Achieve night in order to set aside time to explain this process to the parents.  I you would like to look more into what Read To Achieve is and learn more about how it is implemented into third grade, feel free to check out this PDF put out by the North Carolina Department of Instruction: http://www.dpi.state.nc.us/docs/k-3literacy/resources/guidebook.pdf.

This blog post ties in with teacher leadership because it is our responsibility to teach the students, but also make sure the parents have an understanding of what their students are learning too.  Progress monitoring ties in with the NCTCS number four because in order to see growth in a student, you have to meet them where they are.  Every student is on a different level and it is our job to assist and see every child grow.