A Peek at My Week {2-2-14}

Happy Groundhog Day!  I hope that furry little fella brings us a quick spring.  After the last week we had (two school snow days for the Polar Vortex Part II and more snow, snow, snow to shovel, shovel, shovel), I have quite had it with Old Man Winter. Anybody with me???

I was just looking over the very sad list of my recent blog posts.  It seems like all I can do these days is manage to post for this weekly linky party.  (Good thing I started it then, right?)  I am right in the middle of an online course I'm taking to get my Reading Teacher license and it is so much work!  At the end of the day, all I can do is fall asleep (usually reading something for class).

So, what else is up this week?

I will have another three day work week this week, but this time it won't be for bad weather (hopefully!).  I am very excited to attend the Wisconsin State Reading Association (WSRA) conference in Milwaukee this Thursday and Friday.  I love this conference, and am hoping to run into some of my friends from the Writing Project from this past summer.

At the WSRA, I will be attending some professional development sessions with these fabulous people:

Carl Anderson:  I will see two of Carl's presentations -- Assessing Student Writers and Conferring with Student Writers.

       

Aimee Buckner:  Take Note!  Strategies for Helping Students Recompose What they Read to Their Own Words

Lester Laminak:  When Writers Read

I'm sure that after these two days packed full of professional development, I will have lots to share with you here.  Be sure to check back!

Also this week, we will continue to explore Text Structure.  I plan on using select Wonders from the Wonderopolis website to demonstrate the different text structures.  

Have you ever used Wonderopolis in your classroom?  My students love it! (And it's FREE!) 

I have read through the titles of the Wonders and have chosen two for each of the five text structures I will teach.  Each day, we will read through one of them, identify the text structure, and give evidence for our thinking.  

What I also love is that students will learn something along the way to add to their background knowledge.  Like this Wonder we read about Earworms.  You can read about it here.  (You know that you want to know what an earworm is!  Really....it's not gross and you can impress your students with your new knowledge.)

So that's it for me this week!  How about you?  Grab my button and link up to your post.

Wishing you a fantastic week!  (Think spring!!)