Persuasive Resources

After today I only have a half day left between me and Christmas break! I am so excited to have 2 weeks off. Luckily, I have nothing planned during the break and I think I am most excited about that. 

When we come back to school in January, I have decided that I am going to be using the Language Arts C-SCOPE curriculum for my class. My district has currently adopted the math and science curriculum, but the Language Arts and Social Studies is also available to us. I know I have blogged about the lack of scope and sequence before, and I am actually really loving what CSCOPE has to offer. So many teachers in the district have been complaining about it because you have to do a lot of supplementing. However, I think that when you have nothing to go from, it has some good bones to work with to make it great for your students.I loving using picture books as mentor texts, and was wondering what books you love to use to teach persuasion. My kids will be identifying different techniques used in reading and they will also be writing their own persuasive essays.

Along with the new curriculum, I am excited to get stations going again in my classroom. I have really missed doing them this past 6 weeks, but with what I was teaching, it just wasn't conducive. I have been thinking about how I am going to make it work, and I think I am most excited about my stations board. I am going to get it all finished over the break and will be sure to share with you all.

I am also looking at purchasing the 6+1 traits writing crate from Scholastic. Have you ever used this for writing instruction in your classroom? The new math teacher who taught 5th grade self-contained last year was telling me about it and that she loved it. I might also see if I can budget for it for next year, but I would love to have it this school year. What do you use to teach writing in your class? 

After today I am finished giving tests. Since my classes are double blocked, we have been testing during the first 2 hours, and during the second 2 hours we have been watching The Polar Express and I made them hot chocolate too. Even though my kids have seen the movie a bunch, they still love it!