Daily 5 and CAFE - Week 2

I had a great response to my post last week on how I was implementing the Daily 5 and CAFE strategies in my grade 5/6 class.  I wanted to take the time to answer some of these questions in my post tonight.

I'll start with timing.  I have a 100 minute literacy block, 5 days a week, which is lovely.  I also integrate reading and writing into my content areas (1/2 hour daily).  

I will admit, starting the Daily 5 and CAFE is taking a lot of my language block.  But it is very important to model, model, and model to build that stamina and muscle memory.  When the program is fully implemented (which I expect to happen within the month), it will take up about 55 minutes of my 100 minute literacy block, leaving me with 45 minutes daily to teach other units / writing genres not covered with the daily 5/cafe.    Those 55 minutes when the students are engaged and comfortable with their routine will give me MORE time to meet with guided reading groups, confer with students independently, do a little small group intervention, etc.  Being able to have more time to meet with smaller groups of students will only benefit these students so much more.

Okay, so set-up.  My students all have a language arts binder that they keep in the classroom.  This binder has sections for reading, writing, and media.  We have a small Daily 5/CAFE notebook, and a reader response notebook that we keep in the front pocket of our binders.  We will also have a Work on Writing, and Word Work pocket folder we will keep in the back of our binders.  We just made our Work on Writing folder today, as today was the first day Work on Writing was introduced in class.

 We begin each language arts block by reviewing the CAFE strategy we added to our board the day before. In our notebooks, we record the strategy, draw a small picture to help us remember, write the secret to success, and then students reflect on what the strategy means to their own reading comprehension.  I've been really impressed with how well this is working.  It takes about 10 minutes for students to complete.

We then discuss our Daily 4 rotations (again, I am doing the Daily 4 in my classroom - Read to Self, Work on Writing, Word Work, and Listen to Reading {which is my read aloud}).  In my room, we will always to Read to Self first - the main reason is that we've just reviewed the cafe strategy, and I want my students to work on applying that strategy to their independent reading.  This week we've been working on discussing what "good readers" do and look like, and setting a purpose for our reading.  Any important information is recorded in the daily 5 (4) section of our notebooks.

Today was the first day we started discussing Working on Writing.  We began by brainstorming reasons why we write (think-pair-share activity), then I modeled the strategy of underlining words that are difficult to spell while working independently.  We recorded both minilessons in our notebook.

Following this, I introduce our new CAFE strategy for the day (the book recommends adding 3 strategies a day, but with everything else going on in our language block, I feel that reviewing the last strategy and adding a new strategy is enough for one class).  We discuss what the new strategy means, then post it on our board.    During our read aloud (next), I model how the strategy is used, and ask students to help me use the strategy and apply it to our reading.  When I finish reading for the day, I choose a question from my Comprehension Question Fan for students to answer in their reader response notebooks.  Students need to show where they have used our "RESPOND TO READING" strategies (CRAFT board) in their answer.

Whew ... I think that about covers it.  Right now I'm only left with about 15 minutes at the end of each language block.  We've been using that 15 minutes to start our personal memoir writing workshop unit.  So far, all is good in the language arts world.  My students are really starting to be able to explain the CRAFT strategies, and apply these strategies to their own reading.  They are building their stamina during independent reading, and I'm so excited that we've added Work on Writing this week.  I'll let you know how it's all coming together next week.

So, this was a long one ... hope you're all having a fabulous "wordy Wednesday"!!!