I & E: A Kid-Friendly and Powerful Tool

I have had the opportunity to teach many grades. Actually. I've taught every grade level. That's pretty amazing to me, too, because I've only been a classroom teacher for about 11 years. And I'm much older than that would lead you to believe. The point in this is that in every grade there are kids who are ahead of the "curve" and kids who are behind. We all know this. Great teachers strive to uncover ways to help kids progress no matter where they may be on the spectrum of academic achievement.

Several years ago when I was teaching first graders, another teacher in my building and I decided we would try something we called "Math Exchange." Weekly we gave our kiddos a short formative assessment on targeted math concepts or skills we were focused on at the time and then sort our kids according to their level of mastery. Not surprisingly, we found groups of kids who had reached mastery, another group of kids who just needed some practice, and some who were totally lost.

This led us to enlist the help of some of our parents. We would develop an activity so our students who had reached mastery could be challenged to the next level and typically our parent volunteers would lead those groups. We would also have groups that just needed practice. Again, this was a perfect fit for parents who could help those kids. The two teachers would then focus on those students who needed some extra help on the skills they really needed to know. We spent about 20 minutes on a specific practice, activity, or intervention.

We found this time to be not only valuable educationally, but also an experience our kids looked forward to! We began doing this once or twice a week, and our kids worked really hard so they could be in an "E" group, which were our enrichment groups! In other words, they were highly motivated to master the math skill!

When I moved a year or so later into fifth grade, our building had added two teachers focused on RTI. We were also developing our focus on standards-based learning, so our kids were becoming more aware of and taking more ownership in their learning. Our fifth grade team worked to develop and enlarge the concept of Math Exchange and ended up calling it I & E, which stands for Intervention and Enrichment. Eventually, we were engaged in I & E four days each week, with two days focused on math and two on language arts.

This past year I moved to fourth grade, where (hopefully!) I'll be for the rest of my teaching career. My teammate and I implemented I & E, much to the delight of our students! We were able to enlist both of our RTI teachers along with education majors from our local university, some of our incredible parents, and even our principal at times. We found that it helped our students in some profound ways at all points on the spectrum.

In order for you to get an idea of the nuts and bolts of this, let me share with you what a typical week would look like in fourth grade.

Formative assessments: These are absolutely a must. Formative assessments must be focused on the targeted learning goal. They should be quick to complete (five minutes or less) and quick to check. Some examples for math are 2-digit by 2-digit multiplication or comparing fractions. Examples for language arts include nouns, verbs, or any other part of speech you're working on, or students' development of  a piece of writing (beginning ideas all the way to published writing). Our goal was (and is) to give our formative assessment late in the week and plan our time for the following week according to the results.

We then grouped our students so the more intervention that was need the smaller the group became. We also made it a point to have parents with groups that needed the least amount of guidance.

I & E Time: We scheduled math for Monday and Thursday; language arts was on Tuesday and Friday. They were always toward the end of the day and we made sure it was part of our RTI teachers' schedule. Sometimes in language arts we simply gave kids who needed more time to work on their writing that time while other students developed iMovies from writing they had done. Once or twice during the year we had kids practice readers' theater and grouped them according to reading levels (although we never told them that's how they were grouped). They loved it! They would practice for several days during language arts I & E time and then perform for the rest of the fourth graders, typically during a Friday I & E time. They were engaged, often suggested props and/or costumes, and looked forward to the day they could present to their classmates. We often invited our kindergarten or first grade reading buddies and that made it even better!

The following is one week of just my kiddos and where they were slated to go for the week. The other fourth grade teacher did the same for her kids.

Math Intervention and Enrichment

Week of April 29, 2013

Monday and Thursday

Division Practice Mrs. Gibbs	Double Digit Division Mrs. Schaible	Double Digit Division Mrs. Rooney	Fractions of… Miss Hinkley	Mr. Baum iMovie Fractions
Ryleigh Nevaeh* Keeley* Kiah Ryah	Morgan *Owen *Danielle Bailey Keeley Taylor (Matthew) (Jozlynn) * Olivia	Livi + Emma + Nick Briana	Tayla Evan *Matthew (Owen) Danielle Cole + Nevaeh *Jozlynn (Ryah) (Olivia)	McKenzie Zach

*Go to this group first. Once you really “get it” you may go to the other group.

We found this to be an extremely valuable tool to help our kids all reach the next level of learning, no matter where they were on the learning curve.

This coming year, I know we will tweak our formative assessments according the needs of our kids, but it is gratifying to know we have discovered an exciting tool to engage and challenge every single student!

Questions? Please comment! Do you have a similar strategy in place?? I'd love to hear about it!

@suz_gibbs on twitter or simply comment!

Finding the Joy of Reading

I can remember watching my mom read. She read loads of magazines and always had a pile - a really big pile - next to her bed. And by her dresser. And on the end tables. I think she had some romantic novels, too, that she hid under the bed. To her five children, though, she often read A.A. Milne, and it wasn't unusual for her to suddenly burst into a rendition of "James, James, Morrison, Morrison, Wetherby George DuPree..." which was her favorite. Of course, she did this to honor and tickle my brother (whose name is James)! But that was about it.

My dad was always a reader, too. Since he was a pastor much of his reading consisted of (naturally) the Bible, along with countless commentaries and books on pastoring and counseling his congregation. He still enjoys reading and has branched out to many other genres. He often will send a book home with me at the end of one of our visits.

Since I can remember, though, I didn't really share that reading bent. I started taking piano lessons when I was four and practiced every day; sometimes of my own accord and sometimes under duress from my mother. By the time I was nine I was also taking violin and voice lessons. Music was what I did with my time. Reading for pleasure was not even on my radar, except for Archie comics (usually choosing only the ones that were heavy on Betty and Veronica) and Highlights for Children.

One of my grandmothers was the sweetest, kindest person I have ever known. She had taught in a one-room schoolhouse and while she enjoyed reading, when we were around she was busy being our sweet grandma. She baked. She gardened. She lived a simple life and loved on us lavishly.  My other grandmother was stoic and seemed to be above everyone else. She was studious and a very serious science teacher. Her gifts to us were usually books. I would groan inside from disappointment each time I would open one of these odious gifts and add it to the collection of unread books on my shelf.

In eighth grade we read Charles Dickens' Great Expectations in Mrs. Castle's English class and I loved it. In my high school's mythology class we read the Iliad. I clearly recall the vivid images of the various gods and monsters. My favorite teacher, Mrs. Dungy, had us read Hamlet and Othello in Shakespeare class. She loved Shakespeare and since our classroom was the "Shakespeare Room" and was the most elaborate classroom I have ever seen, architecturally built to look like something straight from medieval times, it made a huge impact on me. After all this exposure to great literature, however, I still never cracked a book outside of school. College years were spent reading text books and writing or practicing music, but reading was always for a purpose that never included fun.

Fast forward to August of 2011. Someone recommended The Book Whisperer (by Donalynn Miller) to me. I had become a reader of non-fiction and was dedicated to my students. I put the book on my kindle to take with me while I taught for three months overseas. As I read this book, I knew my classroom would dramatically change. I knew my approach to teaching reading would change. I didn't know my personal reading life would change as well. Upon returning from my Caribbean adventure, I ordered a hard copy of the book and re-read it several times. By Spring Break of 2012 I had set about finding good fiction to read that might be appropriate for the classroom I'd have in the fall and/or books I could share with my middle-school daughter. I started with the Hunger Games series. I was so engaged I would read well past when I should have, and my daughter loved them as well. We talked about them and then enjoyed the movie together. I was beginning to enjoy this!

Then I had a conversation with a family member who is an incredible teacher of reading. We were talking about reading fiction vs. non-fiction. His comment to me was, "Fiction teaches kids empathy, which non-fiction can never teach. Kids have to read fiction to help them in life." He was and is absolutely spot on.

 I began buying and reading books that would fit the students I would have in the fall. I found Abebooks was a source that fit my budget (sort of) and would excitedly open packages when they arrived. I got onto Goodreads and began stalking others who were reading the same type of books I was. I began following Nerdy Book Club to get more ideas, and Mr. Schu's blog for recommendations and trailers of great books. I even got on Twitter so I could follow incredibly talented and smart people who have had years of reading that I missed out on. And I'm thankful to NetGalley, which has allowed me to get a head start on some of the great books coming out for my young readers!

I think I feel like people who have been starving for years. When a banquet is finally provided, they eat and eat and eat and... They just can't get enough. That's me. 

Now my students are readers, too. And not just in the classroom; at home, too. They read and read and read. While the expectation for reading month is to read at home each day for thirty minutes, many of my kids are reading daily - at home - for well over an hour! Then they're asking me for more recommendations.

My life has truly turned on its heels. I have discovered amazing characters, new paradigms, and have been able to offer riches to my students in ways I never could before. I've been able to add richness to my kids' lives as well. I so appreciate those who have helped to light this fire in me. I've found that reading truly, well, it's fun!