WELCOME TO 6TH GRADE LANGUAGE ARTS

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WELCOME TO 6TH GRADE LANGUAGE ARTS
LITERATURENICHOLS MIDDLE SCHOOL

• 6th Grade Literature and Language Arts Team Mr.
  Teichert, Ms. Fox, Mrs. Stratakos, Mrs. Morales
  and the District Literacy Coach Mrs. Patel

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Introductions

• 4 Years total of Teaching Experience (This is my
  second year at Nichols)
• 2 Years of Long-Term Subbing in Highland Park
• 1 Year Student Teaching in Peoria, Illinois
• Studied with Dr. Kevin Stein, Illinois Poet
  Laureate
• 5 Years of Tutoring College, High School, and
  Middle School students
• Published (Articles, Short Stories)
• Working on Publishing a YA Novel

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Reading Writing Grades

•  
• A combined grade for reading and writing endorses
  the reciprocal nature of these two processes.
  Additionally, the CCSS supports an integrated
  approach to teaching thus making it unnecessary
  to separate grading into two categories.
• Students will read, discuss, and craft writing in
  a variety of genres including informational,
  argument, and narrative. Students will also
  respond to reading through literary analyses.
• Students will have opportunities to improve their
  grades and revise their writing. It is their
  responsibility to set up a meeting with me to
  revise any piece of writing.
•  

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The Workshop MOdel

• Class begins with a mini-lesson where a
  particular reading or writing concept is
  explicitly taught
• During workshop students practice the concept in
  small groups, independently, or in partners.
• The teachers work with students in small groups
  or individually
• The class comes together as a whole to debrief
  and reflect on what they worked on
• The teacher uses exit slips, student work, and
  observational notes to inform future instruction

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Grammar

• A Literacy Department goal this year focuses on
  grammar instruction
• We assess each students individual grammar
  skills and then determine what needs to be taught
  whole class, in small groups, or independently.
• Research shows that grammar needs to be taught
  contextually meaning that students have to see
  and identify it in literature and their own
  writing.
• Optimal learning happens when as student is able
  to apply the grammar skill he or she has learned
  into his/her own writing.
• The students took a grammar self assessment (that
  was administered district wide) last week and we
  will be meeting with students to set specific
  grammar goals based on their assessments.

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A look at some of the grammar skills

• Sentence boundaries
• Solutions for run-ons semicolon, commas and
  coordinating conjunctions, add a period to create
  two sentences
• Solutions for fragments, i.e. combining
  sentences, adding a subject, clauses
• Pronoun use
• Proper case subjective, objective, possessive
• Intensive (myself, ourselves)
• Shifts in number and person
• Recognize and correct vague pronouns
• Punctuation
• Use commas, parentheses and dashes to set off
  nonrestrictive/parenthetical elements
• These are based on the Common Core Language
  Standards

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Reading Writing Workshop

• One-on-one meetings are the ultimate confidence
  builders for students. Theyre especially
  effective as follow-ups to (instruction), when
  students practice a strategy. Your undivided
  attention to each child makes them feel that you
  care about their learning and will try to help
  them understand and improve
• (Robb 1998, 7-8)

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Reading

• Time devoted to silent reading through a
  structured, systematic approach and the emphasis
  on school-wide reading contributed significantly
  toward creating a family of readers within a
  school.
• Karen Weller Swanson

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A closer look at one of our units

• Our Middle Eastern Unit combines realistic
  fiction books that deal with conflicts in the
  Middle East with non fiction current event
  articles on the Middle East. The 6th grade
  language arts and social studies teachers will be
  collaborating on the lessons surrounding the
  conflict and the students will write an argument
  essay.