I first heard about Reading Cafe and Daily 5 during my senior year of college. When I began teaching I was so focused on getting my class started that I chose to put both Cafe and Daily 5 on the back burner. Last December it became evident to me that my kids depended too much on me during my literacy centers that I wasn't able to give my guided reading groups the attention they deserved. It was at that moment that I decided to give the Daily 5 and Cafe a "go".
According to the books by "The Sisters" you are supposed to introduce each element of the Daily 5 for 5 days, amounting to one month of school. Well... my team teacher and I did it a little differently. When we came back from winter break we introduced one part of Daily 5 a day and even practiced doing the complete Daily 5 on day 5! Now, I don't necessarily suggest rushing into it the way we did, but it seemed to work alright for us. This was probably due to the fact that although our kids hadn't done "The Daily 5" they had done centers and things similar to it. Their age helped too.
As we introduced each element we made a "T" chart. These charts go over why we do that element and what the student and teacher actions are during that time. We focused a LOT on staying in one place and working the entire time. I wanted to make sure my kids developed faith in themselves and were NOT running to me if something was confusing. They have been doing really well with that and showing a strong sense of urgency in the classroom.
Here are some pictures of my charts. I followed the book for the most part, but changed a couple things to fit my kiddos. If you're wondering about the funny angle it's because I am all out of wall space in my room. I actually posted these suckers on the ceiling! It works great! If kids get confused or show signs of distress without saying a word I can just point up. Also, you can post the expectations directly over the area you want your kids to that activity in.
Here is the breakdown of how Daily 5 happens in my classroom...
At the front of my classroom is our "flight monitor" (I have a airline themed classroom). The flight monitor is a magnetic pocket chart from Lakeshore that sticks right to my board. This chart has shows each group what their schedule of "rounds" is. *This is one modification my team and I made to Daily 5- we select groups based on good reading buddies. Our students do not get to pick the order of what they do.
Round 1 begins with the signal of a bell. I set a timer for 12 minutes. When the timer goes off the kids know to clean up that round and move to the next round. During rounds I pull my guided reading groups or meet with students to discuss their writing.
A little more about each of my rounds...
Word Work:
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| Here is my Word Work set up. |
"White Write"- Dry erase boards (bought a large piece of white board at Lowes for $9 and had them cut it into 30 pieces. Used duct tape to cover the "raw" edges) where students practice writing their words
"Rainbow Words"- Students write their words on a half sheet on notebook paper. Each letter is a different color.
"Magnetic Words"- A serving tray from the dollar store and magnetic letters from the dollar spot in Target (buy at least 3 sets for multiple letters). Students make their words using the magnetic letters.
Phonics flash cards from the dollar spot at Target
"Tile Words"- Sets of tiles (plastic at Mardel's for $3.99 and cardboard at Lakeshore for the same price) students manipulate to create their words.
"Candy Land- Sight Word Edition"- Candy Land with a twist! Purchase a original Candy Land game board. Print your Dolch sight words- or any other words you want kids to know at glance. Cut them and glue them onto the colored playing cards. Laminate for durability. Have kids play game by pulling a card. Students get to follow the colors on the card if they can correctly say the sight word on that card. I let my kids play this game in pairs. I also only let them play it once a week that way everyone gets a turn.
"Word Sorts"- An assortment of word sorts to increase vocabulary (great practice for ELLs). All of my word sorts are from ReadingA-Z.com. Well worth the subscription. Many school's already have subscriptions... check with yours!
"Stamp and Write"- Students write their words then stamp them. I bought the large clear stamps from Lakeshore (these work great so kids actually SEE where the stamp is going... they aren't just putting it down).
Read To Self:
Read to self is pretty self explanatory. Students visit my library once a week and find 3 "Good Fit" books to keep in their book bag. My library is leveled so they know where to look for an appropriate book to read during read to self.
Work on Writing:
During work on writing my kiddos write in their Wiis. Wii stands for "Writing Is Important". Inside of their composition book is a list of writing topics that they can write about. Students keep their notebooks in a our "Wii Charging Station" when they are not in use.
Read to Someone:
Students are placed into groups based on their reading levels. I make sure each group has at least 2 strong readers. These kids tend to gravitate towards reading with a low reader without any push from me. It works out great. While they read they sit EEKK (Elbow to elbow, knee to knee) and each hold a part of the book. They either take turns reading books to each other, read a page/paragraph to each other, or sometimes they whisper read together. It's their choice.
Listen to Reading:
I have a listening center from Lakshore that I use with my iPad. I download audio books from iTunes or find them free online or from other teachers and put them on my iPad. I select one student in the first round and one in the last to be my "iPad keeper". This student is someone I trust to take it out of its case, power it on, power it off and put it back in its case and place it on my desk. The listening center hooks into the iPad headphone jack. From the listening center are 6 additional jacks and volumes. Lakeshore headphones plug into this so 6 students can hear at once. In many cases, my students share books. I hope to have multiple copies of books for kids to each have their own at a later date.
More Resources...
Fantastic FREE printables for Daily 5:
Hope you found all of this helpful and useful! If you have any questions please let me know! Also, if you do Daily 5 in your classroom and have some tips or other ideas, please post those as well!
Have a great evening!
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