Like most of you, I am already thinking about what I'll be doing next school year. Yes, I am enjoying my summer vacation, but, there is always that part of my brain reserved for school, the part I cannot shut off or ignore. I stopped trying to ignore it years ago!
The BIGGEST change for me next year, will be my use of interactive notebooks. I have always been intrigued by the idea, and I decided to give it a try towards the end of this past school year. My first graders enjoyed being interactive notebook guinea pigs!
For several weeks, my students completed numerous activities in their notebook and we all loved the experience SO much, that I decided to dedicate my life to making interactive notebooks that align with our 2014 Journeys reading program. AND since I know many teachers do not use Journeys, I also made a set of grammar and phonics notebook activities for first graders who are not using the series. I have been working for MONTHS on this endeavor, and I am happy and relieved to say, that I have finished them! It's taken me a LONG time to get to this point!
If you are like I was, and are on the fence about whether or not to use interactive notebooks, I am going to tell you why it's time to jump off the fence and dive right in!
During the weeks that my students were guinea pigs, they were ALL so attentive and eager to participate in the activities. There were no moans, no spaced out looks, and definitely no complaints. Adding in the interactive component REALLY made learning the skills WAY more interesting. This type of learning and these types of activities involve so much more than just listening to the teacher. They are also using their creative side, and cutting, gluing, coloring, writing, thinking, and planning. They learn really fast to tune into the directions and follow them carefully, so they don't cut off something important or put glue in the wrong spot.
When I first introduced the activities, we did them all whole group. Once they got the hang of it and I saw how much they enjoyed it, I put some of the activities at their stations. Not the reading activities though. I will always do the reading activities as a whole group lesson.
Here are some pictures I snapped while my students were working. I couldn't take too many photos because I was completing the activities at the same time.
Since I took these pictures, I have changed the labels at the top of each page and fine-tuned some other things. My students were very helpful in telling me what worked well and what needed to be changed. I listened to them and used their ideas when I created my activities. I made sure not too have TOO much cutting and gluing of small pieces because it's hard to cut and they could easily lose them. Also, it's way too time consuming to have to cut such intricate designs. I also repeated a lot of the activities throughout the lessons. Although the skills change, the template remains the same. This is helpful because it allowed them to complete the activities on their own during station time and they didn't need me. If they forgot how to do something, they just looked back to a previous lesson for assistance.
Using interactive notebooks is a great way for children to learn and interact with new information, as well as, review and practice skills already introduced. In addition, having all of this important information in their notebooks served as a very useful and necessary learning tool. My students were able to refer back to their notebooks if they forgot something and needed a refresher. They really took pride in their notebooks, and were very proud to share their work with others. Whenever we had downtime or free time, a lot of my students enjoyed reading through their notebooks and sharing them with their buddies. Unlike completing worksheets or other printables, which go home right away, these books are always available to the children.
And now, I am VERY proud to share my work with you!
For each lesson, there are sight word, phonics, grammar, and reading activities that will definitely excite and engage our students.
Each activity comes with a label that includes an I can statement. All lessons are labeled with the lesson number to help keep you and your students organized.
Also included, are explicit instructions on how to complete each activity and the common core standard it covers. I also have photos of the completed activities to show you what they should look like. In some cases, the photo shows a different skill being taught, but the interactive template is the same.
There are also quite a few different notebook covers for you to choose from. I plan on keeping all of the activities in one notebook, but I know some teachers would prefer to have separate notebooks for sight words, grammar, phonics, and reading.
If you want to try these interactive notebooks, you can purchase them separately, by unit, or you can purchase all six units at once. I bundled them together at a discounted price.
Only Unit 1 and the bundle contain the sight word dictionary. The dictionary consists of six different pages, all containing the sight words for the year. My students will glue this into the front of their notebook during the first week of school. As I introduce the new words each week, the children will highlight them in their notebook. This will help them remember which words were taught and keep them accountable for spelling them properly. If they forget how to spell a word, they can refer to their notebook. The last page contains blank lines for them to add in words that are important to them and that they want to spell properly.
As mentioned earlier, in addition to the interactive Journeys activities, I also took the SAME grammar and phonics activities and made interactive notebook pages for those who do not follow Journeys, but are looking to use interactive notebooks with your first graders. If you click here and here, you can see all the grammar and phonics skills included in these packs. It's in the product description and, if you download the preview, you can see it again, plus a lot more images of some of the activities included.
I urge you to give interactive notebooks a try! You won't be sorry! Your students will definitely benefit from keeping these notebooks. They'll learn to listen more attentively, and they'll be engaged and stay engaged during learning time. In addition, they will learn valuable organizational skills. They'll be able to refer back to skills already taught, and you can easily use these notebooks to scaffold and asses learning.
Once again, here are the links to ALL my Interactive Notebooks...
The only prep work for you is to print and copy.
Imagine not having to plan your daily grammar, phonics, sight word, and reading lessons? Ahhhhhh! Sounds good to me!
Journeys Interactive Notebook Links
Now is a great time to purchase them because they are all on sale!