How can it be?    10 years ago a teacher shared with me ideas from a brand new book.   That book was called, Daily 5!   It rocked my world.   It changed the idea of centers and teaching to the average away for me.   In those days, I differentiated instruction within my small groups, but the other groups were the same activities for all.   Daily 5 changed all of that for me and my students from that day forward.   

The original book was seen as a "How To Guide".   I saw fellow educators following the authors words to the T.   I decided to take parts of the book, ideas, and suggestions and tweak them to work for me.   The main difference for me was that I was not very keen on the idea of students choosing where they were going and with who they were going with.   Later, the book Daily 5 was updated and the authors very much came out and said that their point was really the philosophy behind the book.   They mentioned repeatedly to make it your own.   The key is to teach in small blocks of time, allow movement, adjust for differentiated instruction, and let students be able to make choices/ownership with their learning.  Instead of Free Reign, I give choices within the 5 rotations.  Just as a note, Mondays are still reserved for me to introduce the skills and concepts of the week.   Fridays are still reserved for wrapping up the week, extensions, and assessments.   Daily 5 is used 3 days a week in my room.   I am going to break away from this model sooner than later depending on what Language Arts Pilot we end up buying.   I would love to stretch my curriculum into a 6-9 day unit of study depending on the extension,interest, and skills being introduced.   For me, the second half of first grade always looks completely different that the first half of the school year.

My five rotations include Work on Writing, Read to Self, Word Work, Listening to Reading, and instead of Read to Someone, they come to see their teacher at the kidney table. Work on Writing is always changing.   Sometimes they are working on vocabulary that ties in with our current unit of study, or they might be writing about a topic, or they might be writing a letter to a friend (mail is delivered on Fridays).  To keep it fresh, the activity is always changing.   Read to Self is wonderful.  Students can sit on a couch, a rocking chair outside, or snuggle up in the library.   Sometimes I have students read Elbow to Elbow, Knee to Knee if they didn't finish something at the kidney table or if I feel that they need additional practice.   During this time students can also read/be read to on their Chromebooks.   Students can take A.R. tests.   Once again they have choices within the activity.  Word Work is a big hit!  There are over 30 activities to choose from.   Students work with their spelling family or their high frequency words.   They can use Playdough with letter stampers, they can use Wiki Sticks, students can cut out their letters/words from magazines, rubber stamps, Roll and Write games, magnetic letters, Dry Erase boards, etc.   You get the idea, lots and lots of choices.  Listening to Reading is an evolving stop in the Daily 5 cycle.   I have retired all of my cassette tapes several years ago.   Students may pull up a chair and listen to a book on CD.   Every title I own has a second copy.   2 students may share a book, but 4 can listen at the same time.  I lay out 3-4 choices of titles.   They either go with our unit of study, our language arts program, or themed books for the month.   Students may also use their Chromebooks to hear books read to them.   No matter what, I require the students to complete a follow up page for a book that was listened to.   I only ask for one of the sheets by the end of the week and of course, they have choices as far as what sheet to work on. Following along, listening, comprehending....these are all needed skills in first grade.

The meat and potatoes of my Daily 5 model is when they visit me at the kidney table.  Students might be working on writing complete sentences or leveled phonics with Dry Erase pens on Dry Erase sticker spots on the table.  Students might be working on revisions on a prior piece of writing.   Once again, I have options and I can target what students need in a small group setting.  Currently I am piloting Houghton Mifflin's Journey program.   I am in love with their leveled readers!   The program comes with high, medium, and low text, but get this!   The titles are tied into our anthology!   The titles are filled with meaningful and engaging text!   My students go nuts when I bring out the books! I let them take them home of course.   Parents can see how they are another authentic piece that ties in with our curriculum.   By the way, their are also vocabulary books and ELD books. This week all of the literature is based on the animals in the ocean.  Needless to say, every student is engaged and excited.   Each leveled reader also comes with multiple meaningful activities.   Wow!

For years, I used to try to watch the clock and when I could I would hit a gong and students would rotate based on names in a pocket chart.   Well you can imagine that that probably didn't always go so smoothly.   3 or 4 years ago I decided to try and create my own Power Point to help the flow in my room.   Game Changer!   I was able to control the time, add sounds, images, and the best part is that I can switch the placement of students with ease!   Once again, I am always trying to make sure that the students are engaged and invested in what the skill or learning is about.   I have converted my Power Point into Google Slides.   I have even used this technology for a similar model with math called the BUILD model.   We use that program once a week.   For fun, I even recreated one of my slide shows for our class party today!    I inserted Halloween/Fall clipart/photos.   I played my slideshow on the interactive white board.   Students rotated from here to there for small group activities.  We did everything from Ten Frames with Eyeballs, to graphing with Cheetos Bones (chips), to games, photo booth, art project, and cookie decorating.  Don't worry!   The cookies were sent in little bags to be eaten at home. :)

I have shared my homemade Power Points with everyone on the SVUSD First Grade Google Group, but am more than willing to send it to anyone who would like to give it a try.