Adventures in First Grade

Friday, January 6, 2012

Bead-Azzling Readers

I am sorry that I haven't been able to post for the last few days.  My oldest had a stomach bug on Wednesday, my two-year-old had it yesterday, and my husband has it now. I am the last one standing....YIKES!  As I have been Cloroxing the house (and myself) I keep repeating, "I will not get sick.  I will NOT get sick."  So far, it seems to be working.

I was only in school for three days this week because of snow on Tuesday and then the beginning of the sickness on Wednesday.  We surprisingly have gotten a lot accomplished.

In my Daily Five journey, we are up to four minutes of Read to Self, and I have been amazed at the outcome!  They are so into it!  In fact, I had several kiddos who were really upset with me when we finished Read to Self!

Hopefully, it will continue to go smoothly.

While on the topic of reading, as some of you may know, our school uses the Accelerated Reader program.  In December we used a reading incentive of adding links to a paper chain on our holiday tree for every 100% earned.

In January, we are having Bead-Azzling Readers.  On a bulletin board, I have pinned a small gift bag for each child (so there is no comparison about how many beads a child has, etc.).  Every time they get a 100% on an AR test, they get to pick a bead from the 100% box.  To encourage my kiddos to read more chapter books and non-fiction, they will get an additional bead for every 100.

At the end of the month, they will make necklaces with the beads they have earned.  I was a little nervous at first about what the boys would say, but they have been just as excited as the girls.

Here are some pictures of the Bead-Azzling Readers board and the bead boxes:




The 100% beads are just regular beads that you get about 1000 in a container.  The non-fiction beads are star shaped.  The chapter book beads look like the 100% beads, just much larger.  I got all of the beads at my new favorite place - Hobby Lobby.

I am curious, do your schools participate in the AR program?

Happy Friday!


7 comments:

  1. I'm your newest follower...stop by my blog and enter my $10 tpt giveaway :)



    Color Me Kinder

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  2. LOVE!

    I just gave you the Versatile Blogger award. Come on over to check it out!

    Holly
    Crisscross Applesauce in First Grade

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  3. I'm loving the beads! My kiddos just aren't that motivated to get AR points this year... :(

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  4. I love your bead idea! AT our school students can do AR after they successfully read the 250 sight words list- sometimes in Kinder, most kids in first grade. I have incentive charts and give my students stickers for every test they pass. When they fill up the 20 squares on the chart they get a prize from my treasure box and start a new chart. I gets them excited, but I especially like how your bead system has special ones for non-fiction. Love that! THanks for sharing.
     Chrissy

    First Grade Found Me

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  5. I'm your newest follower!

    Thanks for the great AR incentive ideas! This nine weeks my co-teacher (and partner blogger) are doing a competition between our two classes. We hung a graph in the hallway and update it daily. The kids love it and are excited to read!

    Also, we may be starting to implement the Daily 5 next year so I'll be keeping an eye on your blog for how that works with AR.

    Crystal

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  6. I love that idea! In my classroom, my students get to put a sticker on a chart for each 80% or 100% they receive. For every 3 stickers, they get to pick a prize from the prize box. They get pretty pumped about that, but I love this idea so much! I might steal it for fact worksheets because I have so many students that rush through without being careful. I bet this would make them check their work (and we do a sheet almost everyday so we would still have time to make a cool necklace this year).
    I found your site when I blogged about Daily 5 and AR and Kimberly from First in Maine suggested that I find you. So glad I did.
    I might be back asking more questions about incorporating Daily 5 and AR when I start both in the fall.
    First with Franklin

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  7. What do they get for their beads?? It's a cute idea but my students would ask me that question.

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