Best. Decision. Ever. :)
Now, it took a good bit of planning on my part. I spent lots of time on the weekend gathering texts and making it look appealing to my 3rd graders - but I like that stuff. :)
My goal each week was to find 3-4 poems (or short pieces of prose) that students could choose from. This gave me an opportunity to bring in seasonal and high-interest text to my classroom.
The kids chose a new poem each Monday after we read all of the choices aloud together as a class. We were able to build a fluency routine into our everyday Reader's Workshop/Daily 5 Mash-Up, but I'll have to save that for another post. :) However, I will say that throughout the week they had lots of opportunities to practice their poems both inside and outside of school. And, because they chose their pieces each week, they were way more engaged in the practice process than I saw when they were working on our Reading A-Z passages. (Nothing against those - I still use them! I just noticed a BIG difference in their interest in the fluency material.
I'd love to share a set of poems I collected for a week in February. I didn't write any of these poems, but they are published "out there" on the web and I've given credit in the packet where credit is due. I'm working on a few sets of my own poems with a few more bonus features I have up my sleeve. :)
Our theme for this particular week was Presidents' Day, and I actually had a student come back last year and ask for a copy of the "Lincoln Rap" I'm including in this set. She wanted to use it for a speaking and listening project she had and I loved that she remembered it.
This freebie pack also includes a fluency rubric you could use for lots of different speaking and listening activities!
If you'd like to grab a copy of these poems for your own classroom, click here or on any of the pictures above.
Thanks for joining me here at The Primary Peach! I hope you're enjoying our Sweet Treats series! Keep checking back all month long for more February goodies! If you're looking for even more fabulous ideas from The Primary Peach, be sure to follow us on Instagram, Pinterest, and Facebook to catch all the latest news and updates!
