Morning Meeting

Information provided on this page for classroom use only; not for reproduction

.thevirtualvine.com 2003

I wanted to add this information to the website since I've had several people request further information, but I didn't know exactly where to put it.  So I just created a whole new page.  Problem solved! :)  If you have further questions, email me and I'll be glad to try and answer them and then post the answers here as well.

This is a picture of my Teaching Wall where our Morning Meeting is centered. 

The Teaching Wall is attached to strips that were built into the classroom.  I have each component for our Morning Meeting numbered, to help me stay on task.

Pledge

Read a book that corresponds to theme

1) ABCs & alphabet sounds song (on song chart)

2) Word Wall (on an opposite wall that you can't see)

3) Calendar

4) Days of the Week

5) Months of the Year

6) Write the date 2 ways on laminated sentence strips with a Vis-a-Via

7) Graph the Weather (which is missing in the picture)

8) Write a sentence on a laminated sentence strip with a Vis-a-Via

9) Count to 100, count backwards from 10, count by 10s to 100, later we'll add counting by 5s

10) Time: Tell the time and write it on a laminated card with a Vis-a-Via (can't see this in pic)

11) Money in the Bank (except that we now use a money pocketchart)  The money corresponds to the date: 17th = 17 cents

12) Tally Marks corresponding to date (this I've changed to ordinals)

13) Pattern (add to it daily, start a new one each Mon)

14) Days in School using Place Value Chart

15) Temperature

16) Number Pattern

17) Shapes

18) Daily Graphing Question coordinates with theme

Sing color words songs from song charts using cassette (Frog Street Press)

Review poems in pocketcharts

Get the mail from class mailbox

Read emergent readers

More pictures at My Room

For Morning Meeting my students sit at the round table and face the Teaching Wall.  We quickly go through each component of the Meeting.  I try to get through it as quickly as possible.  Some days I stop to introduce a higher level skill, so we spend a minute or two longer. (usually has to do with the calendar)  The faster we move through the information, the more interested the kids are.

The ABCs we just recite while I point with a pointer.  I still have some that can't say them and some that still don't recognize them, so this is good for both.  We also sing a song that incorporates the sounds (the Alphabet Sounds Song on the Literacy Connections page). 

When we write a sentence, I choose a student to give me a sentence.  Their sentence might be "I like a red cake." (when we were doing The Birthday Cake)  The group tells me how to spell the words, including capital letters, spacing, and punctuation.  I write it on the laminated sentence strip with a vis-a-via pen.  I help them out when needed.  This is a great time to work on spacing, capitalization, punctuation, language, decoding, sight words, and available resources.  By available resources I mean we talk about where we can look in the classroom for words we don't know how to spell ... sight words on Word Wall, "red" & "cake" from The Birthday Cake pocketchart.  When they use these resources on their own, I tell them to "Kiss their brain!" (from Dr. Jean)  They love to do that.  We just touch our head and give an air smooch! :)

During Writing Workshop, they copy the sentence from the wall, and then write two more sentences of their own.  If you're teaching Ks, they may not be able to do this.  We started out the year drawing a picture and writing about it.  I conference with each one when they're finished.  We go over "corrections", but I don't tell them that.  We've advanced up to where we're at now.  We just started on the two sentences.  They're not doing so hot on the two sentences.  Although they did great copying the sentence and writing ONE sentence of their own.  Writing TWO sentences is still a little scary to them.  But we're moving along and I'm proud of them.