Mornings Matter: Daily News

One of the routines that happen every day in my classroom is Daily News.  This format of Daily News came from my dear friend, Traci.  I was in a slump with my morning messages, and she showed me how she does her morning message.  I haven’t looked back since!

I love so many aspects of our daily news time….

1. I love how it builds community in the classroom – we all work together to complete the daily news chart.

2. I love how I can reinforce SPECIFIC skills that the children need to work on.  If I find that Johnny and Jane are struggling with rhyming, I might add a rhyming section to my daily news the next day.

3. I love how it sets up our day – we often write about special events that are happening during the day. I love how it lets those anxious kiddos know what is in store for them.

4. I love how SIMPLE it is.  5 minutes at the end of the day (or sometimes in the morning before the kiddos come in) and it’s done. 

5. I love that it is interactive, and the children get up and down – participation and engagement is at a HIGH level.  We sing, clap, tap, and so on.  Sometimes, I even let the children have their own white boards to work right along with the child that is coming up to the chart.

6. I love that it is a PREDICTABLE part of our daily routine.  Kids know what to do, and they feel SUCCESSFUL!

Here are some examples of our Daily News charts and some of the skills that we may be working on:

Here are my tips for Daily News:

My biggest tip is to LISTEN to your students! Write your Daily News based on what YOUR students need!  If you are struggling in the beginning, set up a daily schedule as a guide to what to write.  I’m not gonna lie – sometimes I feel like banging my head against the wall because I can’t think of anything to write!  Sometimes it’s short, sometimes it’s long, that’s okay!  We all know we need to be flexible as teachers, right?!

I always try to include a little sampling from 2-3 subject areas.  I almost always include something language arts (in addition to the phonics, punctuation, etc. portion in the body of my message) and math. 

So, are you going to include Daily News this year in your classroom? What questions do you have? Tell me what works and what doesn’t work for you!

I Can Read!

Establishing the belief that Kindergarteners can read before they really know how to read is so important! They develop so much confidence and begin to take risks in their reading and writing.  Our morning message for the first few weeks is the same every day! 

Today is (insert day and date).  It is (insert weather).  

As the children's confidence increase in reading this highly predictable message, I start taking out letters, numbers, and eventually whole words!  Reading this message every day builds their self-confidence and they're so excited when other teachers come in and they can "READ" the message to them! Doing morning message also helps children to understand the way we read - moving from left to right on the page.  They are very excited when they get to come up and circle or write a letter or use the pointer to read!

During our morning message we also spend some time circling letters we know, adding punctuation, play a matching game, make tallies and so in.  I will add a picture of a morning message next week!

Children can also read environmental print from a very young age!  Helping children to understand that reading those signs is really reading is also a confidence booster!  Environmental print is everywhere and is a great way to start teaching children about print all around them.

We did this very simple activity the second week of school. The children cut out the signs that they can read and glue them in their book.  You certainly can make the books "fancier," but in the essence of time at the beginning of the school year, they are simple construction paper books!!!  The children became very excited about all the things that they could read.  They took their "I can Read" books home to their parents to read that night.  PS - It's also great for cutting practice at the beginning of the year!

 

 The next three photos are from a conference that I went to presented by Dr. Jean!