Take that, TEST! & an Earth Day freebie!

A HUGE multiple choice several 42 paragraph passages long load has been lifted from my shoulders!

The first round of Reading Testing is through. And most of my kids ROCKED it! In their own ways, of course! How are your Tests scored? Like I said, my results are immediate because we test online [BLAH]. Students are given a score of 1-4, with these labels:

        1: Well Below

2: Below

3: Meets

       4: Advanced

To be in the clear [avoid summer school and count towards our AYP, as third grade is the only tested grade that counts at our school], the students need to have a 3 or a 4 by the end of the year.

We test four times. This is new this year, as last year, we tested three times. Today was our third reading test. If the student scores a 3-4, they do not have to participate in the fourth test. Out of my brood, only 6 have to retest! And out of those six, four of them went from a 1 to a 2! The other two did not try. [Don't get me started!]

I did a few things to pump my kids up this morning. Here are some pictures..

YEAH RIGHT. Do I ever bring my camera to school? Fail. But here's a list, think of it as a poor man's photo montage. Don't hold your breathe, but maybe I'll bring my camera tomorrow.

1. Two days ago, we made mustaches and magnifying glasses. We called ourselves Reading Detectives!
2. Yesterday, I made a small Tshirt template, and we made TEAM jerseys!
3. This morning, the students had to do a checklist for morning work. Their tasks included reading a short book and taking a Reading Counts quiz, getting a drink, having a snack [I brought bananas], wishing three friends good luck, putting their head down & counting to 100, and then coming to me for a reward [which was a piece of gum, seriously the best motivator. ]
4. I asked a different teacher to write a short letter to each one of my students. This was THE BEST! I had them open their letters [it was a surprise] right before we went to test, and my kids were SO excited to receive a letter from either a past teacher, a favorite instructional aide, or another staff member! I'm so thankful that my coworkers are so invested in the students, even when they aren't the homeroom teacher!

I know it seems like a lot of bells & whistles, but like I said, most of them ROCKED the Test, even though some have not "met the standard" yet! These six friends retest in about a month. There are a couple who are only a few points away, so it is totally do-able!

We test Math next Friday. And it happens to fall on a Pajama Spirit Day. FANTASTIC. But now that three quarters of my class know what success feels like, I'm pretty confident we'll do just as well on that!

I promised an Earth Day freebie!

I've been so wrapped up in testing that I'm just now getting around to planning Earth Day things. My B. As a school, we do a mile long walk called Walk To School Day, in order to promote exercise, so this is in the afternoon. As a grade level, we are going to collect trash around the out skirts of school property.

As for my classroom, we are going to complete this organizer and turn it into a letter to the earth, promising to do certain things. In the product, the graphic organizer is page 1. Upper grades can write in the boxes and lower grades can draw in the boxes. Or both!

Page two is a blank earth graphic. We are going to do a "teared paper" \slash\ mosaic earth craft. Click the image to pick it up fo' FREE at my tpt store.

Happy Earth Day and Happy State Testing! =)