So intrigued by all of this - so I am trying to gather all the info so that I can soak it in and use it. Alas, I am having an unexpected difficulty. I bought and read the Daily 5 and Cafe kindle books which refer me to the web site for the forms. But it is so bewildering and frustrating to me that after spending all this money on the books and joining the web site, I cannot find ALL the forms or info in one place so I can download them. After I click on the topic, I see 3 more similar topics and download 3 more forms. The last one then leads me to another topic and more forms and more links. How will I know when I have seen everything? When can I be sure I am not missing a form or a key bit of info? Where is the central place where these are stored? Where is the site map. Seeing one piece of the puzzle at a time seems like a labor intensive way to do this so I am sure I must be missing something! Can someone help me out? I would like to implement this year and am quickly running out of planning time for this school year. Thanks!
I would start on the “Interactive CAFE Menu” (it’s listed under the green CAFE tab on the main page). Here’s the link to that resource: https://www.thedailycafe.com/cafe/cafe-menus/interactive-cafe-menu
When you click on any strategy in the menu, it will take you to a map of all the resources available on the website connected with that. For example, if you wanted to work on the Strategy “Use prior knowledge to connect with the text”, when you click that on the menu, this is what you’ll see:
https://www.thedailycafe.com/strategies/comprehension/use-prior-knowledge-to-connect-with-text . This place lists all the videos, forms and suggested lessons on the site. If I were you, I’d print out the “Ready Reference Forms”, the Parent Pipeline, the “I Can” bookmark and put them in a folder or notebook. You could do this with all the strategies ahead of time to create your own materials in a way that works for you. Yes it will take a while, but then you have it :).
Another alternative is to decide which strategies you want to introduce your students first, and start with those. Then, print out the new ones as you have need.
If you had the “physical book” for CAFE, it comes with a CD that has printable versions of the Ready Readiness forms and forms for the Pensieve (which you’ve seen in the appendix on your Kindle book), but you would need to get the other forms from the website.
The Sisters intend for the website to be a resource that is constantly updated, so there are many resources that have been added since the book was published. Don’t get discouraged, though–once you get used to using the site, you’ll see how it can be a great resource for you.
Again, I’d start with the Interactive CAFE Menu. You also can bookmark places you want to keep at your fingertips. The “Search” tab is also very helpful if you have a specific topic you want to read about.
And, of course, using the Discussion Board as a way to talk with teachers who are familiar with the site can help direct you to find what you need.
It really is exciting to get involved in Daily 5 and CAFE, and you’ll see the pay-off with your students in a big way.
The Kindle version should have come with a warning that you would not get those forms - if I had known that I would have bought the print copy. I need to have a hard copy of forms as I can not always get an internet connection at school and don’t have a printer in my room. I get all of what you said, but I still think the design of the website is an absolute travesty. Just to download the Cafe Menu Strategy ready references, assessments, and parent pipeline forms (in English and Spanish) requires a total of at least 152 separate downloads!!! Plus after a bit of time, the web site makes you sign in again! Just getting to each of the forms requires multiple clicks as there is a description page you must go through to get to each form - ARGHH! I am sure I made more than 1000 separate clicks today on those alone! So frustrating! Then, I still needed to print each one of these forms individually as they are all separate files!!!
I get that that the sisters want to help kids learn and teachers teach but why make it so difficult to get the resources they promise? They of all people should know how little time we have and how all of this occurs on our own time. I am used to working with science teachers who are much more generous with their ideas. It makes me want to cry that I wasted so much time on something that should have so, so easy to do for absolutely no reason. If it is not faulty design of the web site - it is a deliberate attempt to make it hard to get the resources so you will need to sign up for longer periods of joining the web site. Relying on site bookmarks as you suggested would certainly do this. They are making us pay a steep price (again not paid for by our schools) for this membership and, although the content is there, if we pay in $, we shouldn’t have to pay in time as well. Plus, there is no way to see the updates to the site that I can find - how would I see if new literature lessons or the missing pieces to the strategies were added? Would I have to keep sifting through it all to find new things?
I like the ideas and the compilation of practice suggestions even if they are not all original, but I’ve paid the price of two books and a web site membership to just find out that I have to spend hours and hours (literally - days) to get some of the resources. And I haven’t even started finding the info on scheduling etc!
Certainly I am willing to pay for the ideas - but they should be ashamed to hold their fellow teachers over a barrel to make the max amount of money. Plus if you make it this difficult you decrease the chance that could be easily put into use by more people therefore decreasing the chance to really affect the education of students especially those who need this individualized attention. I know you are just doing your job so I am not meaning to rant on you but I am speaking out for the teachers that will follow here - hoping that this message will get communicated, changes will be made, and these dedicated individuals who donate so much of their own money and time will be better served by you and thus more children will benefit.
I can feel your frustration coming through, and I’m sorry for that. I know we all feel that time crunch–it is the teacher’s worse enemy. We all need secretaries!!
I will most definitely pass your comments along to the Sisters. I am sorry there was no notice about the lack of the CD with the Kindle version.
As I mentioned before, the Ready Reference and Pensieve forms all there on the CD, but the other forms have been added since the book was published. That’s why they are available on the website. The way we learn about new items that have been added are through the weekly newsletters, or Tip of the Week, which list all new additions.
The cost of the website figures out to be about $5.70 a month which keep us up to date with the latest videos and newest forms. I have heard the ladies say that the best thing about publishing a book is that it’s out there, but the worst thing about publishing a book is that it’s fixed in time, and there’s no way to update without publishing a new edition–except by way of their website.
Your suggestion of having materials, like all the Ready Reference forms, at one link is an idea I will pass along, as well.
Please don’t let the “paper crisis”, which is a real concern, keep you from the most important part of CAFE and Daily 5–the structure of your literacy time and independence of your students in their learning.
Thank you for passing this on and treating my frustration with respect - that is appreciated. I was treated very kindly. FYI - Here are the things I have been unable to find so far: F- RRG for Read as author, EV - Assessment for use pictures, EV - Voracious reading assessment (could use from fluency), C - prior knowledge assessment, and the Accuracy use the pictures rubric seems to be mixed up with the one for make predictions. It is late so I may have made an error or these were not included because they were repeated from other categories, etc. If these do exist and I just missed them, I apologize and if you would let me know where to find them I would appreciate it. Thank you.
Vocab-Voracious reading assessment–It is cross referenced from the Fluency one
F-Voracious_Reading-Assessment.pdf
676.83 KB
You are spot on about all the other forms. The F-RRG was an added strategy from the “original” book–there’s not one there, either. I’ll pass this list along. The rubric given for using pictures is really the Making Predictions rubric–I had noticed that before, so just kinda made one to use myself :).
You might watch the Tip of the Week to see if these are added in the near future :).
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