Hi! I am linking up with Doodle Bugs Teaching for her Five-For-Friday-Linky-Party!
1. If you haven't seen or used the Aging Booth App...I highly recommend that you try it. I took pictures of almost 75 first graders this week and we laughed sooo hard. Some of the kids loved seeing themselves. Some were maybe a little scared. They asked if their picture was REALLY what they were going to look like when they were older. They laughed at their pictures and they laughed at their friends. It was so much fun!
I printed all the pictures and we did this fun project.
They turned out really cute!
2. I had the MN Viking Cheerleaders come and read to my class. ALL the kids were sooo excited!
3. Our first grade team dressed as 100 year old ladies for the 100th day. I had a hard time taking them seriously! LOL! I am lucky to work on a team of ladies that I enjoy working with. :)
4. We are loving doing Reader's Theater in my classroom. This week was the first time I did the plays with my WIN (WHAT I NEED) groups. We talked about using expression, fluency, eye contact, etc. while doing the plays. I am impressed with how well they did! The kids drew the setting of their plays. I then took a picture of it and used Veescope on the ipad to add their setting as a background. They stood in front of the green screen to present. I added the plays to YouTube.
The plays were from a pack purchased from A Teeny Tiny Teacher. I purposely put the plays on green paper because I didn't want the paper to cover their faces when I was recording them in front of the green screen. All the green disappears. I am still trying to decide if I like it?
I have permission to share this one. I am so proud of these girls!
Today was Presidents Day. Unlike some lucky teachers who got to stay home, I had to go to work today. We had a full day of workshops. On top of that, we ended up getting 5+ inches of snow this morning. It started in the morning and it fell hard and fast!
My first part of the morning was spent learning how to do my web page. I loved that we were walked through...step by step...how to set up our pages.
We then had to go our home school to work with our PLC's on goals that we set. I am excited that I will be doing Reader's Theater with my group. I found these fun plays from Kristin at A Teeny Tiny Teacher. I am so excited to use them.
After lunch, we spent the rest of the day at another school in our district. We listened to Steve Dunn talk about writing. My head is spinning with all the great ideas that he gave us. I loved that he gave us examples and ideas of how to teach writing in our classroom. I can't wait to go back to my classroom and try some of the things that he shared with us. The afternoon went by so fast!
Tonight I created some different writing papers that I want to use during Writer's Workshop based off the ideas that he gave us.
This paper is meant to be used for kindergartners who are in their beginning stages of writing. They will draw a picture in the box and then write their sentences below it.
This paper is meant to be used for kindergartners in January and first graders throughout the school year. The page on the left side of their journal will have the box on it. That way when they are done writing, they can go to the next page and still see their picture.
Finally, this paper is meant for first graders and higher. Students will draw pictures of what happens in the beginning, middle and end of their stories. The boxes are on the left side of their journal and the extra lines are on the right side so they can still see the pictures.
You can find all these papers HERE. I hope you find them helpful to you.
Hi! I hope you all had a fantastic week. I have been looking forward to tonight. I'm hoping I'll be watching lots of television tonight. On my list is The Bachelor, The Tonight Show (Jay Leno's last episode) and the opening ceremonies of the Winter Olympics.
This week was a fun week and went by super fast. I am linking up with Doodle Bugs Teaching to share five things about my week.
1. Our school was lucky enough to have Derek Anderson illustrator of Hot Rod Hamster and other popular children's books, visit our school. It was fun watching him show pictures that he has drawn and pictures of his part. He showed the kids hidden pictures in his books. He also showed them how to draw a hamster. Our media specialist got together with someone to record a song for the kids to sing and act out for Derek. They had a blast.
2. We've had so many days of indoor recess this winter... I have lost count. Instead of putting out the usual toys, games, books, coloring sheets, movies, etc., I started playing exercise videos for the kids. They sing and dance and have sooo much fun while releasing extra energy.
Our favorite song has been the Gummy Bear song. They ask me to repeat it over and over. It's so much fun watching them dance to it. These kids have way more coordination than I will EVER have.
3. We have been learning about the Winter Olympics. We started our fact fluency races. I started giving my kids 3 minutes to finish their 1's facts. After 3 minutes, they get a marker and come and sit on the floor by the Smart board. We correct the tests together. If they get all the facts right, they color in the gold medal for their ones facts. If they don't get it right, they will take the same test the next day. They will do this until they pass. The next day, they will take the next worksheet with facts that they haven't passed yet.
I have folders labeled with each fact so that they go to the folder that they are on and grab their sheet. I am pretty impressed with how well they have done so far.
We started our tally sheet to keep track of how many gold, silver and bronze medals that the athletes from the United States of America win. The kids are so excited to report on this.
We colored North America (where we live) on a world map. We then colored Sochi (where the Olympics are) red. I had the students answer questions based on the map. They had to answer questions like.
1. How would we travel to Sochi?
2. How long would it take to get there? We learned that we are 5,684 miles away from them. The kids were shocked.
3. We learned that we would have to cross the Atlantic Ocean to get there.
My kids are having so much fun with my Olympic unit. We had a parade today. They each studied a country and presented their info on it this week. You can read about it HERE. We are loving using our green screen and iPad.
You can find my Winter Olympics Pack HERE. It is loaded with tons of fun activities for the kids to do. I also have two winter Olympic freebies in my store. Enjoy!
4. I had a pretty comical event happen this week. On Wednesday night I stopped at the mall. I had a few things to pick up for our new house. On the way home I was switching the radio station in my car. When my oldest son is in the car with me we listen to harder rock music. When my youngest son is in the car, we listen to pop, top 40's music. I NEVER get to listen to country music anymore. Sooo, I was alone and switching through the radio station. There were commericals on EVERY station. I finally got to one and a song was finishing up. I was at a stop light, and the announcer came on and said be caller.....(I don't even know what caller he said) and you'll win tickets. I quickly dialed the number that he said. It rang once and a guy answered. I said, "Hello". He said hello back and asked how I was doing and where I was calling from. I answered his questions. He said that I sounded really confused. I asked if I was the winner and said that I thought it was way to soon to get through. He told me that I was the winner. I was excited...but then remembered I had NO battery left on my phone. I quickly pulled into a parking lot. I had a 3 inch battery charger in my car. I had to lay on the seat to talk with my phone plugged into the console of my car. He got all my information and said someone would be calling. In the meantime, I was frantically trying to figure out what radio station I was listening to...in case they asked what the best radio station was. Thank goodness they didn't...because I had been flipping through stations and didn't know. After I hung up...I learned that I am going to be getting tickets to see Lee Brice!!! I love his songs!!! Today I got the call telling me where and when the concert is. (Yes...I had to ask what tickets I won and they laughed.)
5. I am addicted to Homegoods and to Kirkland Homes. Moving has caused me to want to get rid of all of our old stuff and get new stuff. We have TONS more wall space. I wish I was one who could just leave the blank spaces alone...but I need pictures hanging in them.
This week I found these gems to go on our walls.
These match the colors of the walls, rugs, furniture....everything...to a tee. I had to get them. Best thing ever? There was a scratch on one frame. I asked about it and got it for 50% off.
I am still debating on picking these up....
Our closet is full and we don't have a lot of space for our jeans. I thought this would be a fun thing to hide them in.
I really, really, really want two of these. They have 4 mini drawers on the top and two cupboard doors on the bottom. We lost a lot of storage space at our last house. These match our colors...I just can't decide if I should do it or not!?!
