Five for Friday: Pumpkin Palooza!

Isn't this the truth?! I feel like we are constantly assessing. This week, however, we had lots of fun with pumpkins!

 

I have awesome parents this year that have made quite a few Scholastic book orders which helped us to earn some bonus points. I was able to get a lot of fine motor activities to give my kiddos some extra strength using those little muscles =) You would've thought it was Christmas day when I opened the box to tell them about the purchases I had made for our room. Look at the concentration in those little faces :-). Score!

  

We read TONS of pumpkin books this week that were informative and fictional. I will have to take a picture of my one wall in my room so you can see all of the anchor charts that have been hung. I did put all of the activities we did this week in my "Pumpkin Palooza!" pack that you can get from my shop on sale until this weekend . In fact, my entire shop is on sale until midnight on Saturday =)

Pumpkin Palooza!

So, I may have too many irons in the fire at the moment. I have conferences next week, plus my evaluation, a husband traveling, and two book studies that I am participating in. Did I mention that I am on the Science adoption committee too? EEK! This week was our first meeting for "Causes and Cures" which focused on how our brains work and some of the impulsivity we see in our students. I'm excited to see what I can learn in helping some of the kiddos in my room!

I stopped at the local farm on the way into work to grab some pumpkins. The kids were so excited to see them when they arrived on Monday. Little did they know they would be elbow deep in digging out seeds and guts. LOL! We did lots of things like measurements and observations before the scalpel began. I think they were amazed that some of their estimations of 50 seeds in a pumpkin were grossly under the actual number of 418! I then cooked them for the kids to test. Some really liked them while the gag reflexes kicked in with others. It definitely is a different texture. I am letting the pumpkins dry out and I created a journal page for them to monitor the date and the way the pumpkin has changed over time just like in "Pumpkin Jack".

Ahhh...it was a fun soccer season and I love watching my boys play but I think we are all soccered out between the practices and games of three players. My little guy was the last to finish up this past weekend and he earned his first trophy. He was so excited to finally have one like the big boys! The cupcake was a nice treat too =) We also carved our own pumpkins at home too =)  Happy Halloween and enjoy the extra hour of sleep this weekend!

Five for Friday: A FREEBIE to celebrate Friday! Woot woot!

I'm still working so hard on the noise level in my room. They don't seem to think it's at all important that I am talking sometimes...until they don't know what they are supposed to do. LOL!

 

We started to touch on pumpkins which we will begin studying next week. I noticed after doing some literacy assessments that my kiddos had some difficulty with recall. I created a sequence activity for them to do after reading this story. They did much better this time around...phew! I attached the pages  if you would like to try it in your class too!

 

 

My hubby left last weekend for a work project so I have been flying solo. I'm used to doing before and after school with the kids by myself but I worry when he's gone that something will go wrong...it usually does. The worst week ever to date was when my dad found out he had some health related issues on a Monday, my son got the flu on Tuesday/Wednesday, I woke up with an abscess tooth on Thursday with a root canal on a Friday. That week will for sure go down in the record books. This week, though, went really well and the kids were great! I will admit that we were all zonked out by 9 at night though. I have a hard time waiting up to put them to bed. LOL! We took some Fall pics around our neighborhood with the weather being so nice for late October. Love my boys!

 

   

I got this book in my last Scholastic order they sent me and it was cute! We noticed how all of the pumpkins had their own characteristics and talked about adjectives. I gave the kids a bunch of construction paper and let their little imaginations go to town. They need all of the fine motor development they can get.

 

I don't know about you but our conferences are right around the corner....along with a bunch of other things like Halloween parties and OTES. I had a conference pack in my shop that needed a major facelift. I recently achieved a TpT milestone and put this pack up for free (THIS WEEK ONLY) to help celebrate. Woot Woot! Grab it before it goes back to its regular price next week.

Conference Ready! Forms & Quick Assessments

 

I am so pumped! We saw this shirt on an old friend while seeing her Facebook page last week and I had to get one! I am a huge Ohio State fan and our school is celebrating SuperHeroes in our reading program! #WIN!!! I can't wait to get it!

Have a great weekend!

TpT Milestone and a FREEBIE!

It's Sunday Funday.... getting ready to start with week and needing to finish report cards before Friday. EEK! Then time to prep for conferences and an evaluation. Somewhere in there will be a Halloween party too. The next couple of weeks will be crazy!

On a happy note, I am celebrating a TpT milestone and they asked me to pick one product to showcase this week. I gave my conference pack a huge facelift just in time! I am putting the product for FREE this week only! If you have it already then you can download the new version =) Thank you to everyone that has helped make this possible. I am so appreciative for my TpT community!!

Here is a preview of "Conference Ready! Forms & Quick Assessments" if you need some tools for your conferences too! It has an invitation, confirmation, self-assessment, enrichment ideas for home, literacy & math assessments, writing template, and a conference summary. Have a great week!

Conference Ready! Forms & Quick Assessments