Five for Friday: March 25th

This is the truth! On Friday nights, I am exhausted!

We are on Spring Break this week but I did a lot before we left. We took down all of our Dr. Seuss books and filled the shelves with all of our Spring things.....which means we are in the homestretch when we return! So excited!!!

I love these directed drawings we did that I found on Pinterest. The kids put their hand on the bottom of the paper, drew a circle around it, added two dots in the top corners and finished the lines to make ears, and then added the facial features. We drew everything in dark crayons and then they finished with the water colors. They came out so cute!

We do Jump and Wills Guided Reading units. I love seeing how the kids can make connections and write opinions. I thought these two friends did a great job in writing their opinions whether the Easter Bunny should allow skunk to help him hide eggs in the book "The Easter Bunny's Assistant". The first friend said "I think he should let him because the bunny can plug his nose." LOL!

"I think he will say yes because he might show good hiding spots."

I had some friends get way too much out during the game time so I thought it was a good opportunity to do some spring cleaning. We got rid of so many things that didn't have their parts and pieces. The bins looked fantastic when we were all done. Great lesson in sorting and classification =)

I got my haircut and it felt so good! Four inches off and I feel like a new woman. LOL! It is light and fresh for Springtime and our trip to Florida. I love the view from our room. Back to reality next week but so thankful that our family had the time together to make some great memories!

Enjoy your weekend!

Five for Friday! March 18th

I finished all of my i-Ready tests this week in preparation for report cards. Woot woot!

I read so many books related to St. Patrick's day this week! We had to make our own leprechaun's and talk about times when we felt lucky too. There were some really cute ideas =)

Who doesn't love the Old Lady stories? I made a little sequencing activity to fit in a shamrock. In challenging some of my more advanced readers, they had to add the rhyming words from each component as well. I put it free in my shop if you want to grab it!

There Was an Old Lady Who Swallowed a Clover activity

It was a busy week because we had to fit in St. Pat's Day, Easter, and assessments. Crazy! We made these cute little chicks and turned them into simple math equations after reading "Jellybean and the Unbreakable Egg". A darling little story about a chick that takes longer to hatch. They try to crack him using many different methods but find out that loving him is the best!

We had a Celebration of the Arts in our building with the theme being "Eric Carle".  I bet you can figure out which books go with each project. There were lots of  cute displays throughout the entire school as well as the 4th graders (my son's class) performing with their recorders. I thought the picture was so fitting =)

 

Woohoo!! We made it to Spring Break! So excited to spend time with the family =)

Have a great weekend!!

Five for Friday Fun: March 11th

It has been a very busy week and my husband is traveling so I definitely can say that I am doing my best =) One more week until Spring Break! Yippee!

We brought Spring inside and decorated our classroom door. I made a bunny Olaf that my five year olds detected right away. Unfortunately, my husband asked why I put elephant ears on a snowman =) We put our fine motor skills to work in creating some flowers. They look great!

I started reading some fictional and informative stories about St. Patrick's Day. I actually learned quite a bit in the Gail Gibbons book about the history of the holiday. Each of the kids put together a rainbow with the writing prompt "If I found a leprechaun and he gave me six wishes, I would wish for a rainbow of things." On each color, they wrote one wish they would want granted. We hung them right outside our door for everyone to see. 

I grabbed my little guy a new outfit for Easter. Being the third boy, I feel like I need to get him something new every once in a while. Right next to those jazzy shorts was an adorable matching dress. Of course, I had to buy it for my beautiful niece who looks absolutely adorable in it. During the change of our 'fancy clothes', he managed to find the Trump wig from Halloween and had a ball running around in it. LOL! Always keeping us in stitches!

The kids have absolutely LOVED all of our Dr. Seuss books because they can read many of the words in them. I made a center for them to look through their favorite books while filling out a story map (characters, setting, beginning, middle, end, and story connection). Another page is doing some text evidence work =)

This was the hit of the week! I made a rekenrek for each little kiddo in my class using pipe cleaners and beads. We are working on sums up to 10 so I used that many beads in two different colors. This tactile way of doing simple addition facts really made quite a difference in a lot of my learners. They will keep them at their seats until they've mastered them. I did make a few extra for some of my struggling mathematicians to take home and practice as well =)

We are in the countdown to Spring Break. I can't wait! 

Have a great weekend!

Five for Friday: Seuss spectacular!

It was Seuss ALL.WEEK. LONG! It will be a quick post because I think most of the pictures sum up the lessons we did plus it was a long conference night. Thank goodness for Cuddle Up and Read Day tomorrow =) We read "Horton Hears a Who" and reviewed our question words.

 
I absolutely love "The Lorax". It touches on so many great lessons. We made truffula trees with our high frequency words we have covered this year. Kids then got with a partner and practiced reading them up and down.

 
I was stumped with an extension activity for "If I Ran the Zoo" so we got out magazines and created our own characters. After creating our own animal, we wrote a fictional story to go along with it. 

 
I have to say that this has been my most favorite winter! We have lucked out with the temperatures rising into the 60s in Ohio on some occasions. Just enough to give a fresh breath of air to hold us over a few more weeks until Spring. I didn't miss hardly having any snow. In fact, we have enjoyed many weekends at the local park. Look how excited my little guy is too =)

Also last weekend was our school talent show. Some of the faculty in our building, including myself, did a lip sync battle. The kids always love seeing the staff perform! Can you tell it was team blue vs. team green? LOL!

I had to throw in some math and "One Fish, Two Fish" was a great opportunity to do so! The kids made their own fish in a bowl and wrote out the equations below.

It was a busy week and there will still be some more goodies to come! Here is a freebie if you are looking for some whole group activity fun. Have a great weekend!

I Have, Who Has? games with CVC words, high frequency words, & numbers!