Five for Friday: Going Buggy!

Heck yeah!

We began our study of insects this week and I think it will continue for another week or so as I keep adding more and more stuff!  Here are some of the books we used to help make our anchor chart!

One of the first activities we did was labeling an insect. They also had to use a word bank to help fill in the word puzzle.

I love this time of year because the kids are capable of doing so much. I got out my book of reader's theaters and they had a blast!! So, I made one for bugs and insects this week which allowed them to get into pairs to play the parts. I will definitely be making more of them in the coming weeks. I also did some differentiated text evidence activities too. I love when the kids ask to take the next level and push themselves into trying harder material. 

Who can study insects without reading "The Very Hungry Caterpillar"? We designed our own butterflies with construction and tissue paper before sequencing the story. Kids also had to match the sentences to the illustrations. It was quite a task but they did great! I have put all of this into my new pack (that isn't quite ready yet as I want to add more but will be out soon!).

Oh goodness.... this half marathon is quickly approaching. We are down to 30 days and I have been training hard! Lots of running with fast paces (slow ones too), runs outside, etc. I have to be honest in that I can't wait for it to be over because it is stressing me out. EEK! I made my playlist which I am still tweaking too =)

I try to keep healthy by exercising and eating well to be a good role model for my favorite three little boys in the whole world. I love them to pieces!!

I sent that meme to the boys as it is so very true!

Have a fabulous weekend!!

Five for Friday: Writing, Running, and Family

It has been a tough year for me professionally but I think there might have been a breakthrough this past week. I would love to see this little flower bloom before we leave for the summer =)

I started cutting out pictures from the newspaper that my kiddos could use in their writing. I'm always looking for new ways to make writing fun and they really seem to love that time of the day. I explained to them what a journalist does and how closely they can work with photographers in writing their articles. I wanted them to pretend they were a journalist and I was a photographer giving them the picture they were going to use in their article. I wanted them to use their imaginations in coming up with their own story. They did such a great job! I will definitely be doing this again before the end of the year.

This one was a riot! "The guy was fat and chubby and lazy. He put on a weird tv show. It was so weird all he did that day was watch tv all day. The end." She used those adjectives for sure!

"In the woods I see a waterfall. It was beautiful. I loved it. When I had to go home, I was sad. My mom saw me crying and said we could come back again." -seriously, so precious!

"The gorilla likes grass and he likes to play with a green ball and he plays with his friends."

"The cat is rolling a ball. He is making a snowman. The snowman is big and it is outside."

We had to throw in the ways to be great to the Earth in celebrating Earth Day. The kids made a large web of ideas that I then typed up. We placed each one on a green heart cutout that was the leaves of our trees (which happened to be our forearm and hand).

I am already starting to think about next year. When the new class comes in, I like them to see some of the projects the previous class did. I had the kiddos grab their punch cards to look through to serve as reminders of all of the things they could do throughout the year. We had a long talk about why Kindergarten is one of the best grades to be in and why it is my FAVORITE! I explained that they come in knowing some letters and sounds but leave with the tools they will use their entire lives....reading, writing, and arithmetic! They now know all of their letters and sounds, compose sentences into paragraphs, complete simple addition/subtraction, tell time to the hour, and so so much more! So, they wrote why their futures are so bright and added their portraits with sun glasses =) They are in the library getting laminated because I loved them!

I am thrilled that the weather is FINALLY starting to get nice again. We had a fantastic weekend filled with all of the favorites....hiking, soccer and more soccer, as well as some fishing.

I also got in a longer run outside. I have to admit that I am nervous about my upcoming race as all of my training has been on the treadmill. Even though I run everyday it is such a different feeling running on the pavement.  I hope to get a longer one in this weekend if the weather cooperates and in between all of the soccer games again. LOL! You can see that my exercise can be a bit excessive on some days as it showed my medal for 204 minutes. It is either that or therapy. Oh wait....it is my therapy but much cheaper =)

Have a great weekend!

Five for Friday: April 15th

This has been me all week. I was flying solo with the kids since Sunday and hit a few rough patches. Definitely looking forward to the weekend...and it's supposed to be warm! Yeah!!

We continued with our plant unit this week and read "The Tiny Seed". We got the watercolors out to make our own flowers. We then discussed the items that could harm or help the seed in the story. They did a great job!

This book is great in talking about the food chains and why we need them. Several different chains are discussed in the book but we chose to illustrate one of them. They seemed to really get a handle on the concept.

 Who can study plants and not include a fairy tale? We studied "Jack and the Beanstalk". We made our very own with the elements from the story on each leaf. I really liked some of the giants the kids made with their illustrations.

Now that we are finishing up our plants, I put everything we used (plus MORE!) into a pack and placed it in my shop. You can get a preview here or check it out on the link below.

Plenty of Plants!

The hubby was out of town for business this week. It seems that when he does his long travel periods that everything hits the fan. He wasn't even gone an hour when the littlest guy went on my treadmill while he had it running and got his face real good. His lip is almost back to normal size. My oldest jumped off his bed and landed on an ipad...it's in a million pieces. My saving grace was that soccer was canceled which kept my sanity. LOL! I had to attach a pic of his bag because it has become a joke in our family with the way he packs. Everything is in color coded bags. White means that they are clean before transferring into the blue ones for dirty clothes. He also was able to travel with his new bag he got for Christmas. He had a great week traveling though and the boys loved having fun dinners =) 

I was excited to order this for my half marathon coming up next month. I will be running with some great friends and we each got our own colors. It should be fun but I definitely need to hit the pavement as I have been just on my treadmill all winter.

Definitely looking forward to feeling the warm sun on my face this weekend....even if it is at soccer games.LOL!

Have a restful weekend!