Five for Friday - 2/26/16

My favorite link up of the week with DoodleBugs Five For Friday 

Started the week off with a PL Day where we were actually able to work in our rooms. Hooray! I thought it would be neat to have a little tour of my class now that we are more than halfway through the school year. I know we commonly share pictures at the beginning of the school year, but I always think it is interesting to see the room once it has been "lived-in" and things have been added throughout the year.

Text Based Evidence

Using Ezra Jack Keats Read Alouds

This week we read lots of books by Ezra Jack Keats and practiced using text based evidence to answer questions during writing.

Students began using phrases like:

The author states...

I know this because....

The text states....

My evidence is on page....

I am really proud of the progress my students have made with this so far. 

Phonics Poster BUNDLE

I just finished my Phonics Poster BUNDLE with real photos. These can be posted on the wall or put in a binder for students to review specific spelling patterns.

Click HERE to see in my TPT Store.

120 Chart Math Game

My students love this new math station game. A blank 120 chart inside a sheet protector (or you could laminate it) and then have students use different color dry erase markers and take turns filling in numbers on the chart. The first player to get 5 in a row wins!

Step 1 of the Read Across America Week Door Contest 

Pout Pout Fish is one of our favorites!

I plan to add a few more things to the door next week.

Blub, blub blub...

Thanks for joining me for my randomness this week!

Five For Friday- 2/12/16

My favorite link up of the week with DoodleBugs Five For Friday 

Valentine's Day Stuff

Earlier in the week, one of my reading centers was set up for students to make cut out hearts and then write their spelling or sight words on the hearts to take home and practice their words. This was a favorite center this week. I like how they each show so much personality.

I made my students' Valentines with water color paints. I was trying to stay away from candy, because I knew they would bring enough of that in themselves. I found this super cute valentine template at My Frugal Adventures Blog. 

We measured objects using conversation hearts. 

This morning, I realized that we had not made bags/boxes for our Valentine Cards and goodies. So, this was my quick solution that turned out pretty well. We used bingo daubers for the dots.

One of my favorite books is The Pout Pout Fish. I love that he starts with a pout and ends up being a kiss kiss fish at the end. 

Students created their own fish to measure during math. We even numbered the fish and then walked around the room with our math journals and measured everyone's fish and then compared our measurements. If students did not have the same measurements they went back to that fish to figure our who was right and who needed help to measure correctly.

Students also wrote about how they would cheer up the Pout Pout Fish and turned their writing into a Voki. 

Interviews

This week I was part of the interview team at my school interviewed lots of people for a few positions at my school for the upcoming school year. I'm writing about this, because we did it in a different format than you are probably used to. Our interviews were similar to "Speed Dating". Candidates sat at tables to meet a couple people from the interview team at a time and answer a few questions and then when time was up/called they switched to meet other people. I was actually facilitating the video portion of the interview. Candidates were asked to answer a few questions about themselves on video. 

This format made for very interesting interviews. 

Woohoo 500 Followers on TPT

Do you get messages during the day from your husband telling you that he's bringing a pig home?

That's completely normal right?

He actually teaches at a Middle School in the county and they have an agriculture class where students are encouraged to bring in animals/pets.

Thanks for listening to my randomness for the week!

Five For Friday- February 5th

My favorite link up of the week with DoodleBugs Five For Friday 

I have some wonderfully exciting news to share, I will be the Media Specialist at my school next year! I interviewed and found out this week. This is thrilling to think about as I start to plan for next year. Please feel free to share your favorite things that your Media Specialist does at your school, so I can keep that in mind. 

Writing

We read Chocolatina by Erik Kraft and Denise Brunkus, a story about a girl that turned into her favorite food, chocolate! Students then wrote about what it would be like to turn into their favorite food. Students then typed their writing and started to create Vokis.

We also read If I Built a Car by Chris Van Dusen and students designed their own car. They then wrote about the car in their writing journal. My students absolutely love sharing their writing. I had each student read their writing to the class. I noticed that my students needed to work on giving the person reading their undivided attention. So, I decided to let the person sharing their writing ask a comprehension question or two to the class after reading their story. If a student was able to answer the question they could move their "monster" on our behavior board. My students have never been so quiet and attentive while listening to their peers. This worked wonders!

Amazing Race

I talked previously about how my school is having an Amazing Race at school where teachers are on teams and completing challenges as well as counting up exercise time to make it to specific destinations. Well I am trying really hard to exercise, but I'm going from absolutely nothing to exercising so it's a bit hard. I ran some this week and we had a jump rope challenge where we needed to jump 360 times a day to earn points. My calves hurt so bad!

Here's my running partner, well not really, she likes to lay in the middle of the yard and watch me run. Our Australian Shepherd is the one that runs with me. 

Rekenrek Task Cards for Math Stations

Students love solving these equations at math stations using rekenreks. 

The BUNDLE is in my TPT store HERE

My students are also using this counting forward/backward task cards. They use a cards along with the Sock Puppets app on the iPad. They record themselves counting forward or backwards according to the card and then listen to the recording to make sure they did not skip any numbers. Students love listening to themselves talk even if it is counting! 

The Counting Forward Cards can be found HERE

The Counting Backward Cards can be found HERE

Do your students come in wide awake and ready to share something with you each morning? Mine do! Don't every tell your students which sports teams you support/don't support, you will never hear the end of it! This is at about 7:30 in the morning...

Thanks for listening to my randomness for the week!