Five for Friday/Freebies!

Today, I'm linking up with Doodle Bugs Teaching for Five for Friday!

 

 We've been learning about the different states of matter in science, and even after several examples and experiments, my some of my littles were still not quite grasping the concepts.  So I did what I usually do and made up a song!  We sang it daily and they each got their own copy so they could sing it at home. 

They LOVED it and they were able to better retain the information.  :)

 

 

 

Our shared reading story this week was "The Dot" by Peter H. Reynolds.  Don't you just love this story??  I know I do, and my first graders do too!  It's great for predicting, inferring, and especially comparing & contrasting.  It's also great for discussing how characters change.  We've been hitting those reading standards left and right this week.

I always want my students to connect to the story, so this week we completed this reader's response log.  They did such an awesome job at being creative and thinking outside the box!

 

 

 

This year, I'm doing writer's workshop very differently than I did last year (you can read about that here if you'd like!  I will make a post about how we do it now soon).  My class this year needs a lot more structure than my class last year.  This isn't a bad thing; we've just had to change up how we do a few things! :)

 

 

We finished up our "Ouch" stories this week.  They turned out great!  My little writers really put a lot of effort into writing, revising, and editing these stories.  I had parent helpers publish the stories for them. 

 

Today, we started "How-to" writing.

 

 

We began by discussing what "How-to" writing is.  The first step was thinking of some things we could do very well.  We made this "Things we ROCK at!" chart.

 

 

Then, they went back to their seat and made their own list.

 

 

We stopped there for this week.  Next week, we will start drawing and writing each step.

 

 

 

 

 Lately, my kiddos have been really impressing me during math tubs.  Working together, flying through the skills... so I decided it was time for a bit of a challenge.  One of our math tubs this week was Buggy Math: How Many Legs?  Let me tell you, this math tub definitely sharpened up some higher order thinking skills!  I got some little bugs from the dollar store and the students had to tell how many legs were on different numbers of bugs.

 I didn't get a picture of the back side, but they then had to add two bugs together before they told how many legs there were.

This little one above had written 5 bugs = 29 legs.  She realized she miscounted and said, "OH!  Because if you counted by 5s you wouldn't count 29.  It's 30!"  Wow, hello recognizing multiples of 5!

 

 

 

 

 

Last - but not least! - we've been working on our Mother's Day gifts.  They always turn out so cute.  :)  If you would be interested in this project you can click on the cover page below. 

 

Thanks for stopping by!  Have a fabulous weekend, friends!

Five for Friday (on a Saturday!)

Hi Friends!  I'm linking up today with Doodle Bugs for the Five for Friday linky party!  (Even though it's Saturday... oops!)

1.  We've been working hard on reviewing letter sounds, especially beginning sounds!  This was one of our morning sheets this week.  I heart DJ inkers clip art! :)

2.  We have also launched daily five in our room and have started reading to self time.  We were up to 12 minutes! (Then went back down to 7 on Friday - thank you, Friday the 13th!)

 

{The 3 ways to read a book sign is from Shine on in Kinder and can be found here! :) }

We did the "shoe lesson" (from the Daily Five book) for using "I PICK" to choose good fit books.  (I thought these shoe anchor chart pieces were from First Grade WOW but now I can't seem to find them!  If anyone knows where they are from, I will be sure to give credit!)

 

 Here are our book boxes.  I let my kiddos choose 5 books for their box.  They also have their poetry binder they can read during read to self and they can also use their whisper phone (pvc pipe!).

3.  We also started math tubs this week!  I wanted some easy-ish tubs for the first week to ease into how we do math tub time.  :)

We worked on patterns (from my Welcome Back to School Math Center pack).

 

 

Roll and Write (top) and Sort It Out (below) are both from Julie Lee's All About Me pack!

 

Roll, Add, and Cover... from my Watermelon Wonder pack!

 

4.  We talked a little about September 11th this week.  To them, since it was before they were born, it seems like "forever ago."  To us, it seems like yesterday!

 

 

 5.  And since I didn't share a picture of my teacher space when I showed classroom pictures last week, here it is!  It was nice and clean, so I snapped a pic! :)  I do make sure it looks like this when I leave each day.  I can't walk in to a messy classroom in the morning!

 

 

Happy weekend everyone!

Five for Friday!

Today I'm linking up with Doodle Bugs Teaching for Five for Friday!

1.  I'm especially happy it's Friday because I get to see my best friend today!  And you all might know her...

It's Chelsea from Blooming into First Grade!  We met as freshmen in college on the cheerleading squad and we were roomies for 2 years.  I miss this girl with my whole heart!!

2. Is anyone else's classroom a hot mess right now?  I just feel like everything's everywhere.  I have so much to do for the end of the year, but all I want to do is CLEAN and ORGANIZE. 

3.  My kiddos have just been completely CRAZY lately. :)  Example one: (And let me just preface this picture by saying we have been doing this all. year. long.  They are supposed to look at the analog clock and write the digital time.)

Yes, this little decided to just label it. 

I die. :)

4.  Pennies... PENNIES.

That one kept me laughing all day.

4.  



 

6 more days.  6 more days.  6 more days.  :)

5.  My brother works for a non-profit organization called The National Canine Cancer Foundation.  A few weekends ago, we had a "Pup Crawl" to raise money for this awesome foundation.  The research conducted by the NCCF benefits both humans and dogs affected by cancer.  This handsome fellow was right next to my t-shirt booth and because I was working, I got a free kiss. :) 

If that's not the sweetest thing ever, I don't know what is.