#Gingerbreadmanexchange2014

Wheeeew! What a short week! Three days sure does fly by quickly!

I didn't think I'd have much to blog about this week...but, here we are with my Five for Friday:).

I'm so excited to be apart of the 2014 Gingerbread exchange, hosted by Pawsitively Teaching. I know, you're asking, what's this gingerbread exchange about?! Click here to read all about it. In short, I've been teamed up with 15 other teachers (in various parts of the U.S) and we are exchanging gingerbread men and letters with our classrooms. So much fun! Here's what we've done so far:

We created gingerbread men that best represented where we live. Since we are surrounded by agriculture, we dressed up our gingerbread men as lil' farmers. Don't you just love their cute overalls?

Next, we wrote a letter as a class to our soon-to-be new friends! I had one kiddo copy the letter over for us.

All of our letters and gingerbread men are ready to be mailed off. I don't think any of my firsties have ever mailed anything. They were fascinated with the fact that we were MAILING our creations off to other kids! Yes, I Iet them decorate the envelopes:).

Stay tuned for more gingerbread exchange fun...

Today was an exciting day for room 16! We took 2nd place in our PBIS door decorating contest!

The kiddos spent quite a bit of time learning how to use our new iPad this week. Thank you so much to Donors Choose and all the generous people who helped make this possible! 

Gobble gobble...time for verbs! The kids thought my drawing was hilarious (which is why I'm sharing it). I'm a first grade teacher, not an artist. I tried:). Hopefully I'll have some fun verb activities to share with you next week. This was a short week:).

I also finished up my newest creation this week! With all the excitement of the gingerbread exchange, my kiddos are going to LOVE these activities! If you're interested, take a look here. It's filled with several math and literacy activities. I've also created a family-home project that is also included in this pack.

Have an awesome weekend!

Hello Four Day Weekend!

 I'm finally linking up again with Doodle Bugs Teaching!

Sniffle, cough, sneeze. It's that time of the year. I may not have much of a voice...but I made it! No substitute. Just a teacher with no voice most of the week. We all know it's much easier to go to work than plan for a sub:). I got through the week on a bag of cough drops and some airborne. I'll have four days to recover now. Yes, a four day weekend for me!! Yippee! Can you tell I'm just a little bit excited:)?

We began the transition from Halloween decor to Thanksgiving this week! I'm secretly excited (shhh...don't tell my firsties). I'm not really into the bats and spider decor. So...turkeys it is! Aren't these adorable?! They are so full of personality. Although each kiddo had the same turkey parts, they seemed to put them together just a little different. We also did some turkey themed writing. I wasn't sure if the kiddos were going to finish the writing this week. It was one of "those weeks" {sigh..}. I know all of you teachers out there can relate. I'm blaming the Halloween candy:-). But, any-hoo...we got our writing done!

First grade writing in progress!

This month is "responsibility" month at our school! Next week, we are having a door decorating contest. With it only being a three day week, I decided we better get it done this week. Did I mention I have a four day weekend:)? I really wanted to touch on Veteran's Day with my students, so I decided to incorporate it into our door decorations! I love how our door turned out! We are responsible lil' soldiers! I don't have a handy dandy template to share with you. I just cut everything out by hand...tracing random bowls and cups around my room for sizing. 

Speaking of Veteran's Day, I'm so excited about winning Cara Carroll's Veteran's day pack! We will definitely be putting some of this to good use next week:)!

Next up...Common Core math! Math has been really tough for my firsties this year. It's a big change from what they are used to doing. Unfortunately, our current math curriculum doesn't always meet the needs of all my students. So, I created this pack to help more of my students become successful. Click here for some freebie pages from this pack. If you're interested in the entire pack, click here.

Happy Friday!

Busy, Busy, Busy!

Wheeeeew! It has been a busy couple of weeks! We've had parent conferences, Red Ribbon week, our second annual Trunk or Treat at school, and Halloween festivities! We've still been learning, I promise:). In fact, we just finished up our pumpkin unit today! This is one of my favorite units to teach. Who doesn't love pumpkins?

Here are a few of the things that have been keeping us busy in room 16!

I'm going to start with my favorite craftivity. I've been looking forward to blogging and sharing these pumpkins with you! I just love them! They are not your typical jack-o-lanterns. In fact, they are a combination of inspirations I got on Pinterest and Instagram. I love social media.

Aren't they awesome? I love them...and plan on keeping this bulletin board up throughout November!

We also had an afternoon of pumpkin investigations. 

Roasted pumpkin seeds were a new thing for most of my kiddos. They enjoyed them so much that I had parents ask for the recipe because the kids went home talking about them! 

We read about the lifecycle of a pumpkin...and wrote about it.

Of course, a craftivity:).

Next up...painting pumpkins! The kids REALLY enjoyed this. I wasn't brave enough to carve pumpkins; so painting was the next best thing. After looking at the pumpkins, I think the kids are picking up on my love for Pinterest. No jack-o-lantern faces in our room! I think they used our pumpkin craft as inspiration! They must enjoy our bulletin board as much as I do:). 

In honor of Halloween today, we turned math into a little "Franken-fun" with my Frankenstein themed math (and craft). Thank you Pinterest for the inspiration:). 

This year, we had our second annual Trunk-or-Treat at school. It was a huge success and a lot of fun! It also happened to fall on "Twin day," which was part of our Red Ribbon dress up days. My friend Jessica and I dressed up as Waldo! 

This Waldo started her morning off with a big cup of coffee:).

Here we are at our booth during Trunk or Treat! Aren't we just the cutest first grade teachers you've ever seen, haha?!

We had all these yummy goodies for sale!

One last item to share...

This year, I have my first ever parent volunteer that comes in every Monday morning. Yes, first ever!! She is awesome. She helps me prep these cutesy craftivities you see:). As a little thank you, I made this simple Halloween treat for her. A mini mason jar, chalkboard  tag, and some Reese's pieces! Simple & cute. 

Happy Halloween!

Poppin' In For Conferences {and some batty activities}

We've gone batty! Well, not really. But, we did spend a good chunk of our week learning about bats! The kiddos loved this...especially since we are getting so close to Halloween!

We started off the week watching a couple of short videos {educational, of course} about bats! Then, we read these cute lil' bat books, made by my friend, Jessica! Not only did the kids love reading all about bats, they loved that they got to take the books home!  We learned lots of fun new words this week, like echolocation! It makes me smile when I hear the kiddos using these words in conversation throughout the week! I also read one of my favorite books to the kids, Stellaluna. I used a few of the activities from my Stellaluna activity pack...these were a big hit with my lil' firsties! 

The bat books also helped the kids with their writing this week!

We charted some of our new learning!

On Friday, we published our writing! Now, I'm not into the scary looking Halloween stuff....so I  created these "not so scary" bats instead! Yes, they needed a bow:-). No scary looking bats in our classroom!

Aren't they just adorable?! I love October!

Speaking of October, parent conferences are coming up this week! Can you believe  it's already time for conferences? 

To help me stay organized during conferences, I always create a "notes about your child" page. This helps me stay organized during the conference. It ensures I don't forget anything, highlights the areas of strength and areas for improvements, and reminds the parents to go over these things with their child. 

Here is a sample of what I am using this year {leaving off the student's name}. I keep it very simple and easy to use.

I also created these parent gifts as a way of thanking the parents for attending their child's conference. They are simple and easy to assemble.

If you would like to grab a copy of my thank-you label, click here. Just print and attach to a bag of popcorn. Easy-peasy!

Have a great week!

 

Hello October!

Well, it is starting to look like October in room 16...that is until you walk outside and realize it's still 100 degrees outside! Despite the lack of cool weather, the October transformation has begun! We started our spider unit this week. Now, I'm not a huge fan of spiders, or any insect for that matter...but I did find a few ways to "cutesy" it up a bit:)!

Welcome to spider week!

We kicked off the week with these adorable spider hats! Yes, we did a spider craft on a Monday:)!

The kids absolutely loved putting these hats together-after we read our spider books, of course (you can see them hiding under the spiders). We don't just craft and make cutesy hats all the time-I promise:). The kids LOVED them so much that I had several kids bring them back to school on Tuesday to wear:)! 

We did some informational writing on spiders this week and turned our writing into these "not-so creepy" spiders. Cute, right?

We also learned some new vocabulary this week! 

I am not an artist-which explains this drawing:).

Ok, I saved the best for last!! Are you ready for it?!

Spider cookies!!

I prepped all the parts-which included cutting all 168 legs out of licorice:). This made it quick and easy for the kids to assemble.

Definitely a big hit with the kiddos:)!

Stay tuned for more October fun next week!