Firstly, I apologize for my lack of blogging. Life has been... well, life as a first year teacher! That is really the only way that my fellow teacher blog friends will understand. I'm linking up with Blog Hoppin' since I will discuss one AMAZING writing bundle I got from TpT during the big Cyber Monday sale! If you got some sweet stuff, make sure you to link up too! :)
I seriously feel like a chicken with my head cut off! Everything I touch seems to multiply into 500 other things I need to do as well. I decided to take a break while sitting here entering grades for progress reports (YIKES!) to catch everyone up!
I am so in love with my kiddos! I cannot believe it is already December! Where in the world has the time gone?! I have seriously watched these kids grow before my eyes in the last 4 months! With all of the holiday festivities, testing, and trying to get ahead of the game, I have seriously slacked off from blogging. But, I miss it and the ideas I received from everyone! So please leave a comment below if you have any ideas for me :)
October- We started out this month by making some really cool Spider shaped Cinquain poems! The kids loved doing this fun little craft with their poetry. We also made shape cinquains where each student cut out some construction paper in the shape of their topic. They turned out really good! I have some amazing writers in here! We also had our "Fall" (Halloween ;) ) party and we had a BLAST! I really have the most amazing parents this year. They made sure our kids had a fun craft, we mad monster mix (chex party mix), and we had some sweet treats. We also had the BEST thing of all- our first ever PUMPKIN MANIA DAY in our magnet program! The students each brought a pumpkin in and they traveled to each classroom teacher on a rotation basis to learn more about pumpkins! It was so neat! My teammate and I did the Math rotations and the kiddos really just loved it. Their faces were priceless :) (P.S.- I dressed up as Pete the Cat! ;) )
Monster Mix!
Sweet treats and goodies!
Yes- that is a Snoopy Costume that one of my students wore! :)
November- Let's start out with the AWESOME project from Fabulous Life of an Elementary Teacher the Turkey in Disguise project! My kiddos truly went ALL out for this project! Their writing was even better! I was cracking up! :) Thanks so much for that Lacey and if you haven't checked her out, click on over to visit her amazing and fabulous TpT store! We also did an awesome Kagan strategy called Jot Thoughts where they brainstormed as many invertebrates and vertebrates as they could. They were coming up with some amazing ideas! I love that strategy! Because I wanted my students to have a clear understanding of what Thanksgiving was really about, I focused on this A LOT during this month. We did everything from reading and writing about it to social studies lessons on it. They thanked me afterwards for telling them about the first Thanksgiving! I felt so proud to be their teacher when I read their papers where they had to put themselves as a Pilgrim on the Mayflower and write about their experience. When we shared, you could tell they totally understood the concept and what it meant to be a Pilgrim back then! Then, of course we had our Thanksgiving feast thanks to my wonderful parents AGAIN! They made a full turkey, stuffing, homemade pumpkin pie, mashed potatoes... You name it, and we had it! It felt so awesome to be able to experience that with my students! They also made a really cute photo frame and wrote what they were thankful for on the frame! So cute!
Working on inferences! I love the mystery paper bag idea! :)
Santa Turkey ;)
One student made a Mexican party turkey! :)
Alien Turkey.. I love the creativity in this one!
Sheep disguised turkey
Pageant girl turkey
Indian turkey
Scarecrow turkey
AMAZING sunflower turkey!
Our Thankful Frames
December- Well, things are in full swing and we just took our mid-year FAIR test, which is completed on the computers. It tests the students comprehension, word analysis, and maze skills. I really just hate having to do these with my students, but I don't have a choice! They were so great and they honestly never complain about them. I always give them a little break after those tests with brain breaks :) We just recently found the what does the fox say dance video- OMG! I was CRACKING up watching my students! They just loved it!! The next couple weeks are going to be so packed full of holiday activities- I cannot wait! We are doing Holidays Around the World from the AMAZING and SUPER talented Hope King over at Second Grade Shenanigans. You can check out this adorable and HUGE bundle here in her TpT store. I mean seriously- let's be honest- the WHOLE reason I bought the bundle was for the I Want a Hippopotamus for Christmas writing activity! :) But, honestly- this pack will be used in it's entirety! I cannot wait- you should definitely check it out! My kids are going to just love it! YAY! My husband and I also participated in our church's annual Serve Day for our community. It was one of the most rewarding and humbling experiences. Other people were telling us how blessed they felt that we were there to help, but I felt amazingly blessed to have that opportunity! Also, we found the most perfect Christmas tree the same day! DOUBLE SCORE!!
Hubby and I serving our community! We are Here For Good! AMEN!
Oh Christmas tree, oh Christmas tree!!! :)
My kiddos dancing to the What Does the Fox say video! :)
Finally, I am having a few issues with some of my students. They are REALLY struggling with comprehension strategy skills. It is like they came to me with absolutely NO schema for reading! They can read and are knowledgeable enough to figure out basic questions, but higher order questions really shake them. Also, I cannot- and I really mean CANNOT- get one of these students to slow down OR check their work! She is like Speedy Gonzalez and she refuses to check her work or slow down. I have tried restricting to doing one page at a time with a time limit and they are not allowed to move on or do anything else except check work during that time for the page, but she just sits there and refuses. Anty suggestions?!? I am at my wits end with her! During our FAIR test she was finished in less than 20 minutes for an hour long test, which means she didn't get past the lowest comprehension passage because she bombed it :( It makes me sad-frustrated-irritated-mad... I just don't know what to do! HELP!
Well everyone, I hope that gets everyone caught up in my world and I am off to finish up my plans for next week! Please leave some love below- I could use it!
I am right there with you with the frustration of the student that rushes through! One of my brightest should be getting 100s on everything, but refuses to take his time. He just wants to get it done! I end up having to check his work immediately so he can go back and make corrections and he has to spend more time on his work. It doesn't help me at all though on our Benchmarks, when we aren't allowed to speak and tell him to slow down. Let me know if you find anything that works!
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