Gingerbread Week Day 4

Must ... write ... Day 4 .... post!

Cannot fall asleep until this is complete.

Boy, today was a long one! I worked late, then I rushed home to pick up the man and head on over to the in-laws for dinner. Three hours and a while later, I am finally home. Man, I'm exhausted.

Today was a fun day. We did the "Which part of the gingerbread cookie did you eat?" Math lesson. I'm sure you've heard of it. The kids take one bite of their gingerbread cookie and we record where they took that bite {head, tummy, arm, & leg.} First, we make a picture graph to display their information. We analyze the data. The kids complete their own bar graphs. Afterwards, I had them help me take the pictures from the first graph and turn it into a Pie Graph. They enjoyed helping make this graph (very attentive.) Then, everyone writes sentences to describe their data. Easy - peasy - lemon squeezy!

In the afternoon, I gave the kids another gingerbread man cookie to enjoy. We discussed adjectives to describe the gingerbread man cookie and added them to our large gingerbread man. Then, I let the kids choose their favorite seven adjectives and add them to their own gingerbread man bubble map.

Today was our last day for our Gingerbread Man comparison lesson. We read the story, The Gingerbread Cowboy. They loved this one, too! There is something magical about desert regions to first graders. I don't know why, but every year my kids get soooo into learning about deserts.

We recorded and posted the last bits of information to our large Gingerbread Story Anchor chart and completed the last story response sheet.

I still have at least three other gingerbread men stories to read tomorrow: The Gingerbread Pirates, Bad Boys Get Cookie, and The Gingerbread Friends. However, I'll just read those aloud for enjoyment, not work! They've been working super hard all week.

As I was tidying up the room at the end of the day, I noticed I had a small problem ...

I'm running out of places to hang up my student work!

I had to hang today's work on our library bookshelves. Hopefully, no one needs to shop for new books tomorrow!

I did get some really good news at the end of the school day. The "no pajamas" declaration for our Polar Express Day was overturned. My kids were so thrilled {me, too!} I could have kissed my computer when I read that email! :)

Let's hope for smooth sailing tomorrow. Either that or everyone is taking a long nap {including me!}

Gingerbread Week Day 3

Yay, I made it over the hump!

I'd love to report that I only have two more days until Christmas break, but then I'd be a darn liar! That's right, we have school until December 22. I've got to say, for this year, I am so thankful for blogs and Pinterest. I have MORE than enough ideas for lessons and craftivities to last me through this week, next, and even the week after that!

However, I'll take the break. I'm ready for it right now!

Well, I did have another observation again today, but this one was only 20 minutes long and it was first thing in the morning. I didn't lose any time from my regular schedule.

I can't imagine what it must be like to be a new teacher nowadays. This year, I have walkthroughs and observations all of the time. During my first few years teaching, I only remember being visited by the principal when it was time for my formal observations {that was 3 times a year.} And that was it! No one else would ever walkthrough, observe, or even visit. I think I would have lost my cookies, if I was observed back then as much as I am now! We are so used to people watching us. We could hold class outside in the middle of a busy parking lot. I am not sure if that is good or bad?!?! Whatever it is, these kids are always being watched.

Anywhoo, back to the topic at hand, Gingerbread Week Day 3.

Today, we read the Gingerbread Baby by Jan Brett. I love this book! Jan Brett is so talented and creative. The kids really enjoyed this story, too. They liked the ending the best.

We recorded the characters, refrain, and ending onto our giant Anchor Chart and completed a response sheet.

Sorry the picture quality isn't that great. The lighting is so crappy.
At least I remembered to move the red garland today!

Then, during our 3 rotations of Daily 5 students who were either 'reading to self' or 'reading to someone' could use this cute gingerbread house and character sticks to act out the story. They loved it.

If you use any of Jan Brett's books, you've gotta check out her website. She has many activities to go along with her books. She even has videos to show kids how to draw some of her characters! 

Click {here} to go to her website.

There's even an interactive gingerbread house that the kids can decorate by dragging the candies onto house. So cute!

Alright, confession time.

I was scared that my gingerbread cookies would stink and there wouldn't be enough for my two lessons, so I went to Walgreens and picked up some Pepperidge Farms Gingerbread cookies. {NOT, what I wanted to serve to my class.}

Then, when I came home, I baked the gingerbread cookies from the mix. Surprisingly, I managed to have plenty of cookies and they didn't taste awful either!

I had Scott do the official taste test. I'm going to use his bite with our class data! :)

So, I guess I'll keep the Pepperidge Farms ones for the house. I know one person who won't mind having more cookies in the house at all!!!

Happy Wednesday!

Gingerbread Week Day 2

First off, today was NOT as productive as yesterday. I had 45 minutes taken away from my regular day for a Fundations observation. That 45 minutes pretty much ate up almost all of my time for any good Gingerbread activities.

Oh well, tomorrow's another day. 

All we did accomplish was to read the Gingerbread Boy, Gingerbread Girl, compare the two stories using a venn diagram, and complete a response sheet.

The overall response I got from most of them was that the Gingerbread Boy was predictable. Ha! They didn't get into it as much as they did with the traditional story yesterday. To each his own. 

Completely different reaction with the Gingerbread Girl. They LOVED it! The girls wanted me to sing her refrain over and over again. I thought that was pretty cool. I was getting myself prepared for a revolt after the Gingerbread Boy.

Then we completed the story chart on our big Gingerbread House Anchor Chart.

Try to ignore the red garland in the way! Oops :{

I ended my day with an hour long meeting and an e-mail stating that we can't wear our pj's for our Polar Express Day. I was crushed, devastated, and disappointed.  That's my favorite day of the year! I guess I'll let them take their shoes off instead. I'm not sure the kids will be allowed to board the Polar Express if they aren't in their pjs. Oh, well.

Tonight, I went out to Target to pick up the Gingerbread cookies for our science project and for the great bite taking day. Guess What??

They didn't have any Gingerbread Man cookies!!!

Yikes! So, I picked up one lonely bag of gingerbread cookie mix. Now, I've got some baking to do! Oh, my poor kids. You can't screw up the mix, right?

Check out what else I got at Target:

It's a Gingerbread Man headband! 

Hahahaha! I could not pass it up. The kids will probably think I've lost my mind.

Let's hope we have a better day tomorrow. :)

Gingerbread Week Day 1

It's Gingerbread Week in our classroom, yippee!

Unfortunately, I don't have a lot of extra time to do bunches and bunches of gingerbread lessons and cute craftivities. We aren't doing an anthology story this week, so I can use that time. For anything else, I'm trying to integrate the best I can.

For instance, we integrated gingerbread into our math lesson today. We've been working on fact families, so I figured we could make gingerbread houses with fact families written on them. I lucked out and noticed that Mrs. Hodson from Today in First Grade ... had a great fact family house freebie! One less thing to do for me. Gotta love that!

I copied her house onto brown construction paper. It was a lighter shade of brown and they looked fabulous. Next, I knew I wanted to add candies to the houses, but I hadn't made up my mind on how we would do it. So, I decided to check out Jan Brett's website because I knew it is full of great pictures and ideas.

Lo and behold, I found exactly what I wanted. Not only did she have candies for our houses, but she also had these super adorable gingerbread friends!

Click {here} to go to the Jan Brett Gingerbread Friends page.

Here's how our Gingerbread Village turned out. I had one little cutie still out sick so you'll notice a spot left for her.

The kids were so proud of themselves! {me too!}

Later in the afternoon, we read the Gingerbread Man. I asked if anyone remembered the story of the Gingerbread Man. They told me what they remembered {which was pretty good} and we went over the GIANT Anchor Chart we were going to complete as we read the different gingerbread stories this week. Got this from Deanna Jump's Gingerbread Unit. It's super cute, go get it now!

I reminded them that as I read the story they had a job to do. They needed to recall the characters, refrain, and ending of the story so we could put it on the chart. I read the story to them and they loved it, of course.

The kids gave me the answers for the anchor chart and I added them on.

Afterwards, I read Deanna Jump's Gingerbread story to the class. It is short and sweet and the kids loved the rhyming. Then, I showed them our big ole pocket chart with the same story all mixed up. We worked on ways to put the story back in order. They SO wanted to look at the book to help them figure it out. I told them we would look at the book after we tried to sequence it on our own. They didn't like that answer, ha!

Alas, they did it {without the book!}

One of my kids asked me to take a picture of it. I guess they are really used to me taking pictures of them by now. They want to document everything!

Here you go, buddy!

Can't wait for Day 2 fun tomorrow!

Week in Review

Oh, wow! Have your kids been nut-so lately or is it just me?

Everyone is either sick, getting sick, or getting over being sick. Even I got sick! There's just not enough Lysol in the world to keep these germs at bay. On Friday, I only had 13 kids in class. Five of them were still hacking and sneezing. Which makes for some pretty whiny kiddos.

Anyway, we really didn't get a lot accomplished due to testing and illness. Or, at least, as much as I wanted to do. Oh well, there's always next year...

Here's some of the activities we did get to:

Amy at Step into 2nd Grade with Mrs. Lemons posted this great lesson about Reindeers and Caribou. It was AWESOME! I learned so much about caribou. We didn't get to all of the activities but we did have fun doing the research together! Click on her link to view the lesson. She has a wonderful blog - very generous!!

She wants a cell phone! Who is she going to call??

She wants a new jacket. So sweet!

Antonio wants an elf to be his brother. Cute!

Lindsay at Teacher Bits and Bobs had these cutie-pie Santas and I fell in love! The kids loved coming up with items to put on our list for Santa. We generated the list together on chart paper and then the kids filled out their letters on their own. The next day, we made our Santas. Let me tell you, this not using tracers thing is fun. There were just two students who really couldn't figure it out. Poor guys! Their Santas were all backwards. I had to intervene! Click on the link above to view the beautiful art and letter.

That's about it for now. This coming week it's all about the Gingerbread! Yippee!

I love this week! No basal story. :) Only, too bad for me because we also have school the following week as well. BOO!

Opie, our class elf, wishes you a happy week!

Sunshine Award 2011

Once again, I'd like to thank Sara at Smiling in Second Grade, Patricia at Primary Practice, Jess at Rambling About Reading, and Haylee at Following Optimism for giving me the Sunshine Award. It is fabulous of y'all to think of my little ole blog so highly. The teacher blogging community is so welcoming and genuine. Reading your blogs and receiving positive comments from all of you has been a highlight of my year 2011!

Now on to the award responsibilities:

1. Thank the person who gave this award and write a post about it.

2. Answer the following questions below.

3. Pass the award to 10-12 fabulous bloggers, link their blogs, and let them know you awarded them.

Q and A:

1. Favorite Color?

Blue and Green {and I do have a soft spot for pink}

2. Favorite Animal?

So hard, I love most mammals. 

Let me repeat that - I love most mammals. 

NOT reptiles

NOT fish

NOT birds

 MAMMALS. 

Some that are on the top of my list are cats (all kinds), elephants, and giraffes.

3. Favorite Number?

I guess it depends on the day.

3

7

13

4. Favorite drink?

If you haven't already gathered that I am quite indecisive.

I love water, Diet Mountain Dew, orange juice, rum, and tequila!

I used to love beer until I couldn't drink it anymore. {sad}

5. Facebook or Twitter?

Twitter, I guess.

Can I say BLOGGER?

I got rid of my Facebook account this year.

It is too much work to read through the posts of people I'm not really interested in {but can't delete because I see them around town.} Also, you can totally tell which people are lying about what is going on in their life. And, of course, everyone's life on Facebook is wonderful! They have perfect husbands, children, friends, jobs, etc. GAG ME! Over it.

6. Passion?

Teaching is my number one passion.

7. Giving or Getting Presents?

Oh, I'm a giver! I am always on the look out for cool gifts for my friends and loved ones. My only problem is I have the hardest time waiting to give my gifts. I want to give them their gift RIGHT AWAY!

8. Favorite Day?

My special day, of course, my birthday! The best day of the year :)

Now, I'm passing this award on to the following blogs:

The Silver Lining

BEE the Change

Blooming Into First Grade

Booky4First

Busy Bees

Carried Away in K

ChalkTalk: A K. Blog

KinderGals

Teacher Bits and Bobs

Rambling About Reading

The Teacher's Cauldron

Thank you so much for this award!

Oh and by the way, I am so happy to say that I was a drill sergeant today and was able to get 12 of my students FAIR tested by 11:30am this morning. I've never tested that many students in such a short amount of time. I have 6 more to go. Not too bad. Of course only because I was forced to get it done this quickly. Ideally, I would have administered it much differently {Especially since about 5 or 6 of my students have the worst colds. You know that affects their fluency score!}

Well, laundry is calling... Happy a great Hump Day!

Piranha 3D

So, okay, I am going to apologize right now because this post is going to be a random hot mess! I am sorry...really...sorry! Now on with the craziness:

1. You know how there is the Land Shark that goes around eating people? He tries to fool us by disguising himself as a pizza delivery guy, candy-gram delivery person, or a repairman. Then, if you fall for his clever ploy and allow him entry into your house he will eat you where you stand. Yep, that's the LandShark. You better believe it.

The LandShark is a nuisance and can be very dangerous if you are not careful. Beware!

Well, I haven't had to deal with the LandShark, thank goodness {but don't think I'm not keeping an eye out for you LandShark!}  HOWEVER, I have been visited by the LandPiranha! He may look cute and very similar to my little sweetie Gus, but don't let his looks fool you. This guy is all teeth and is out to destroy your stuff!!!!

He has chewed through 3 sets of iPod buds, 2 computer power cords, 1 Wii power cord, 2  phone adapters and recently {and most notably} 1 computer modem.

This little darling has a fixation for skinny cords. I think I may have to wrap them all with electrical tape. I yell at him, spray him with water, put pepper/apple bitter on the cords and he still comes back for more. Arg!

Alas, this LandPiranha is my baby and I will be a good pet owner and train him to chew on his toys and not our stuff. Honestly, I'm shocked he hasn't gotten electrocuted, yet!

I have been without the internet for 5 days! What a pain in the neck, y'all. NO paying bills. NO checking e-mails. NO Christmas shopping. AND, NO blogging!

It's one thing to not post or read my blogs because of being super busy, but it is quite another to not do this because you just CAN'T!

Plus, getting a new cord was such an ordeal. Lesson learned: the people that work at our local Radio Shacks are morons. Hopefully, we won't have to go back there again or any time soon.

If any of y'all have LandPiranhas in your home, I feel for ya!

2. Now, wouldn't you believe it but my teacher workstation (MY COMPUTER) died on Friday!??! It is messed up so badly that the tech people have called for more tech people to check it out because they haven't seen anything like what I have. Great! They don't know how long it is going to be before they can fix it or replace my workstation. Nice! One long vacation please!

3. I want to give a huge THANK YOU to Sara at Smiling in Second Grade, Patricia at Primary Practice, Jess at Rambling About Reading, and Haylee at Following Optimism for giving me the Sunshine Award. I love it, love it, love it, LOVE IT!

I will post more about this award and all of the goodies that go along with it tomorrow after Scott and I's last Merengue dance class. {sad} We have had such a blast learning how to dance with each other. I always want to dance with Scott and he never wants to dance with me. Well, it turns out, he was too embarrassed to dance in front of others. Not anymore, thanks to ballroom dance lessons!  Now, wherever we go and as long as the DJ only plays Latin music, we are SET in the dancing department. If the DJ plays any other type of music, we're screwed! Haha! After Christmas Break, we will learn the West Coast {whatever that is...} and broaden our dancing spectrum.

4. If you are a Florida teacher then you are probably familiar with the FAIR test. If you are not from Florida, the FAIR test is a reading assessment that takes F-O-R-E-V-E-R to administer for K-2 teachers. It covers most components of reading and is designed to show what a student can or can't do in terms of reading ability. K-2 teachers have to administer the test individually to all students. In the past, the teachers at my school have been given the professional courtesy to administer this assessment whenever we can get to it within the testing window (which is about 6 weeks long.) Last week, my grade level was informed that we were to double up our classes and administer the test this week. I have NEVER wanted to give this assessment before Christmas. And I have never completed testing all of my class in two days. I want my kids to do well and right now they are in an elf and Santa fog. The last thing on their minds is their reading ability. I'm pretty bummed about this. I hope my results don't stink too bad! Plus, I had to come up with 14 stations for my class and my teammates class.

Having to prepare stations makes me soooooooo grateful that I decided to teach using the DAILY 5.  Color printing, cutting, laminating, cutting again, making copies, and storing these stations has been a major chore. My teammate tested her kids today while I taught 30 kids in my classroom. They were having fun and being productive, but it was so loud. Two hours later and I was exhausted. Now, I am also grateful that we have class size here in Florida. My first four years of teaching were in fourth grade and I had 30 students in my classes. It wasn't fun, but I did it. Grading all of their work was a nightmare. I never stopped grading. Then, I moved down to first grade and the Class Size bill was passed. Thank God!

Well, that's enough randomness. I hope I haven't bored y'all to death. Oh, and THANK YOU to everyone who made me feel better about my ridiculous boxtops cutting habit. While I was meticulously cutting them out, I was thinking about how anal I was being but I couldn't get myself to stop. Oh well, I guess I can't give up all of my bad habits!