St. Patrick's Day

           I will start by saying that St. Patrick's Day is one of my most favorite holidays. When I was in college, I studied abroad in Paris and had a very close Irish friend who was studying at the University of Dublin. Our break at the American University of Paris fell over St. Patrick's Day, so a group of us went to Dublin and stayed with my friend. I fell in love with Ireland and it's people. They are wonderfully kind and really know how to celebrate! I went back to Ireland three times during my stay in Paris and traveled outside of Dublin to the countryside. I stayed with my friend and his family. It was a welcomed break from city life and the home cooked meals nourished my soul as well as my body. I plan on taking my son when he is old enough, and I would recommend traveling there if you have the means.

          First graders have amazing imaginations which is what I really love about teaching such young individuals. We start off the celebration early by talking about Leprechauns. I read many books about the tricky fairy folk. If you don't know anything about them, here are a few facts. They are fairy folk and are considered elves. They make all of the fairies shoes. They love the color green. They love gold and hide it at the end of rainbows. We had such a wonderful time reading and writing about Leprechauns. I even have two students writing an "All About" book on leprechauns this week.
         Next, we moved into the STEM lab to build a trap. Each student was able to set his or her trap out around the room to see if a leprechaun could be caught. They were very serious about finding the right place. Most chose by the door because logically speaking they were more likely to catch a leprechaun when he came through the door if their trap was close by. Very clever 1st graders!

We wrote two "How To" pieces, one on building a trap and another on catching a leprechaun. Both turned out very adorable. I really have master writers in class this year.
       On St. Patrick's Day, a leprechaun did visit the classroom organizing all of the green crayons, sorting the green dice and connecting cubes, turing over chairs, and leaving little green footprints everywhere.

            He even took all my dry erase boards and replaced them with all green ones. We later found out that the green markers he left me were very messy to get off the board and turned my whole hand green! No one caught him, but he lead us on a scavenger hunt around the school and left us cupcakes, apple juice, and Lucky Charms for our party! 

Of course the scavenger hunt written in poetry form lead us all around the school to all the important places. After walking all over the school, the treats ended up being right under our noses in the classroom.  What a tricky little elf!We used the Lucky Charms to create a graph of the different types of marshmallows. This is the perfect introduction to graphing in math. The students can line up the marshmallows in each box, which allows me to correct students that start from the top. Then they can either create a normal bar graph or a picture graph. Both types of graphs are apart of the 1st grade graphing standards. 

The day was a giant success with all the students believing in leprechauns!

Valentine's Day Themed Party

This year I was on the committee for the PTA Board Luncheon. We decided to have it on February 13th so that we could have a Valentine's Day theme for the party. I was so excited to send out the invitations and create all of the decorations. I truly love party planning and DIY decorations. I have had much success with Paperless Post for online invitations. They are just beautiful. You can select your invitation from a number of options. The one that I chose happened to be free, but they all are not. Once you have chosen an invitation, you can chose an envelope, liner, and stamp. You can track who has been sent an invitation, if they opened it or not, and who is coming to your party, on a very simple to use tracking page.

I really wanted the invitation to reflect the Valentine's Day theme, but be sophisticated enough for an adult luncheon. I think that it turned out very well, and I received many thank you response from the PTA board members.

As the board members opened the link to the card, they were taken to an image of the envelope with the heart stamp. Special stamps cost money, but they are worth the small price to start the invitation off right. The envelope then flips over and opens to reveal the heart liner. The liner and stamp are the only two real Valentine's Day themed items. I did chose the festive Carnaby in pink invitation to keep the theme going, but it did not scream Valentine's Day. If you are planning a party and want to be environmentally friendly without sacrificing style Paperless Post is the way to go. I hope you enjoy exploring Paperless Post! They also have a wonderful option for print invitations. I sent out an invitation for my son's Baptism. I wanted a copy of the invitation, so I just hit the "order this card design in paper" button, and one was sent to my house for his baby book. 

I also love making decorations. I discovered this love last year in September when I had to decorate for my son's birthday party with a $200 dollar budget. For this luncheon, I immediately went on Pinterest and started to pin fun ideas. My board is a small, but I still had fun pinning! If you would like to view it, I have set up a link here. I went with the hot air balloon theme.

I started by weaving the baskets. To do this, you need two different colors of brown paper. One of the papers, you will fold in half and cut slits about one inch apart by starting at the fold and cutting up. You then need to cut the other paper into one inch strips. Unfold the first paper and weave the strips in an under-over pattern until you have moved from one end to the other. Next, very carefully fold and cut a half-basket looking shape. When you unfold the basket will be symmetrical. Then, glue the edges down so that the basket does not unravel. For the hearts, a die cut machine is desirable, but not necessary. I did use a die cut, so my hearts are all symmetrical and equal. Once I had all of my pieces, I just started placing hearts to looks like a large balloon. I did two boards this way. Beautiful!

I forgot to take pictures of the room. I know many board member have shots, so I am going to try to chase them down. I hope that this inspires you to think creatively and have fun with any party that you might be throwing!

Valentine's Day Mailboxes and Post Office

It has been some time since I had a moment to sit down and write a blog entry. As I work this morning at 4:00 am unable to get back to sleep, I thought it the perfect time to reflect on the weeks past. Sometimes it seems almost impossible to incorporate the projects that I did before the Common Core Standards, but we did manage to do a design challenge for Valentine's Day. I spruced it up, and it can be found at Valentine's Day Mailbox Challenge.

I started by giving the PPT presentation on what I expected from my students mailbox designs. We looked at different types of mailboxes and discussed characteristics. I threw in some very funny ones that took on the features of animals and superheros to inspire them to think big.

Then, we visited our STEM lab and got to work designing. They turned out excellent.

I placed them in my cubbies so that they were out of the way, but easy to access.

To take it even further, we mailed our valentines in a post office activity. Each students takes a role as a worker at the post office or a mailer of valentines. They run through their roles of stamping, sorting, mailing, and distributing mail until they are replaced. The process is very smooth and all students get to do all jobs. I am working on attaching this part of the project to my TpT Mailbox Challenge. The students really loved it. Everyday they would ask me, "Are we doing post office today?" I was very exciting to have them act so enthusiastic toward the game that turns out to match with our social studies unit on "Goods and Services". Students learned how things can be exchanged for money specifically buying stamps. They are learned the specialized work that people do in the area of mail and banking.

Students are lender money by the bank so that they can purchase their stamps to mail their letters.

Alphabetical sorter for mail

I made my very own mailbox using two boxes stacked onto of each other and covering them with blue paper. I took screen shots of the post office sign. 

Students buy stamps.

The mailman collected mail from the sorting bins.

One of my students putting letters in the mailboxes.

One of my student mailing letters.

Someone gets a loan for stamps for their valentine, and another student lends out money and uses a checkbook to keep track. 

On Valentine's Day, the students took their mailboxes to their desk and read all of their mail. There were some mistakes of mail not making it to the right mailbox, but for the most part, it was a great success.

Being Big

Today, my Project Cornerstone moms came to read to my class and teach a lesson. Project Cornerstone is a program ran by the YMCA that helps promote a great classroom and school community. It allows parents to be a support system for optimal physical, mental and emotional development. During this month's Project Cornerstone lesson, my class was asked what it means to "BE BIG". "Being Big" is treating yourself and others with respect. They use the words "being big" because children always want to be bigger and older and more mature. They also use these words because big kids are supposed to treat themselves and others with respect.  I love the idea of "Being Big", I use these words all of the time when students need to be respectful to me, themselves, and others. They are learning what it means to grow up. Growing up does not just mean getting older, moving grades or getting taller and stronger. It also comes with mental and emotional responsibilities. As any supportive adult in a child's life, I want my students to grow into kind, generous, and honorable young adults and adults. I love that my school has amazing parents that want to be involved in their child's life and the lives of all of the children in their child's class. These parents understand the importance of teaching kids ways to respect themselves and others. Behaviors need to be taught. Children need to watch and learn from adults that they trust. This is why Project Cornerstone is so important. If you see a Project Cornerstone parent around school, stop and thank them. They are helping to guide your child toward being comfortable and confident with who they are and making choices that reflect this attitude.

Room 8 is learning how to be big. These are all of the pledges that my students made to help them be big in 2015!

Martin Luther King Jr.

The three day weekend has come and gone, but I wanted to remember the hero that helped change the way people were treated in this country. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was an ordinary man who did extraordinary acts of bravery. All last week and this week, my first graders talk about, write about, and listen to stories about this ordinary hero. My hope is that they understand that ordinary people can be heros. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., Rosa Parks, and Ruby Bridges were ordinary, but because they had the courage to do what was right, they are considered heroes. When learning about these amazing people, I want my students to start to understand that if they choose to have the courage to what is right especially around bullying, that they are being heroes.

We read Martin's Big Words, a picture book about his life. His words captivated people. He is considered one of the greatest public speakers in the history of the United States. The book is filled with words like inspire, freedom, togetherness, love, dream, etc. We spend time trying to define these words, and I talk about their importance to the Civil Rights Movement. The artwork is award winning and the story is simple enough to reach the younger students. You can find the story read for you on youtube if you click below.

After we have discussed Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.'s life, we discuss his dream for the future. I ask my students to think about their dreams for themselves and the world. We brainstorm what they want for the future. They think of everything. It really shows that they understand the issues in todays world like pollution, traffic, deforestation, extinction, oil spills, hunger, war, homelessness, etc. It always surprises and amazes me when we create our list. Although they are young, they listen when adults discuss issues going on in the world. They observe their environment. They have their own opinions and ideas for how to make the world better. They are optimistic. It comforts me to know that the next generation cares about the world we live in. 

The students write a paragraph discussing three of the ways that they want to improve themselves or the world. I give them a choice because some students really want to become excellent readers while others want to talk about ways to improve upon todays current pollution issue. Both choices speak to the determination of my young students to make things better. 

We complete a craftivity to accompany the writing. The students create a Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. figure complete with suit and tie. They are all different, but equally as adorable. 

Snowy Day Inferencing

Inferencing Investigations

In the month of January students become investigators. It is their job to use clues from stories to infer what a character is doing and how a character is feeling. I start off by using "Inferencing Investigation" by Babbling Abby. This activity requires the students to listen to a story about a boy and his grandmother. The story leaves out details from their snowy day activities. It is the students' job to infer what the boy did with his grandmother based on clues in their "Snow Day Case File". I split the class up into five different groups. Each group has their own case file that they use. The clues from each file go with other clues, but the students do not realize this until we come back together and talk about what they found. 

Some of the clues have times attached to the event, so we were able to create this timeline. Each child chose one event and illustrated it. 

There was a writing component to this project as well. Students were instructed to choose one piece of evidence and the matching inference to create a sentence using the frame "Based on _______, I  infer that ________________________________."  These are samples of the wonderful writing and illustrations that my students produced. 

Nick Bruel Author Visit

Today, we were visited by the author Nick Bruel, who is the author of the Bad Kitty series. He presented his new book Bad Kitty: Puppies Big Day, which came out today, January 6th, 2014. Mr. Bruel discussed where he gets his ideas for his books. To our surprise, he starts all of his books by simply coming up with a title! Who knew! Then he explained how he with the title Bad Kitty, before creating the story of Bad Kitty. After he came up with multiple events in the stories, he put them in order alphabetically, and the Bad Kitty books were born. As an aspiring author, I loved learning how he started his books.

For a majority of the assembly, Mr. Bruel worked with all of the students to come up with a story called Mad Horse. He went through an exercise with the students where he asked them many questions in a rapid fire way, and called on students to answer. He took whatever was said to him and incorporated it into the story. Here is what the students came up with...

Mad Horse

Mad Horse lived on a farm, but he did not like the other animals because they are mean to him. He got very mad when they were mean to him. He was running away from the farm to the city.  The city was five hundred million miles away. He decided to get on a plane, but he didn't have any money. So then, he jumped on a train to go to the city. He was not supposed to be on the train, so he was kicked off. He needed a miracle. Santa arrived because one of his reindeer had fallen off and he needed Mad Horse to help him. Santa sprinkled pixie dust on Mad Horse. They went to the city together. When he saw his cousin, he was happy and they talked and talked and talked.

He finished by telling students what the secret to writing a story is.

"This is the secret to writing stories. Always ask yourself questions."

I was very impressed by the presentation and so happy that I took my class to go see him. I would encourage all teachers to try to get an author to visit. This was our second author visit this year! I hope that this visit will encourage my students to be patient writers.