THANK-ful Teachers! {Wednesday}

Happy Hump Day!  

{True story.... I HATE when people call Wednesday "Hump Day".  But when in Rome....}

It's time for another round of THANK-ful Teachers with Blog Hoppin'!  

Wednesday:  ACTIVITIES LIKE... We will post about activities that we just love doing in our classrooms!  Show us those WOW lessons!

My Three Favorite Activities to Do Are:

1.  Life Cycles

I absolutely LOVE teaching about life cycles.  The Life Cycle of a Butterfly is my favorite, but The Life Cycle of a Frog is a close second.  I love making huge, interactive bulletin boards to go with each life cycle.  To raise the bar last year, I added higher level questions and information about butterflies on the board.  We discussed those questions as we came to them.  We also added each stage of the life cycle on the board throughout the unit.  It's always a class favorite!    

(I couldn't find my picture, so I stole my coworkers.  Still just as cute!)

2.  Shaving Cream

This is old news, that never gets old!  Shaving Cream is one of my FAVORITE ways to review just about anything!  I've used it for spelling/sight words, math facts, time, shapes, and anything else you can think of.  The best part is, when you are finished, you have clean desks and happy kids!

3.  Science

I love teaching Science!  It's always the kiddos' favorite, too.  We are so lucky, because our school district provides all the materials for awesome science experiments and lessons.  Our first unit this year was on the weather.  

So we made rain:

and tornadoes! 

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Life Cycle of a Frog

I saw the best idea for the life cycle of a frog on You Can Make The Sunshine Anytime, which made me remember to post about what we did at the beginning of the year to learn about frogs.  I have a frog theme in my classroom, so I thought it would be fun to buy two tadpoles and have them grow into frogs.  One of them died, so then I bought one more tadpole with legs.  Then they died, too.  I was so mad.  I contacted the company I bought them from to find out why the first one died.  She suggested to clean the tank more often (I was already doing it 2-3 times a week) and to use bottle water to fill it with.  Yeah right, they're tadpoles for crying' out loud.  So sadly, we didn't get to watch them grow into frogs.  Next year, I'll do Mrs. Matsuda's activity.  So cute.  :)  We did have fun with some other activities.  First of all, I LOVE this book from Insect Lore. 

It has so many fun activities to do across the curriculum with frogs.  It also had the idea for a huge bulletin board and a book about the life cycle.  I turned our board in the hall into a lake/land area for the frogs.  Each child also got a book with a page for each stage.  Every week we learned more about each stage, and then made a representation of each stage and put one in the hall and one in their books.  I also printed out facts for them to put in their books.  If that doesn't make sense, maybe these pictures will help.  :) 

It was a lot of fun.  I really love teaching about life cycles.  But we sure do miss these little guys...

This is snowflake doing an interpretive dance to a glee song.  ha.  :) 

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My Everest

I had planned on posting more classroom pictures and activities tonight, but left my parent permission slips at school. I'll try again tomorrow! But for now...

I bought this mailbox this year. I was so excited to finally bite the bullet and buy the one I wanted. My first year I just used an old one my school had. Then I bought a cheap one at Staples, that basically fell apart last year. I am in LOVE with this one. It is made entirely of wood. Sturdy, and a nice blue color. It shipped to my house and I attempted to put it together. I figured it couldn't be that difficult...



Boy was I wrong! I got to Step 2, and then gave up. :)



I took it to my school the next day and my wonderful custodian* assembled it for me.



And since you can almost see my desk area anyway, I figured I would post a picture of that, now that it is clean and organized.



I use the blue basket for the class to put their homework and class work in. I was so excited to find this basket at Porter's. It matched the mailboxes perfectly! The brown basket on my desk is for notes from parents, lunch money, picture money, etc. I don't always look through the blue basket, so I need to have a place for important papers. Sometimes notes would get buried in the basket... especially if it was a crazy, hectic week.

I use the black hanging file organizer for sub info and my materials/copies for the week.

The larger stuffed frog is used for decoration, and for my most favorite game to play with the class. I call it "Frog Ball". It is a simple and wonderful game. Everyone sits on top of their desk. They pass the ball around. If they talk, miss when I think they could have caught the ball, or throw a bad throw, they are out. It is amazing how well they play this game. Back when we had more time in the day/year, we used to play it for birthdays. Now I'm saving it for those days where I feel myself losing my patience. They children love it, and it gives me a few minutes of silence. :)

The time-out desk is beside mine. When a child gets to red, they get a piece of paper and a pencil and start writing the saying that is there. This gives them something to do until I am able to come talk to them about the problem.

Under my desk is the "Busy Buck Store". I use Busy Bucks as my reward system. I pass them out to children I see following the rules. I also give them a Busy Buck for any work finished during Workshop (our independent work time - more info to come). They turn in papers, and if they are correct, nice, neat, and have a name, they get a Busy Buck. They also have to give me one Busy Buck in order to go to the bathroom and if they burp (or any other bodily noises done on purpose). When we have extra time in Math, I let them count their Busy Bucks. We have a Busy Buck Store once a month. I have all kinds of items for sale - toys, candy, books, stickers, etc. When they choose an item, I have them count out the amount for me. It ends up being a fun and educational behavior management system. My favorite so far!

*A word of advice to all you teachers out there - Get on your custodians good side! I always try and clean as much of my room as possible before he comes in. I give him thank you treats throughout the year, my class knows his name and writes him thank you letters at the end of the year.

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Class Pets

Our classroom pets arrived today!

We are so excited to watch these little tadpoles grow into frogs. We voted on their names today. The final decision was "Snowflake" and "Hopper". After counting the letters and comparing the words, we decided since Snowflake was the longer word, the bigger tadpole will be Snowflake. The smaller one will be Hopper. That's easy to remember!

The tadpoles have a small plastic water plant because they like to sit in the plant leaves or nibble at algae that sometimes grows on the leaves. When the tadpoles become froglets (it grows four legs but still has the tail) I will add a "land" object for them to climb out and rest.

Closeup of Snowflake

Next week we are going to start learning about the life cycle of a frog. In 12 to 16 weeks, we will have two great bullfrogs to keep in our class. I have never seen a tadpole in real life before, so I am equally excited to watch them grow!

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Pencil Jars

I saw this cute idea for pencil jars at Tickled Pink. I planned on getting pots and making my own to match my frog theme this year. As usual, I went to my favorite local craft store - Porter's - to purchase my supplies. Then I spotted these adorable pails. I thought they would make perfect pencil jars. I also love the fact that they have handles. Sometimes we go into other rooms to work, and this will be so easy to bring along. Then, I found the cutest frog scrapbook paper, printed the words, and voila! The most fantastic pencil jars!


To cut down on noise and distraction, we don't sharpen pencils during class. If a pencil breaks during class, they simply trade it for a sharp one. One of the jobs for the student of the day is to choose one recess to stay in and sharpen pencils for us. They seriously love this job! I've only had a couple boys who would rather go outside. If that's the case, I let them pick a friend to do their job for them. This simple routine helps our day run more smoothly.

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