First Week Survival ~ Daily 5 Up and Running

I can't believe this three day weekend went SO fast... entirely too fast!  I would love to have just ONE more day! And even though I'm dead dog tired I told myself I had to blog and share with you a few things from our first full week back.  I know many of you do Daily 5 and we have gotten it up and running piece by piece.  I'm still not taking groups yet.  I want to make sure they are doing all activities properly and can problem solve and take care of situations without interrupting my group.  I love the first few weeks of Daily 5 because I am able to meander around the room and listen to kids read, watch them write, watch them build words and really get to know my students by having small conversations with them during this time. We start out with Read to Self and here are a few pics I took during that time.

We talked a lot about choosing just right books and using the five finger rule.  We also practice getting our book boxes and having them by our side during Daily 5.  After they all got the hang of Read to Self I introduced word work.  We began our first weekly word study last week and took our first spelling test on Friday!  I was amazed that 90% of my class spelled and wrote 100% of the words correctly!  Usually the first test is a doozy just because it's their first one.  I was blown away!  Word Work allows my students to practice these weekly words.  They always have a "must-do" and then they can choose several different activities to practice spelling and making words.  My "must-do" varies daily.  I use many of the pages from Abby's Short Vowels Pack and some word family activity pages from the great Cherry Carl .  I start out only introducing magnetic letters, rainbow words using smelly markers and glitter pens and stamps.  I add more throughout the year as I feel they can handle it.  Here are a few pics I took during word work.

As you can see our first week is short a.  She spelled "we" but as long as I see them building words it makes me happy. I love hearing them read me the words they have made.

These words were off of our word wall.  We start out with about 15 words on the word wall from Kindergarten or High Frequency words they will use a lot.  As you can see I think it's time for me to get some new ink pads!

I also have introduced writing.  I know that seems like a lot but we have writer's workshop every morning.  I like to introduce some "fun" writing choices so students can write and illustrate with markers.  One of our first writing activities is making a card.  I use the monthly premade card templates from Deedee Will's Writing Work Stations.  I also use her monthly vocabulary cards to hang in my writing center and I also use the corresponding page of the monthly words in my student's writing folders for writer's workshop.

Students are able to color and be creative during this time but are writing to their friends or their teacher.  This gives them more practice using the strategies we are learning during writer's workshop like stretching out the sounds in words.

On Friday I wanted to do something fun and yet connect it to our curriculum.  Since this week was short a and we worked with -at words, I found the cutest craftivity that allowed the students to write a story using at words and they got to make their own "Cat on a Mat".  The activity is by Mel From the Pond.  I fell in LOVE with it and my students did too! So after students wrote stories about their cat (and some were SO hilarious) we broke out the scissors and glue and began making our cats. I love standing back and watching how my new first graders use scissors and glue.

I wanted to take pictures of their stories too and forgot to take them before leaving for the weekend (it wasn't like I was in a hurry to start a three day weekend or anything ;)  I'll try to post them another time because they were so adorable!  Here is some more pics of our super cute craft!

Next week is only four days but we will be working with short i. I will be introducing more writing choices, our listening station and read with someone next week.  I love to hear how others use Daily 5!  I steal grab ideas from teachers all the time. It has to be my favorite time of the day!

Hope you had a fabulous three day weekend!  

Have you lost your rainbow?

Have you read the book "The Leprechaun Who Lost His Rainbow" by Sean Callahan?  We created some rainbows this week!  In this story, the leprechaun is named Roy G. Biv.  We talked about the colors of the rainbow and the order of the colors using this leprechaun's name.  The little girl in this story has to help Mr. Biv build a rainbow by putting items into his hat that match these colors.  When he has something for each color a rainbow magically appears out of his hat.  This story inspired me to create this fun writing prompt and craft that goes along with the story.  

The students had to think of items that belonged to them that were a color of the rainbow and write about it.  In the story, the little girl had to place one item that was very special to her that she did not want to give up, but sacrificed in order to make the rainbow. At the bottom of the paper, the students had to tell me which item was the most precious to them and why.  Here is a student example.  I apologize for the pics. I took them with my iphone and they are just not very good.  

Here they are lined up in the hall:

I guess it's time to take my snowflakes down.  They are clashing with our spring writing!

The kids enjoyed coming up with items they would put in the hat and what item they would sacrifice.  I have included the writing page I used below.  The kids loved this book and as soon as I put it back on our seasonal shelf, they were fighting over who gets to read it again first.  

On another note, our super scientists have been going great!  I can't wait to paste some pictures and information about what awesome scientists we have in first grade.  Happy Wednesday!

Happy 100th Day!

Our 100th Day of School was Friday!  Our day ended with a BANG... literally!  Each Kindergarten and First Grade class (that is 5 classes total) blew up 100 balloons and then laid them out in the hallway like this!

Yes... that is 500 balloons.  We then let our students come out and pop them all by sitting or stomping on them.  It sounded like fireworks going off!  They had SO much fun popping them.  If you click on the picture above you will see a minute long video of the organized chaos!

We also made 100 t-shirts to celebrate our 100th Day.  Each student brought in a white t-shirt and I traced a 100 on their shirt using a fabric marker.  The kids then colored in the 100 using fabric markers and used fabric paint to make 100 fingerprints (in 10 different colors).  They all turned out great and truly unique.  Here are a few pictures.

I made a sign for our door for the kiddos to walk through that morning.  I had to put it on the inside of our classroom since the door would have smashed it otherwise.  It reminded them all day they were 100 days smarter!

Our Kindergarten and First Grade Teams worked together to create 20 minute rotations and each classroom focused on a different activity.  We had 100 day sucker lick and exercises, 100 hungry ants activity, 100 day read aloud and writing, 100 day puzzles, 100 day old portraits, and rockin' the 100th day music fun!  I know that is six rotations.  Our sped teacher for K-1 decided to get in on the fun so she added an activity to our day.  The kids loved it, were moving and a grooving and learning in the process!  Here is a picture of our class wearing the crowns we made.  

Hope your 100th day was a blast!  

Penguins and Dialogue

For the last two weeks we have been learning about penguins.  We have read tons of books and found lots of facts.  To end our unit we made our own penguins using our footprint traced onto black construction paper and adding wings, a white belly, orange beak and feet and used paper reinforcements for eyes.  They all turned out very cute and here are a few pictures of how they all had an original look to them.  

ADORABLE!

Even this one is so stinking cute!

So since one of our spelling/word wall words this week was said, we began looking at dialogue in the books we read, in our morning message and finally writing some of our own.  I gave each student a dialogue box and had them write what their penguin would say.  They made me smile!

I tried to get a close up of this one.  The penguin said, "I'm reading!"

It feels like Antarctica where I am.  Yesterday the windchill in the morning was 3.  However, it is supposed to warm up this weekend. (Above 30!) Have a great weekend!

Grinch Twist... made by my first grade "whos"!

So we did the Grinch thing.. And who doesn't just L-O-V-E the mini-grinch unit by Deanna Jump?!  Anyway, flying by the seat of my pants, we took the Grinch project a little further.  We read the book "The Grinch Who Stole Christmas" by Dr. Seuss and was fascinated by all those little whoville characters.  If we were going to write about how we would make the Grinch grin, well then we were going to pretend to be whos in whoville.  So on a whim I took the kids pictures, glued it to a piece of black construction paper and wrote each kiddos name above their picture in white crayon.  If they were a girl their name was (Insert girl name here) - Lou Who.  If they were a boy their name was (Insert boy name here)-Woo Who!  Too funny... but they just giggled and loved it!

They were then given an array of construction paper, ribbon, yarn, pom poms, and a menagerie of craft items to decorate themselves as WHOS.  I wasn't sure how it would turn out - but the end product was super cute! (At least I think so.)  Take a look at these whos...

What do you think?  Like I said it was a whim ~ and they l-o-v-e to do projects involving pictures of themselves.  My little whos had fun and enjoyed telling me how they would make the Grinch grin. Didn't mean to post twice tonight but couldn't help sharing.  Happy Friday!

Painted Ornaments Christmas Gifts

We made our parent gifts this week.  I say parent gifts, but actually my students make them for whomever they choose... grandma, grandpa, sister, brother, etc.  I bought these ceramic ornaments (that are VERY strong considering).  One of my students knocked two off my shelf and believe it or not they did not break!  Whew!  Anyway, they only cost me 60 cents each!  I have a supply of paint pens from years back that I break out on the day we decorate these ornaments.  I am always pleased how they turn out and each one is unique.  Here is my example that I show the kids.

So then they get to work painting and decorating their ornaments.  Here are how a few turned out.  Beeeeauuutiful!

This little guy has a sister named Myla - My ornament said Nyla for my niece. He copied my design but turned out super cute!

On the back I write our class and the year so each time they hang it on the tree, hopefully they will remember our time together.

And finally we package them in tissue paper in these cute little red bags that they decorate.  We add some ribbon and wah-lah!  They can't wait to take these home and give them to their relative.  Here are some of the bags they decorated.

Just thought I would share what we've been up to in Room 23.  Hope you are having as much fun!  Only 2 more days for us...Have a fantastic weekend!