Spider Informational Writing and a Craft

I had a request to put all my spider informational writing into a packet so I did.

I included book suggestions and templates for either schema anchor charts like I posted about yesterday or circle maps like I used last year.

As I said yesterday, I chose to use my hamburger paragraph planning sheet this year but I included the same type I used last year and that is in my bats unit.

 I also included 3 different paper types: primary lined, dotted lines, and intermediate lined.

And we all love the craft to put up with our writing so I included those templates also.

You can grab it in my store HERE for only $3!

Informative Reading and Writing and a FREEBIE

Sorry for the long absence. My oldest kitty (17 years old next month) is not doing well. She will only eat if we hand feed her and it looks like her kidneys are failing. We have had her longer than our kids so it is hard to consider that she may not be with us much longer. :-(

So let's catch up...
We are working on informative reading and writing.

 My first graders read all about bats and I have a unit aligned with Common Core if you are interested.

My 2nd graders are reading about spiders.

This year I used my hamburger paragraph unit to introduce informative writing.

We talked about different options for the topic sentence and conclusion and they filled in their own facts. I think scaffolding is very important in writing. The next assignment I will ask them to write two sentences for each juicy detail and gradually provide less support as they get better at coming up with topic sentences on their own.

It's official. My windows have become teaching walls. The students are getting really good at identifying text features. I love when they come to show me they found one in a book they are reading!

posters by Deana with 2 additions made by me

My second graders did a little writing activity, highlighting the proper nouns they used and made the pumpkins free hand.

Here they are hung up with the first graders Where's My Mummy projects.  My favorite response this year was, "When I get scared, my mummy let's me sleep with her and my daddy sleeps in my bed."

Could you use a fun math activity this week? 

My 2nd graders will be practicing making nouns ending in y plural this week.

Have you grabbed my Halloween ABC order FREEBIE?

I'm off to work on my Halloween costume. Do you have yours ready for Friday?

Two Tech Activities and a FREEBIE

This week, my 2nd graders were working on quotation sentences again but this time with the dialogue tag at the end.

Activity # 1
My students love it when I include my kids in their work so I used the free app Balloon Stickies to add some speech bubbles to pictures I had handy.

In partners, they determined what an appropriate tag would be, then wrote the sentence with quotation marks.

Activity #2

I introduced the app Sock Puppets. It is easy to use and these digital natives picked it right up. We are lucky enough to have the full version with tons of options (like Halloween characters and backdrops) but the free version will work.

First, partners each picked a character and agreed on a background.

Then, they decided what their character would say.

Next, they recorded themselves speaking for the character. The app converts the kids' voices into silly voices (that they can adjust) and makes the sock puppet's mouth move.

Look at those engaged kids!

Finally, they wrote what each character said using quotation marks correctly and adding a dialogue tag to the end on this worksheet. You can grab this for FREE {here.}

One of my missions in life is to keep learning fun!

This young lady rarely speaks or shows any emotion so I was thrilled to capture her smiling!

Yesterday was spent at a football tournament (my son scored a touchdown) and then going to see the H.S. performance of Snoopy (we've got some talented kids) so today is laundry, grocery shopping, helping study for tests, etc. day! Hope you  found something in this post you can use.