Bats & Halloween Tales

I am so sad Halloween is over. I LOVE it. I think next year I may start in September so I can fit more fun in! I am not kidding. I didn't get to spiders and they are WAY more interesting than apples. Although you can't taste spiders and I am a fan of anything involving food. Hmm...a decision for another day.  Here is what we did finish this week.

Just like last year, we read Spookley the Square Pumpkin and made our own unique pumpkins. We have been learning about describing words so we also wrote about them including adjectives.

A student immediately spoke up to say that Spookley is actually a cube and not a square. I was smiling to myself that he remembered our geometry unit from a few weeks ago but my grin grew by a mile when I realized that the speaker was a student that is NEVER with me. Seriously, this boy is on his own planet most of the time and I am constantly having to repeat directions or redirect him. It is little moments like that that make teaching worthwhile.

Since I am trying to incorporate the Common Core this year, I beefed up our bat unit with more informative reading and writing.

We started by recording what we already knew about bats.

The students wrote down facts on their circle map as we read a nonfiction text.

We shared out on a class anchor chart afterwards. Then students circled and numbered three facts on their circle map that they would like to write about. I walked them through completing a planning sheet like this. I can't deal with managing all the colored strips of Step Up so I use a flow map version.

 

Writing always looks better on paper that has been cutesified {yes, that is a word :-) }

 

The students did a great job! I was going to make a craft to go with it but Teri beat me to it and hers are always adorable! So you can grab your cute bat template from A Cupcake For the Teacher.

Of course some just had to make theirs vampire bats!

 We are learning about adjectives so we used a bubble map to describe bats.

We have been practicing telling the difference between fiction and nonfiction a lot! One great tip I have is this: When we get back from the library I ask the kids to hold up their book if it is fiction and then do the same for nonfiction. This is a way for the students to practice sorting, it gives you an assessment as to who is still confused, and it is interesting to learn the students' reading habits. This is a cute and glue we did as a more formal assessment. I had the actual books out in the front of the room in case the kids needed to refresh their memory.

I made this double bubble to address  CCSS RI1.9 Identify basic similarities in and differences between two texts on the same topic.

 I put all this into a packet called Bats Informative Reading & Writing for only $3 on TpT in case you want to save it for next year. 

I know it is late, but would you still like to win one for next year? If so, you can enter below and I'll pick a winner on Saturday.
a Rafflecopter giveaway

 Halloween in the middle of the week was crazy, huh?  Six of the staff dressed up as Where's Waldo/Wenda with me but we forgot to take a picture! I basically looked like this: {Okay, add a few more pounds but you get the drift.}

During the parade my firsties kept saying, " Mrs. B, that teacher is dressed like you! Hey, there is another one!"  It was pretty funny. My parade story isn't quite as dramatic as last year, but when the teacher lap was done I came back to find my class all out of their seats chanting, "Go Mrs. Bates! Go, Mrs. Bates!" Seriously? Is it something I do? I guess I do joke around with them, etc.. Oh well. Everybody is happy and learning so I guess it is all good.

Then it was time for Round 2 at home. My hubbie and 2 boys like to make our house spooky. It never fails that we end up making some little kids scared to the point of crying. Here are pics in the daytime but imagine fog and creaky, howling, screeching sounds...

The ghost kids really freak people out!

I didn't get the grave with the arm coming out in the picture.

We have had SF Giants fever around here so my 10 year old made the panda at the end in honor of Pablo Sandoval. My kooky husband made the dual personality. :-)

And 4 days later....

California and Jack do not get along too well.

 To round out my crazy week we had Fall Festival last night. From 5:30-9 there are carnival games, cake walk, food, etc and the teachers always sign-up to do a shift. I ended up helping a lot at the glow booth which got a lot of visitors. It is a nice community event and I feel like a rock star because families current and past constantly wave or hug {yes, I am a hugger} or want to stop and say hi.

We have half days this week and conferences in the afternoon. Should make for another exhausting week! I am taking my 10 year old son Quinn to get his cast off between conferences on Monday (remember he broke his elbow?) My husband can't take him and was going to make him wait two extra days. Quinn has been such a trooper with his cast, not complaining at all, so when he sweetly asked if maybe I could somehow take him to get it off on time since it was getting itchy, I rearranged my schedule. I only had to ask 2 parents and they were super nice about it.

Alrighty, I have to get off this blog and go finish my report cards. I usually have them all done and printed by now but I've turned into Last Minute Lucy this year! I hope you are making use of my labels on the sidebar to look ahead for ideas because clearly I am not doing a good job posting them early. Sorry peeps! I hope to get back to my organized self sometime soon. I'd love to hear from you if you have a second to leave a comment.

Missing Snake Mystery

Sorry I haven't been posting lately, I am in a bit of a funk. I think it is mostly because my district has mandated 4 computer lab sessions a week and that is seriously messing with my instruction and mojo. I am so fed up with the decisions the higher-ups are making. You want better test scores? Make my class size less than 30 instead of buying programs where the kids spend their time playing arcade games and changing their avatar more than actually learning math. Apparently I am a game monitor now instead of an educator. See, Negative Nelly in the house. YUCK!

 I did manage to fit in our q-tip skeletons.  After reading Skeleton Hiccups the students wrote advice on how to stop hiccups. They got pretty creative. Hic, hic. hic!

...telling him to eat ice cream.

...standing on your head and spin around, and drink milk.

...making him scream.

I have been making the skeletons for years but the writing response idea was from Cara at The First Grade Parade last year. My writing paper is available here.

On to my snake drama. Two weeks ago my 2 corn snakes escaped. You'd think this would be a cause for concern but to be honest, it has happened before. A few times. If the cage is not secured just right these sneaky guys squeeze their way out during the night. This time I found Mini-Me within a day. Actually, I slammed something onto my bookshelf and he stuck his head out from under it, so I guess he found me. I couldn't locate Striker anywhere. The kids weren't fazed but the moms kept asking if I had found him yet. One refused to come volunteer until he showed up.

Last week we had off. Yep, you heard me, October Break. Weird, huh? It started a few years ago as a furlough week but now my district decided they like it there and extended our school year to not lose any teaching days. I convinced my husband to take a few days off (he has a terrible job where he is never home) and we drove down to Disneyland. It was scorching hot but still fun. Anyhoo, we were notified that our rooms would be fumigated over the break. I left a note.on the door,  "LOOSE SNAKE! Please do not spray this room!!!"

When I got back on Monday there was still no sign of him. I started to worry that he had squeezed under the door (remember our classrooms in CA open to the outside.)

And then yesterday, I opened the cage to let the Star of the Week hold the remaining snake and there were TWO snakes in there!!!! All I can guess is maybe one of the night janitors found him and put him back??? Either that or I am totally losing it. My staff is teasing me that it is the latter.

What else can I catch you up on? This class is completely enthralled by my Sight Word Superstars program. They are so cute, intently practicing their specific list during Daily 5 word work. This is available in my TpT shop if you are interested.

I am hoping to get out of this funk and make some new things soon but until then, here is a freebie I made last year.

Jack o' Lantern Making Words

Hope you are all doing well. I am going to visit some of your blogs right now and try to reconnect and get back some of my inspiration.

A Treat for You

Happy Halloween! Since we had all of our festivities on Friday, I tried to keep today as normal a day as possible. I have to admit, my kids did pretty well considering.

We read this cute book which went perfectly with the start of our geometry unit. In fact, I couldn't even get through the book without students interrupting to correct the book. "Mrs. Bates, the author called Spookley a square, but isn't he really a cube? " Another student adds, "Yeah, he isn't a plane shape." I swear I heard the Hallelujah chorus blasting in my ears. Apparently a few of these monsters DO listen to me occasionally.

At the end of the book,  the next season of pumpkins are all different shapes and colors. I LOVE art and writing projects based on picture books so...

Each student made their own Spookley pumpkin and wrote a sentence or two describing the shape and color. Some students even named their pumpkins.

I didn't get them up on the bulletin board yet but wanted to take a quick pic so you could see how cute they are. The writing paper is nothing special but you can download it {here.}


I'm off to take my boys Trick-or-Treating. Unfortunately, I broke the cardinal rule and bought candy I like. Stupid, stupid. Will I be able to resist? Doubtful. Happy Halloween!

Costume Parade Antics

Our school  decided to have our Halloween parties and costume parade on Friday. The whole school brings out chairs and sits in a giant circle, 3 chairs deep. Each grade takes a turn parading around the inside of the circle, starting with kinder. The big kids always lean over and try to get the little kids to give them 5 which then gets my little guys excited to stand up and do the same back when the other grades come around. The control freak in me hates this because they are out of their seats (because the back two rows are left out otherwise) but I try to let it go since the other teachers let their classes do it as long as they stay in our chair area. Of course, this class pushes everything PAST the limit and started going out too far in the circle. I tell them to sit back down. This is to be expected with this class.

What was NOT expected was what happened in the last parade round when ALL the teachers do a lap. I had told some of the teachers at lunch on Thursday that I was worried about leaving my class unattended. They looked at me like, "Really? No one has ever had any issues. It is only a few minutes." I start to think that maybe I am blowing it out of proportion. But, just to be safe, I announce to my parents at the end of our party that there will be a teacher walk at the end and I would very much appreciate it if they would keep an eye on the class for me while I am gone. I even make eye contact with a parent who volunteers enough to KNOW they need watching. And yet....

I am strolling around the circle, waving to my former students, when one of the teachers comes over to me and says, "Do you know you have an entourage?" I must have had a look of confusion on my face because she smirks, "Look behind you."

I turn around and 4 of my students (you know which 4, the ones that are making my year OH SO SPECIAL) are parading behind me. They even grabbed our class sign so there is no doubt which teacher has no control over her students. SIGH. REALLY? Thanks a lot parents for helping me out. Is it too early to start a Days to Summer countdown?

Due to extreme exhaustion (or perhaps depression) from constant behavior issues, I have not been doing much creating of my own. So I thought I would share (with permission) some cute things my teammate Toni does.

Remember I posted about the Mystery Bag last time? This is the follow-up activity.  Students guess how many mini marshmallows it will take fill the ghost. 10 are glued on as a benchmark. Toni has the kids use unifix cubes to count 10 with one-to-one correspondence. Then they take turns coming up to glue theirs one. I use double ten-frames.

Aren't these cute?

And look at these tear art cats. She said there are supposed to be polka dots on the cat too but the parent helper forgot. They are still adorable.

Alright friends, Super Mom has to go to 2 baseball games, deal with a car that won't start, host dinner for family tonight, write progress reports, do 7 loads of laundry, etc. so I will try to check back when I can to read all YOUR wonderful blogs. I hope you got a chuckle out of my parade story and you have no similar stories of your own!

Halloween freebies and an opportunity to win

Last week we read Where's My Mummy, a cute book about a baby mummy who is not afraid of  the usual Halloween scariness but IS afraid of a mouse.

We made our own baby mummy and wrote about what our "mummy" does to help us when we are scared. You can download the writing paper here. I got this idea from Cara over at the First Grade Parade and tweaked slightly. I cut strips of manila paper 9 x1 inch and then the kid trimmed them to the size they wanted. For the black eyes I cut 1 x 2 inch rectangles and then told them to fold in half, cut off the corners and round. This is called the circle cut in TLC art and my kids are pros.

I also wanted to share a fun idea I got from my teammate, Toni. You put an item in the mystery bag and then have the kids take turns asking questions to try to narrow down the possibilities. It is great to develop deductive reasoning skills.

I do guide them a little, "If it is not black, what other color might it be?" Or, if it is not an animal or a toy, what else could it be?"  The class LOVES this so of course I hold it over them and tell them we may not have time if they are not being cooperative. Have I mentioned this class is one of my all-time hardest?? Okay, I know I have, too many times, but seriously, you'd have to see it to believe it. My blood pressure must be through the roof.

I was going to tell you what was in the bag but how about you play along instead? You can ask questions like the kids and I'll answer. I'll even give the FOLLOWER who gets the right answer an item from my TPT store.

P.S. I was right about the broken bones. Poor girl broke her wrist in 2 places. I also had to pass out a LICE notice today. The fun keeps coming...

Glue Got You Gloomy?

What is this I am reading? Some of you had days off this week?? What is fall break and how do I get one?? 

Since we were in school for Columbus Day, we watched this BrainPOP Jr. video that I thought was  good and made these TLC art projects.

Today we read Skeleton Hiccups which the kids enjoyed. They couldn't wait to tell me that they thought it was a fantasy story. LOVE when that learning transfers!!

Then we made q-tip skeletons and this year we added a writing idea I first saw over at the First Grade Parade. My writing paper is nothing fancy but you can get it  here. I have a terrific parent who pre-cut the fingers and feet.

This project requires white glue. You just shuttered didn't you?  Thinking about the pools that take days to dry or drips when the darlings want to show their friend their art? Whining that they can't open that orange lid or that nothing is coming out? Here is the solution....

I bought these Tap N Glue caps and I am in LOVE! No clogging, no opening or closing, just press down and squeeze and a little bit of glue comes out! They fit on any size of glue bottle.  No, I don't get a commission, I just thought you might be a big geek like me and get excited about these. Not as excited as I would have been about a fall break....