Fact Family Freebie

I forgot how much I hate the Envision 15.2 worksheet on Fact Families. Let's not see if they can actually understand how to write all 4 related facts with the larger numbers before asking them to write them ALL with the answer FIRST. Addition is no problem but understanding that the whole has to go in the middle for the subtraction sentences is tough. Oh, and then on the assessment there are none in that format. Huh?

I taught the part-part-whole method which I like but I also wanted my firsties to connect better with the vocabulary of fact family and related facts. I was explaining how you are related to your family and one of my smarties piped up, "Yea, that's why they are called relatives." So I know HE got it but for the rest, I made a more concrete fact family. I got this idea from Gladys at  Teaching in High Heels.

  

I hung these characters on the white board and we moved them around, making all 4 related facts. The numbers are sticky notes so I could easily change the numbers. My students wrote their answers on white boards and held them up. I love this because I can easily see who gets it quickly and who looks around in confusion.  Gladys had another good tip about telling the kids that only the 3 family numbers belonged in the house and they didn't let in strange numbers. This TOTALLY worked. During white board practice I heard one of my girls say, "Johnny, you let strangers in your house! 10 and 5 aren't part of the family!"

Here is the worksheet I made for independent practice.  Leave me a comment if you like this or are just glad it is FRIDAY!! I am SOOO ready for vacation. Do you have the week off like we do?
Fact Families

The Principal Gestapo

Today the Superintendent was scheduled to visit from 10:30-11. I figured that left 1 minute per classroom max and it was during my Daily 5/Guided Reading time so as long as I had my objectives posted I was good to go. That isn't quite how it went down...

A few minutes before school starts I hear through the grapevine that the Sup has cancelled BUT now we have 9 principals from other schools coming through and they are here NOW!

5 suits come in as I am transitioning from our Daily Editing Word Problems to my sequencing lesson using a flow map. They stay 10 minutes which feels like FOREVER as they are scribbling on their notepads and scrutinizing my room.  I breathe a sigh of relief as they silently file out the door. My kids have been shockingly good UNTIL....

The mom of my quietest girl comes in, handing me a late slip, (by 40 minutes) explaining that her daughter is outside crying and won't come in. I realize I had heard someone wailing outside but we are close to the preschool special ed so those sounds don't really register anymore.  I step outside (leaving my door open) and see her clinging to a pole.  I have had this before and usually if I can get them in the room and mom leaves they calm down in a few minutes. I try to bring her in but she is physically resisting. Suddenly she starts SCREAMING bloody murder and falls to the ground.  I look over and who is just down the hall, yep the Principal Gestapo.  One of them comes to my rescue since I CLEARLY can't handle her and the other 29 bambinos waiting for me. I have no idea how they got her down to the office but my principal delivered her back over AN HOUR LATER!

I felt pretty inept until my principal told me the angel threw a total tantrum on the floor of her office and refused to cooperate with her either. Apparently she tried to negotiate how long she would have to stay at school.

Turns out the pumpkin was upset because:
a) she was late (mom accidentally took Dad's car keys and had to leave work to come back home)
b) she missed her cousin who had been visiting

This one is absent and tardy quite a bit and maybe now I am getting a glimpse into why.

I SO wish wine didn't give me a migraine because a bottle sounds in order about now. Hey Kristin, got any Math Pills you can share? Do you think they work for Major Meltdowns?? 67 days and counting....

Plastic Heart FREEBIE

Did you snag yourself a set of heart containers from the Dollar Tree? Have you decided what you will do with them yet? I made mine into the math tub below but Cara and Abby also have some great ideas you should check out.

Partners each pick a heart out of a Valentine's gift bag. Each partner counts their coins and writes it on their line. Then the partners decide if a greater than or less than sign should go in the circle. The player with the larger amount wins that round. After putting the coins back in their heart and putting it aside, they each draw another heart out of the bag and follow the same procedure for the second round. After 5 rounds, the player who won the most rounds is the winner! Just make sure when you put the coins in the hearts that you make them all different amounts. You don't need numbers on the hearts unless you want to make an answer key. 

Sorry for the glare. I try to conserve paper whenever possible (I do work at an environmental science magnet after all) so my students use these dry erase sleeves. Click below to get your copy. And remember, comments make my day! :-)
Don'Tgochangingmyheart

I was contacted by VocabularySpellingCity.com and I've been given a premium membership to VocabularySpellingCity.com for a candid, personal, online review. VocabularySpellingCity.com helps students study word lists using 25 different learning activities such as MatchIt Sentences, HangMan, and Word-O-Rama.  Parents can create their own spelling lists, find published lists already available on the site, or use any of dozens of  free teaching resources on topics such as analogies and compound words.

Be sure to come back in three weeks to read about my experience. There might be more free memberships available for bloggers.  If you're interested, find out how you can review VocabularySpellingCity.com. 

"Hearty" Word Work

I am getting into all thing hearts lately. Here is a quick word work activity I made around our word pattern for the week.

The student places a tile on the heart and determines if it makes a real or nonsense word. I challenged them to see if they could make a couple with two tiles.

oo words





We are also working on compound word this week so we are making these "door books."
Fold the paper hotdog style, cut the top paper up the middle to make two doors.

A little catching up from last week:
I'm glad to see some of you were able to use the groundhog pattern I shared last week. Here are two of my favorites from my class. I think the ears being lower might actually be the way to go. I felt my sample looked a little to bearish..

Check out those crazy eyes!

Glasses!

We were also working on proper nouns last week so I leave you with another thinking map. I had the words posted without capitalization and then the students told me where to put them.

Not beautiful. Just keeping it real.

Thanks for the tags from Rebecca at Teaching First, Mrs. Nunley at First Grade Magic, Latricia fromWild about Second Grade, and Tricia from Quenn With Class. I wish I had time to answer that many questions but my life is INSANELY busy. I am always jealous when I read other posts about watching reality TV in your jammies. I watched no TV last night and wasn't in my jammies until midnight. {Insert pouty lips here.} I know those of you with kids can relate! I can't even keep up with my blogging like I'd like. So if you don't get a comment from me, know that I am trying to read you on my phone at basketball, baseball, cub scouts, etc. Wish I could comment on Google Reader!

I am now late so I have to run! I will leave you with this question:
Do you know how many school days you have left?

Yep, that kind of year here and my answer is 70!! I think I can make it!

100th Day Fun!

My favorite part of 100th day is the old people art. This year we used wallpaper instead of fabric for the shirts.We made a circle map of what we might be like when we were 100 and then wrote about it.

I love how she piled the hair on top like a bun!

This guy told me he purposefully took most of the cotton off so it would look the fuzz he has on his head and it does!

 

I do it TLC style so I don't have templates to share.  I just precut the rectangles and the kids follow my oral directions to trim it into a head, etc.

We made crowns and glasses again this year.  You can click here to get links for these.

 We read 100th Day books.

The student favorite by far though was the Fruit Loop necklaces. It is always interesting to see who strings by color, who creates a pattern, or those that don't give a hoot and just want to be able to eat them!

 They had to count out the 100 pieces by tens first.You can get the sorting sheet here.

I got smart this year and taped one end of their string to the desk so no one had their loops fall off halfway through!

Last, but not least,  Wildlife Associates brought amazing animals for us to meet. I didn't get pictures but here is one from their site.

We were visited by a

• Canada Lynx
• Snowy Owl
• Coatimundi
• Coendou (Prehensile tailed porcupine)
• White Tailed Kite 

It was so cool! This was a perfect lead in to our animal adaptations unit coming up and a great way to end a special day.