Holiday traditions

We also did some Christmas sentence starters like: "Christmas is special because," "My favorite Christmas tradition is," or "I like Christmas because." Each kid made 2 hand-prints and 2 sentence starters to make our wreath!

 

http://stepintosecondgrade.blogspot.com/search/label/christmas

When I'm sick... creative writing

On Monday we started our week long journey with this writing activity.

(For my little sick guy, I copied Cara's Alliteration poster!)

First, we brainstormed a time that we have been sick. My students made a little bubble map in their journals to start their process. I love how this cutie made her bubble map into a sick person. The next day, we put all of our ideas together on the chart shown above!

Here's how our writing process went for the week:

Monday: Brainstormed with a bubble map

Tuesday: Charted our ideas and wrote 2 parts (What they were sick with, and how they felt)

Wednesday: Re-read what we had written so far, began writing the last two parts (What happened because they were sick, and how they got better)

Thursday: Finished rough drafts, began revising/editing

Friday: Finished final drafts and made little sick people when writing was completed!

Here's how ours turned out:

Love, Splat Valentine's Day

For Reading/Writing we read "Love, Splat" and made a text-to-self connection with a little writing creativity from the one and only, Cara Carroll :)

The students finished the sentence stem "I feel loved when..." Then they were able to put their little Splats together!

We are all special and unique

This lesson came from Scholastic.com. I read "Stand Tall Molly Lou Melon" to the class and we talked about how Molly's grandma helped her feel special. Then we read the poem that was on the Scholastic lesson plan called "Sunny Sunflowers," and discussed how we are like sunflowers because we are all special and unique

On each petal, they wrote a sentence telling what made them special. This really helped me see who could form sentences on their own, and who needed help!

 

http://stepintosecondgrade.blogspot.com/search/label/New%20School%20Year

"What we are reading"

http://4thgradefrolics.blogspot.com/search/label/Book%20Whisperer

wanted the kids to be able to visibly see their progress in the classroom as well as in their data notebooks so here was my plan:

I made a What We're Reading board. Each time decides they are committed to a book or a student finishes a book, they get a note card. On the card they put their name, the title of the book, and the author. Then they turn the cards in to me and I punch a hole and put them on a metal ring and hang them on the board on a fat push pin. (now, I realize that there are only 12 hanging there....I have 22 students so........some are slower readers, some have given up on a book, others forgotten....it's a work in progress.)

Back to school bulletin boards

Cow Boy boots are also stationary paper

The bees are actually stationary papre

The class pet is a "wild" sting ray they train.

Bulletin Boards

If you chose to use fabric instead of butcher paper put all the fabric up at once.
So they go by months starting with the last.

Snow flakes (last), Fall leaves (ontop of snow flakes), Apples (ontop of fall leaves)

That way they are already cut to size and you don't have to find time during the school year to put a new one up. Just remove the staples and add a different boarder if you choose.

This is a reading tree, made from butcher paper and chains created from construction paper.
When students read x amount they get to write their name on an apple and paper clip it to a chain.