What's the Matter? Giveaway

Wow, break went by fast. Today I buckled down and got some work done. My "What's the Matter?" unit is up and running! I haven't done a giveaway in forever, so why not! The whole mini-unit is all hands-on and concludes with a unit test. So, how can you win it you may ask? Easy. Of course you must be one of my followers, but I also want you to head on over to my Colleague's  new blog. She teaches across from the hall from me and she is goooood. Follow me, Love to Teach, and my TpT and that's 3 chances to win. Don't forget to write 3 separate comments. I will choose a winner Sunday around 10 a.m. eastern time. Good luck :)

P.S. Don't forget to follow me on Facebook and stalk me on Pinterest (addicted? maybe!)

Cruise time!

This is a non-school related post :) Don't worry, I have tons of plans to update and create things later this week.

Well, it's Sunday and my break started Friday and I'm still stinkin' sick! I came down with a cold last Wednesday. My husband came home Friday and is flying back to DC on Tuesday. So much for having fun. 

Anyways, most of you know that I'm a newly-wed and my husband is living with my aunt and uncle in the DC area while he finishes up an LLM at Georgetown Law. To celebrate his graduation, him getting a job, and kind of a honeymoon we didn't get to have we booked a cruise! This is our first cruise ever. 

So anyways, I was hoping you all would be able to give me advice. Tell me what I should and shouldn't do.. maybe things to see or not see. We are going on an 8 day Carnival cruise at the end of May (89 days!) and will be going to St. Thomas, Antigua, Tortola, and Nassau. 

Any tips, stories, suggestions, or advice is greatly appreciated :) 

Capital Region Get Together?

There have been so many blogger get togethers over the past year and frankly, I'm jealous! 

Is anyone out there from the Albany, NY area? I'd love to coordinate a little blog convention. Comment or email me! 

100th Day and then some!

Today was the 100th Day of school!! It's funny because last year it fell on Valentine's Day with all of our snow days. Not this year. 

 This is the 3rd year I had my students make 100th Day t-shirts. They love it. It's so much fun seeing what they come up with too!

 This is the second year I did pizza fractions. It's basically an all morning activity and the kids love it. This is how I manage it: 

1. I broke my class into 3 groups of 4. 

2. They sponge painted a large pizza pie cut from poster board. 

3. They put the pie aside to dry. 

4. The students had to figure out how many toppings each student in the group needed to color to equal 100. 

5. Each student colored 25 pizza toppings which can be downloaded here.

6. They cut out the toppings and then combined them in a bowl. 

7. They sorted the pizza toppings and created fractions on scrap paper.

8. They then had to add up the numerators to make sure they did indeed equal 100. This was a great exercise. 

9. After they checked their work they got sentence strips to write the fractions onto. 

10. After lunch the pies were dry and they glued their toppings on. 

11. We finished up the day by having a pizza party! SO much fun :)

Thick and thin questions!

January's Snazzy Snack! Yummm. So fun and easy. 

Non-fiction text features anchor chart. Each day we added something to the chart then they tried it out in their journal with a topic they chose. We're building up to our big planet research project in March.

Thank you to everyone who has purchased my Solar System Unit and left awesome feedback. My students are having a BLAST with it. I hope yours are too. 

This month we have been doing a lot with inferencing and this is my way of assessing them. If they make an inference while they are reading then they write it on a sticky note and stick it on our inferencing chart. This has helped me SO much with lesson planning because I'm really getting a feeling for who understands it and who doesn't and what I need to focus on. 

Whoooo that was a long post :) Happy Friday everyone. 

Solar System Unit!

My Solar System Unit is done! I started the unit a few weeks ago with my kiddos and so far they're having a blast with it. 

We did the crater labs today and my students had a blast. Their thinking was very in depth too!

Phases of the moon flip book!

Planet lap book

Here is what is in the unit:

Moon KWL Chart
Crater Lab 1
Crater Lab 2
Phases of the Moon Flip Book
Layers of the Earth Dessert
Layers of the Earth Labeling Worksheet
Layers of the Earth Graphing
Layers of the Earth Graphing Questions
Planet Lap Book Overview
Planet Lap Book Organizers
Report Graphic Organizer 
Review Sheet
Assessments

Hello there!

I've been working hard on a Solar System Unit. I'm hoping to get it finished either tomorrow or Wednesday night. I LOVE teaching about the planets and we're studying non-fiction in writing so they'll be writing a planet research report.

It's getting pretty close to the 100th day! If you missed my post last year, you can read it here.I'm pretty much doing the same activities. I LOVED the pizza fractions and this year we're going to have a pizza party to go along with it. I got 100th day plates and cups on clearance over the summer. Psyched!

Anyone else completely addicted to Pinterest?? I have sooo much blog reading to do because I have become more preoccupied with Pinterest lately.

I'll be back in a couple of days with some classroom updates. We've been doing some fun things with inferencing and the Planets.

Time for the Bachelor. Who do you think he'll choose?? Doesn't that Courtney girl remind you of that weirdo Michelle from 2 seasons ago? I personally think Ben is as dry as his wine.


And... just wanted to leave you with a picture of my cutie pies. :)

How to Make a PBJ Sandwich!

In January I focus on procedural writing. The best way to learn is by doing, I think, anyways :) Last week each student wrote a "how to make a peanut butter and jelly sandwich" guide, which can be found here. Today the students were given somebody elses guide and had to follow the directions to make the sandwich. Can I just say they LOVED this?! They also learned that it's important to be very precise when you are giving somebody directions!

I gave each student a dixie cup with peanut butter and jelly to make it easy.

Following the steps...

As the students were following the steps they made comments on ways the writer could have been more specific. What a great way to provide feedback!

And.... the best part... EATING it!