Five for Friday, Poetry Picnic, and giveaway!

Iiiiiiiitttttt's SATURDAY!
We only have FOUR, count em 4! days of school left.
We also have a THREE, count em 3! month summer this year!
And that is perfect because we're MOVIN'!!!
I'm a little bit excited!

This past week was pretty great if I dare say so.
As I've blogged already, we started out countdown with 15 days left rather than the usual ten!
But the kids are super engaged so it was worth it!
Every day is a new theme and though it's a lot of copies...and do not even get to most of it...it is a blast

Friday was field day
I do not like field day
much like my friend Amanda!
no competition?
what's wrong with competition?!
But a big improvement was having 15 minute stations this year so it kept everyone {and I mean 13 classes of Kinder-Second graders all out at the same time together...} busy!
and thus begins my Five for Friday

1. It's just not a fulfilling field day until you've...ripped YOUR pants!

Bles him! He has the best attitude and sense of humor!

she caught me trying to get a candid!

and here's my middle blondie pulling away for his class's tug of war!

2. I'm loving my new fake toms! $20 at target!

3. As you may know, I am a very healthy eater! bahahaha!

I got these for teacher appreciation and had never tried them

I think they look gross.

Oh Holy Lord! They became breakfast all week!

DELISH!

It's like Nutella wrapped in a chocolate shell!

4. I picked up an iPhone 5 on Mother's Day.

My mom had gotten me a verizon giftcard for my b-day and when I went to upgrade I found out I couldn't keep my unlimited data! GASP

Turns out, it's ok! I will survive. 

I'm on my phone all day when the kids are at block and I was nervous about overages, but they went through my history and showed me the best plan...

So I got to rename all my app folders!

It's the little things

Do you have a free sex offenders app from your state government...

it's quite interesting...

that adorable background is from Lee-Lou blogs!

and 5. This file was going to be the death of me

have you had these files...??

All into it for a few days, get distracted, can't get things exactly how you want

that is this file for me!

I began after I bought Hope's Poetry Picnic

wow

did my kids need more explicit and hands-on practice!

So I asked Hope if she'd mind, and being the doll she is, she said go for it!

So a month and a half later-here you have it!

Poetry Picnic Centers!

and I will be adding some syllable practice this summer. 

maybe some more, but here it is for now!

And in new file fashion-I'm giving away one of these puppies!

Just leave a comment and make sure you are a bloggy follower-I'll pick a random number tomorrow!

Good Luck!! Have a sweet Saturday!

a sure cure for arachnophobia {freebie}

each year I hand this poem out a poem to my kids called A Murder in the Garden {freebie at the end}and they think I am all kinds of crazy! What kind of teacher gives out a poem about murder to seven year olds!

Well, maybe a teacher who lets you hold a tarantula!

Yep, I finally let the students pet Hairyette. They were so excited. Only three students kind of stayed back out of the way. And one eventually couldn't help themselves and came over with us. Since we are in the midst of a measurement unit and spiders I figured it had to be done!

Of course I started with my recess gloves on. Then I loosened up and just let her crawl on me sans gloves. The kids know a fall can kill this fragile pet and were very good about not bombarding me. Even though we know they are covered in hair, they were still shocked at how soft she is.

 

  

After a minute or two we started measuring. Her legs are 2" long, her cephalothorax is about 1" across, and her total body length is 4". Just a little gal! And I just impressed you with my bog words didn't I?! Well, I impressed the kiddos today too. I told them I spent my weekend writing an arachnid book for our class and learned all kinds of new information. Like daddy long legs are not poisonous-we already knew that they aren't spiders, but harvestman. I had heard they were super poisonous but their mouths were too small to bite a human.

   

and here’s where she ended up! Why do all animals go into hair?? I was really trying to prevent a fall {ignore the bad hair day today!}

     

If you wanna impress your kiddos, snag my little arachnid love mini pack!

and grab the Murder in the Garden poem for free!

and my arachnids need love Venn for free too

I hate recreating the wheel and so many of you amazing bloggers have already made bat and spider units, so I sure wasn't going to!

great schema Intro, purple pets and sticky notes

Here’s an idea from a workshop I attended awhile back, but it’s worth sharing. We discussed teaching kiddos about how connections are made and new learning become permanent. The presenter had a drawing of a brain with different areas from our experiences. So this is how the lesson went.

1. Introduce the topic to be discussed-we did pumpkins

2. Ask what they already know. For instance I said I knew pumpkins were a fruit.

3. Ask how they know that-I answered that I’d read it in a book.

4. Put glow-in-the-dark puffy paint ($2 at  Wal-Mart) on the area of the brain that says books.

5. Repeat until most of the brain it painted in. Take a restroom break and tell the kids that when you return, you will show them how making connections lights up our brain, or creates more synapses.

When the paint dries it glows in the dark! It was awesome and a moment kids would remember. Of course, you wouldn’t want to do it repeatedly-but what a wonderful intro!

Here’s a picture of her brain with paint (I did not take a picture of it in the dark!)

Our poem of the week is My Neighbor’s Dog is Purple. I love using it to refresh them on mental images, but more importantly teaching how they change as we get new information. I got the idea from Deanna Jump. And yes, these are related! Based on their schema, they draw a dog {Chihuahua, German Shepherd, etc}. They color it purple. It’s what the poem says. THEN you read the 3rd stanza

My neighbor's dog looks nasty,

it has a wicked smile....

before my neighbor painted it,

it was a crocodile.

Now our mental image takes a left turn! I also use the Green Giant poem she recommends. Our counselor uses the same poem for listening skills. She reads it aloud, they listen, then draw and see how many details they can remember. It’s a good one!

And yet one more thing…we finally started our story map stickies this week.I know you’ve seen this poster. It’s a goodie and all over Pinterest, but I love Rebecca’s. I use it as a predicting activity. This also requires a little schema and background knowledge {and common sense}.I write the author, title, character names, a phrase for the problem, solution, theme, and one or two events. I hand out the stickies to whomever I can reach without getting up from my comfy butterfly chair, and they place them on the poster where they think they go. Of course we usually have to change a few. I remember last year someone placed Eve Bunting on the “problem” section! haha! Anywho, it’s a great little part of my weekly routine!

One more day this week. We have Friday off! Woot woot! And it’s Mr. Lamb’s b-day. I actually get to have lunch with him! Lucky guy!

The race begins...for fun fluency practice

I mentioned our poetry race last week and had a few requests to share more. Now that we are partially settled in our "tweener" home I have a little time!!
My teammie found the idea over the summer and we ran with it.
What I do: I hand out a typed up poem each Monday. I just visit giggle poetry or break open a Silverstein anthology and break a few copyright laws on the copier. So far we've used homework, oh homework by Bruce lansky and my fish can ride a bicycle by shel Silverstein. They loved them both!
What they do: After cutting out the poem and gluing it in (on the right side only of our notebook) I read it aloud and they follow. Then they read it a few times to themselves. The next day we read it to a partner two times. On Wednesday we go across the hall and read to a few peeps in a different class. On Thursday and Friday we read again to partners. Each time we read it aloud, the listener signs the back of the page. I informed them I am a verified handwriting expert and will know if they sign others' names. They'll try to get away with anything!
A few others things I may include are sending a copy home and having them read to staff members. I don't want to send the notebook because I'm anal about them falling apart in the slightest way.
Now the BIG deal is the trophy. This is comprised of a pack of four mini trophies from the dollar tree hot glued together. It's a big deal y'all! Each Monday morning I count the signatures. The kiddo with the most gets to keep the trophy on their desk for the whole week.
Here's a few pictures. I haven't made anything printable because I'm trying NOT to! The easier the better.
The return. Not only are the using expression like their amazing reader of a teacher, they are memorizing and wanting to copy owns in their writers journals! Who knew poetry and fluency was fun!
Happy reading! I promise to share some goodies soon. I am in the midst of teaching process skills prior to starting our matter unit and am loving what we are doing!

Rethinking Poetry

This past year I began...keyword began...keeping Poetry Notebooks. As a class we read aloud the weekly poem a few times, partner read, shared, discussed, and eventually glued it in and illustrated each stanza.
Now there were a few things I felt went well...first off the visualizing that went on and was discussed was great! And second, they knew what a stanza was. Well, not much to brag about.
This year I plan to continue weekly poems, but I want to add more depth to how we interact with poetry. I have come a long way from simply reading poetry during a unit in April like I did in 4th grade, but I am still not satisfied. I recently purchased Month-by-Month Pocket Charts from Amazon. I love the lesson ideas, but the poems are not my style. I personally love Giggle  Poetry for finding poems to share! Kenn Nesbitt is a riot! My kiddos loved his poetry!
I would LOVE to hear what others are doing with poetry! Please leave a comment!