Happy Friday, friends! I hope this post finds you well and loving our 5-days-until-Winter-Break countdown. Today I’m just stopping by to share some pictures and funnies from 1st grade. Nothing serious, just fun. ๐
It’s official friends, I have corrupted my children. We’ve been ‘enjoying’ a lot of indoor recess lately, and after we had our mandatory Go-Noodle session, 3 of my friends organized the dominos. Color. Then, number. ohmygosh.
Participating in Computer Science Week, we also tried our hands at the Hour of Code. Friends, let’s just say it was hard. Very hard. Manageable? Absolutely, but my friends definitely struggled. It was really interesting to see which friends battled head-on and the friends who wanted to immediately give-up. Some of my engineering-minds THRIVED, which was really neat to see. My take-away: we need to do out-of-the-box really-hard things more often! ๐
One of the most wonderful parts of blogging has been the amazing teachers I’ve met along the way. It was such a sweet surprise to arrive home to this adorable ornament from ZipADeeDooDah Designs!
This was our Monday-morning pep-talk and IT WORKED!!!! Woohoo ๐ I came back to a clean room, everything on my plans completed, a stellar report from the sub (aka guest teacher), and happy children. Amazing guest teachers are SUCH a blessing!
Also, have you heard about – Educreations?!?! It’s an amazing app that allows you to record your voice while writing on the screen. It similar to ShowMe or other tech devices…but a lot easier to use and has a lot of bonus features. I’m impressed! I’ve created my first video about making 10 to Add….something parents consider the new ‘Common Core’ math and really don’t understand. You can check out my first Educreation here – http://bit.ly/12RFO9F
This week also marked the end of the annual Christmas-play season. My Mom is a children’s pastor at our church, so every year I’m blessed to watch our lambs, angels, and shepherds shine!
My new school has zero book-rooms/closets/cabinets which makes guided reading tough. I use Reading A-Z and our basal but still I miss REAL books. So, I’m creating my own book room. Every month, I order 7-8 copies of all the $1 books Scholastic Reading Club offers. In the next few years I’ll have a great selection for all my reading groups!!! My order arrived today. BESTDAYEVER!
This week I also blogged about our Daily 5 Word Work center, including how I differentiate for all my learners. You can check out the post and ideas here!
This evening I spent a little extra time a school prepping for our Christmas-themed week next week. My favorite part of the evening was setting out my Christmas book. My friends LOVE walking into different displays each week. It’s so fun to see them immediately dart to our shelf on Monday mornings!
Well friends, I am off to bed. I will be suffering a Saturday-morning alarm into order to volunteer/shop at the Scholastic Warehouse Sale. This is one of my favorite Saturdays each year, so I’ve got to be ready to roll in the morning! Have a fabulous weekend, friends. ๐
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We use Benchmark, which has 90 titles for second grade small reading groups. It is nice to have them at my fingertips, but I'm often hunting down books from the first and third grade teachers for lower and higher reading groups.
By the way, I'm sorry if I missed it somewhere, but I was wondering if you announced winners for your giveaway at the end of November? Thanks!
Great to see the creative activities in 1st grade. The Hour of Code experience sounds challenging but rewarding. Kudos to the engineering minded students who thrived. Embracing difficulty is key.
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