Currently - Ice and Polar Animals!

Hooking up with Farley (I think I'm #322??) for December's Currently on a snow ice day where schools are closed.  I'm not thinking this is going to be a good winter - normally, our ice/snow days come in late January, early February.  December is almost unheard of!  Hopefully, we'll not miss so much we're extending the year!

So, first.....

 

Hah hah - I think all that above is pretty self-explanatory.  Our ice storm came on Sunday to central VA, which closed churches all over and set schools 2 hour delay.  In our rural county, though, with as many backroads as our buses go on, PLUS we have 2 campus-type schools while they are rebuilding from the earthquake, it closed us today.  Not that some of us aren't sneaking in to get some work done :)

I'm trying to get those little things done that didn't quite get done this weekend/Friday afternoon before I left school, like helping my team with simple directions to use StoryJumper (love that site) and getting my units ready for January.  Please don't groan - I normally don't work quite that far ahead, but this year, we are joining my in-laws in Florida so no "working break" for me this year, so I have to have everything ready for January when I leave December 20 for break!

I have this wonderful parent this year who LOVES to book bind.  I don't mind doing it, but it's so time consuming!  She is able to do it at work, and has been creating my Number of the Day booklets, binding together author studies, and I hoped to get her my Polar Unit together. 

Last year, I created this fun unit to study animal life cycles and adaptations, as well as some geography, and focused on Polar Animals.  At the end, it was an absolute mess to bind together!  So, this wonderful parent has offered to do it ahead of time for me, so the students work out of the booklets.  I am so into that!  However, as you know, it's getting everything together that can sometimes be overwhelming as well!

But, it did let me get it organized enough to put it on TpT!  I hope you'll check it out.  It's 24 days of lessons about the northern lights, geography of Antarctica and the Arctic Circle, animal adaptations and life cycles, migration of whales - you name it!  

I love when you can get into a unit and the kids are equally enthusiastic!  Some of my kids from last year still talk about it!  :)

So, here are a few pics of what I'm talking about.  It's a 100+ page unit containing links, virtual field trip via Google Earth, nonfiction passages, animal diagram pages, life cycle pages, etc.  Throw in some science experiments and scientific method to round it out!  Click on the pics to take you to see more (the free preview includes the 24-day unit plan!).