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Does your district do a pacing guide? Ours does, and
it's usually determined by a representation of teachers who either meet
during the school year, or during the summer. It's a recommended
guideline of when/length you teach one of the standards. We do have a
lot of students who move within our county, so it makes sense.
I
just don't understand why it seems to change every year. Or the fact
that we teach NO Science this nine weeks, and no History NEXT nine
weeks!. Hmmm.
Anyway,
we normally do our Economics unit in late winter or spring. Not so
this year. It's a crazy time of year. I mean, a "is it a full moon
tonight because the kids are acting crazy!" time of year!!!! (And that
was the week AFTER Thanksgiving!). Yes, I know they're excited about
the Christmas season - which was what inspired me.
Have
you ever thought that an elf is actually a producer? An elf uses
capital, natural, and "human" resources (kinda - do we think Santa as
"human"?). An elf would definitely deal with scarcity, and buying gifts
is DEFINITELY making an economic choice! Throw barter and money in
there, and it's a unit!
Thus
was born "Elf Economics." I've taken my unit and completely revamped
it so that my students are now elves-in-training. Seriously. We filled
out an application and everything! Which then led to an elf visiting
our room and leaving us some directions on how to earn "sparkle points"
based on student work habits and behavior. If they earn a sparkle point
for the day, the elf leaves them (or the teacher to pass out) a treat
each morning for the previous day's behavior. They earned their first
treat this morning - special marshmallows that tasted like candy canes!
It was a big hit with the kids.
Unfortunately,
the elf leaves the scent of vanilla cookies behind, so even though he's
invisible, we know he's there. He also leaves glitter EVERYWHERE. Red
and green, of course, but after two days, we're still finding it in
folders, books, etc. My kids told me they knew the elf wasn't me
because I wouldn't mess up the room like that! :)
He also left a friend behind to keep an eye on the kids.
So,
we've been working our way through the Elf Training Center, which they
were nice enough to leave on my wiki page. It's a work in progress.
At
some point, I'll have it all together and be able to say "voila - here
it is!" (And of course, they'll move economics to some other part of
the year - but I guess the Easter Bunny can teach economics as well,
right????).
Until then, if you'd like to use it, feel free to visit the {ETC}
on my wiki page. It seems to change a little each day as the elves
update it. I'll try to put the rest on my teacher store as it is
completed, or leave you a link for Google Drive! I hope to have more
pics up soon! Until then, enjoy your weekend. We are also counting
down to "Snowman Day" which our school has on December 20th - it'll be
here before we know it! :)
I think we have 10 days left. Frankly, I don't count. The kids do. My assistant does. However, if I began to count, the panic would set in on EVERYTHING I have left to do, and not enough time to do it in! I mean, I need at LEAST a day to clean off my desk and we get a day and a half at the end of the year for workday/checkout. AUGH! Speaking of which, I have NO CLUE where my "end of the year" checklist is....probably on aforementioned desk!
But, that's the not point of this post. No, I have spend most of today working on review games for my students. I need something to hold their interest and be fun and make me feel like yes, they DID learn something this year! :)
So, I thought I'd share what I've done. Hopefully someone else can use it as well....granted, these are based on Virginia standards, but after reading an article, I found that Common Core and Virginia are pretty well aligned (shhh....VA is trying to take credit that they helped inspire CC according to one of the articles, but I'm not so sure about that!).
Okay, for Science, yes, I did a SCOOT! I actually have been thinking of taking the cards though and using it for a game show type review, but I might just stick with SCOOT on this one.
For History, I created review cards (whew! 56 of them!) where we're going to do a scavenger hunt type thing and kids will be running around the room, searching, and waving cards, shouting answers to me, wanting a sticker on their chart. Sound hectic? :) Actually, I sit there happily on my reading table, taking it all in because they are so HAPPY to be reviewing and learning! In the chaos, there IS a sense of peace! Ha!
And, since this is something we did this week that my kids surprisingly loved (I mean, how can you jazz up dictionary skills?) I'll share with you our "Dictionary Detectives." The kids had a GREAT time looking up unfamiliar words, as well as familiar ones they had no clue had other definitions! Then, they went crazy and just started looking up words! Can't ask for a better moment than that!
Click on any of these images to see them closer on Teacher's Notebook. They're also on TpT as well, but ahem, I priced one a little cheaper on TN and I'm thinking of throwing a sale REAL soon to celebrate the end of the year. I will DEFINITELY let you know! (I'm just trying to load some more items on there first!).
Have a great week! :)
I'm linking up with Farley of Oh Boy 4th Grade for May's Currently.
We are continuing our ancient civilization studies with Egypt. The students were VERY excited we were moving on to mummies, pyramids and hippos.....as in, watch out when you sail along the Nile for the hippos and crocodiles! :)
Several years ago, I won a Playmobil grant and earned the Egypt collection. After "traveling" to Egypt through Google Earth (visit my wiki learning pages to download that journey!), viewing 2 pop up books (Tomb Hunters and Ancient Egypt), and watching a Brain Pop Jr. video on Egypt, students had a pretty good grasp on what the geography and area were like.
The kids had a BLAST recreating what it would have looked like, and we created our desert out of brown bulletin board paper and the Nile from the blue (complete with student drawings of hippos and crocodiles!). Had to share...turned out too cute!
If you ever have a great idea using Playmobil products, please look into their grant! You create a lesson plan and they usually select 6 winners each year. I believe this year is over, but keep it in mind for next year. There is more information on their website under "education" I believe.
I remember when I was little, I heard this expression and encouraged my dog (an avid digger) to dig to China so I could see the other side of the world. Obviously, it didn't happen (not to mention my parents, once they stopped laughing, told me it was impossible).
Now, I get to teach about Ancient China in second grade! We combine it with a unit about Ancient Egypt (and in third, they'll learn about Greece, Rome, and Mali). I wanted to share with you some of the things we do with Ancient China.
Of course, there's always the Anchor Chart. :)
But, we started our journey into the past with a field trip. That's right - a field trip to China! Except on this trip, no one gets motion sickness! Several years ago, I learned how to make virtual field trips with Google Earth, so we began our journey by crossing the United States and Pacific Ocean until we got to Asia. Oh yeah, there were lots of ooohs and aaahs. (I just LOVE Google Earth!). We then explored the Great Wall, the Panda Reserve, where the terra cotta warriors were found, the Huang He (Yellow River), and other areas of importance. If you'd like to experience it, you can go here to my wiki page where it's a quick download (just make sure you have Google Earth already installed on your computer!).
We continued to explore with a story about Chinese New Year, as well as other stories, and created our own New Year's dragons. Throw in a powerpoint about contributions, Brain Pop, a foldable in our interactive notebooks for symbols and characters of Chinese writing, as well as the occupations of the people....and that was pretty much it.
Hmmm. Doesn't sound like a lot, but we had fun learning and practicing our symbols. The camera must have taken a day off then. :) I did post my unit on TpT and TN, in case you are interested in checking it out!
At the culmination of the unit, we read about the Silk Road and created our own coins, drawing and writing about what we learned about Ancient China. Did you know the Chinese have holes in their coins so that they could wear them on a string around their neck? It helped in case someone tried to rob them....their money was hidden underneath their clothing!
It's that time of year again that our Famous American projects are due! I was SUPER impressed with my students' projects this year! I have to admit, I had my doubts about whether some would bring them in, but they DID and they looked AWESOME! I am so proud of the effort my kiddos and families put into these!
Normally, I am all about the family projects, but the make up of my class this year is very different, and I realize that not many are able to have the parental support at home. So, I scaled back on the projects, but I decided to go ahead and do this one, since it's a tradition in our second grade.
My students had three weeks (two weekends...very important when you live out in the country!) to complete these. They then presented them orally in class, which I recorded with the Flip camera. I'll be editing it and transforming it into a movie for the class to watch on Monday. Of course, I can't take credit for the camera work. Once you presented your report, you became the "camera person" for the next up. It kept the kids engaged as everyone shared their project!
The idea came from one of my teammates, which had been passed down over the years (not sure where the original came from). We also include the rubric and a template for the written report, as well as a list of suggested Famous Americans, but my students are able to usually do anyone they want (I had one request to do Bethany Hamilton this year). On the list, I also suggest websites that are kid friendly. While some stick to the ones we talk about in class (Jackie Robinson was a favorite this year), we also had John F. Kennedy, Oprah, Ben Franklin, the Wright Brothers (check out the picture--too cute!), Rosa Parks, and more!
Five more will present on Monday (stomach bug and two forgot their projects) so I might add a few more pics then!
