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Well, gosh, isn't that all of us at the end of the year?
It's been a crazy two weeks. This past week, my daughter got the "stomach bug" that's been going around, so I was in and out of school, which has been hard as we try to finish our final math unit (measurement) and go into review mode for our end-of-year tests next week!
So, thought I'd show you what we've been up to and share a little freebie I created for a summer packet! More on that later....
First, our measurement unit was rushed, but we had a little fun with it by measuring our feet in first inches, then centimeters. I cannot remember who published this idea, so if it yours, please credit yourself!
Had fun with our unit on Egypt by creating an Egyptian scene (the pieces are Playmobil I received from a grant several years back - if you haven't heard of the grant, go to their website and apply! I received "sixth place" but still got plenty of good things!). Those are hippos and crocodiles in the Nile. :)
Then, our grade level did a rotation on ancient China and Egypt. I reviewed the Chinese contributions and we made kites, students chose 4 of the contributions (besides kite) to illustrate, and then wrote the contributions on the tails of the kite. I added a straw to the back of the kites to make them a bit sturdier (I have no idea if they'll really fly - I must have answered that question dozens of times! I haven't heard the results yet, either!).
We have a fabulous world carpet that students play a game to learn the continents. I substituted my reading focus wall to put up the USA map so students could learn their places around the country. They loved finding the places as much as jumping around the "world" on the rug! (The labels are just sentence strips and the map I've had for years - used permanent marker to draw mountains, etc. and added a map key that I wrote right on the bulletin board paper!). With all that practice, they aced their standard!
We created the "Summer Bucket List" by Kristen Clements that turned out super cute! I had a 5th grade teacher who was so impressed, she did the same for her class!
Finished our prefix/suffix unit with creating flowers to make our "grammar tree" look a bit more festive outside our room.
Shared "Flat Stanleys" that had returned from adventures!
For the end of year gift/summer review for my students - well, I knew they would not be happy doing worksheets at home and honestly, after trying to work with my own kids, I know what a struggle it is! I brainstormed and came up with activities the kiddos could do that would make things fun, as well as mirror some of the games we've played in class! When I presented it to them on Friday (I had one student whose last day it was - she's heading to England!) they were super excited! I got most of the items at Dollar Tree.
I added a few things in there that they might not have at home, but for the most part, tried to make it "user friendly" so that students wouldn't have to hunt for materials (or the parents wouldn't have to go out and buy a lot!). You can find the Summer Review Activity Packet at Google Docs. Its in Powerpoint format, so if you'd like to make changes and personalize it, you can! I paired it in their buckets with another freebie, You Can Even Read a Cereal Box by Cynthia Vautrot. Love her idea!
So, how are you ending your year?
Feel the same way?
With the end of the year fast approaching (yikes! 16 days - scary but exciting at the same time!), we're starting to begin review mode with centers and other areas as we're still trying to finish up units!
So, I thought I'd show you what I've been working on this week.
Our butterflies emerged from their chrysalis! We said goodbye on Wednesday (all 5 made it!). It was hard, because at first, they didn't want to come out! We made sure to release them in the field behind our school, near the woods and away from the playground and bus loop!
Our "Flat Stanleys" started coming in this week! So far, our Stanleys have visited Newport News (VA), Utah (Great Salt Lake), Texas (Austin), and California (Fort Irwin).
We are finishing up our prefix/suffix unit and I was rather disgusted with some of the sheets I had because they combined prefixes (which is a good thing because it saves paper, right?) but was wrong for the order I was teaching it in! My kiddos do better with an activity on the carpet and then an independent one at their seat to "seal" their learning.
So, if you're not happy, change it, right? I created a set of activity sheets with ONE prefix or suffix per page, and made them look fun so my kiddos would enjoy themselves as well as learning (very important this time of year to catch their attention!).
I also played around with some shapes on Microsoft Publisher and created flowers. I always do a flower activity to decorate our tree in the hallway with prefixes and suffixes! I'm pretty happy with the way they turned out!
I also had a few review items I've made previously and then realized I hadn't shared nor had I put them on TpT or TN! These I've either already used or are using them for review (or both!). Click on the pictures on the ones you'd like to check out closer!
Okay, well, sorry for the double blog post today but Blogger's schedule kinda messed me up with the announcement of the Teacher's Notebook sale/drawing. I also saw where they are offering a $5,000 scholarship to an online university for a Master's in Teaching! That's in addition to the drawing they're holding for the $100 Oriental Trading Gift Card. Wow! You can click on the link in my earlier post to take you there! (I'll be adding a sidebar one soon!).
Be sure to check out my sale thru the 10th - everything in my store SHOULD be (I say should because I found one item that had gotten overlooked!) 50% off and with TN's extra 10% off, that's 55%!!!!! Please be sure to stock up - it's a great opportunity! Several items are less than 50 cents!!!!
Typical Virginia weather - after being snowed in for several days, the temps yesterday and today were in the 60s!!! Granted, we'll have a nice muddy playground tomorrow (ick!), but at least there won't be any snowball fights :)
So, I spent the last day of my unintentional 5 day Winter Break finishing up an idea that came to me one morning, as I am preparing to work on my prefix/suffix unit.
It's called the "Great Movie MixUp" and features adorable clipart from my favorite, mycuteclipart.com and also the zombies from Creative Clips.
The actors, crew, and equipment has gotten mixed up! Students must re-sort and decide which go to what movie, meanwhile putting together base words with prefixes and suffixes. I chose 8 to focus on (that didn't include spelling changes, since students will need to pick 3 to record from each movie set): pre, re, un, mis, dis, ful, y, and less.
Movies include zombie, cowboy, space/aliens, detective, monster, sea life, pirate, and airplanes! I incorporated a lot of "likes" from my kiddos this year (I have one that is NUTS for pirates!). I thought about including some more licensed characters, but figured I wanted this to be "timeless" and "classic."
I thought it turned out cute! If you click on the title picture, it'll take you to TpT or {here} for Teacher's Notebook!
I must admit, I've been enjoying teaching this to my kids this year! It's always good when you can make something boring fun! :) Besides creating "unmuffins" and matching aliens to their spaceships (from an earlier post, available on my Teacher's Notebook and TpT stores) which the kids LOVED, we created an anchor chart
and "springed" up our grammar tree outside the room.
The students were given the center of the flower with a prefix or suffix and a template for flower petals. They then had to use words (written on the petal) that used the prefix or suffix (I made my kids do one of each). I'm adding the extras to our literacy centers so we can fill up the bush a bit more! :)
I hadn't anticipated adding a bush, but I really didn't want to take my rainbow down from St. Pat's Day and it couldn't just end mid-wall. That, and I had requests from a PreK teacher and the PT across the hall (who has her kids park the trike at the rainbow or at the tree) to not remove it! I very heartily agreed! It does add a nice splash of color to the hallway! :)
I also add magnetic alphabet letters to my whiteboard to use during our unit. It helps the kids remember what each one means when we add it to a word.
I did the same with the suffixes on the right side of the board. The students had fun writing words on the board and moving the letters to make new words!
Next week, we'll end our unit with a Grammar Adventure and a game of Scoot before our assessment. (I wanted to add pics here, but long story short...the links take you to my TN store, where they are CHEAP through April 30th!).
I have to admit...I'll miss our activities, but have great ideas for our upcoming reference materials unit. Here's a peek at one of my scavenger hunt ideas, available now on TpT and Teacher's Notebook.
Don't forget! All my activities on Teacher's Notebook are half price until April 30th to celebrate my new store! Please grab an unmuffin, alien, Grammar Adventure, or Scoot if you like what you see! ;)
I always try to take a creative spin in subject areas that are either difficult or (gasp) boring to my kiddos. Unfortunately, prefixes and suffixes fall into both categories with mine. Over the past years, I've added alphabet magnets and add that prefix (or suffix) to the board after we talk about it. Students can then use the letters to add to words they write on the board, etc. Simple enough and can be reused each year (I had to buy several packs of these to have enough vowels, especially "e").
This year, being a more "pinteresting" teacher, as well as inspired by all those that teacher blog and create activities for TpT and TN, I've created two games I think my kids will like!
The first one is inspired by our Friday viewing of The Electric Company. We stream it from the website, and then I always create (or find) centers to go with each episode. If you haven't checked it out, you should! This week, I decided to do "Unmuffins" because it covered the prefix "un." So, that inspired me to create my own version of "unmuffins" as a center (which also includes pre, re, mis, and dis).
Sooo...what to do with suffixes? I was trying to think of things that go together...fish and worms, sandwich slices....and boom! I created a Suffix Alien Invasion (covering y, ly, er, est, ful, less). I thought it turned out really cute!
Both of these are available on TpT if you click on the pictures. I'm planning on using both in my classroom this week as we return from Spring Break (I am NOT looking forward to waking up at the crack of dawn tomorrow!). I'll let you know how my kids rate the centers! I can see my boys really enjoying the aliens (although one will complain its not zombies...but oh well, can't please everyone!).
Till then, if you're like me, returning from Spring Break, good luck to you! I hope you are well rested, your kids are "spongy" and ready to learn, and things don't get too hectic! :)
