Holiday Card Exchange!

Have you ever done a holiday card exchange with your class? This is my first year doing it, and it's actually really exciting. We joined a group through a teacher who runs the exchange every year. She put us into groups of 30 and sent out the class names and addresses.
Two weeks ago we put 29 holiday cards in the mail.
This week... we began receiving our cards! Here is a picture:

 

I wanted to think of some activities to do with my class now that we have the cards. Friday is our last day of school before our break, so I have a few open blocks of  time.

My first idea was to do some map skills and have them mark the places the cards came from on a state map. This would help them begin to learn the locations of our 50 states since this is part of our social studies curriculum coming up. I also thought about doing some map scale activities. I coiuld pick out a few of the cities and we can figure out how far each card traveled. We can also see which  traveled the furthest and which traveled the shortest distance. They can also compare and contrast the distances and do some problem solving. 

I'd love to hear other ideas if anyone has ever done extension activities with a project like this! 

Poetry Practice with Casey

Oh, hey there! Yep, I'm still here. Yep, I still have a blog. Nope, I didn't forget about it.
Life got a little crazy at the start of this school year....and to be honest, I didn't put blogging at the top of my life. But, now I need to get back at it. So ... here is what we're working on in 4th grade:

Poetry!!

In looking at the CCSS, students have to do a lot more with poetry than just read it. Students need to understand poetry vocabulary, compare poetry to prose summaries, as well as visual representations. In looking at the suggested mentor texts for the CCSS, one of the suggestions was to read Casey at the Bat by Ernest Thayer. Here is a look at some of the things I'll be doing with the text:

Is this something you could do with your fourth or fifth graders? If so, click here for a copy of the activities.
As you can see, the first thing I'll be doing with my students is identifying key poetic elements in the text. We will especially focus on the imagery and tone of the piece, helping students to understand that these elements can happen in poetry just as in other literary texts.

Next we will be comparing the poetic version with the prose summary. I'm not sure my students even know what it means to read a prose summary, so that should be an interesting mini-lesson. Once we read and discuss both, we'll compare and contrast them in an open-ended response. I'll be using my compare/contrast words worksheet to help my students remember what words compare and what words are used to contrast. Click here to download it free from TpT.

Another thing I'm excited to do with this text is compare the poem to a visual presentation of the text. I think my students will really enjoy watching the cartoon version, especially since keeping their attention through the next week and a half could be tricky. I searched and found a Disney version on You Tube. Here is the link.

Check back later this week (or maybe weekend) for more about teaching figurative language (and ugh ... interpreting figurative language) to your students ...

It was an organizing files kind of day ... PLUS some new freebies!!

Ever have one of those? Feels kinda great and quite a bit tedious at the same time. I spend the day organizing the files on my computer. Much like the physical areas of my life, I start out being completely organized with the best of intentions, and end up with everything a bit messy. I don't mean to get lazy and lose diligence, but it inevitably happens. So, 4 hours later, all of my files are color-coded, organized, and back where they belong. The best part is, I won't have to search as hard for things I am looking for, which can be a really big time saver.
While I was doing that, I found a few files that I never uploaded to my blog. So, I also spent some time today added two more pages to my blog and uploaded some free resources. I have more to add, but I thought I got a good start.
Check out the new pages and see what I've added. Maybe you'll find something you can use in your classroom.

On another note, this week will be back-to-school for our students. Tomorrow is my last inservice day, then Tuesday it all begins again.

So, does your school do inservice to start the school year? What do you do/learn?
We did:
1. One day on balanced literacy, specifically focusing on effective strategies for guided reading
2. One day on math, specifically focusing on the new technology component of the CCSS Everyday Math
3. Tomorrow's crazy day: Curriculum updates, school improvement plans, and a smattering of other updates.

And so, my friends. I leave you with this lovely eCard I saw on facebook, which will be quite fitting for my year:

Back to School for Me ... and a FREEBIE for you :)

Tomorrow is back to school. You know what that means? Meetings ... meetings ... and more meetings. It's ok though, I love getting to see coworkers who've been MIA for the summer. So, I was working in my classroom today, trying to get everything in place and make everything look pretty.
I love blogging with my kids, so I made some posters to put up in my room using our poster printer.
Click the images below to get your own copy!

The graphics are by the lovely Nikki @ http://melonheadzillustrating.blogspot.com/
The fonts are by Darcy Baldwin @sweetshoppedesigns.com  

TpT's Back to School Sale!

So, maybe like me you have the back-to-school blues....

But, cheer up! TpT is having a back to school sale :)

Yep! You know what that means? It's stock-up time. So, go fill your cart with goodies to make the start of a new year a little brighter and a whole lot easier.

What type of products do you look for on TpT? What will you buy?

I just uploaded two new products today (in time for the sale of course!):

Click on the pictures to see them in my store. And get shopping already!!

Who's Ready for a New Year?!?

Ok, maybe I'm not quite ready. I mean, who doesn't love summer? Though, getting ready for a new school year can be quite fun. I love setting up my classroom and making everything look new and fun for a brand new school year.

What do you do to get ready? I'm planning on starting investing time in my classroom on Monday, getting it ready for 23-25 fresh new faces. Plus, I have $100 bucks to spend at Lakeshore and can't wait to pick out some new goodies. It's so hard to decide what to buy though! 

 Set of 3D Shapes?

 Magnetic Base Ten Blocks?

 Tub of Fraction Circles?

 Text Set for Teaching Math Standards?

 

Nonfiction Text Activities?

 How Did You Solve It?

CCSS 4th Grade Math Center Worksheets?

These are tough life decisions ... What did you buy for your classroom this year? What would you buy if you were me?

And speaking of getting ready for a new year, Fun in First Grade is having an awesome Back-to-School giveaway. You can win one of seven prizes PLUS an item of choice from her TpT store. Just another reason to love the beginning of the year. AND, if you like Duck Dynasty, she has the cutest freebie featuring a quote from Phil and using Melonheadz Illustrations!  :)

Oh, AND as if it couldn't get better ... Melonheadz is having a sale in all of her stores until the 12th, so get to shopping. I think saying I'm obsessed with her graphics is an understatement :) Happy shopping friends!

Staples... I will get around your ridiculous limits!

I know I'm not the only one who goes into Staples and then immediately feels frustrated when the sign says "limit 2" per customer.

 

So, I want more than just two glues Staples. I have 25 students in my class! Also, ten folders and 4 pencil boxes just won't cover it. Now, I get it. If they sold that quantity at that price to us all, they would make no money. They are a business after all. 

However, I wasn't just going to give up. So, I may have gone to Staples 5 separate times last week to get more than their "limit". You do have to spend at least $5 in the transaction to get the penny deal, but there were quite a few other things I wanted to buy for my classroom anyhow. After the 5th trip, though, I began to feel a little nuts. 

Does anyone else do this? Or, if you don't stalk Staples to get their insane cent deals, what do you do to try and stretch your money, but still get things your students will need for the upcoming school year? Does your school provide a lot of the things you need? Do you ask the students to bring items in? Or, do you buy mostly everything with your own budget?