100 Days in School

I can't believe it's already the 100th day! On our 100th day of school all of us dressed up like 100 year olds! It was so much fun. I couldn't resist taking a "granny selfie". My student teacher did an AMAZING job with the planning on this day! Here are some of the fun things we did.

 There was a "100 survey" wall where the kids could go when they were finished with their centers.

 Each student brought in 100 things and made a sorting mat. They grouped them by 10's on the mat.

We used the app Aging Booth to make the students look like they were 100. We printed them out and they wrote about what it would be like when they were 100; they also got to decorate the frame around their 100 year old face. Here is a pic of what I turned out to look like....

They did a search of the room for numbers. They hi-lighted the numbers they found to find the mystery picture (it made a 100).  Each student made a 100 things hat. Each strip they either stuck 10 stickers or drew 10 things. When you add it all together it makes 100!

All in all... it was a crazy day BUT lots of fun!

How did y'all spend your 100th day in school?

-Libby

New Year, New Goals!

This year being a new mom I have set some new goals for myself so that I can better provide for my family and have some more creative outlets. I am privileged to have my assistant teacher serving as a student teacher in my classroom this semester! Since I'm not having to plan lessons it's opened up time for me to:
1. Upload my original games, lessons, printables, etc. to TpT (Teachers pay teachers)
2. Blog about what's going on in my classroom

So here's to new beginnings... I am now in charge of the bulletin boards and had a lot of fun with these. My assistant has had some great, fresh ideas to go along with lessons I've done in the past! 

You've got to love when your student's resolution is to listen to you! :)
I used a poster board cut in half to make the giant popper. Then I just stapled it on the board and stuffed wads of butcher paper in it. My assistant had the cute idea to add curled pipe cleaners to it.

 We already had the door done from before Christmas but thankfully it still "goes" with the cold weather. All of the snow globes turned out so cute! 

This is our outside bulletin board. It goes along with our Journey's Lesson 16 story Let's Go to the Moon! I made the rocket out of butcher paper and put my face and my assistant's face on it. I drew this picture of an astronaut last year and had the students draw their own faces inside the helmet. It wasn't very cute that way! So my assistant had the idea to add the aluminum foil around their faces to look like a helmet!  Each of the students used actual pictures of their to make their astronaut's faces but I've covered them up with apples for privacy sake. Way cuter.  The story is about Moon facts so they wrote a list of Moon facts on the blue construction paper next to their astronaut. 

We now have a classroom set of iPads for small groups (5 iPads) so we've all been racking our brains on how to use them! I found a great FREE app to help with understanding place value and using longs, cubes, and flats. It's called Number Pieces. I wrote numbers on cards and had each student draw a card, build the number with the longs, cubes, or flats, and then write the word. Then they circled the tens place and underlined the ones place. It was an awesome way to easily assess if the child understood place value... plus it was tons of fun! It worked well with my struggling students and the more advanced ones because they could move at their own pace.

Lastly, I just uploaded BAM! for Unit 4 to TpT! 

http://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/BAM-High-Frequency-Word-Practice-Game-Grade-1-Journeys-Unit-4-1655956

I hope everyone enjoys their long weekend! I've been able to create the BAM! game and add photos to the blog in between Miles napping. He just started crawling so we have been scrambling to baby proof all the extra places we had forgotten. Ahhh... the glamorous life of a new mom! :) 

-Libby

High Frequency Word Game called Bam!

I had a co-worker ask me about how to play the game "Bam!" the other day. It has become a staple in my classroom so I thought it would be fun to share. It's great for practicing high frequency words. We use Journey's as a part of our Language Arts curriculum. Each lesson has a list of high frequency to practice. I found that incorporating them into a game makes it easy and fun for the students to practice. You can download it for FREE from my TpT store! The download has color and black and white printables.

Please let me know how you like it! I am working on making a bundle of BAM! games that cover all the high frequency words in each unit.

Peace, love, and teaching!

-Libby

Fractions Galore!

We have been studying fractions in math. I always dread fractions because I feel like it's a hard concept to grasp for first grade. But thankfully I found a great lesson on The First Grade Parade using construction paper pizzas and REAL pizza boxes. Let me tell you... my kids were so excited when they saw those pizza boxes on my desk! And all I had to do to get them was ask. I went to a local pizza place and they were happy to give them to me. Not to mention I got to eat pizza for dinner, too. :) Anyways...I know they were all hoping for real pizza but they were happy none the less. They really seemed to get the concept... very quickly! Here's a pic of one of the boxes:

So I was feeling inspired and created my own lesson (another one I just posted to TPT!) called Ice Cream Fractions. This cutie lesson is FREE! Here are a few completed by my students. I improved the one that is on teachers pay teachers to have lines for the kids to write on... they ran out of space without them! They seriously got carried away with all the different ice cream flavors. So cute!

I am having so much fun using this new knowledge on how to create sheets for lessons on my computer using Publisher. For the LONGEST time I have just been using Word or drawing everything by hand. I would love reccomendations/comments if anyone has found great software they like to use. I am considering getting the Adobe Creative Suite but I hear it is expensive. Might be worth it, though!

OK... so it's been a LOOOONG time since my last post. About 6 months... but who's counting? I have gotten so consumed with tutoring after school it seemed to have taken over my life... that along with the crazy holiday season I got out of the routine. Anyways...blogging is something I really enjoy and have truly missed. The past few months I have been getting into some better habits, like working out and eating healthier, and I really think it has given me more energy. I swear when people used to say that to me I would roll my eyes. Maybe it's that or it could be the nicer weather rolling in... either way I am in a much better state of mind these days.

So I am going to follow my advice I give the kids to "Get it together". After lots of help from my assistant, downloading PDF converters, learning how to use Microsoft Publisher, dowloading super cute graphics from Scrappin Doodles, and picking out adorable fonts from Fonts for Peas, I am SO excited to announce my first EVER download to Teachers Pay Teachers. And it's free!

Please dowload this and use it with your kiddos to get ready for Easter.
http://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/Jelly-Bean-Graphing-Sheet

Here it is in black and white. I am not quite sure yet how to post it on the blog in color yet but I'm sure I will figure it out eventually. The actual download is in color.

I made a super-cute activity with fractions and ice cream scoops that I will be posting as soon as I get it done. In the meantime... Happy Tuesday!

Once again, saw this on pinterest: The Sweet Life of Third Grade so I had to make my own!
I used PowerPoint, google searched images, sharpies, and a glue stick and came up with this rendition.



We have LOTS of co-curriculars. I am so glad they all fit on the page :). I laminated it and hot glued a bow on the ribbon. It has been a great job for the Line Leader to be in charge of doing before we leave the room.

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad

Pumpkin Patch Mice

I found this adorable pin on Pinterest of mice made out of shapes. I knew a math explorations was coming up with shapes so I could incorporate it into the curriculum. They turned out so well I wanted to use them on my bulletin board. So I incorporated a writing aspect. I gave the students the writing prompt "A mouse was walking in a pumpkin patch at night and saw...". They did a great job incorporating seasonal words in their stories!


















Thankfully my assistant cut out almost all the shapes for them and they just arranged the mom the page and glued them down. They had to cut their own arms, legs, and tails. It was great for me to see if any students had spacial issues.

Today we had conferences and I am ready for the weekend (and a beverage!) Have a good one everyone!

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad