Elf Glyphs

My plan was to post more often with this blog! I thought for sure I'd have the time to research topics and come up with ideas, pull from my archives - but I find myself taking this from a friend's blog - thank you Rebecca! My December post is long over due and classrooms are running out of time!

You can find the patterns and rules to make your elf glyphs at www.mathwire.com. Send along an email of your finished projects if you decide to do them!

Eric Carle's a Blogger

How exciting! Click on the posting title to check it out!

Fact and Opinion

Another "Mailbox" Idea

Turkey Fact or Fiction
They know he's usually the center of attention on Thanksgiving, but what else do your students know about Tom Turkey? Create a fact vs. fiction game with the facts below. Cut out 20 feathers from construction paper. Write one fact on each feather. Program each of the remaining eight feathers with false statements about turkeys; place them in a box. Place the box of feathers at a center and create an answer key. Have a student pick a feather, read the sentence, and place the fact feathers in one pile and the fiction feathers in another.

Turkey Facts:

Male turkeys are called toms.
Female turkeys are called hens.
Young turkeys are called poults.
The long piece of loose skin hanging beneath the turkey's lower jaw is called a wattle.
A tom's beard is a tuft of stiff feathers on his breast.
Many domestic turkeys have white or light-colored feathers.
Wild turkeys have brown or bronze-tipped feathers.
Wild turkeys usually weigh only about ten pounds.
Only wild turkeys can fly.
Wild turkeys rest in trees at night.
Turkey eggs are tan with brown specks.
Turkey eggs are twice as big as chicken eggs.

ELECTION IDEAS

Duck for President

Read Duck for President by Doreen Cronin with students. Suggest that the class have an election for a new boss of the barnyard. Have students recall the different types of animals in the story; then list the animals on the board to identify election candidates. Over a few days, encourage each youngster to make a poster for his favorite candidate and ask each of several students to tell the group why he thinks his chosen candidate is the best. On a designated day, have each youngster vote for his favorite candidate by secret ballet (ballot pattern). Count the votes with students and record the results on the board. (If there is a tie, determine how to resolve it with student input.) Declare the top vote-getter the boss of the barnyard.

Election Day Song
(sung to the tune of “Down by the Station”)

The day for elections
Is early in November.
It’s always on a Tuesday,
When people vote.

See the voters at the polls,
There they can cast their ballots.
Vote! Vote! Count! Count!
See who wins!

Presidential Characteristics

Aside from citizenship and age requirements, political candidates must possess certain qualities. Have students brainstorm what these must-have attributes are. Honesty? Objectivity? Global awareness? Calmness under pressure? Have the class vote to reduce the list to ten characteristics. Then have each student individually rank each item in the list in the order of its importance. Tabulate students’ opinions for each separate trait. Then divide students into groups to graph the results on posters, creating a presidential profile.

New Release

We're decorating cupcakes here today!

What Fear?

"The Little Old Lady Who Was Not Afraid of Anything," by Linda Williams

This story works perfect for an interactive read aloud! In the story, an old lady walks home one night and is followed by shaking clothing, amongst other things. Everything that follows her ends up being the perfect makings of a scarecrow. Bring in articles of clothing that match up with the story and encourage your students to wiggle and shake their props as the story is read again, or retold by another student.

Click on the Posting Title for a link to a Readers' Theatre that goes along with the story as well or check out this post reading activity that encorporates Science.

FIVE SENSES REPORT
Under each heading, list at least three words to describe a forest:
Sights
Sounds
Smells
Colors
Tastes

Use the words in a five senses report

The forest is (color)_______________________
It sounds like____________________________
It tastes like_____________________________
It smells like_____________________________
It looks like______________________________
It makes me feel like_______________________

Walk to School Day

International Walk to School Day - October 8, 2008
This day encourages students to exercise and communities to create safer walking and biking routes. For ideas on how to organize an event, promotional materials, and more, visit the link that is attached to the posting title!

E-Mentoring Program

Free for Title 1 Schools
In2Books is an e-mentoring program that pairs students with adult pen pals to correspond about books they read. New to the site is Student Place, which is designed to help students choose books they would like to read based on genre, reading level, and more. It's all for grades 3-5. Visit the site attached to this posting title to learn more.

Family Day

Studies show that the more kids eat dinner with their families, the more likely they are to get better grades and the less likely they are to smoke cigarettes and use drugs and alcohol. Family Day - A Day to Eat Dinner with Your Children reminds parents that what kids really want at the dinner table is to spend time with them! This year's celebration is September 22, 2008. Learn more by clicking on the posting title listed above!

Create a Winning Classroom Contest

Use Carson-Dellosa classroom decoratives to create an inspiring, fun classroom design and you could win a shopping spree! The Create a Winning Classroom Contest awards one PreK-8 teacher a $1,000 shopping spree for Carson Dellosa materials at a teacher supply store. Twenty first-prize winners receive $100 shopping sprees, and 100 second-prize winners receive $25 shopping sprees. Get entry forms by clicking on the posting title above. The deadline is September 15, 2008.

Teaching Economics with Children's Literature

Visit the link attached to this posting for ideas!

Creative Fundraiser

Looking for a creative fundraiser? Consider ArtStamps, a program in which students have their original artwork turned into real U.S. postage stamps. As a bonus, students who submit artwork by December 31 will be entered to win the National Artistic Achievement Award. Winners in each of five groups win $50 to $500, receive their artwork in a custom frame, and have it displayed on the ArtStamps Web site. To learn more, visit the link attached to the posting title.

Literature Activities

Click the posting title for literature activities for the books, "One Odd Day," "My Even Day," or "My Half Day" or cut and paste the following link into your browser.

http://www.sylvandellpublishing.com/documents/OddEvenHalfTeachingActivities.pdf

Fancy Writing

Get your writers to use fancy talk using "Fancy Nancy," by Jane O'Connor

Book Synopsis (taken from inside sleeve)
Meet Nancy, who believes that more is ALWAYS better when it comes to being fancy. From the top of her tiara down to her sparkly studded shoes, Nancy is determined to teach her family a thing or two about being fancy.

How Nancy transforms her parents and little sister for one enchanted evening makes for a story that is funny and warm -- with or without the frills.

Pre-Reading Activity - make a list of fancy words and come up with the synonyms for them.

Post Reading Activity - Encourage students to use "fancy" words in their writing. Post on a display with fancy decorations. Have a "fancy" dress up day and encourage students to wear fancy clothing and use fancy words when talking.

Blog Makeover

Don't you love it? I want to thank Danielle from
www.blogsbydanielle.blogspot.com for my makeover. I could just stare at it all day - it's too darn cute! It makes me miss teaching even more! Thank you Danielle for your gift of design and eye for detail.

Field Trips Grant Program

This year, Target will award 5,000 grants of up to $800 for for field trips. Applications will be available online from September 2 - November 1, 2008. Previous winners are welcome to apply.

Visit Target.com/teachers for more information and to apply for a field trip grant.

Small Favor, Big Impact

I have a small favor to ask of every one that visits my site that could make a big impact for Adopt-A-Classroom and America’s teachers. For the second year, American Express Members Project is giving away $1.5 million to the project that receives the most nominations on the Members Project website at http://www.membersproject.com. Last year, Adopt-A-Classroom made it into the Top 25. This year the focus is on national attention to the importance of teachers in our communities and the issues they face. I greatly appreciate your taking a few minutes to go to memberssproject.com and nominate “Adopt a Classroom - Support America’s Teachers.” You do NOT need to be an American Express cardholder to nominate a project. (This is a big difference from last year’s campaign.) Help Adopt-A-Classroom win $1.5 million to support America’s teachers. As an FYI, this is the first of 3 rounds of voting. The next round narrows it from Top 25 to Top 5 and the final round narrows it to a winner. Thanks so much for doing this. Please forward this email to your friends and family.

Visit Adopt-A-Classroom's website at

Matter - Particle Pictures

Lesson Adapted from "Mailbox Books"
Grade 2-3; Oct-Nov 2007 Edition
Debbie Ann Troha, Wrights Mill Road Elementary, Auburn, AL - Theresa Bales, Kimball Elementary School, Kimball, WV

The concept of the three states of matter comes fairly easy for most third graders. By the time we are ready to discuss the particles of matter, the concept becomes difficult. First of all, what is a particle and how can you describe it?

I came across this lesson in one of my "Mailbox Books" last year and tested it out for myself. It quickly became one of my favorite lessons used to cumulate the unit on Matter. It's called "Particle Pictures" and requires very little materials (11" x 14" light colored construction paper, markers or crayons, glue, and O-shaped Cereal - may I suggest Cheerios so you can clip a Box Top?).

After discussing the main states of matter and their characteristics, distribute materials and have each student label their paper as shown with "solid," "liquid," and "gas." Next, direct them to draw the outline of a picture to represent each state of matter. Then have them glue O-shaped cereal in each outline, placing the cereal pieces in the solid shape close together, in the liquid a little farther apart, and in the gas very far apart.

It gets a little glue crazy, but I really believe it helps in understanding the particles of matter.

Let me know if you choose to do this lesson and how it goes!

Box Tops for Education

Earn Money for Your School!

Brand name products can help you earn cash for your child's school. Simply clip the Box Tops coupons located on various products and send the Box Tops to your school - for each coupon you clip, your school will recieve 10 cents! Most school's Parent-Teacher Organizations participate in this program. You'd be amazed how much money the school earns from these simple Box Tops. Just over the past two months, I have collected a total of $8.90 - from products we use every day in our home - including Cheerios, Huggies Wipes, Fiber One Bars, and Ziplock Storage Bags.

If you do not have a child in school, clip them and mail them to a school located near you. Or, if you really want - mail them to my favorite school - Farmington Elementary School, 500 Sunset Lane, Culpeper, VA 22701 - tell them my blog made you do it!

First Day Jitters

First Day Jitters Julie Danneberg (Author), Judith Dufour Love (Illustrator)
This is a great book for the first day - provides an immediate pre-reading activity about some of the "jitters" students have on the first day of school - whether they are returning students or are new to the school itself.

If you've never read it - pick up a copy and don't read it! Save it to read for the first time to your students on the first day of school - you'll be just as surprised as they are!

Click on the link below for a free downloadable discussion guide that goes along with the book.
http://charlesbridge.com/

Instructional Spending Money

Those closest to me and the inclined plane know that I have our allowance spent long before the school year begins. It's no wonder. Have you looked through the catalogs that are showing up in your mailbox? Here are two things of interest:

Teacher Created Resources - Fall 2008

It's called, "The Ultimate Pocket Chart" - it's "clearly" the only pocket chart you'll ever need! It offers limitless possibilities for interactive lessons. It's made of clear vinyl, has a huge center opening, and 10 rows of pockets on both sides. Many and varied inserts to present lessons. You must admit, you gotta have this!

The second is from Smile Makers. It's an incentive/reward item. I don't own a pair of Crocs (yet), but I understand they are incredibly comfortable. They have the little "snipits" you can poke through the holes of your shoes. I know a lot of the girls in my class last year owned them - strolling in with little horses, flowers, rainbows, or ladybugs on their shoes. Smile Makers has a similar item for these snipits called "snap bracelets." You can order celebration buttons to put on the bracelets, much like the Crocs. Check them out - too cute!

The Mailbox Books

Any one who has taught with me knows I'm a huge fan of "The Mailbox Books." The lessons provided in these magazines are tested, engaging, fun, and everything (except for maybe a little of material gathering) is provided and prepared for you.

The Mailbox switchboard telephoned my home the other day asking if I was going to renew my subscription. How sadended I was to say that I was not only to later call them and renew - just at a different level - that level being PRESCHOOL. Being a stay-at-home mom (SAHM) doesn't mean I cannot continue to teach. I've already picked up two of their new Mix & Match Game books to setup and play with Owen. These books are available from Preschool - Grade 5. If you plan to do literature circles - they are great self-starter activities for one of your groups.

And as always, if you are looking for a new, engaging, and unique lesson for Grade 2-3 and want to view my archives or need a suggestion, please leave a comment and I'll gladly flip through my books to help you out! You know I view these books from cover to cover!