Friday, June 6, 2014

Five for Friday


Yet again, another short break from blogging. I swear, I do want to blog! After all, I always take pictures during the week in anticipation for my weekly Five for Friday post. But lately, I have just been beat and exhausted to the point that I have no energy left to blog. I also write and send out my class newsletter when I get home from school on Fridays so that zaps a lot of energy out of me, leaving me with no energy to type another blog post.

BUT, given how we just finished our last full week of school, I am pushing myself to post even though I'm exhausted beyond no other.



I surprised my kiddos on Monday morning with a surprise field trip! We were going to walk to a park close by and have a field day and bbq there! My parents are great because they helped me keep this secret. I recruited some parents to help plan and get people to sign up for food for the bbq. I also sent home the permission slips in sealed envelopes and asked parents to do the same.

BUT, before I could reveal the surprise to the class, I got a surprise from them.


Belated birthday gift! I guess the kiddos secretly used Google Documents in their Google Account to make a page for my very special birthday book. Very sweet of them. Some of the messages in there almost made me tear up!

But, back to the field trip. The kids said hooray. The walking chaperones showed up and off to the park we went! Some of the activities for the day were...

Relay Races - three-legged race



Oops...some kiddos fell there...

Hike around the lake where we ran into a lost turtle.


Making some ice cream in a bag.

...and ending the day with some celebratory cake! A couple weeks ago my friend who is a photographer came to take pictures of the kiddos with their published book. We also took a class picture which all my parents say is better than the class photo from picture day. Guess the picture is so awesome it deserves to be on a cake!

The cake was also special on the inside too! Two flavors!


On Tuesday, we worked on our Father's Day gift. For some reason I thought Father's Day was this coming Sunday but I was wrong. Oh well, now we have our gifts ready already! We made a coupon book for Mother's Day so I thought it would only be fair to make on for the dads too. I had the kids draw a self-portrait of their dad wearing a tie. I laminated their pictures and then attached the coupon book from Savvy Second Graders to the bottom of the tie. They turned out real cute!









Wednesday was Judgement Day!


The kids spent the last two weeks planning and writing a persuasive letter. The purpose of the letter was to convince the judge (me) that they should be sentenced to third grade. (I saw this idea on a Teaching Maddeness)

On Judgement Day the kids went up to the judge one at a time and read their letter outloud. Then they waited to hear their sentence.


They did a great job and everyone got sentenced to third grade!


The students have been writing their autobiography for the last couple of weeks. Today was the day we added our peer comments (basically like signing yearbooks). We went around the classroom in Scoot formation and wrote some positive peer comments in our classmates' autobiography books.






Our last session with our Art parent was this week. The kids made house collages. They used a variety of scrapbook paper to create a house and some scenery. 







Well, I reached my five. Would you believe it if I said that there are still more things to share about this week? I guess you'll have to come back next time to find out more! (Hint: Has to do with opera and our published books)

6 comments:

  1. This comment has been removed by the author.

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    1. I do have some awesome families this year! Nothing would have ever happened in this classroom if it weren't for them! Thanks for the follow! :)

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  2. You have so much fun in your classroom! That field trip looks like so much fun! I definitely plan to try the "Judgment Day" essay idea with my second graders, too. Thanks for the great idea!

    Sally from Elementary Matters

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    1. I was really happy with the results of what I got on Judgement Day. I hope you do too! :)

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  3. It looks like you had a great week! I'm jealous that your school is walking distance from that beautiful park. By the way, the idea for "Judgement Day" is from Amanda Madden from Teaching Maddeness (http://www.teachingmaddeness.com). I love that idea, and I may have to try it.
    The Traveling Teacher

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    1. Thank you for helping me find the blog! I need to pin it so I can find it again. Now I can give her the credit she deserves! :)

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