Five for Friday

Since I'm supposedly back to the blogging world that means back to my weekly (hopefully) Five for Friday!

My theme this week was about giving thanks. We started by reading Thanksgiving is for Giving Thanks.

(Click on the image to see it on Amazon)

The book basically goes through different things that different kids are thankful for and the reasons why. This led to a discussion about what we are thankful for, which I listed on a circle map. (Love thinking maps!)

Once we listed the things we were thankful for, it was time for some writing!

Writing template came from Shawna Devoe from The Picture Book's Teacher Edition.

I didn't take pictures of everything...I wish I had. But on a different day we talked about nouns. I incorporated our theme of giving thanks to nouns by have the kids categorize the things we were thankful for into people/animals, places, and things. We also went through our circle map and sorted the words there.

Here's what I do have pictures of though! Thankful turkeys! Template courtesy of First Grade Fanatics. 

These are now hung up on our classroom window (my makeshift bulletin board). 

Thursday nights are "date" nights with the boyfriend. I'm a pretty easy date to satisfy because all I ever want are french fries. They are my comfort food! Mmmm~

Today, a volunteer docent from a nearby art museum came to do an in-class presentation on art. He talked about lines, color, and texture. Then the class got to look at different pieces of artwork and try to identify the lines, colors, and textures they saw.

Cuddles time with the pup when I get home!

He's starting to get a fan club in my classroom. (I talk about him a lot in class and show my kiddos pictures and videos of him) Students are turning in fanart of Snap!

The week is finally over! It felt SO long! Probably had to do with it being the last week the benchmark window was open. One of the benchmarks we have to assess is F&P testing, which is done 1-on-1. All of us first grade teachers were given a half-day sub for testing, but four hours is definitely not enough time to test 22 kids. I think I only had 8 students officially done after those four hours! Ended up not meeting with my reading groups this week so that I could have that hour to keep testing kids. Managed to finish all of them on time. Phew! Now to get report cards finished. Good thing we get a long weekend to complete them. Too bad I also scheduled a mini vacation with the boyfriend to Santa Cruz for the weekend just to relax. Oh well. Things will get done eventually!

Just out of curiosity, who else has Monday off? At least two other districts I know of are only taking Tuesday off for Veteran's Day which is just very strange to me. I am super thankful for this four-day weekend. I definitely need it!

Thankful Turkeys

So my district takes the entire week of Thanksgiving off which is great! Except, with all the stuff that happened in November, there was no time to really incorporate a Veteran's day and Thanksgiving lesson. The best I could do for Veteran's day was quickly talk about veterans with the class and incorporate some reading comprehension and writing in the homework. Thanksgiving is even harder to stick in with the entire week off. So we did a quick craft and writing. My students are always asking if they could take the crafts or artwork we make in class home. Of course, I always say no because 1) I want to hang them in the classroom for display and 2) Don't want the artwork to get ruined in backpacks. But this was the perfect craft for the kids to take home just in time for Thanksgiving!

May I present you the thankful turkey!

My example. Why skittles? Read to the end to find out!

Got the turkey patterns from First Grade Fanatics. Of course, I always like to add some sort of writing to our crafts so before making the craft, I had the kids write in their journals a list of five things they are thankful for. After they made their turkeys, they were told to do their writing in pencil first. After they finished writing in pencil, they got a sharpie (oh MY were they excited) to trace over it. 

Now here are some student samples! They turned out very cute!

I took individual pictures of the kids with their turkeys to add to our memory book for the end of the year (my gift to the class at the end of the year). I also added some yarn to the back of the turkeys so that the kids could hang on the wall at home.

Another turkey activity we did was with our fifth grade buddy class (classroom next door neighbors). Roll a Turkey! Got the game from Adventures in Room 5. The kids really love the "Roll a _____" games. This resulted in the use of a bulletin board between our classrooms that has been neglected for years!

And finally, the skittles story. I am not a big chocolate fan. I can probably have two pieces of chocolate and then be done with it. Last year I discovered that chocolates are like one of the default gifts to give to teachers so I would get tons of chocolates for the gift-giving holidays and just give them to my mom to eat. So this year I decided to tell my kids and really emphasize with them that I don't like chocolate but prefer fruity candy. So I chose skittles. And now everything is about skittles. If a kid keeps forgetting something, I jokingly tell them that they owe me a bag of skittles (which I sometimes get!). The day after Halloween, around half of my kids came to school with a bag of skittles for me from their trick-or-treating stash (my desk drawer is now full!). Even during Art, when we were making collages from magazine clips, my kids thought they saw a snippet of a skittle bag and got super excited about it. So I thought I would add that on my turkey as something I'm thankful for just for fun. :)

Thanks for reading to the end! My next post will be about the different art lessons we have done in class so far. I am so grateful to have such a wonderful parent as an art docent. She comes up with the best lessons! So don't forget to stay tune for next time's post! :)