Roll a Fairy Tale

Today we went as a school to see a performance of "Into the Woods" at a local high school. For those of you that are not familiar with the show, it is a show comprised of a mix of different fairy tales. Thus, I found it to be a perfect opportunity to embark on a short fairy tale unit in class!

We spent the past week and a half learning about fairy tale characteristics and analyzing several fairy tales in search of examples of these elements. 

Your Spanish lesson for the day :)

Cenicienta = Cinderella, Blancanieves = Snow White, Juan y los frijoles mágicos = Jack and the Beanstalk

After the show today, we then worked to learn a new activity that I will be placing in our "Work on Writing" center, called "Roll a Fairy Tale".  The purpose of this activity is for students to select the various story elements necessary to write their own fairy tale. The kicker is the story elements will be determined by the roll of a die!

Here are the pages necessary for the activity:

1. The elements sheet (it comes in English too :)). Students will roll a die four times, once for each category to determine which they will use to create their fairy tale.

2. They will then create their story on this writing page complete with a fairy tale intro! (It comes in Spanish too :))

I copy the pages back to back so that the students can refer to the planning page while they write. I also ask my students to circle the elements after rolling the die so they remember what they need to use.

Here are some examples of my own students' writing from today in class. They did a great job for their first stab at it!

(Once upon a time there was a boy names Bob and his mom Ally, the queen. They lived in a castle and his mother told him to do everything that she told him to do. His mom then told him to go outside to pick flowers and when he went outside he saw a magic wand and he used it to make all of his dreams come true and he lived "happily ever after".)

I had to include this next one too because it just cracks me up...ohh a second graders sense of humor..

PS. One of my native English speaker's wrote this one!

(Once upon a time there was a princess named Mrs. Toots-a-lot (I kid you not this is what he wrote ;)). But an old woman wanted the princess for herself because the princess was very beautiful. One day the princess saw a magic ninja and the ninja did not like the old woman either. So both took all of the food from the old woman and the old woman died. Then they lived happily ever after!). 

Grab a copy of the activity for your classroom for free by clicking on the image below.

Math Vocabulary Cards

Just finished creating word wall cards up through the remainder of the school year and thought I'd share this latest creation with all of you! In previous years, I had just used the good ole' sentence strips and a sharpie, but this year I thought I'd dress them up a bit.

These can be used for introducing vocabulary terms as well as a resource for students on your classroom "Math Word/Content Wall". I know I see my students refer to them all of the time, which puts a smile on my face!

The cards are aligned with the second grade Common Core vocabulary and come in both English and Spanish! Click on the image to check them out :)! All you have to do is print, cut, and laminate!

Multiplication Mania!

We have been knee deep in the beginnings of multiplication these past few days. Thought I'd share a few quick freebies with you all that I have created and/or enjoyed from other teachers that you may be able to use to do the multiplication basics with your kiddos!

First things first, a quick anchor chart....(We have been referring to this all week long to help us remember not only the different ways we can represent a multiplication story, but also how the addition and multiplication number models are interconnected!)

On Valentine's Day...(because the kids were not already on enough of a sugar high), we worked to create arrays for the first time using Nerds candies!

Just a quick note - we found that a dab of liquid glue worked the best, although my kids did have some success if they lathered on the glue stick! Also, my freebie does not include the dot grid that is included on this photo, because I cut and pasted one of the grids from our Everyday Math Journals to make it a little easier for my students to glue in neat rows and thus, could not claim them as my own! I encourage you to do the same, and/or your kids could also work to put the nerds into equal groups instead of creating the array. There are many ways it could be used! Grab this freebie in both English and Spanish here.

We have also been working on solving multiplication number stories. I was inspired by a freebie from Smiles from Second Grade to create this quick number story activity page for my students to complete during group today with me to review not only the two ways to represent a multiplication story, but also how to write the different number models effectively.

Here is a student who decided to use arrays...

and another who preferred equal groups/pictures..

Grab a copy of this in Spanish here. 

Grab a copy in English (by Smiles from Second Grade) here.

Borders for both freebies by Creative Clips.

Acts of Kindness Coupons

¡Feliz Día de Amor y la Amistad!

(Happy Day of Love and Friendship!)

We celebrated today, by working to spread a little love and kindness to those we love.

The students created "Acts of Kindness" coupons for their parents this morning to give to them as a thank you for all that they do! Each kid put together a mini booklet comprised of 8 coupons reflecting things that they were willing to do to help their parents out! Here are some examples they came up (some are quite cute and funny- def. things their parents will appreciate!):

"folding clothes with you" 

What parent wouldn't love their child to help clean the dog's poop!? Such a sweetheart!

Here is another doozy- "Change the diaper of my brother" :)

I have such giving kiddos!

Grab a copy of these coupons for free in English and Spanish for your students. I used them for Valentine's Day, but they could truly be done at any time of the year as a way for the students to give back!

Book Recommendations

One of the options that my students have in their "Read to Self" center is to write a book recommendation. It is just a short and sweet way for them to share what they are reading and enjoying with others (and it is a quick way for me to check in with what they are reading as well!). 

In our classroom library hanging on the wall we have our "What do you recommend?" board. This is where the students post their recommendations. I have it located in the library so that they can check it out when they book shop to see if there is anything they would like to check out!

Here is what the recommendations look like up close filled out by a few of my kiddos...

English

and Spanish (I have them printed back to back so they can decide based on the language of the book they are reading)

One thing I would highly recommend if you want quality "reasons for recommending" is to create an anchor chart and brainstorm with your students some good reasons/examples of why one may recommend a book. We did this (I meant to snap a photo of the chart...sorry for my failure!) and it really helped to boost their reasoning beyond because it was good or interesting, etc.

One other thing to note, is that I have my library organized by genre for the most part and then a few baskets mixed in with Dr. Seuss or Clifford books, etc. Thus, my students have the option of writing the genre or basket name depending on what makes more sense. I have left this option for you as well as created some with just "genre" and some with just "basket" as an option to hopefully accomodate for different library set ups.

Snag a free copy of this book recommendation that we use in both English and Spanish by clicking on the image below:

(Font: Kevin and Amanda, Border: Creative Clips)

"Super" Bowl Sale

Happy "Super" Bowl Sunday everyone!

While feasting on chips n' dip, lil weenies, and ice cold beverages today, take a moment to check out my TpT store if there is something that you have been eyeing! Everything in my store is up to 28% today only in honor of this auspicious occasion! I encourage you to check out many of your other favorite bloggers stores as well! Happy shoppin and football  commercial watchin!

Making the world a little brighter...

Every other week my class gets together with our 5th grade dual class (sidenote...check out my colleague Laura's blog as well @ Mrs. Castro's Class) to do a reading or writing activity. Recently we did a writing activity together tied to Martin Luther King Jr. and his dream for our country. After learning about Martin's dream, the kids worked together in the buddy pairs to compile their own dreams  for our world to make it a better place.

The kids each wrote a dream (the 5th graders were wonderful helpers for my kiddos) as well as each cut out a different colored hand to represent Martin's dream of us coming together and embracing diversity to attach!

Here are some examples of beautiful dreamers:

1.) "I have a dream that people will not fight."

2.) I have a dream that there is no war in the world."

1.) "I have a dream that people will play and learn more."

2.) "I have a dream that people will take care of animals."

As you can see, below each dream the student wrote his/her name on the shorter line. You could do this with another class, or within your own room by putting your students in partners. Or you could even have each student do it individually and write 2 dreams instead of one.

Here is our finished bulletin board with our dreams for our world!

If you'd like a free copy of this activity, click on the image below. It comes in English and Spanish.

(Border by Creative Clips)

In the spirit of thinking about how to make the world a little brighter, this week my kiddos completed their monthly service project. 

Our service project theme this month was "saying thanks" and "staying warm"!

Combine the two and we've got some adorable hot chocolate thank you cards.

First things first, yesterday, my kids and I taste tested some delicious hot chocolate after lunch and worked to describe it. Here is what we came up with:

Then today, we went back to this list and discussed which of the adjectives could also describe people, in particular the teachers and other staff members that work with us each day in our building. We outlined these words that described both hot chocolate and people with the blackish/brown marker.

After this, each of my kiddos received a post-it with the name of a teacher or staff member that has made a difference in our lives. 

I asked them to use 3 of the words from our chart that describe the selected individual to complete the key phrase "Hot chocolate is _________, ___________ and _____________. Just like you! Thank you for all that you do!"

They then glued their writing onto a hot chocolate mug (which you can snag free from Caitlin @ Kindergarten Smiles ) and glued on a few marshmallows for effect!

Finally, once they were finished, the kids brought over their project to me so I could add on the final touch- the real hot chocolate tied on by a ribbon to the back!

The kids had so much fun today delivering the chocolate to all of our super school helpers and were delighted to surprise them with such a simple gesture!

A little thank you goes a long way!

Here is the writing paper used for the activity if you'd like to try it out with your class in English!

(Border by Creative Clips)