Outer Space and Football

Can you believe it's already the last week in August!?!?! While we have had a great 3 full weeks of school so far, I must say that I am looking forward to the long Labor Day weekend coming up.

This week we focused on our solar system with our expository text "Exploring Space with an Astronaut".  Let me talk about how much I LOVE integrating Science and Social Studies into Reading!! Our skill this week was "main idea and details", so I found lots of solar stystem books from our local public library to put in our classroom for the week. I used this one for a read-aloud:

It was perfect for main idea and details because each page had one fact/detail which went great with the graphic organizer. After the read-aloud, the students worked with a partner to list 4 details and the main idea of the text. 

graphic organizer found here

I also found this great main idea game that my kids LOVED!

There are 4 sentences strips in each bag - 1 is the main idea and 3 are details. As a group, they had to decide what was the main idea of the bag and write it on the recording sheet. They all  had to agree on the same main idea before writing it down. I had one designated person from each table be the "messenger" to bring me the bags and get a new one for their table-which worked great for no arguing/ fussing over who gets to take the bag! For the most part, all the groups worked great together and everybody finished. Yay for cooperative learning! 

In Science, we made a model of the order of the planets in the Solar System. I had to explain that the planets are not actually lined up like this, but they are actually orbiting the sun-the center of our solar system. They have really soaked in all this space knowledge like a sponge. :) AND we get to continue our study next week with a new reading story!

you can see the working buddies made their appearance again today :)

We also started our "Star of the Week" for the first time, so it was fun celebrating a sweet student this week. I can't wait to do it 19 more times with each of my sweeties! 

Now, for Friday and that long weekend.........

Shawn and I will be cheering on the Alabama Crimson Tide in Atlanta for the Chick-fil-a Kickoff Game vs. West Virginia. Here are a few pictures from last year's festivities:

Hubs (fiancé at the time)

Best friends/bridesmaids

if we go to the ATL, we gotta make it to a Braves game!

See you guys after the long weekend!

Communities and Coins

Y'all, it's official.

I have the best class in. the. whole. world. Not even kidding. These kids rock! We had a couple of friends turn 7 this week, so it's been fun celebrating birthdays and watching these little people grow in the short 2 weeks I've had them.

This week our Reading was integrated with a Social Studies unit about urban, suburban, and rural communities. We worked on a really cool project using an old shoebox to make community dioramas. The kids were given an urban, suburban, or rural setting on paper that they colored, cut, and glued inside the shoebox. They even had a sign where they could create a name for their town - these were hilarious!! My favorite town name is probably "TJ Yeldon Town"-who is an Alabama football player. If you're a 7 year old boy living in Tuscaloosa, you obviously have to name your shoebox town after a football player!

Here are some other finished dioramas-they ALL turned out fantastic!!

 

In math this week, I really focused on identifying coin and coin values. On Friday, we started a game called "Collect $0.25", where you have to add/trade coins to get to 25 cents. In Alabama, 2nd grade is the first time students get exposed to money (which is crazy to me!). This meant that we had to learn these coins ASAP if we had to play games with them! I used Blair Turner's 2nd Grade Interactive Notebook to start learning about some moolah! (I wrote about the interactive notebook in this post before school started). 

First, we made a chart about the 4 main types of coins. The kiddos were given a container of coins, wrote down their observations about them, and then we discussed their observations in whole group. 

ignore the disgusting board-learning happens here!

On Wednesday, we finally broke out our math journals for the first time and started with our interactive notebooks. I think what I love the most about these math journals is that it will become a tool and resource for the kids. They can always get out their math journal if they need help remembering how much a nickel is worth because we organized all the information in a really cool way. 

the fish is a working buddy-they sit on quiet desks and watch the student work hard. A great behavior management tool!!

messes = hard work, right???

We also started counting strips this week. We used machine tape to count as high as we could! Some of my kids got in the 800s by the end of the week. I was also able to see who really needed help with place value once they got past 99. They loved to see how high they could count-I loved to see how diligent they could work on writing 800 numbers!! That's a lot of work!

That's our week in a nutshell! It's relieving to finally be in a routine and get to work in our reading and math programs.

Oh, and have I mentioned I LOVE my sweeties?!?! :)

First Full Week of School!

Oh. My. Word.

Never have I ever felt such exhaustion. I've been running around the halls like a crazy person these first few days, and my legs and feet have never been so sore. I LOVE IT!! This means that I am back in full swing, ladies and gentlemen. I've got such a sweet, precious class-I know we are going to have a great year together! Here is the first full week with my new sweeties:

Monday:
4 - count 'em - FOUR new faces joined our class Monday morning. (Did I mention I've been running around like a crazy person??) Our class is finally complete with 21 sweeties, and we are rockin' and rollin'.

I decided to do an author study with Kevin Henkes books this week, so we started with a first week of school classic: Chrysanthemum.

(click on the pictures to find the books on Amazon)

We talked about how our words can make other people sad or happy - wilt or bloom. We watched what happened to Chrysanthemum's heart as the mean words were said to her (wrinkled a big red paper heart) and then opened it up when Mrs. Twinkle was nice to her. We signed the heart and hung it on the wall outside our classroom, saying that we promise to never use our words to wrinkle others' hearts. They took it very seriously. Too. Stinkin'. Sweet. 

Tuesday:

We made Chrysanthemum flowers and wrote about what makes us wilt and what makes us bloom. Find the activity here with Hollie Griffith. 

cutie-patootie

Wednesday:
Sorry, no pictures. We finished our Reading Baseline Test and went to the library for the first time. Not a very exciting day, just practiced routines, rules, blah blah blah. You know how it goes!

Thursday:

 Why haven't I read this book more often?!?? Kids stress and worry, too. This book really allowed for some connections-everybody worries, but it doesn't have to be all that you do! Our reading skill for this book was compare/contrast with Venn diagrams and text-to-self connections. I got all the materials I needed from Read with Me ABC. My kids loved it!

Friday:

We had our first visitor today!

Back off ladies, he's mine. :)

My class LOVED my husband, and he's such a good reader! He asked them good questions throughout the book and made them giggle a lot-especially the girls. It was so great having "Mr. Shawn" come visit. In honor of his month in the NICU at DCH, he read Julius, The Baby of the World to wrap up our Kevin Henkes week. 

After he read, we made a Wemberly craft and connection from Worried Wemberly Back to School Activities. I love the way they turned out!

I promise I teach math! We've been practicing using math tools such as connecting cubes and shape blocks. We are perfecting the way we sit on the carpet for math talk time and work in groups during math workshop. Next week comes the interactive, cooperative learning!

That wraps up our week! Overall, I'm really impressed with my crew. They work great in groups and want to make me happy - every teacher's dream! I keep forgetting they are only 7 years old. We've definitely got some growing to do, but I think we are going to have a lot of fun together!

Now for a 9:30 bedtime on a Friday night. I know, I know.

Don't judge.