Valentine's Day Pack In Action

My students started working on the stations in my Valentine's Day pack.  THEY LOVED IT!  My students were so engaged and the conversations were great!  I love hearing them learn and talk about what they know to each other.  They were sad when our Daily 5 time was up and can't wait for tomorrow's  Daily 5 time.

 

 

My sister's 2nd grade class also started this today and she said they also loved it.  Her student's told her that I was cool.  :) 

 

 

You can get the awesome packet full of fun things for the kids to do while learning here. That's the best part! 

 

 

This week in a wrap

This week we covered one of my favorite topics in Social Studies and one of my best selling items on TPT.  We did the Social Studies Government Breakdown and oh my goodness the conversations they were having.  I was just smiling walking around the room.  They sorted the descriptions together one day and made a venn diagram comparing/contrasting Mayor, Governor, & President.  Then, the next day they created their tree maps after sorting the descriptions again.  I loved hearing them talk to each other about what they learned and already know! 

 

 

 

 

 

 We have also been going over the Water Cycle and I got to pull out a game I found a few years back.  You can get it here along with other ideas.  It's a fun game where the kids are water droplets and they move all different places (ground water, soil, clouds, river, lakes, ect).  It's neat to see how everybody went different places throughout the process.  They love it!

 

 

It was also the 100th day of school and 1st and Kinder had some cute decorations and activities that I thought I would share.  Second doesn't get to do all that fun stuff but it was sure cute to see around the school!    This is a poster they hung for the 100 days and then said the celebration continues!  Fun!

New to my TPT store

Christmas break has been wonderful and it's sad that there is only one more day left.  I have had a great time relaxing with my family and enjoying my two sweet boys.  I don't seem to see them enough during the school year.  I have added a few new things to my store and I am excited about my new Valentine Reading Station Pack.

This is my new Valentine set.  I love themed sets and try to change it up every now and then.  I can't wait for February to bust this out and see what the kids think.  You can get this set here.

Our hall theme this year is All Stars.  I created this for my team and we all hung this outside our classrooms.  I just took these down but they were so cute.  I had each kid hold a bat and put on a batting helmet.  I then cut their pictures out and put it in the oval and made a long pennant outside my classroom.  They enjoyed seeing themselves and others enjoyed reading information about each kid.  You can get this FREE here.

 

 

Types of Sentences is going to be a great station for my kids to work in for a few days.  I can't wait to get this up and going.  You can purchase the set here.  I will for sure be posting this set in action soon!

 

I just love doing Star Student and showcasing those kiddos.  I draw a name each week and that student is the star student all week long.  They get to bring in some small things to show off their interests.  They also get showcased in the weekly newsletter.  They LOVE it.  This little bundle has all you need to have a star student.  (2 different sheets they can fill out with their information, 2 different posters, certificate, a letter to the parents, and questions to ask the star student for the newsletter)  You can get all of it here.

 

 

 

I hope you all had a great break and rest up your little ones are coming back soon!  Mine will be waiting on me Monday morning! 

 

 

 

 

TPT SALE

My store hit a milestone and so I'm having a sale!  Come on over and get you some goodies while they are on sale. 

Mrs. Cate's Adventures TPT Shop

 

Natural Resources

This past week we learned about Natural Resources.  We watched a video and then did my Natural Resource Match while discussing.  The next day I assigned them all to a group and a destination.  I told them they were going to be dropped off at this location and they were to determine the Natural Resources that were already there and then only take 5 things that they could bring with them.  THEY LOVED THIS!  Talk about the conversations that they ere having.  I loved it!

 

One group was in the DESERT and they wanted t take a sleeping bag, which was on the list.  Here is how the conversation went.

Girl 1:  We need to take a sleeping bag so we can have a place to sleep.

Girl 2:  Yes!

Boy: No, we can sleep on a sleep on the ground.

Girl 1: NO WAY!  I am not doing that!

 

 

 

 

Too cute!  You can get my Natural Resource pack here.  It has this group activity, a word sort, cut and paste, another definition sort, and definition poster.  It's a great pack to teach your students all about Natural Resources.

3D Shapes

We studied 2D and 3D shapes and it was a good time to bring out my unit to add to the daily lessons.  The kids loved the sorting, coloring, and identifying the shapes while learning :)  That's always a good thing right?  You can get this packet here.

 

 

 

This packet includes:

What Shape Am I activity - see below

Shape  Color - see below

Shape match (I didn't get a picture of the tables matching the shapes to the correct name)

 

I had to share this too.  My students were writing postcards to someone about a vacation they dream about going on.  I had a few students get out their planners that had the United States on it to look up how to spell the state they were visiting!  They were all worried about how to spell states and this was a perfect solution to help them.

Lately

Amongst all the first of the year testing (still doing some) and getting adjusted to a new school, I have been absent from blogging.  Here are a few things we have been doing lately in class.

 

 I got my students book boxes (ice cube boxes from Wal-Mart -- so much cheaper!) and added my calendar numbers to them.  You can get my calendar numbers here.

While introducing Daily 5, we made anchor charts with watch the teacher and student should be doing during each rotation.  I took pictures of my students doing it correctly and posted them next to the anchor charts.  They loved seeing themselves in pictures and it's easy to refer to if you seeing them trying to do it wrong!

 

 

When looking to see if they understand if they knew Fiction and Non-Fiction titles/books, I gave them a scholastic book order and they sorted the pictures.  They did some shopping too and enjoyed this assessment.

I got to hang up some awesome work created by my students and they loved seeing their work in the room.  On this assignment, they created their own problem story and showed me how they solved it.  Some were really creative!

 

 

Finally and most recently I finished my writing example wall.  You can get the awesome writing set  hereand the 'write" pencil here.