Earth Day and Moving

This week my kids LOVED learning about Earth Day. Below are some pictures of activities we did. One of the charts is about how they dream the world should be. I use the book "We Dream of a World" that is written by kids. After we read the book, I have my kiddos add to it and then we make our own book. I am always touched by what the kids have to say and what they want to add to our chart and write about. This year, my chart paper was filled and I had to use my dry erase board to get all of their ideas down. It was precious.

Underneath they wrote their Earth day pledge.

KWL

The kids also made their own earth by coloring a paper plate blue with coloring pencils and then used a green paint handprint to represent a helping hand. This was used to decorate their writing.

I'm looking forward to next week's  unit - Pond Life. Let's see if anyone brings tadpoles in to observe!

I also found out this week that I will be moving to kindergarten next year. I'm excited. My first year teaching was in kindergarten. I started packing up some of my stuff today. It is amazing how much can be acculumated in such a short amount of time (and the dust!). I'm a little sad to be leaving the land of first grade. I had said before that if I ever moved, I wanted to go back to kindergarten. I just didn't expect it to be so soon. But here's to an adventure in kindergarten! :) 

No Voice, SPIDER!, Some Kindness, and a New Mini Unit with a FREEBIE!

First of all, HAPPY FRIDAY!

Oh my, this was one of those mornings where you feel like you should just turn around and go back to bed. I woke up with no voice, thanks to wonderful allergies. And I had spilled 2 drinks before I even got to school. This was not going to be a good day.

Then, when my students were doing independent reading/AR and conferencing with me...I saw it. I saw a big fat brown spider lurking beside one of my student tables.

This isn't the famous spider from my classroom. Sorry guys I was a little too panicky when I saw it to stop and take a picture. Thank the Lord my students were otherwise occupied and it wasn't direct instruction time. The kiddos that were watching me must have been wondering what I was doing. I looked around, still frozen, for something to kill it with, found my watering can and smushed it. By then everyone's eyes were on me (apparently all it takes it hitting a watering can on the floor). And when I asked for a tissue, they brought me every box in the room! Whew, I don't want that to happen EVER again.

On a good note, during stations today, their writing station was to write a letter to someone in the room telling them something they were good at or something they liked about that person. We talked about putting lots of effort and love into the letter. Students drew numbers to see who they would get. I had mine in there too, which meant I also wrote a letter. I was really surprised at the response I got. Students put their letters in our "mailbox" and I delivered them at snack time. The looks on their little faces reminded me of why I teach. They were so excited and immediately went to the one who wrote their letter to thank them. It was PRECIOUS!! Definately something I will do again. :)
Here's how students were able to randomly select a friend so everyone could get picked:

Below are some examples of the sweet letters:

And BTW, I have a new mini unit. I'm using it to go with Earth Day, because what kid doesn't like worms? It's for the book "Diary of a Worm" by Doreen Cronin. Click on the book cover to go by my TPT store to check it out!

Click below to get your writing FREEBIE!

Hope you all had an awesome week. So thankful that today is FRIDAY. Only 20something more days to go!!

Too Cute for Words!

While I was blog hopping looking for ideas for Earth Day, look what I came across!! This is so adorable and I know my firsties will love this activity! :) I found it at The Learning Tree blog - check it out!

 

I can't wait to use it!