Where has the time gone???

Oh my!  I can't believe it has been over a month since I last posted!  All I can say is "I'm sorry!"  I got caught up tonight and feel so much better!  We have had a great first semester - I can't believe it is getting ready to end and we will start a new year!  Time really does fly - whether you're having fun or not!  However, we always try to have fun in my class! 

Looking forward to a few days of having fun this week! 

Gingerbread Men Unit

We have been working on a gingerbread unit for the past two weeks.  We have read several types of Gingerbread men stories - including The Gingerbread Cowboy and The Gingerbread Girl - this was their favorite because she didn't get eaten in the end!)  We worked on what happened at the beginning, middle, end of each story.  We sequenced the stories.  We compared the Gingerbread Man to the Gingerbread Girl using a Venn diagram.  We discussed characters and setting.  Whew!

We made gingerbread ornaments that later had to be thrown away because 2 little fellas tried to eat them - imagine their surprise when it didn't taste very good (by the way, it was only made of applesauce and cinnamon). 

We finally made real gingerbread cookies and graphed what was eaten first - head, leg or arm.  These turned out yummy. 

Yummy!

Some serious decorating!

Family Holiday posters

I absolutely love the holiday tradition posters that we did this month!  Each family had to make a poster, draw each family members' hands and write what each person loves about the holidays.  Some favorites mentioned: presents, spending time with family, decorating the tree, Christmas lights, traditions.  They were awesome!  I have great families!

Michelle

Landon

Kenna

Logan

Ms. Angela

Ms. Cathy

Hunter

Billyjo

Dalton

Ms. Debi

Putting up our Tree - Oh What Fun!

I love Christmas!  Once Thanksgiving is over, I am ready to put up the tree.  This year, my kiddos really got into helping.  With Christmas music playing, we had a blast!

Grrrr!  The lights are all tangled!

Somehow when Michelle was unwrapping the lights, she ended up wrapping herself up in the lights!

Making Our Christmas shirts!

We were lucky to have Kenna's mom, Amanda, come and help us make our Christmas shirts this year.  She offered and I jumped on it!  they turned out super and we wear them every Friday during the month of December.  I will post a picture of us all wearing them as soon as I can get one.  So far on Fridays, either someone has been out or forgotten to wear their shirt. 

The students did a better job than I did when we were getting our feet painted. 

He loved it!

Thanks Amanda!

Ick!

Monster Unit

We had so much fun reading different "Monster" books (good ones, not bad - of course!)  I think "Tickle Monster" was everyone's favorite!  We made our own monsters and displayed them outside our room.  We receied lots of compliments on our monsters.  Some students who were not in my class liked them so much, they went home and made their own monsters.

Pumpkin Jack

We have had sooooo much fun with different pumpkin activities.  We read a book called Pumpkin Jack.  It was about a boy who had a jack-o-lantern named "Jack".  The entire story takes Jack through dying (composing), replanting of his seeds, and growing into other pumpkins.

We are going to watch our own Pumpkin Jack and see what happens to him over time.  We covered him up very well, because he got a little on the stinky side.   When they saw the mold developing, all of the students were saying "yuck!"  It didn't phase Landon though, he tried to pick him up. 

We will be watching him and making observations over the next months.

How many pumpkins tall are you?

We enjoyed seeing how tall we all are compared to the pumpkins.  We also made pages for a class book related to this activity.   It is sad to see how short I am though!  Some of my students are catching up to me!

Ms. Cathy

Ms. Debi (They love it when I get them involved - HaHa!

Michelle

Kenna

Billyjo

Landon

Dalton

Ms. Angela

Logan