WEEKLY REWIND – ADJECTIVES, MATH, AND QUESTION MARKS

I see a pattern emerging in these posts. It seems that I can’t make it to the party on time . . . I guess I am a Sunday share kind of a gal 🙂  I’m not going to fight it.  Instead, I will just blog on and not look back!

Here’s a little peek at last week.  The class and I found ourselves mixed up in all sorts of different things.  Just see for yourself . . . 

ADJECTIVE PUMPKINS
This is one of my favorite fall craftivities.  Not only does it teach students about the power of adjectives, but it also produces some of the best kid art a teacher could ask for.  These look stellar up on our wall . . . love seeing the imagination that was poured into these.

The kids selected an adjective to build their pumpkin around. Up top we have little, adorable, and pretty. Down below we have fancy and spooky.

This week we will follow up with oodles of related adjective activities.  This craft is part of my Adjective Pumpkins Pack.  

FALL-FLAVORED MATH
Math centers have been a must in the afternoon.  Rotations are the perfect way to in more standards and spiral review . . . and let’s face it . . . some days they are kinda sick of hearing my voice by the time 1:15 rolls around 🙂  With this said, we rolled, spun, graphed, and teamed up to work our way through some tricky concepts.

Pumpkin Graph & Spin

Going Batty for Missing Addends

Falling Into Subtraction (A little pumpkin seed snack helps the math flow.)

If you are looking for some October Themed Math Centers for firsties, I have a collection.  They are aligned to the CCSS and incorporate many of the concepts found in Module One of Engage NY.  

Oh, and while I am on the subject of fall flavored goodies, be sure you check out the Haunted Hop that I am participating in this week.  There are tons of fun FREEBIES up for grabs to get you through the rest of this month and part of November!

CLICK HERE . . . and magically transport to this blog hop!

DOUBLES
Doubles facts are no match for the kids in Room 18. To help us master these fun facts, we sang Ron Brown’s Doubles Song, made some doubles flash cards to keep in our desks, and completed Latoya Reed’s awesome Doubles Mini-Book.  It’s a freebie in her shop . . . SCORE!

Doubles Flash Cards The perfect 3-5 minute transition 🙂

This Doubles Mini-Book was a hit! Thanks, Ms. Reed!

QUESTIONS (CAPTAIN QUESTION MARK)
After focusing on the 3 Kinds of Sentences last week, we narrowed our scope to take an in depth look at questions.  The kids met Captain Question Mark and I have yet to see a backwards “hook” since this fancy introduction (read all about the Captain in last year’s post . . . HERE).

In addition to our Oscar-worthy acting, the kids sorted and wrote oodles of questions this week.  We even used the whole mystery box concept in a new way.  The crew knocked it out of the park!

Sorting questions and statements. Of course the question mark looks like a hook . . . themed learning rocks!

Fall is in full force around here! (Even though it was in the 90s all last week . . . sigh.)

We used the mystery box in a new way. It had to be a treasure box to go with my Captain Question Mark theme 🙂 Instead of writing a guess as to what was inside, the kids wrote questions. I answered all of them and the crew had the chance to guess what was hiding inside!

These activities are pretty easy to put together on your own, but if you are looking for a themed packet that has every base covered, check out my Captain Question Mark collection.  It’s a fun one 🙂

WRITING SERIES – PART II
Speaking of writing, I finally finished part two of my Writing Series.  I poured my heart and soul into this post as writing is my absolute favorite thing to teach.  There are oodles of unique ideas up for grabs that have proven to work wonders for first and second graders.  I promise that it’s worth the CLICK 🙂