What a "Seusstastic" Week!

Wow!  So much has happened and I haven't even been keeping up with my blog!  Today, while making fun writing with paint on our hands, I let the students have fun with my camera.  I am so sad because my husband bought me a new camera for Christmas and I am just not happy with it.  I cannot get it to take good pictures.  I think it is too smart and all I needed was a point and shoot camera... so please forgive my messy pictures! 

We had our Portfolio Conferences where the parents come in and look over their child's work for since the beginning of the year.  We are big on showing our growth off!  The students come so far in just a short amount of time and they all need some Bragging Rights!  The parents seemed to enjoy spending the time with their children.  I did take pictures of the parents, but I will just email them to the parents instead of putting them on here... I have all my students permission to be on here, but the parents I don't!  So they get out of being on here!  :)  Thanks for coming and supporting your child!  They love sharing their learning with you.

Last week we had Career Week and we had different activities all week long.  One of my favorite activities are the "Dressing Up Day."  They all looked so precious in their outfits and they all outdid themselves.  Just look at how cute they are!  We had a big parade where we show off our careers with the rest of the school.  Who doesn't enjoy showing off in the parade???  (I had 4-5 students out ALL week last week, that is why I didn't have all their pictures!) 

  

This is our door!  We didn't win, but I thought ours was very cute, but I guess I got the whole career thing mixed in with what they were asking... I have to follow my own advice...

FOLLOW DIRECTIONS!

We were supposed to make a theme for our door for COLLEGE... I kind of did what we were working on... MY DREAM CAREER IS.... but they still turned out super cute!  We did a PowerPoint page and they inserted pictures that showed their career.  We then made pennants of the colleges we wanted to go to. 

They did a great job with it!

Not only did we have a fun week last, we had a wild and crazy storm pass through on Friday.  Let's just say that Mrs. Harpley doesn't enjoy storm/tornadoes at all.  We had a threat of one and next thing I know, the wind is blowing like crazy and hail started!  Anyway, they did a great job and I moved them away from the window and just waited until it was over.   

I love my class! 

When it stopped long enough to open the window, we had a great Science experience with hail! 

Ok... I HATE having my picture taken... but I thought I would put a picture of me up since the kids enjoyed being the photographer for the day... here we are working on some fun Dr. Seuss writings.

Thanks so much to Mel over at her blog... Seusstastic Classroom!

The kids LOVED this fun activity.  I will have more to follow when they are all finished!  Here is a sneak preview! 

And yes... I am wearing a tie!

Finally.... today was "Tied" up in a good book!  They all had to wear their ties and get tied up with a good book!  Too bad today, we didn't have much time to read other than our reading book!

I LOVE READING WEEK!!!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY DR. SEUSS!!!

Wordless Wednesday (Almost Wordless)

Putting the Timeline together for President Lincoln's life.

These writings turned out so great!  I was so excited to see how creative they were with these fun Valentine writings!  I am so impressed, because it really takes a higher level of thinking to do these! 

They are ROCK STARS!

This week is career week and we have been talking about our "Dream Careers."  Today in computer lab, we created a PowerPoint of what we wanted to be when we grew up and found pictures to insert.  Once again, totally impressed with how smart these kids are!  They did a great job using the program!  I will put up pictures later, since this blog is supposed to be "WORDLESS!" 

Happy Wednesday!

Wordless Wednesday

Workshop Wednesday

I know... it is not Wednesday, it is Sunday.  Sunday is the day that I can catch up on my blogs and try to get them done.  So I think instead of trying to do it more than once a week, I am sticking to Sundays.

February is proving to be a very busy month.  In math we are working on measurement and still working with telling time.  They are enjoying measuring, since there really isn't much "thinking" when it comes to using a ruler or yardstick.  We are going to measure our room and see what "tools" would be the best way to measure it.  One of our ESSENTIAL QUESTIONS is: "What tools can we use to measure objects?"  Well, not only can a ruler be a tool, but we found out that string, blocks and even our shoes can be different objects we can measure with.  It will be fun tomorrow to see the different numbers when they use their feet to measure. 

This week is Valentine's Day.  Not only do we get to eat chocolate this month and not feel so guilty, it is the shortest month of the year, so that means warmer weather is coming around soon!  I was thinking about those cute candy hearts with the words on them last week when it came to me.  So we did these awesome Acrostic Poems last week and they made them all by themselves.  For this activity we learned about symmetry and poems.  We used the dictionary to come up with words that describe us or adjectives.  Many of us had more than one A in our name, so they had to get creative.  They really liked this and coming up with different adjectives that describe them.  The boys were so funny, because they used words like "smelly" and "dirty."  I told them to think of sweet words too, but some I just couldn't get their mind off those boy words.  They did a great job making them!  I am really proud of how well they did.  But I shouldn't be surprised because this class is truly amazing and talented and perfect!

Wednesday is our workshop day.  I love workshop because that is my time with the kids to really work with them on certain math or reading activities they are struggling with.  Or, it is just to listen to them read, which they love to do.  They love this time as well, so I just wanted to share a few pictures with you.  They are really learning, when they think they are just having fun!  Love it!



Last, but not least, is our famous AR Super Stars.  They have worked so hard to reach their goal in AR.  I don't want to make reading all about speed reading and then taking a test on it to get a point... I want them to enjoy reading and really get something out of it.  Most of the time it works... others, they just read to take a test and get their points.  AR is such a great program and has such positive outcomes that I can't help but push it.  I am so proud of one of my students who has come such a great way with reading.  He liked to read, but his confidence just wasn't there.  Well, I am so proud to say that this nine weeks, he is reading like a pro and has the most AR points in my class.  I think this kid has quite a competitive drive, because he is trying his best to be the top reader.  The way he is going he is going to have 400% by the end of this nine weeks.  I think he really wants a trophy and he will have one the way he is going.

Here is Cason with 300% in AR.  I am so proud of him for setting such a great example for all the other students in my class.  They all started trying to get to 300%, so I am letting them.  But... sometimes they are more worried about taking a test, instead of listening when I am teaching.  I guess I will have to live with that.  At least the drive to succeed is there! 

Check these Awesome Super Star Readers!!!  I am so proud of them all for reaching their AR goals and above!