The kids were excited to be done with apple related poems this week! In science we are studying the life cycle of frogs, so we are using frog poems for our fluency piece. Today we used "5 Green and Speckled Frogs" which is really a song, but good for fluency anyway.
Tomorrow we will work on pulling out sight words, number words and color words.
We started all new centers today for reading groups. Most of them revolved around frogs or pond life, which hopefully will help the kids remember our topic for the week! Two of the centers require work on dry-erase boards. I guess I could just have them use paper, but that gets boring after a while. I let my students know that it's not just me that's going to see their work this week! Students who work on dry-erase boards will have their work displayed on this blog! You would have thought Christmas had come early, they were so excited. Today it was Teams 2 and 5 who had the special centers.
Team 2 had the fluency center today. The center had a copy of a short story about a frog and a fly, it also had the story strips that they were to put back in order. After putting the story back in order, they copied the story. If their written story matched the printed copy, they got it right!
Team 5 had the comprehension center. They had animal cards, wild and tame, and a page separated into the 2 categories. Their task was to separate the cards into the 2 categories and write them on their dry-erase boards. This activity ties into our previous science lessons and builds their vocabulary.
Team 1 had a center today that I really enjoyed making, the Vocabulary center. I used the Read, Build, Write mats from
http://homeschoolcreations.com on the topic of Pond Life. The center included books from our classroom library on the topic, the RBW mats and the vocabulary cards. It is wonderful for building vocabulary, spelling and handwriting skills, and integrating science into our reading centers. What I love the most about the website is that most of their materials are FREE to download! Check them out!
In math we started by stretching our minds around a single concept: making the number 10. I began the lesson by giving the kids each a get of 10 unifix cubes and a sheet of paper. I told them to think back to the lesson when we made our Power of 10 poster.
I wanted them to use their cubes to show the different ways of making 10 again. After they reminded themselves how to make 10, I made a 4-square on the board. I explained that we would be using this 4-square pattern a lot in math this year.
In the
first square, we shared different ways of showing 10 as numbers. We didn't list all of the ways, just a few. In the
second square we turned one of our math sentences into a story problem. We used the numbers and the clue words
in all to show what operation to use to solve it. In the
third square I let 2 students come to the board to show a picture of 10; one created butterflies and the other created circles. In the
fourth square a student came to the board to write 10 using the word.
*This is a great way to test your student's understanding at home. Fold a piece of paper in half twice, making a 4-square. Make a title for your 4-square (ours was "10") and see what he/ she can come up with.
Square 1- numbers
Square 2- story
Square 3- picture
Square 4- word (or maybe another set of numbers or a different operation, like subtraction instead of addition)
In science we worked more on our lapbooks! We created another mini book, this one is on the 4 things that all living things need.
It's in the shape of one of those fortune tellers I remember making in middle school. There are 4 things living things need, and there are 4 flaps!
1. Food. All living things need food. Plants have the ability to make their own food. Animals have to find it. I had the kids create pictures of their favorite foods. Mine are pizza and ice cream.
2. Water. All living things need water. Since water doesn't naturally come from bottles, we created rain clouds and a running water source, like an ocean or river.
3. Space. All living things need space to thrive and grow. Animals also need shelter, while plants seem to be able to survive in any place where their needs are met. I had my students create a picture of their favorite space. I had some choose tree houses, their bedrooms, and Chuck-E-Cheese. This is my favorite space: on my couch at home reading a book. In fact, that is where I am typing this blog! I try to type before I leave school for the day, but today was a little crazy. So, I am in my favorite place, typing about my favorite people. :)
4. Air. You can't see it, but you know it's there! We created air particles on our papers. Of course, you already figured that out, right? ;)
All in all, a pretty full day. Tomorrow- FROGS!
Our Daily Brain
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