Freebie Daily Morning Math Week 2

Hi everyone! Lisa here.

I have been so busy blog stalking, learning how to blog, and updating lessons so they are  much cuter  more engaging for the students. It has been a ginormous learning curve on my end but extremely fun!

Well, Tina and I have been updating our Morning Math reviews for the first half of the year. We started off with headaches (18 weeks of morning math in July???), got excited, bought some clip art, got  more excited, got unexcited when it didn't come together, got more headaches, got excited again, etc.  Like I said- learning curve.

I keep telling myself that if I get all of the kinks out now, it'll be so much easier when school starts =) Yeah, my cup is always half full. And I'm a dope!

Click the image above if you would like this freebie. It is week 2 of our unit.

We also have the first six weeks completed and uploaded to TpT.

Click on the image above if you would like to see it!

Now I'm off to make breakfast. I've had some nice family time in my house. It's rare when all three kids are here at the same time. You know, college kids. My niece (also a college kid) and mom were here yesterday and we had a great time laughing, making food, eating, watching movies, etc.
 I love summer time =) I hope everyone else is having a wonderful summer vacation!

Freebie for First Day Jitters

Hello all!

I have been working on our back to school unit for First Day Jitters. Have you ever read this book? It has a surprise ending and is fantabulous! Tina and I began using it about 13 years ago. We absolutely love this story.

I wanted to recreate the different activities we have done over the years and put them into one unit. Well,  I am done!

 

This unit contains-
Vocabulary Cards
Story Map
Character Trait Map
Venn Diagram
2 Different Writing Prompts
Word Search
Making Words Activity
Acrostic Poem
Missing Poster
Advice Letter for Sarah
More suggested activities

If you are interested, just click on either image above=)

Freebie Activity- First Day Jitters Graph
This recording sheet will allow your class to record how everyone feels on the first day of school. They will tally every student's choice and then color in a bar graph.

 Just click on the image above for this freebie!!!! Hope you can use it =)

Classroom Website

Hi all! This is Lisa blogging today.

Last Saturday,  I read the post by Ladybug's Teacher Files,  "Using a Blog/Website for Parent Information Night." It is part of Kristen's Optimum Organization Linky Party that she is hosting with Elizabeth from Fun in Room 4B. I have loved reading these tips on organization this summer.

In her post, Kristen discusses using a class website/blog for parent night and throughout the year. This is genius. Am I the only person who has not thought of this? Seriously. I have a class website on Weebly. The only problem is parents cannot subscribe to it. Blogger is blocked in our district so I need to use Weebly. At my last parent night, I made magnets with my info. for the parents. I included my email but not the class website . What was I thinking!!!!

This year I will utilize my website differently. In the past, it was just to showcase what the kiddos were learning during the day. This year, I will use it for parent night and all year with homework information, the schedule, our calendar, etc. At the end of last year, my kiddos began blogging about their learning. We will continue that and the showcase too! Maybe parents will even bookmark the website .

Here is Kristen's button if you would like to visit her post.

Freebie- Parts of a Friendly Letter

Hi everyone! Today we have a freebie for you.

In our last post, we discussed how we teach the parts of a letter.Here is the song and the modified movements to go with it. If we can sing and dance as we teach, we are happy teachers.

Just click HERE  or on the image above to get this freebie!

Parts of a Letter

Hi everyone! Lisa here .

Today I wanted to post about writing letters. Not the letters in the alphabet but letters to people .

In my classroom, the kiddos write letters to everyone- me (about their reading), characters, authors, teachers, friends, etc. It used to drive me crazy when they would turn in their rough draft and it would be missing the date or the closing or the signature . I made anchor charts galore but some still would forget. I made a checklist, but they would still forget. What drove me completely bonkers was that they would forget on their final copy too!

Quite a few years ago, I found a friendly letter song on the internet. It goes to the tune of "The Adams Family". It is awesome and easy to remember. The kiddos put a copy of the song in their Reading Notebook. And when they forget on their rough drafts, I just hum the beginning of the song. They fix that puppy up lickedy split!

Last week I read Mrs. Laffin's Laughings post on friendly letters. She teaches her students to use movements. So cool!  Now we can sing and dance so this lesson just got kicked up a notch!

I did not create any part of this song and dance . I'm just sharing. If you want to see Mrs. Laffin's post just click HERE. This is the song- with the movements modified to go with the tune =)

5 Parts of a Letter (to the tune of "Adams Family")

The five parts of a letter     (hold up five fingers)
Are easy to remember       (point to your brain)
Heading                            (pat the top of your head)
Greeting                            (move your hand from your mouth outwards)
Body                                (wiggle your body from shoulders to hips)
Closing                             (pat your knees)
Signature                          (stomp each foot)

Parts of a letter                 (snap, snap)
Parts of a letter                 (snap, snap)
Parts of letter, parts of letter, parts of a letter    (snap, snap).

Later this week, I will post a freebie- this song!

About Tina

I am finally jumping in now that I have some free time this summer.  I have been busy babysitting my grandson and chauffering my son to baseball games and driver's ed.

This is will be my 21st year of teaching.  I taught fifth grade for one year and have been lucky enough to be in third for 19 years.  I began teaching in a dual language class.  I taught the English component of the curriculum for 7 years.  I loved it!  But I needed a change so I packed up and moved schools.  I was fortunate enough to get a third grade position at an AWESOME school where I met my very best friend, Lisa.  We have been together now for 13 years and we are inseparable.

Teaching is a family profession.  My husband, daughter, son-in-law, twin sister, 2 brother in-laws and a few nieces and nephews all teach.  You can imagine the discussions at holiday get-togethers.  I think my father started it all, he was a community college teacher for many years.

I am a very family oriented person.  Because most of my family members are teachers we spend a lot of time together during the holidays and summer.  I am a very lucky person!

To Homework or Not to Homework

Hola everyone! Yesterday I read Lindsay's post (My Life as a Third Grade Teacher) about homework. She brought up a hot topic in my grade level.

Every year I tackle this topic with Tina, the co-author of this blog. Do we want to give homework? And how much?

About 9 years ago, we changed the way we assign homework. We began giving weekly homework. It was sent home in the homework folder on Monday and  turned in on Friday. Over the years, our weekly homework has evolved. Now, we hand it out on Fridays and it is due the following Thursday. That way, the kiddos can get it done on the weekend if needed. Parents are grateful but we still have problems. Some kiddos don't have anyone to go over their work. Some kiddos don't have anyone making them do their homework. And some still don't complete their homework or even do it at all!

We give the students a reading passage with 4-6 questions (starts off at a second grade level at the beginning of the year), 2 review pages of math we have already learned, spelling words (they can use spelling city or practice in a number of ways), daily math fact card practice, and daily reading.
Inside of their homework folder, we clip in examples of how the homework should be done. For reading, we expect the students to underline where they found their answers and justify their answers. For math, we expect the students to show all of their work. Homework is always a review of what we have already practiced!

But I am sure we will ask this question in August- Do we want to assign homework this year?
It's a lot of work for us. It takes a lot of time to prepare. It takes a long time to check.
 We have a fun activity on Friday afternoons for those students that did complete their homework correctly. Like I said- lots of work.

How do you handle homework?