Pumpkin Fun!!

I like to do something with pumpkins every year around Halloween.  We always go to the pumpkin patch, so I make sure to get a pumpkin for myself to use in class.  We studied apples the week before, so we did a little comparison to start off the week.  They had a few more ideas, but we ran out of time.  The kiddos completed their own Venn Diagram after we did this one as a class.

Last year we did Pumpkin Math and More, where each student had their own little book to complete.  Since I have kids two years in a row I wanted to switch it up a little bit.  We explored our pumpkin together and made a chart to record the results.  Some of their predictions were way off.  We need to work on our estimation skills!

I live in an apartment in San Francisco, so carving a pumpkin isn't really my thing.  There is nowhere for me to display it, and it would just smell up the apartment if kept inside.  For this reason, I make use of the class pumpkin in a different way, baking it!  Each year I take my pumpkin home and bake it to make pumpkin puree.  I let my kiddos vote on what kind of pumpkin treat to make.  Believe it or not, they chose pumpkin pie!  I was amazed, considering pumpkin cupcakes, pumpkin cake, and pumpkin bread with chocolate chips were on the list!

Today we put the pumpkin to use and mixed up the pumpkin pie.

Unfortunately, with all the craziness of kids in costume on Halloween, we didn't get a chance to taste it yet!  I put it in the fridge for tasting on Monday.   The kids will have to wait!

They did get a chance to eat some pumpkin seeds though!  I let them pull the seeds out of the pumpkin during class.  We count them, and then I take them home to roast in the oven.  A lot of the kiddos had never had pumpkin seeds before, but they all liked them!  I am looking forward to seeing what they think about the homemade pumpkin pie.

Christopher Columbus discovered. . .

the Bahamas (according to my students).  I think I have some more work to do!

Since Columbus Day was on Monday, I thought I would teach my kiddos a little bit about the man behind the holiday.  Whenever they have the day off I feel obligated to explain the holiday that has created this joyous occasion.

It was difficult to find books on the topic, but I managed to find a couple.  

I read these and discussed them with the kiddos.  I also taught them a couple of songs to help them remember the information.  I can't take the credit for these.  I found them online at Teaching Kids 1st and just copied them on to chart paper.

I was also lucky enough to get some free Scholastic News in the mail, one of which happened to be about Christopher Columbus!  It even included a couple of worksheets to extend and assess learning.

I only gave this page to my first graders.  

This one was for all my K/1 kiddos.  They had trouble with #4.  We will have to talk more about that.

I found some great free worksheets on TeacherspayTeachers to incorporate math and phonics as well.  

We have been working on word problems, so this one was perfect!  Thank you to Growing Firsties.

 Thank you to Practice Makes Perfect for these two math pages.

I put these pages in centers.  The kinders did the color by letter and the firsties did the other pages. 

Thanks to iHeartLiteracy for this one!

Thanks to Creatively Crazy in First Grade.

This was great to help them build sentences, work on handwriting, and work on using capitals and punctuation.  Thanks to Christina Mauro.

The kiddos also got to do some writing.  They wrote about where they would like to explore.  I forgot to take pictures of their notebooks.  Some of them were pretty entertaining!  To give you an idea, here are a few of the places they wrote about:

• Fairyland
• a person's mouth
• under the sea
• Mexico
• a carnival

After a week's worth of learning about Columbus, they still get some of the information confused.  However, they have a basic understanding of who Columbus was and what he did.  In all fairness, they probably know just as much about him as some adults.  Now we are on to more important things like, pumpkins and Halloween!  They could rave about these topics all day long!

Starting school with the 5 Senses!

Okay, so we didn't officially start school with the senses, we studied it during the second week.  In all fairness, the teachers out there know that the first week of school is reserved for dealing with criers, runners, whiners, and kids that generally have no idea what they are supposed to be doing.  Once we got all of that under our belts, we were ready to begin!

I tried to do some different activities with the five senses this year so that my first graders (who I had last year for kindergarten) were not bored from the repetition.  Plus, the more ways they learn the material the better!  I have a little book series written by Sharon Gordon.  There is a book for each sense.  I read these throughout the week.

For the sense of taste we had a taste test.  The kiddos loved this!  I gave them something salty, something sweet and something sour.  They had to taste them and decide which category each fell into.

Almost everyone sorted them correctly.  Next, they had to complete a tasting sheet.  We used the top row to record the foods we tasted, and then they had to come up with one other food that fit each category.  The first graders had to label theirs while I walked around and labeled the pictures for the kindergarteners.  Thanks to www.mrswillskindergarten.com for this handout.

lollipop, soy sauce, lemon

candy, lox, apple

We did some journal writing for the sense of smell.  This was the first time the kiddos got to use their new notebooks, so they were pretty pumped!  We brainstormed good and bad smells earlier in the day.  I showed them how to make a t-chart and then they drew things that smell good and things that smell bad.  

As you can see, some students wrote words, while others did pictures that I labeled.  Still others wrote the letter the object begins with.  This activity is easily adjusted for different ability levels.

To wrap up the week, I had the kiddos complete a senses assessment.  They all did very well.  They were required to draw two objects that can be experienced using each sense.  I am not sure where this handout came from but it is great!  If it belongs to you let me know so I can give you credit!

Once upon a time. . .

. . .there was a K/1 class that went on a writing adventure.  They filled out graphic organizers, wrote rough drafts, and created books, all at the young age of 5.

Yes, I took on the challenge of writing Fairy Tales with K/1 kiddos.  This was a two week long process, during which I repeatedly had to say, "No, you cannot write the story of Frozen."  What really made me want to pull my hair out was the fact that they were also practicing for the school talent show at that time.  A group that consisted of half the class was singing "Let it Go," over and over and over again.  And by singing I mean shouting, because they are 5 and 6 year olds.  Nonetheless, we made it through, and the result was enough to make a momma (or a kindergarten teacher) proud.

The kiddos love to read fairy tales and watch the movies, but they weren't quite sure how to write one of their own.  They all wanted to write Frozen or Tangled (Rapunzel).  It was at this point that I realized I needed to really break this down and try to foster some creativity.  We started by discussing what characteristics you find in a fairy tale.  This handy little chart was a nice reference for the kids.

Next, we filled out graphic organizers to help us brainstorm.  After they got started, I realized that we needed to do one together.  Unfortunately, this resulted in several spin-offs of my story.

The next day we started our first drafts.  I gave each student lined paper and they began writing their stories.  This took a couple of days.  The final step was turning them into books.  I cut white paper in half to make smaller pages, and I showed them how to write a little bit on each page and then illustrate.  We saved the coloring and the cover for last.  This process took about a week.  Some students took longer than others due to the length of their stories.  Here are a few excerpts from their books.

This one was about a witch who put hexes on everything.  She hexed the Dad's car and made it a toy car.  I love how so many of the kiddos used speech bubbles!

This one was the longest book by far.  I think it ended up being 20 pages!  She included a character with no clothes on.  I was a little leary of this idea but didn't want to squash her creativity, so I simply asked why the character didn't have clothes.  Her response, "She grew up in nature, so she never had any clothes."  That seemed logical to me, so I let her proceed, while I crossed my fingers that the illustrations would not reveal anything inappropriate.  Here are a couple pages so you can see how it turned out (sorry they are blurry).

We had story time once all books were complete.  They took turns sitting in my chair and reading to the class.

Learning about our cultures and our classmates!

Every year my school celebrates International Day.  This is a time for the students to talk to their families and learn more about where they come from.  It is also a time when we all get to learn a little bit more about each other.  For homework this week, my students had to complete the following writing assignment.

This was a week long assignment, so they had time to do some research if needed.  Everyone got a chance to share their writing today.  We also found the different states and countries their families are from on a globe.  Their parents obviously helped them spell some words, but the majority of the kiddos were still able to read their papers independently.  Take a look at some of these treasures:

Luckily the kiddos didn't ask what moonshine is :)

I love the way this kiddo added humor-- "My Dad's family is from Wales-the country, not the animal."

 I am amazed by how many kids are bilingual!  What is even more mind boggling, is that it is often something they keep secret, or don't want to share.  I guess they don't want to be seen as different.  I try to encourage them by letting them know they are smarter than me, because I only speak English.

I really enjoyed learning about their diverse backgrounds, and they seemed to enjoy it as well.  The kids listened intently to their friends and couldn't wait to see where the countries were on the globe.  I really got a kick out of this one:

"There is a special vino from Nimis, but I don't drink it."

She even brought a wine book to share pictures!  At first she asked if she could tell the class about making wine, which I was a little skeptical of.  Then she began showing pictures of landscapes and told about a few of the churches and holidays--whew, thank goodness!  I can just imagine explaining why the K/1 kiddos learned how to make wine at school!

Another part of International Day is a family lunch.  Each student brings in a dish that is popular where they are from. With a variety of dishes, students always get to try new foods.  In some of my previous schools, this would not have gone very well.   I have to give my current kiddos some credit though, everyone tried something, and I didn't even have to do any convincing.  

My class was in charge of desserts, which meant that I had to taste a lot of sweet stuff today.  I was afraid I would hurt someone's feelings if I didn't try each and every one!  The desserts were the hit of the day.  I guess kids don't find cookies and cakes as scary as unknown meat and vegetable dishes.  

If you are looking for a way to celebrate the various backgrounds of your students, International Day is a great place to start!  You could use it as an end of unit celebration as well.  It is a wonderful way to get parents involved too!

Playing with Insects and Spiders

Don't worry, we weren't actually playing with live bugs!  We studied insects and spiders last week and I decided to get hands on with a little Play-doh!  To help the kids see and remember the parts of these critters, we created them ourselves.

First, I taught them the basic parts of an insect. . .

• 3 body parts (head, thorax, abdomen)
• 2 antennae
• 6 legs
• 2 eyes

Then they each got their own jar of Play-doh and some pipe cleaners to practice with.  

The second day we tried the process again with spiders.  These were the basic parts I told them to include. . .

• 2 body parts (cephalothorax--or head, abdomen)
• 8 legs
• 2 fangs/teeth
• 8 eyes (not all spiders have 8 eyes, but that is a common amount)

They loved this activity!

In order to see if they remembered the differences between the two, they got to create one more Play-doh creature, either a spider or an insect.  Afterwards, the kiddos sorted their creations on a t-chart.

Sorry for the shadow!  Have to take pictures quick or the kids get antsy.

We checked each one together to make sure they had the required parts.  They had a little trouble with the insects because they all wanted to create butterflies.  Their butterflies were missing legs, antennae, and or body parts.  I guess they got excited about making the wings and forgot about everything else.  I guess I know what their favorite insect is!

We also made a Venn diagram this week to show our knowledge.  My little smarties did great!

  

Now they are excited when they find insects or spiders outside.  They come running over to announce their find and then proceed to stare at it and describe it to one another.  It always makes me smile :)

Moms! Moms! Moms!

We all love our moms and my students are no different!  In honor of Mother's Day, they created books for their moms last week.  We worked on them all week.  It was a great way to get them excited about writing! Although, I have to say I am pretty blessed in that regard.  My students have been coming to school with glitter covered journals for months now, with no mention of it from me.  I don't know what gave them the idea.  It is like they suddenly realized they could sound out words and write down what they were thinking, and they wanted to do it all the time.  My little writers!

The Mother's Day books were a hit with the moms.  This wasn't a surprise to me since I found them adorable myself and they aren't even my children.  The things kids come up with are hilarious.  They have no filter and are just beginning to grasp the concepts of time, so I think you will find some of these excerpts amusing as well :)

Her mom is nowhere near 72 years old!  

Sounds like someone doesn't like to do chores.

"My mom does not like loud noises."  I like the way she drew the noise in this picture.

"My mom does not like when my brother punches me."

"My mom likes to eat vegetables with pepper and oil."  She did a great job sounding out vegetables if you think about how it sounds.

I love that she included speech bubbles of her complaining and her mom telling her to stop whining.

I had one mom tell me that she doesn't like to watch baseball, it is just that baseball or cartoons are always on at their house.  I bet I can guess who picks the channels.

"My mom likes to wear red shoes and a blue shirt and skirt."  I love the way she decided to trace the color words with crayon.

They drew a portrait of their mom and used it as the cover for their book.

The books turned out beautifully, but I can't take all the credit for the idea.  I got the "All About Mom" template from Miss Nelson.  I cannot recall where I got the other book pages.  If you made them let me know and I will gladly give you credit!  Sorry!  They are great!

Happy (belated) Mother's Day to all the moms out there!!