100th Day of School!

My class celebrated the 100th day of school this week! This is my favorite day of the school year! I love to see the kids excitement and eagerness to complete all of the activities that I have planned for this special day. The day went by in a blur, but my students definitely had a fantastic day! Here is how our 100th day of school went.

We started off the morning with completing a 100th day crown to wear. What's a special day at school without some sort of party gear? My kids took their time decorating their crowns, and they looked so cute wearing them around school all day! They were very quick to point out to other classes that it was the 100th day of school. 

Once our crowns were completed, we of course had to stop for a photo op! 

Then it was time to get busy completing our 100 activities! My students have really mastered nouns, verbs, and adjectives; so I broke the students up into three groups, nouns, verbs, and adjectives, and they had to come up with as many words as they could. After counting and recounting, because some words were duplicated, my class came up with exactly 100 words! They were so excited. 

My students also completed blank 100s charts and a list of 100 words! 

After lunch is when the real fun began. The students shared their collection of 100 things, which I forgot to take pictures of... :(

They also completed my favorite 100th day activity, writing about what they will do and look like when they are 100 years old! These always crack me up!

Next, we completed our 100th day centers! The students made gumball machines with 100 gumballs, stamp books with 100 stamps, and a necklace with 100 fruit loops. 

We ended our day with a making a special 100th day snack to take home and enjoyed a special cupcake in the shape of 100.

The 100th day of school was a blast! I look forward to doing it again next year, and adding new activities.

Contraction Surgery

     We have been learning all about contractions. The students see them frequently in their guided reading books, as well as their library books; so they were excited to become contraction experts. To make contractions more hands on, our class had contraction "surgery". I broke me class up into groups, and each group had five "patients" or sets of words they had to work on to turn them into contractions. My kids felt like real surgeons. They wore latex gloves, face masks, and used bandaids to join the two words together, just like an apostrophe does. My kids ate this up! I was expecting lots of noise, but they were so focused on their "patients" that hardly any talking took place, except when they were talking to their partners. We did have a few "patients" that did not pull through the surgery, because bandaids were placed in the wrong spot or letters were left off, but I have to say this activity was a success! I love making lessons come to life with hands on activities. It just doesn't get any better. Of course, they asked to take the masks and gloves home, and you better believe I let them. I bet I had some happy parents when their child came home and wanted to perform surgery!

Winter Unit

        My students have loved learning about winter this week! We have been so busy in the classroom doing hands on learning activities that have kept my students completely engaged. I have to say, that this group really tries to meet the expectations that I place in the classroom, and they strive so hard to please me. My students eagerness to learn and to please is one of the reasons I LOVE teaching first grade! I have to say, we did so many activities this week, but I am so bad about getting out my camera and taking pictures of my kids at work! Definitely, something I am going to improve on! 

         During our winter unit, we learned all about winter. We learned about what happens to animals in the winter and discussed the differences among hibernation, migration, and adaptation. My students also learned about how the weather changes in the winter, which of course brought up the conversation of snow. Living in South Arkansas, we hardly ever get anything but a dusting of snow, so instead of building a snowman, we built two icemen, and made a hypothesis on which iceman would melt the fastest, the one indoors or the one outdoors. My students ate this up, but being the

teacher that has a hard time taking pictures, I do not have any to show. :( I promise to work on that! We also did some nonstandard winter measurement by measuring items in the classroom with snowmen and then measuring how tall each of them were with the snowmen. I LOVE hearing the "I love school" quote come out of their mouths when they are actively engaged and learning!

         I did take some pictures of some writing that we did this week. My students least favorite subject is writing, but they are so AWESOME at it! I am constantly reminding them of the fact that they are authors and that motivates them. But when I throw in a craft that goes along with the writing, attitudes change and they dive in full force! One day, we talked about what we would do if we could be in a snow globe for a day. My students came up with some fabulous ideas, and I have to say their crafts for this writing are one of my favorites they have done this year. 

        We also completed a standard this week and wrote a how to paper on How to Make Hot Chocolate. The students had a blast! Before we began, they had to tell me how to make my cup of hot chocolate. We talked about how we have to be very specific when writing a how to paper. They loved it when I messed up following their directions, but it helped them to see how their paper should sound. Of course, writing a paper on how to make hot chocolate would not be complete without actually making a cup to go along! Below are some pics of my students hard at work! 

First the students made their own cup of hot chocolate! 

Of course, after tasting their hot chocolate, they wrote their papers. 

        Then of course, we had to make a hot chocolate craft. What is writing without a craft?

        Love the break to take a drink! 

        I may be a little biased, but I think their papers are FANTASTIC!\

        Finally, what is the ending of a winter unit without a special snack!