Construction Fun!

We had a new school built thanks to our awesome community!!!! The new school is WONDERFUL! We moved in over Christmas Break and love everything about the new building.  :-)

The students and I were a little sad to say good-bye to the old building and our old classroom.  We talked a lot about our great memories from the old building.  I was especially sad to say good-bye to my very first teaching home!

The construction workers recently began demolition on our old building.... At first we were so sad to see it go, but then the students were very intrigued by all the noise we heard! Finally, I just had to take them outside to see some of the action- from a safe distance of course! Here are some of our photos!

As you can tell, they really enjoyed it! 

Eric Carle Art!

We had so much fun with our Eric Carle author study! We read so, so many of his books! The students fell in love with his books and characters.  They especially loved learning about animals!

While I would LOVE to say that the students favorite part of the author study was some great project...they all unanimously voted that it was the art project!  I set up four different areas: blue paint with sponges, red paint with crumpled wax paper, tissue paper and modge podge, and yellow paint with small spikey balls. The students covered a page using the materials and paint at each station.  At the end of this stage, each child had four pages! 

So , I completely forgot to bring newspaper.....I thought it should be fine, it's washable paint... WRONG! LOL I spent about 45 minutes scrubbing our new tables! (We just moved into this school in January-look for my construction post soon!) Side note to my principal- don't worry the tables are once again spotless! :-) 

We let the papers dry over the weekend.  Then, we looked through some of our favorite Eric Carle books to get some ideas.  The students used their four papers to create an animal just like Eric Carle.  Of course, I was so excited about all of the great pictures they were churning out that I forgot to take pictures! :-( We did have an awesome mixed-up chameleon,  a giraffe, an elephant, a few dinosaurs, and lots of dogs! 

Whole Brain Teaching

I stumbled upon whole brain teaching this year and Oh. My. Word! It is AMAZING!!!! The best part was that I didn't really have to change my teaching much...we were already doing a lot of the components, I just didn't know it! I seriously LOVE it. It has changed my class! They are engaged, learning, attentive and on task!


My students' favorite is the class call back.  When I need their attention, I say, "class" in various ways and they say, "yes" in the same way I spoke.  Their favorite is for me to say, "Oh my classssss," in a very singsongy (is that a word?) voice.  They say, "Oh my yessssss." It is honestly amazing how much they like it and how well they respond!

They also LOVE to do the "teach" part! I will give them a direction and tell them to "teach," they say, "okay" and teach whatever it is I asked them to, to their buddy.  Every morning we review how to sit in meeting area, complete with fabulous gestures, and then they teach their neighbors using the same gestures.  It is so much stinking fun!

Here are my fab firsties teaching each other! SoOOoooOoooO sweet! 

Go to www.wholebrainteaching.com to learn more about it! I also just typed whole brain teaching first grade in on youtube and watched several great examples.  We have a consultant at my school who has a lot of knowledge on whole brain teaching who has also been a great help!

Smartboard Love!

Wow! Long time, no blog! It would be an understatement to say life as a mama to two little guys (under 3 years old), a wife to a very busy man, and a teacher to some adorable firsties is SUPER busy!!!!! I had the best of intentions to blog once a week, then once a month and well, then I don't know what happened! 

We moved into new buildings over Christmas break.  I LOVE, LOVE, LOVE my new classroom! It smells good, it looks good, there are no leaks or broken things! I love it so much!!!!!! One of my favorite things (Well, beside having an actual teacher's restroom instead of having to go in the girls' restroom.  It would never fail that some little sweetie would be in the stall next me and call out, "Mrs. Frauman, is that you? Do you want to know what I did yesterday?" LOL) is my smart projector! It turns a regular old white board into a smart board! I love that thing- and better yet so do the kids! I created an attendance sign-in using the smart board, a calendar that includes my morning message, high frequency word work, word problem of the day and so many other skills, a Math Workshop check-in and a Daily 5 check-in.  It makes everything so much easier and so much more fun! I used to have an attendance sign-in on my door in the old building, but those doors were magnetic and our new doors are not; not to mention someone would slam the door and the magnets would fall! 

I also find a TON of awesome activities to use on Smart Exchange and on Teachers Pay Teachers! There are a ton of resources out there to help incorporate technology and to make learning more meaningful and fun! LOVE IT!!!!!!!! 

The kiddos love to earn a Just Dance song! 

Still dancing! :-) So stinking cute! 

Our attendance sign-in

Water Works!!!!

         My lovelies experimented with water last week.  They were exploring the difference between water as a solid and water as a liquid and how water changes.  First, we read nonfiction texts about water.  Then, the class worked together to organize the information learned from the texts into a chart.

After the chart, my Fab Firsties participated in different learning centers. During one center, the students made water sensory bottles.  The students had to describe how different objects moved through the water.

The next center involved water as a solid, AKA ice! The students tried to free various objects that were frozen in different sized ice blocks.

(Sorry for the blurry photo! They would not stop hammering! lol )

Finally, the students told math number stories using water bags.  The water bags were sandwich size ziplock bags filled with water.  There was a black line drawn down the middle and small cubes inside.  The students told number stories using the cubes.

(here is a link to the bags!)

We had so much fun and learned A LOT about water! 

Spiders, Spiders, Spiders!!!!!!!

We had so much fun with spiders last week! I wanted to start on the Common Core ELA standard involving research.  I have seen these "Can, Have, Are" charts all over Pinterest and various blogs so I started there! We talked about facts and how they had to be things that were true. Then, I read several nonfiction Spider books to the kids.  They loved it! Well, one of my little "drama mamas" shivered and shook every time I showed a picture of a spider, which was completely adorable! As we read the nonfiction books, we added cool or important facts we found to a chart.  Then we made a Can, Have, Are chart and put our facts in the correct column.  (I think next time I will bypass the writing facts on a chart first and just fill in the Can, Have, Are chart from the nonfiction books).

After we made the class chart, my fab firsties made their own can, have, are chart.

The next morning, I asked the kids to take their very own spider and decide if spiders were harmful or helpful.

 Obviously helpful won.... I was surprised, but I do have only have 6 girls and 13 boys in my class! LOL

Then I made an "Evidence Chart"...I have no idea if that is what it is actually called, but it sounds good! :-) We were presented with this concept at a recent district pd. I made the statement, "Spiders are helpful" at the top.  Then, I made two columns, one is evidence for and the other is evidence against. We talked a lot about what that meant and they were actually really good at it! Then we went back through some of the facts we had written down and our Spiders Can, Have, Are chart and put any evidence we found under the correct heading.  The kiddos really wanted to prove a side (harmful or helpful) right or wrong, but we ended up with two pieces of evidence under each! lol

Then, I modeled how to take our can, have, are charts and turn them into a nonfiction story about spiders.  My kiddos did a really good job of taking their own can, have, are charts and turning them into a nonfiction story.  They had so much fun and worked really hard. 

Aren't they so sweet?!

More Daily 5!!!

I am still totally LOVING Daily 5! I love that I am not spending my Friday after school time pulling papers from center folders and stuffing them with new papers!!!! Whatever will I do with myself - oh wait, I am trying to align all of my lessons to  Common Core! LOL

I really needed a way to track the kiddos through the week besides just highlighting their choices on my tracker.  Which, I figured out if I use different color highlighters for each round it is MUCH easier to track!

Find this tracker here

So I created this reflection:

I used the clipart from these Daily 5 cards found here and free borders found here!

My fab firsties only have time for 3 rounds each day so I made this reflection for the week.  At the end of our Daily 5 time, they will fill in at least one area, knowing that the entire sheet has to be completed by Friday! I also created a quick rubric to go along with it.  I am hoping this holds my kiddos more accountable and gives me another way to track what they are doing in each round. 

I do have to brag a little about my firsties....they are ROCKING the Daily 5! Our Daily 5 time is the quietest time of our entire day! They love, love. love to make their own choices and are doing so much better at it than I thought! I was super nervous to let go of that piece, but they are doing so stinking awesome! :-) I am sOooooOOOOoooooo thankful that I was introduced to the Daily 5 and the "Two Sisters!"