A boy in my class has been out sick for three days. Today at the end of the day as we went around our circle saying highs and lows, his brother said, "Oh! I have to get [this student's] highs and lows!" Then he took off out of the classroom. Everyone was super confused. I thought he had misspoke and was going to get the day's math assignment, but soon he was back with an envelope. There was a letter inside. It said "my low is on Wednesday my throat was clogged up and I could not breathe but my uncle helped me get through it. and my high is I'm getting better." I love that he still wanted to share even though he's been stuck at home!
High of the day: the 7-8th graders had a lab I've never tried before testing salinity. It involves a bunch of beakers and pipettes, salt water, saline water, tap water, and food coloring. Basically, we're supposed to see that different water with different salinity will stay in different levels. We had so much fun mixing and testing different things, we kind of skipped doing the worksheet and just played around. Then we got out a heat pad and an ice pack to see if we could get some convection currents going. It didn't work. Possibly because of the salinity, or because our temperature differences weren't strong enough.
Low of the day: our preschool teacher's dad passed away earlier this week somewhat suddenly. We've had volunteers taking over her class since our normal subs are either sick or out of the state. Today she called me and asked if I'd sing for the funeral tomorrow. So after school I buzzed over to Redeemer to practice "How Great Thou Art" with the organist. It was a little tricky to coordinate with Pastor and the organist during the school day, and then to find a time to get together before the service, but we figured it out.
This evening, my sister and Mrs. L and I participated in an adult spelling bee through the North Mankato Library. We were the Alphabetizerrrs and dressed up like pirates. Mrs. E lent me a hat, I found a red bandana for Mrs. L to wear. She had a parrot puppet. My sister had a piratey shirt and hoop earrings. We all wore black pants and tall boots. And as the cherry on top, we wore black "I" patches. My sister had a joke that went along with our theme: What's a pirates favorite letter? You may think it be 'arrr!' but nay, a pirate's first love be the 'sea'!
We didn't come close to winning, but it sure was fun to guess how the words were spelled!
Friday, January 31, 2020
Thursday, January 30, 2020
Hardtack
Today was a day of food. This morning at snack time, we did a mini-quiz on the phases of the moon. I gave each kid three oreos which they had to 'shave' off the frosting to make it look like one of the moon phases. To pick the moon phases, I paused a NASA video of the moon changing phases at random intervals. They had to label and make the phase on their oreo. It was fun! They did pretty well overall!
Then, in the afternoon for American history, I fed them hardtack since we were learning about life as an American soldier during the Revolutionary War. I made it fresh this morning, so it was still pretty chewable. There were a few pieces left over from two years ago when I taught this lesson; I kept it in a cupboard at school. That got offered up too, and a few kids took it. Once it's dried out it will keep basically forever.
There are a bunch of recipes out there, but the one I like to use is 3c flour, 2tsp salt, 1c water. Roll out 1/2 inch thick, cut into 3x3 squares. Poke holes in it 4x4. Bake at 375F for 30 minutes on one side, then flip and bake 30min on the other side. Since I baked it this morning before school, I cut down the bake time a bit to maybe 40min or so. They still turned out just fine. A bunch of them asked for the recipe even! No leftovers to save for two years from now.
Then, in the afternoon for American history, I fed them hardtack since we were learning about life as an American soldier during the Revolutionary War. I made it fresh this morning, so it was still pretty chewable. There were a few pieces left over from two years ago when I taught this lesson; I kept it in a cupboard at school. That got offered up too, and a few kids took it. Once it's dried out it will keep basically forever.
There are a bunch of recipes out there, but the one I like to use is 3c flour, 2tsp salt, 1c water. Roll out 1/2 inch thick, cut into 3x3 squares. Poke holes in it 4x4. Bake at 375F for 30 minutes on one side, then flip and bake 30min on the other side. Since I baked it this morning before school, I cut down the bake time a bit to maybe 40min or so. They still turned out just fine. A bunch of them asked for the recipe even! No leftovers to save for two years from now.
Wednesday, January 29, 2020
Technology
The IT guys actually came out to school last night! I had called them yesterday morning fed up with my projector turning on but not connecting to my computer. They promised to stop out and work on the cords connecting the two. Of course their track record is not stellar for coming out here when they say they will. But... I had a note on the board from them! And a long black cord snaking across the ceiling from the projector to the wall and across. It's temporary. I hope it will be less 'temporary' than this loaner projector I've had since November. I was only supposed to have it for a week...
In other news, they brought the 1-2nd graders' ipads, which means my class could get the last two laptops we've been waiting on (the 1-2nd graders have been using them while waiting for their devices to be dropped off).
It was a moderately quiet day in 5-6th grade. We were down one boy who was home sick with a sore throat. One of the ones who'd been struggling with sickness yesterday now has laryngitis, so that took another voice out of the equation. Lots of tired kids in my class.
I should get more sleep too. I've been doing great getting up in the morning and being productive at home before I leave for school. Now I need to be better about going to bed on time...
In other news, they brought the 1-2nd graders' ipads, which means my class could get the last two laptops we've been waiting on (the 1-2nd graders have been using them while waiting for their devices to be dropped off).
It was a moderately quiet day in 5-6th grade. We were down one boy who was home sick with a sore throat. One of the ones who'd been struggling with sickness yesterday now has laryngitis, so that took another voice out of the equation. Lots of tired kids in my class.
I should get more sleep too. I've been doing great getting up in the morning and being productive at home before I leave for school. Now I need to be better about going to bed on time...
Tuesday, January 28, 2020
Better and Not
Behavior in our classroom was MUCH better today. I'd say we actually had a good day! Thank you for the prayers!
Religion class was my favorite part of today. Our lesson was on the conclusion to the Lord's Prayer and the main activity was for each student to make an acrostic prayer of his/her name. The sample in the book had phrases of things to pray for, and not just wants/help me/this person. I told them they could do their first name, middle name, and/or last name or some combination of the three and pretty much everyone did their full name. They came up with some super good prayers! One boy even asked if he could take it home with him to pray at bedtime. It really made my heart happy that they were so creative in praising and praying God.
Once again we had a time crunch in the morning with 40 minutes of our Daily 5 time being set aside for Junior Achievement. We are also within the last 50 pages of our read aloud book and of course there are cliffhangers everywhere... we read a little extra today. Are you surprised? I'm guessing we'll finish the book tomorrow. Boy, it's going to be hard to pick the next book. There are so many good ones I want to read with them! I'm not sure if I want to let them vote on my top picks, or if I want to just choose. We'll have to see what their mood is when we finish.
Since we didn't have a ton of time for Writers Workshop today, I had them take the "5 Love Languages" quiz for kids and write down their top two love languages. It was a little weird because they all freaked out at the word 'love', but we made it through. I want to categorize them into the five categories so it's easier for me to show them that they are welcomed and loved in the classroom. It's probably good information for parents to have if they don't already know it, so I'm also contemplating the best way to let their parents know the results. I kind of want to do the quiz with the 7-8th graders, but I think they'll buck more than the 5-6th graders did. Eh, we'll see if we need a time filler someday.
Religion class was my favorite part of today. Our lesson was on the conclusion to the Lord's Prayer and the main activity was for each student to make an acrostic prayer of his/her name. The sample in the book had phrases of things to pray for, and not just wants/help me/this person. I told them they could do their first name, middle name, and/or last name or some combination of the three and pretty much everyone did their full name. They came up with some super good prayers! One boy even asked if he could take it home with him to pray at bedtime. It really made my heart happy that they were so creative in praising and praying God.
Once again we had a time crunch in the morning with 40 minutes of our Daily 5 time being set aside for Junior Achievement. We are also within the last 50 pages of our read aloud book and of course there are cliffhangers everywhere... we read a little extra today. Are you surprised? I'm guessing we'll finish the book tomorrow. Boy, it's going to be hard to pick the next book. There are so many good ones I want to read with them! I'm not sure if I want to let them vote on my top picks, or if I want to just choose. We'll have to see what their mood is when we finish.
Since we didn't have a ton of time for Writers Workshop today, I had them take the "5 Love Languages" quiz for kids and write down their top two love languages. It was a little weird because they all freaked out at the word 'love', but we made it through. I want to categorize them into the five categories so it's easier for me to show them that they are welcomed and loved in the classroom. It's probably good information for parents to have if they don't already know it, so I'm also contemplating the best way to let their parents know the results. I kind of want to do the quiz with the 7-8th graders, but I think they'll buck more than the 5-6th graders did. Eh, we'll see if we need a time filler someday.
Monday, January 27, 2020
Monday, Monday
Whew. What. a. day. It was a tough one.
One of the girls stayed home sick. Out of the remaining 11 students in my class, only four of them focused at all today. Six boys and one girl were off the wall, in each others' faces, couldn't keep their mouths shut or stay in their own spaces.
I had hoped they would be better for our Junior Achievement speaker... mmm, perhaps not. They were a little quieter, but there was way too much silly business going on. And it was from my normally non-problem-causing students!
Sigh. Monday's are always rough. Tomorrow will be better.
One of the girls stayed home sick. Out of the remaining 11 students in my class, only four of them focused at all today. Six boys and one girl were off the wall, in each others' faces, couldn't keep their mouths shut or stay in their own spaces.
I had hoped they would be better for our Junior Achievement speaker... mmm, perhaps not. They were a little quieter, but there was way too much silly business going on. And it was from my normally non-problem-causing students!
Sigh. Monday's are always rough. Tomorrow will be better.
Friday, January 24, 2020
Early(ish) Out
This afternoon has been a moderately relaxing one. All but five of my students left at/before noon. Three of the remaining worked on their Revolutionary War article while one student read a book and I worked with the fifth one to study memory work. Then between 1-1:20, four of the five got picked up. I've had one student left and he's been quietly working (with a few conversational comments thrown in here and there) while I do end of the week clean up type things. His mom should be here any minute to get him and then I can take off for the basketball games too!
Our day was pretty calm for the first half of the morning. Then it seemed to sink in that they were leaving in a few hours and they got a little stir-crazy. We ended our rounds a little early and did 'would you rather' until lunchtime. It's a sneaky way to get them to think about their opinions and release some energy at the same time. I have them line up in the middle of the room, then go to one side of the classroom or the other to show which opinion they have. They had a great time and want to do it again!
Our day was pretty calm for the first half of the morning. Then it seemed to sink in that they were leaving in a few hours and they got a little stir-crazy. We ended our rounds a little early and did 'would you rather' until lunchtime. It's a sneaky way to get them to think about their opinions and release some energy at the same time. I have them line up in the middle of the room, then go to one side of the classroom or the other to show which opinion they have. They had a great time and want to do it again!
Thursday, January 23, 2020
Bowling
All-school bowling was a hit! It was super fun. A little crazy at first, since everyone needed to get shoes. The people running the bowling alley typed everyone's names in the lanes so the kids didn't have to figure it out. We had made teams prior to arrival, but we had to switch things because some kids were gone. All the teachers ended up bowling too! Mr. E did the best- his second game he scored a 200! I did pretty well myself: a personal high score of 156 on the first game and the second I got 101.
The Lakefield tournament starts tomorrow afternoon, and it sounds like my classroom will be pretty empty after noon. The girls' game starts at 4pm, so parents want to leave early to get down there in time. Even though most of the class are boys (they play at 5pm), their families go down early to support the girls' team. I will probably only have two students the rest of the afternoon. My plan is to duck out of school early so I can see them play too! A parent is going to trade places with me at 2pm tomorrow and supervise the stragglers (one is her son) so I can leave early.
In the in between time, they can work on science fair projects, making Valentine's Day cards for soldiers, writing a newspaper article for American history, read a book, and work ahead on memory work, spelling, or handwriting. If all else fails, I can get out some 'building' supplies and we can have mini-STEM lesson.
Wednesday, January 22, 2020
Videos
We've been trying a new potential curriculum for Writers Workshop called Writing City. It's pretty nifty. They have three ways teachers can teach the lesson: teach it themselves with no technology (there's a lesson plan with the lesson chunked and a potential script to follow), teach it themselves with an interactive slide presentation (like on a smartboard), and have students watch a video that takes them through the slides/teaches the lesson.
One of my students had said she learns best if there's a video teaching the topic, so this week that's how I've been testing these lessons. The reader goes a little slow, but they're pretty good. A few of the boys are not as enthralled. One said, "Miss H, I like the way you teach things better." Aww! That made my heart feel good. Other people have also expressed that they're not fans of the videos, so tomorrow we'll mix it up and I'll try one of the other teaching options.
Food Fear Factor went well today, although it seemed to go faster than normal. But that's kind of the way this year's class is. We had kale smoothies (bananas, strawberries, and orange juice also mixed in), coconut water, palmellos (I need to buy some of those!), radichios (cooked with bacon and onions), and parsnips (taste like carrots!) were some of the more memorable items. All together there were 16 things for my kiddos to try, three in each color group with one extra bonus in red (craisins). As an incentive, I gave out marbles for those who were daring enough to try all of them. All together our class earned 56 marbles today and earned an all-class prize. It seems like the majority wants to pick a new seating arrangement. So we officially vote tomorrow on whether that's the class pick or not. Ugh, I hate making seating charts, especially with my kids this year. So many of them are volatile when seated next to certain people. We'll see what happens...
One of my students had said she learns best if there's a video teaching the topic, so this week that's how I've been testing these lessons. The reader goes a little slow, but they're pretty good. A few of the boys are not as enthralled. One said, "Miss H, I like the way you teach things better." Aww! That made my heart feel good. Other people have also expressed that they're not fans of the videos, so tomorrow we'll mix it up and I'll try one of the other teaching options.
Food Fear Factor went well today, although it seemed to go faster than normal. But that's kind of the way this year's class is. We had kale smoothies (bananas, strawberries, and orange juice also mixed in), coconut water, palmellos (I need to buy some of those!), radichios (cooked with bacon and onions), and parsnips (taste like carrots!) were some of the more memorable items. All together there were 16 things for my kiddos to try, three in each color group with one extra bonus in red (craisins). As an incentive, I gave out marbles for those who were daring enough to try all of them. All together our class earned 56 marbles today and earned an all-class prize. It seems like the majority wants to pick a new seating arrangement. So we officially vote tomorrow on whether that's the class pick or not. Ugh, I hate making seating charts, especially with my kids this year. So many of them are volatile when seated next to certain people. We'll see what happens...
Tuesday, January 21, 2020
Squirrely
Boy my kiddos were squirrely today. Sigh, it made for a day of constantly redirecting. We only got one marble in the jar for not blurting (that means there were lots of people talking all day). Hopefully tomorrow they'll be more focused.
I am impressed we squeezed in meetings for all four spelling groups, my three Friday Daily 5 meetings, my normal three Tuesday Daily 5 people, and my handwriting group. It was a busy morning.
Kids have been bringing cereal to school for snack (in the morning and after school before basketball). It's a fine snack, except these kids are SO messy it gets everywhere. Then they don't watch where they step and it gets ground into the carpet. Today we had a number of spills so the classroom floor looks like a mess. One kid opened his desk after school and discovered the whole bottom of his desk is covered in Marshmallow Matey's cereal, courtesy of a classmate who thought he'd want a handy snack.
On the plus side, we have a bunch of fun things on the docket this week: Food Fear Factor, all-school bowling, and the Lakefield basketball tournament.
I am impressed we squeezed in meetings for all four spelling groups, my three Friday Daily 5 meetings, my normal three Tuesday Daily 5 people, and my handwriting group. It was a busy morning.
Kids have been bringing cereal to school for snack (in the morning and after school before basketball). It's a fine snack, except these kids are SO messy it gets everywhere. Then they don't watch where they step and it gets ground into the carpet. Today we had a number of spills so the classroom floor looks like a mess. One kid opened his desk after school and discovered the whole bottom of his desk is covered in Marshmallow Matey's cereal, courtesy of a classmate who thought he'd want a handy snack.
On the plus side, we have a bunch of fun things on the docket this week: Food Fear Factor, all-school bowling, and the Lakefield basketball tournament.
Thursday, January 16, 2020
First Snow Day
I did my lesson plans for next week after school today and I am a bit frustrated because we're not going to accomplish much in the afternoon next week... No school Monday because it's the end of the quarter, Tuesday will be normal, but Wednesday is Food Fear Factor with the school nurse (she brings a bunch of funky foods for my kiddos to try, fruits and vegetables mostly). Our nurse is retiring and she's training in the new one (she seems very nice). Word on the street is that she grew up going to a school like ours and her kids all went to one, so she should fit in just fine! I love Food Fear Factor and it really stretches the picky eaters to go out of their comfort zone.
Thursday afternoon we're going bowling as a school. It will be fun, but we leave at noon so we have enough time to get two games in. Then Friday the 5-8th graders get out at noon again for the Lakefield basketball tournament. Only one of my students is not in basketball, so I'm trying to get her parents to pick her up or have her read in Mrs. L's room (which she will happily do) so I can scurry out early and watch their games.
The other thing throwing a wrench in the mix is this big winter storm... It's supposed to start tomorrow morning at 8am and get worse by 11am. Nicollet doesn't have school tomorrow, so it's down to New Ulm to decide to cancel. But they're not going to because it's the end of their term so everyone has finals/exams and they don't want to reschedule. It's the end of our quarter too, but with only half the kids having busing, Mr. E decided to cancel school already. We knew this afternoon he was calling it, so I had my students get as much done as they could. Most of the spelling tests are done, artwork too. Memory work, eh, not so much. They'll have to say it on Tuesday. That means I'm not going to be able to send out report cards until Wednesday at least. But the school board is okay with that since the weather's arrival got bumped up.
My plan for this long weekend is to get caught up on my large stack of books and movies! Maybe I'll bake a little. Correct papers for sure. See if I can venture out on Sunday for church and our annual meeting. I'm glad there's no where specific I need to be!
Thursday afternoon we're going bowling as a school. It will be fun, but we leave at noon so we have enough time to get two games in. Then Friday the 5-8th graders get out at noon again for the Lakefield basketball tournament. Only one of my students is not in basketball, so I'm trying to get her parents to pick her up or have her read in Mrs. L's room (which she will happily do) so I can scurry out early and watch their games.
The other thing throwing a wrench in the mix is this big winter storm... It's supposed to start tomorrow morning at 8am and get worse by 11am. Nicollet doesn't have school tomorrow, so it's down to New Ulm to decide to cancel. But they're not going to because it's the end of their term so everyone has finals/exams and they don't want to reschedule. It's the end of our quarter too, but with only half the kids having busing, Mr. E decided to cancel school already. We knew this afternoon he was calling it, so I had my students get as much done as they could. Most of the spelling tests are done, artwork too. Memory work, eh, not so much. They'll have to say it on Tuesday. That means I'm not going to be able to send out report cards until Wednesday at least. But the school board is okay with that since the weather's arrival got bumped up.
My plan for this long weekend is to get caught up on my large stack of books and movies! Maybe I'll bake a little. Correct papers for sure. See if I can venture out on Sunday for church and our annual meeting. I'm glad there's no where specific I need to be!
Wednesday, January 15, 2020
Blustery
Today was a mediocre day. No meltdowns, better than yesterday, but the boys were still hard to focus. We're in crunch mode since the end of the quarter is Friday. It's tricky because a big storm with lots of snow and lots of wind is supposed to roll in Friday sometime. Great.
This morning all my kids wanted to talk about was what percent chance I thought we have of whether we'll have school Friday or not.
"100% chance of school Friday."
"What?! But what about all the snow?"
"But Friday isn't here and it's Minnesota. A lot can change before now and then. Ask me Thursday after school."
My current prediction is that we'll come to school but get to come home early. It's pretty blustery today (not a surprise since we've had moderately cold temps but a really cold spell is moving in). Mr. E got worried about the roads so he had combined basketball practice so the kids could go home a little earlier. That was all well and good, except my kiddos couldn't do all their homework/memory work they planned to during basketball study hall. Hmm... hopefully they're using their time wisely tonight (and will use their Daily 5 rounds wisely tomorrow).
This morning all my kids wanted to talk about was what percent chance I thought we have of whether we'll have school Friday or not.
"100% chance of school Friday."
"What?! But what about all the snow?"
"But Friday isn't here and it's Minnesota. A lot can change before now and then. Ask me Thursday after school."
My current prediction is that we'll come to school but get to come home early. It's pretty blustery today (not a surprise since we've had moderately cold temps but a really cold spell is moving in). Mr. E got worried about the roads so he had combined basketball practice so the kids could go home a little earlier. That was all well and good, except my kiddos couldn't do all their homework/memory work they planned to during basketball study hall. Hmm... hopefully they're using their time wisely tonight (and will use their Daily 5 rounds wisely tomorrow).
Tuesday, January 14, 2020
Disney
I wore my hair in a side-braid today, which I don't normally do. I also wore a pastel yellow shirt I haven't worn before. One of the 6th grade boys said, "Miss H, you look like a Disney princess!" Well, I'll take that as a compliment!
The 7-8th graders had made Kahoots to show what they learned about living at different social levels in the Middle Ages. We played them today in class (Kahoots are like a computerized game show where you answer questions about a specific topic and you can compete against other people). Since I hadn't written them, I didn't know the answers, so I could play too! My kids were surprised, but we had a lot of fun being competitive against each other. We still have one more that we ran out of time to play.
The 5-6th graders got to watch videos about living in space (videos from the astronauts on the International Space Station). We only made it through 1/3rd of the videos I have saved, so we'll watch more tomorrow. If you want to watch some, click here.
The 7-8th graders had made Kahoots to show what they learned about living at different social levels in the Middle Ages. We played them today in class (Kahoots are like a computerized game show where you answer questions about a specific topic and you can compete against other people). Since I hadn't written them, I didn't know the answers, so I could play too! My kids were surprised, but we had a lot of fun being competitive against each other. We still have one more that we ran out of time to play.
The 5-6th graders got to watch videos about living in space (videos from the astronauts on the International Space Station). We only made it through 1/3rd of the videos I have saved, so we'll watch more tomorrow. If you want to watch some, click here.
Monday, January 13, 2020
Not Much
We didn't have much 'school' today. As soon as the bus dropped off our Nicollet kids, we all scurried to cars and drove down to MLHS for a Revolutionary War speaker (turns out, one of the dads was a student of Mr. Kind back when he was in middle school!). It was good, but there wasn't as much interactive acting out as in other presentations. He also got sucked up in explaining why the patriots went to war (or 'provincials' as the British called them) and ran out of time so we couldn't act out how the militia would've gotten their guns ready for drills. I remember he did that the last time we heard the Revolutionary War speech and it was really cool. Bummer.
The roads weren't great, so we took it slow heading back to school. We made a pit stop at Pizza Ranch in New Ulm for lunch. There were a few kids who ate too much and had sore stomachs the rest of the day! After that, we had just enough time for 5-6th math and 7-8th science/spelling, followed by 5-8th PE. And that was our day!
After school I had a bunch of putzy little things to do. Now I'm headed to Mankato for a folded book art class put on by the North Mankato Library (the one that runs the Bookmobile). Should be fun!
The roads weren't great, so we took it slow heading back to school. We made a pit stop at Pizza Ranch in New Ulm for lunch. There were a few kids who ate too much and had sore stomachs the rest of the day! After that, we had just enough time for 5-6th math and 7-8th science/spelling, followed by 5-8th PE. And that was our day!
After school I had a bunch of putzy little things to do. Now I'm headed to Mankato for a folded book art class put on by the North Mankato Library (the one that runs the Bookmobile). Should be fun!
Friday, January 10, 2020
Football
The other day we talked about how old Thomas Jefferson was when he wrote the Declaration of Independence (33 years old). I made a comment that that's just a little older than I am, to put it in perspective.
One of them piped up, "Miss H, you're like the prime age for playing professional football."
Another one chimed in, "Or like, a pop singer... or an actress!"
I said, "Oh that's perfect! Maybe I should switch jobs and become an NFL player!"
They all nodded their heads, thinking it over.
A third kid said, "Well, actually, you should wait a little bit, until we're out of your class. Then you can do that."
"Yeah, wait a few years. You'll still be a good age to switch," the rest of the class said. 😂
One of them piped up, "Miss H, you're like the prime age for playing professional football."
Another one chimed in, "Or like, a pop singer... or an actress!"
I said, "Oh that's perfect! Maybe I should switch jobs and become an NFL player!"
They all nodded their heads, thinking it over.
A third kid said, "Well, actually, you should wait a little bit, until we're out of your class. Then you can do that."
"Yeah, wait a few years. You'll still be a good age to switch," the rest of the class said. 😂
Thursday, January 9, 2020
The Best
Sigh, today was the best day we've had in a long time. It's also probably the most fun I've had teaching in a long time. There were zero meltdowns. Kids were focused (the majority of the time). We achieved our class goal we made yesterday (have four or fewer names on the board for blurting each class period). So. Good.
Our devotion talked about the pamphlet Common Sense written back in the Revolutionary War times... yeah, that's what our social studies lesson was about today. Connections!
Everyone was super engaged in the read-aloud book, so we read extra while they all worked on spelling/handwriting. Everyone turned their spelling in on time; I didn't have to bug anyone to do it.
They really liked our Daily 5 class book too! They didn't want to stop reading it (we ran out of time and had to pause until next week).
The 5-8th graders signed up for the Young Writers and Artists Conference today and they all successfully registered (some had trouble last year and didn't find out their registration didn't go through until the day of the conference). They all got in the classes they wanted and are excited about them. Two boys were absent this morning when my class signed up, so their classmates registered for them so they could be in the same classes together. Yes! Looking out for each other!
It was just an all around great day. And I have ladies bible study tonight!
Our devotion talked about the pamphlet Common Sense written back in the Revolutionary War times... yeah, that's what our social studies lesson was about today. Connections!
Everyone was super engaged in the read-aloud book, so we read extra while they all worked on spelling/handwriting. Everyone turned their spelling in on time; I didn't have to bug anyone to do it.
They really liked our Daily 5 class book too! They didn't want to stop reading it (we ran out of time and had to pause until next week).
The 5-8th graders signed up for the Young Writers and Artists Conference today and they all successfully registered (some had trouble last year and didn't find out their registration didn't go through until the day of the conference). They all got in the classes they wanted and are excited about them. Two boys were absent this morning when my class signed up, so their classmates registered for them so they could be in the same classes together. Yes! Looking out for each other!
It was just an all around great day. And I have ladies bible study tonight!
Wednesday, January 8, 2020
Money Money Money
We were big spenders at tonight's PTL meeting. The PTL president and treasurer weren't present (the VP ran the meeting), so there weren't people saying 'hey, slow down with the money spending!' That being said, the PTL treasury is doing pretty good at the moment, so no one is worried that we'll overspend our account.
Here are some of the things we reserved money for:
Here are some of the things we reserved money for:
- National Lutheran Schools Week: money for entertainer, family fun activity, guest pastor
- I Love to Read Month activities
- Valentine's Day treats
- All school activity for the second quarter (bowling)
- Young Writers and Artist Conference registration fees, 3-8th grade
- 5-8th graders MN state capitol trip
I'm probably forgetting something. Even with all that business, we finished in about an hour! That's a record!
Tuesday, January 7, 2020
SMART
The goal setting activity went really well today! We watched a video about how to make 'SMART' goals: specific, measurable, actionable, reasonable, and timely. Then we did a Kahoot game to review what we learned (it's kind of like a game show quiz on the computer). They had such a great time they wanted to do it a second time. We did and some of them got 100% on it! Tomorrow we're going to set personal goals and a class goal.
We also highlighted six of the seven bell songs we have left for this year. I got on a roll copying the music and figured I may as well have them practice all of them. The end of February is the next time we play for church, so there's quite a bit of time. And after how difficult our Christmas songs were, I think they'll master these new ones a lot quicker. So, all the more reason to have more songs to choose from to practice.
The only downside to highlighting all this music is that it's easier for them to complain about how much they have to play. Some only play in five of the six we highlighted, some only play three times. The 8th graders have to do five songs, but I forgot that I told one of the 8th grade boys that he wouldn't have to play so much coming up and I put him on five of the songs. No one else wants to play the lower bells, so he can't even switch with someone. I might offer him some extra credit in exchange. We'll see.
It was a bit of a crazy bell practice since there were so many songs to do. They share books, so it was a lot of back and forth, "where's my folder? what book am I in? what song do I play? wait, I have another one?" Not everyone finished highlighting their parts. I'm going to have to go through each folder and make sure all the parts are highlighted or Thursday when we want to play we'll have a big mess.
We also highlighted six of the seven bell songs we have left for this year. I got on a roll copying the music and figured I may as well have them practice all of them. The end of February is the next time we play for church, so there's quite a bit of time. And after how difficult our Christmas songs were, I think they'll master these new ones a lot quicker. So, all the more reason to have more songs to choose from to practice.
The only downside to highlighting all this music is that it's easier for them to complain about how much they have to play. Some only play in five of the six we highlighted, some only play three times. The 8th graders have to do five songs, but I forgot that I told one of the 8th grade boys that he wouldn't have to play so much coming up and I put him on five of the songs. No one else wants to play the lower bells, so he can't even switch with someone. I might offer him some extra credit in exchange. We'll see.
It was a bit of a crazy bell practice since there were so many songs to do. They share books, so it was a lot of back and forth, "where's my folder? what book am I in? what song do I play? wait, I have another one?" Not everyone finished highlighting their parts. I'm going to have to go through each folder and make sure all the parts are highlighted or Thursday when we want to play we'll have a big mess.
Monday, January 6, 2020
First Day Back
With my squirrelly class this year, plus their typical behavior after a long break, I was kind of scared of how this day would go... It went much better than expected! God is very good! Thank you for the prayers.
I did a lot of preventative measures like having a long morning to-do list on the board, doing more jump rope/running lap breaks, and cracking down on the blurting. I tried a new way of recording blurts that I think I'm going to keep doing. Instead of me writing names/tallies, I have a student do it. If the student abuses his/her power, he/she get sentences. I don't have to write names down while trying to keep track of what I'm saying and the students are still quiet (maybe even more so because they are concerned how strict their classmates will be in recording noises). We did it twice today and it worked decently well both times.
My Christmas break was pretty productive. I read a bunch of books, classroom management themed and some just for fun. I put off looking over my lesson plans for this week until the last minute (i.e. Sunday morning before church) and only got through half of them (the ones I needed for Monday).
Sunday night I still hadn't come up with a good plan for English this week. My original idea had been to do the free month trial of Writing City, figure out how to use it over break, and come up with a plan for the first week back. Yeah, I didn't sign up for it until today after school. I thought about winging English today, but we haven't done circular stories in a long time, plus that is something that keeps them engaged the whole time. So that's what we did! Each person writes a story for two minutes, then passes it to the next person, then that person adds on to the story for two minutes, and passes it to the next person, etc. They didn't want to stop writing!
Then, Mrs. L and I were talking after school and I got an idea for the rest of this week... She's having her class set personal goals and class goals, which is a fantastic idea, so I'm snitching it to use in my class too. She picked each student's goal for this week; next week they get to pick. And she has these clear pockets stuck in a corner of their desk (as big as a post-it note) to keep their weekly goal where they can see it. On the classroom door is a chart to keep track of how they do each day (thumbs up or thumbs down). I'm not sure how much of it I'm going to do with my class; that's part of my homework for tonight. That and figuring out bell parts for the rest of the year.
I got on a roll copying the music we need and printed it off for February, March, and April. We're having a highlighting party tomorrow!
I did a lot of preventative measures like having a long morning to-do list on the board, doing more jump rope/running lap breaks, and cracking down on the blurting. I tried a new way of recording blurts that I think I'm going to keep doing. Instead of me writing names/tallies, I have a student do it. If the student abuses his/her power, he/she get sentences. I don't have to write names down while trying to keep track of what I'm saying and the students are still quiet (maybe even more so because they are concerned how strict their classmates will be in recording noises). We did it twice today and it worked decently well both times.
My Christmas break was pretty productive. I read a bunch of books, classroom management themed and some just for fun. I put off looking over my lesson plans for this week until the last minute (i.e. Sunday morning before church) and only got through half of them (the ones I needed for Monday).
Sunday night I still hadn't come up with a good plan for English this week. My original idea had been to do the free month trial of Writing City, figure out how to use it over break, and come up with a plan for the first week back. Yeah, I didn't sign up for it until today after school. I thought about winging English today, but we haven't done circular stories in a long time, plus that is something that keeps them engaged the whole time. So that's what we did! Each person writes a story for two minutes, then passes it to the next person, then that person adds on to the story for two minutes, and passes it to the next person, etc. They didn't want to stop writing!
Then, Mrs. L and I were talking after school and I got an idea for the rest of this week... She's having her class set personal goals and class goals, which is a fantastic idea, so I'm snitching it to use in my class too. She picked each student's goal for this week; next week they get to pick. And she has these clear pockets stuck in a corner of their desk (as big as a post-it note) to keep their weekly goal where they can see it. On the classroom door is a chart to keep track of how they do each day (thumbs up or thumbs down). I'm not sure how much of it I'm going to do with my class; that's part of my homework for tonight. That and figuring out bell parts for the rest of the year.
I got on a roll copying the music we need and printed it off for February, March, and April. We're having a highlighting party tomorrow!
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)