Week 21- Taxing the Colonists, Bucket List, & 100th Day

I've had a few emails about my photos not loading correctly on my blog so I'm trying something a little different this week. Thanks to those of you who let me know. I'll also be working on getting a new design to help solve the problem. If you have suggestions of where I can find some cute blog designs I'd love to hear from you. I really want red, black, and white with polka dots to match my classroom. I truly appreciate the fact that I have followers and I'm excited that I can share things that other teachers want to use in their classrooms.

This week we started Pasta for Pennies. We are raising money for leukemia and cancer research. We had a visitor come to the school and talk to everyone about cancer. He had volunteers wearing red caps (red blood cells), white caps (white blood cells), and purple caps (cancer cells) to demonstrate cancer and chemo.The students who represented chemotherapy were dressed similar to Power Rangers.

The white and red blood cells were just hanging out until the cancer cells came in and pushed them all together. Once the chemo was injected they came in and "killed" the cancer cells. It was a really neat demonstration and presented in a way that all the students could understand.

We also learned how the colonists felt when they were taxed after the French and Indian War.

We used Skittles for money and each student had 18 of them. King (or Queen in our case) George and Parliament decided what to tax. Then the tax collector went around the room collecting taxes. Our tax collector was not a very popular person after she had to collect taxes on jewelry, glasses, pants, and other items. This helped the students understand how the colonists felt about being taxed. 

Friday was the 100th day of school so we had a little fun! Some of the students dressed like they were 100 years old.

   

We wrote a Bucket List of things to do before turning 100.

  

 

I displayed these in the hallway along with pictures we made. I found an app called Aging Booth. I took pictures of the kids and it ages them! Needless to say, this was a huge hit. No one liked their picture but we all looked old. Check out a few of them.

  

 

I even had them do one for me (I didn't like mine either). 

As you probably know, we had been doing random acts of kindness for a few months. My students have really embraced this and done nice things for people. Several left thank you notes for their mailman and others have been leaving notes for each other. I even had several special notes left for me this week. They really made my day!

STUDENTS: Did you show a random act of kindness this week? Share what you did and why. Why is it important to do good things for others?

Week 20- Mixed Numbers, MLK, & Kid President

This week we did another set of math around the room posters. These were for adding and subtracting mixed numbers. Our math coach, Mrs. Hamlett, made them!

I love these types of posters because it gets the kids up and moving around the room. They also work well together to solve the problems.

I found this really cute step by step for drawing MLK. The drawings turned out great and each was unique.

Later in the week, after we had learned more about MLK, I had them go back and write a few sentences about how he used the habits. I forgot to take pictures of the final product before I left school today so I don't have any to share. Maybe some of my students will share their sentences in the comments (for a bonus ticket).



One of my students, Emily H., created this short video for me. This tells how we used the lattice method to add and subtract fractions with unlike denominators. Great job Emily!


Finally, I have to share the video I showed my students this week. Are you familiar with Kid President. This little boy is so energetic and positive. I loved seeing my students' reaction to this one. They all laughed along with him and we had a great talk about how we are all teachers.



STUDENTS: After watching the above video we talked about how we are all teachers. Explain one way you are a teacher.

Week 19- Fractions & A Number Line

This week we were working on adding and subtracting fractions with unlike denominators. Check out a few of the pages in our interactive notebook.

Thursday we used our new number line to review ordering fractions. I don't have anything magnetic in my classroom so we moved to the hallway on the lockers. I added a 0 and 1 on each end of the number line.

I gave each student a card of their own to add to the number line. They each had to add the card and then explain why they put it in that place. Then other students could either agree with the placement or share an argument to move the card.

I didn't correct the mistakes because the students did it as we went. I also told them I would leave the number line up in the hallway for them to look at and see if there were other cards they wanted to move.

Once we returned to the classroom I had the groups discuss which mathematical practices this activity covered. They all came to the conclusion that it covered all the ones in our flipbook so far.

I also traded desks for tables this week and I'm pretty happy with the results so far.

The tables make it much easier for group work and collaboration. We are working out the kinks but I think this is going to work for us!



STUDENTS: What is your math goal for this 9 weeks? What do you plan to do in order to reach your goal?

Teacher Workroom RAK Board

We are back from Christmas break! I don't know that I can call this a week because the students were only in school one day. Since I didn't really take pictures I thought I'd share something my best friend Kelly Reasner and I did in the teacher workroom today.



We have been doing random acts of kindness with our students so we thought we'd share it with the faculty as well. So we made a RAK board in the workroom. The border was already up but we decided this is something that is going to have to be changed. But I didn't want to wait to share what we did.



On the left side of the board we posted 5 random acts of kindness teachers can do for themselves or for others. We plan to switch them out each week so we added paper clips so they can be easily changed.



Then on the right side we added some posters about random acts of kindness.

So my favorite RAK for next week is to share a music list. I have been accused of listening to music that is a little darker than what most of my co-workers listen to. So I came home tonight and typed up my list so I'm ready to post it Monday. Want to see my list?

Mrs. White’s Top 10 Playlist

10. Under and Over It- Five Finger Death Punch

9. White Rabbit- Egypt Central

8. Get Up!- Korn

7. Living Dead Girl- Rob Zombie

6. Fake It- Seether

5. I’ll Follow You- Shinedown

4. The Truth- Buckcherry

3. Pass Slowly- Seether

2. The High Road- Three Days Grace

1. One More Lie- Aranda

Week 18- RAK and Welcome Jack!

WE started the week with a few Random Acts of Kindness. My homeroom and Mrs. Reasner's homeroom delivered coffee and cookies to all the teachers and staff members in the building Monday morning. We wanted to show them how much we appreciate them all!





These students took the time to decorate the teacher workroom. They had a great time and seemed to be excited to be able to surprise the teachers with this random act of kindness.



Mrs. McNabb came in this week and made an ornament with us.



This is the tag that we tied on the ornament. The students added these items inside the plastic ornament.



Then they filled it up with Epson salt. It is like a mini I Spy for the Christmas tree.



We also wrote some math word problems using a price list and the 12 Days of Christmas song. 



We also played 24. Some of my students were serious about this game. On each card there are 4 numbers. They have to add, subtract, multiply, and/or divide to get 24.


We had a blast at our class Christmas party and there were lots of sweets for everyone!


The week wrapped up with our class gaining a new "student" named Jack. Jack is Dylan's service dog and alerts when Dylan's blood sugar gets too high or too low. We are looking forward to having Jack in our class every day!



I hope everyone has a wonderful break and a safe holiday!

Week 17- More RAKs & A Little Redesign

A few weeks back I was browsing Pinterest and ran across a pin where a teacher had her desks arranged the way I do mine sometime. She used drawers to help keep supplies close to the kids so I knew I wanted to do that.


The drawers came in this week and I love them! We keep paper towels, notebook paper, a stapler, tape, pencils, pens, and post it notes in the drawers. We are still figuring out what we need to add to them to have all our supplied close. I also added tissue and hand sanitizer to the top.

I'm also in the process of making the decorations to hang from the ceiling. I used wiffle balls and tissue paper to create these. I wasn't sure I loved them but the kids did so I'm keeping them. I just glued the tissue paper in the holes in the wiffle balls. They were super easy to make.



This week we continued our random acts of kindness (RAK). We selected different grade levels each day and went and posted positive notes to the teachers. We got so many comments about doing this and my kids are continuing to do nice things for each other as well.



We have several surprise RAK in the works for next week so check back to see what we've done!

One afternoon when we went to pack up we found that one of the students wrote positive notes for everyone and put them on their lockers. Great job!



I also wanted to share this game that my math coach, Mrs. Hamlet shared with me. The students play bowling with order of operations. They roll 3 numbers and write it on their paper. Then they use those numbers and try to write an equation to equal each number on the right side of the page. When they create an equation for each number they knock over the bowling pin (bottom left). I let them compete against each other.


This is the pdf file in case you'd like to use it too!



STUDENTS: What can you do to help someone else without expecting something in return? What is something that stood out to you in the RAK videos we watched this week? Can you duplicate this?

Week 16- Fractions & RAKs

I have so much to share about this week! We started learning about Holidays Around the World this week in social studies. Check out the file on TpT. It is a close read format and my students had fun learning about traditions in different countries.



We started learning about fractions this week and had several fun activities. We started with a living number line. I gave each student a fraction card and they placed themselves on the number line in the correct order.





On Thursday, during our small group rotations, I taught the kids how to play a game called From Here to There Fractions.





We used fraction cards that my former math coach, Haley James, gave me last year. The kids loved using these cards and couldn't believe I had playing cards with fractions on them.



Here is a picture of one of the game boards.



Want to know how to play? Watch this Gami that Haley and Avery made to explain the game.



I also had to do the chocolate bar activity with fractions. I love any excuse for chocolate.





We answered questions about fractions using the chocolate bar pieces.



Want to see the powerpoint I made for this? It is free on TpT: Chocolate Fractions 

And have I mentioned lately how much I love using Padlet with my students? This week we took pictures of our pages in the interactive notebook and I added them to the fractions padlet. That way students could go back and access it from home in case they forgot their notebook at school. It is also a good resource that shows the different ways I teach fractions. I like to show my students several different ways to do things and let them pick what works best for them.

Created with Padlet

My mom stopped by school this week and brought us a beautiful wreath for the classroom door. I love it!



Mrs. Reasner and I have been doing Random Acts of Kindness (RAKs) with our students during the school day. I gave my students a choice board and challenged them to do all of the items on the board this week. Find the choice board idea I found here. We also created a Motivation Wall in the teacher work room. I have seen several of these on Pinterest and knew we had to do this for the teachers. This is what we did. We also left other post it notes so that teachers can add some of their favorite motivational quotes to the wall. We didn't add a bunch because we wanted to leave room for others but I have a list of quotes I plan to add it no one else takes advantage of this.



To go along with the Random Acts of Kindness we started using the Christmas Kindness Countdown. It gives a different RAK each day for the students to do. This week we picked up trash, smiled at everyone, and made cards for our principal. I also showed them this RAK video and we talked about doing nice things for people and not expecting things in return. I think this is a great life lesson and I've seen my students doing nice things for others all week.


We also chose names for the Secret Santa RAK. Each student drew a classmate's name (I added my name too). We will do nice things for that student and reveal ourselves before the Christmas break. I also plan to have them make a picture of their RAK person and list things they have done for them. I found the idea on Pinterest (here it is). 

Mrs. Reasner shared the idea of writing positive notes for the teachers in each grade level so of course I was on board. We have been randomly selecting a grade level and writing a positive note on a post it note for the teachers. Then we go and stick them on their doors. I hope we have brightened some days this week with our little notes of love.

STUDENTS: We started doing RAKs this week. I loved seeing everyone doing nice things for each other. Has this carried over into your life at home? Have you done a RAK for someone at home or has someone done something for you? Share what was done. I'd love to hear about it.