The Snowman

We watched the dvd version of The Snowman by Raymond Briggs. After watching the students verbally identified the characters, setting, problem, and solution. The students then created their own snowmen.

Gingerbread Subtraction

On Wednesday we reviewed subtraction problems by using Gingerbread mashmallows followed by a fun word problem lesson created by my teammate, Mrs. Timms. The students placed however many gingerbread clipart on a cookie sheet that they wanted. (My teammate used foil which was so cute - too bad I forgot mine at home that day!) They then pretended that some of them fell off of the cookie sheet and glued them all down. They then solved a subtraction word problem by identifying how many gingerbread men were on the cookie sheet to begin with, how many fell off, and how many were left on the cookie sheet. And, of course, the students then ate their gingerbread marshmallows. Yum!

Christmas Tree Addition

In the computer lab yesterday the students drew their own trees in the program Pixie 2. They practiced the skill of "click, hold, and drag" to create three overlapping triangles. They then learned to fill in the shapes with the paint bucket feature. For each new section in their tree they had to choose a new shade of green and a new texture background. After their tree was created, they again practiced "click, hold, and drag" to make circle ornaments and filled them with either blue or red. They then typed an addition word problem from the board with their specific number of ornaments. They then solved their addition problems. Lastly, they practiced using the search feature in the clipart, or stickers, section of Pixie 2 to find a star to place on top of their tree. I love the different shapes and sizes of their trees!

My Elf Self

The students created an elf on Monday using the pattern from Deanna Jump's Polar Express unit. Fellow teachers, if you have not seen it, you should check it out! I then took a black and white photo of the students and cut out their face. The students then wrote about what their elf looks like, what he or she is wearing, and what he or she can do using our Write From the Beginning strategies. They turned out really adorable!

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Holidays Around the World: Germany

As a part of our unit on holidays around the world, we read and then sang "O Christmas Tree" with the book version by Debbie Trafton O'Neal and read The Legend of the Christmas Tree by Pat Matuszak. We discussed the how the tradition of the Christmas tree began and how the tradition of using candles at Christmas time began. The students then created their own tree out of hearts (we reviewed number patterns as we created them - the numbers decreased by one with each layer). The students then added a heart and yellow hole punches to decorate their tree. They then drew lines under the yellow hole punches to turn them into candles to symbolizes that candles were once placed on Christmas trees in Germany.

Holidays Around The World: Mexico

As a part of our Social Studies unit on holidays around the world, we read The Legend of the Poinsettia by Tomie dePaola. We talked about how poinsettias are thought to have first appeared when a child, having nothing else to offer, left green weeds at the nativity which then turned red. The students then created poinsettias of their own. (Fellow teachers, I did not take a picture of these but we just layered the a five-pointed flower shape three times - twice in red and once in green. We then added yellow hole punches to the center.)

To Make the Grinch Smile...

This is an idea that I got from Deanna Jump. In her Grinch Unit, she has several activities based off of the book How the Grinch Stole Christmas. This book goes perfectly with our character trait lessons. As we read, we stopped to talk about how the Grinch was acting and why he was acting that way. We also discussed how his character changed over time. Following our character trait lesson, the students created their own Grinch and then wrote about how they would make the Grinch smile.

It's Christmas, David!

Today we read It's Christmas, David! by David Shannon to discuss character traits. After reading and discussing David's behavior in the story, we created a class Story Elements Map to define the characters, setting, problem, and solution. The students then answered questions about David's character on a graphic organizer of a boy. The students wrote about what David looks like, how he acts, and what they would do if they were him. They then colored the template to look like David. (Fellow teachers, I do not have an electronic copy of this template because I received it from a former student intern. I love when the interns bring new and exciting things into the classroom!)

Fact Family Wreaths

To help the students understand related addition and subtraction problems, or fact families, they created Fact Family Wreaths with paper pattern blocks. The students chose between two different wreath patterns. These wreath patterns can be downloaded here from PreKinder and the pattern block templates can be downloaded here. After creating their wreath, they cut them out and glued them on the recording sheet. Teachers, you can download the recording sheet here for FREE. The students had to count how many green and red pattern blocks were needed to make their wreaths and then write the related math facts. We discussed how the wreaths with mostly green had to use more pattern blocks because they cover less area. Teachers, this is a great way to frontload the concept of measuring area. We also discussed that it takes three of the pattern blocks to make one red pattern block. Again, this is a good way to frontload a math concept - this time fractions.

Reindeer Application Placemats

The students filled out reindeer applications today in writing. I got the application from The First Grade Teaching blog. As the students filled out their job applications we talked about appropriate behavior and what makes a good employee. I connected this characteristics back to our class Social Contract. After completing the application, the students glued them on half of a large piece of construction paper. On the other side of the mat, they glued down a picture of themselves that I had taken and printed the day before. They then traced their hands on brown paper for the antlers. With paint, they added a red thumprint nose. We will be using these as our placemats at our festive holiday party on Friday.