FREE FOR 1 DAY ONLY!

I have reached 100 followers on TPT (and close to it on my blog).  In honor of this milestone, I will be giving away one of my favorite units for FREE!!!!  This unit is all about DOGS!!!  This unit will be free from 10 am- 10 pm EST.  ENJOY!

This 40 page unit includes math, writing, reading and science:

Math-
Favorite Breed bar graph and tally chart and 8 extended response word problems

Writing-
A persuasive writing prompt with generating idea chart, picture and publishing paper.
A complete non-fiction book with cover page, table of contents, drawing page, dog breed page, dog features page, labeled diagram of a dog to complete, dog trick page, persuasive sheet, 5 facts about dogs, and a non-fiction glossary.

Reading- 2 cut and paste sequencing activities, dog vocabulary sheets

Science- Venn diagram comparing humans and dogs, living vs non-living activity sheet.

You can download the entire FREE unit HERE.    The only thing I ask is that if you like it, LEAVE FEEDBACK and follow me on TPT for more freebies!!!!

Halloween Giveaway

A friend of mine is having an awesome giveaway for Halloween.  I entered one of my best selling products- Halloween Literacy and Math Super Pack

Check out the giveaway here

Kristin :)

Celebrating Columbus (and a day off) :)

Over the past two days, my class spent a lot of time learning about Christopher Columbus.  We read a mini-book about his adventures and watched a Brain Pop video about him. 

Yesterday, after reading the mini-book,  we spent the day talking about what kind of person he was; what character traits he had.  The students came up with a lot of different ideas:  brave, loyal, courageous, leader...

My FAVORITE answer was:  Christopher Columbus was stinky because he was on the Santa Maria for 70 straight days and did not shower.  HAHAHA  Clever, and maybe true. 

This is the paper we used to complete the character traits.

Today we used Columbus' ships for a math project.  Students were asked to redesign a ship for Columbus after the Santa Maria was wrecked.  Students were able to use their pattern blocks to help them combine 2D shapes for the ship.  They LOVED this idea!!! 

Here are a few examples. 

In writing, we used a graphic organizer to help us create a 1492 Journal.   Students answered questions to guide their thinking like: 
Where were you going?
How many ships do you have?  Draw them.
What is your job on the boat?
What land did you find? Where is it located?
What did you find when you explored?

Students then went on to write a journal entry about the explorations.

Find the complete unit here


Enjoy your day off on Monday. (sorry if you have school)

Kristin :)

I completely forgot about Columbus Day

I cannot believe I forgot all about Columbus Day; we even have off that day!!  I have been racking my brain for activities for my kids to do and came up with this cute activitiy pack.  Check it out here

I plan to use my day off to take my son pumpkin picking.  He loves farm animals and making animal noises (he is 1), so we are off to the farm on Monday. 

Let me know how you plan to spend your day off celebrating Columbus.

Constantly writing about dogs....

My kids are always writing about bringing their dog to the park or teaching their dog a new trick or playing fetch.  I thought I would use these stories and interest and turn it into a new mini-unit.  This unit is across all content areas. 

Included:

Math-
Favorite Breed bar graph and tally chart and 8 extended response word problems

Writing-
A persuasive writing prompt with generating idea chart, picture and publishing paper.
A complete non-fiction book with cover page, table of contents, drawing page, dog breed page, dog features page, labeled diagram of a dog to complete, dog trick page, persuasive sheet, 5 facts about dogs, and a non-fiction glossary.

Reading- 2 cut and paste sequencing activities, dog vocabulary sheets

Science- Venn diagram comparing humans and dogs, living vs non-living activity sheet.

We are starting this unit on Monday.  I'll post pictures of my class completing this unit.

Click here to see Dog Mini-Unit

YAY!!!! For the weekend!

This week my students have started getting into the classroom routine. We just finished a place value test in math. They did rather well! =)  I cannot believe that I have already given my first test of the year!  This is going fast!

Every monday has become Math Problem Monday.  We started doing math word problems with extended responses in preparation for the New York State math test in 3^rdgrade. Since, everything is being aligned to the common core, things are changing! I am noticing that students are beginning to master topics but are having a difficult time expressing their thoughts with math writing. I am going to have to keep having the students work in their math journals. Check out my 3rd grade extended response journals here. 2nd and 4th also available.
 

Coming Soon:

We did a poll in my classroom about things we like to write about and an overwhelming response was DOGS! That got me thinking about all the cool things I can do with dogs and make my class motivated. I started writing a DOG unit and it will be posted soon! Unit will include all major content areas.   

Have a wonderful weekend =)

Kristin

AUTHOR'S PURPOSE with a freebie

Well....we have been in school for about 12 days and the students are just settling into routines and procedures.  (This week I will share with you my job chart board and behavior chart.)

My co-teacher and I have started our first mini-unit on REALISTIC FICTION!  We are modeling this with the cute story, Ruby the Copycat.  The students love this story and can relate to it.  This story opened up to a discussion about friendship, being yourself and confidence. 

In addition to reading this story, we have started our guided reading groups and centers.  I have many center activities for sale in my TPT store.  Centers included:  listening center-the students will listen to our current read a loud AGAIN or a book of their choosing, computers to work on Raz-kids, book shopping/partner reading/reading phones and guided reading. 

Our mini-lesson tomorrow will focus on Author's Purpose.  I felt that this story would be a great introduction to why author's write.  We will detail the 3 different categories for authors and decide where Ruby the Copycat would be.  After this, students will work at their tables to sort a basket of books into 3 categories: Persuade, Inform and Entertain.  

Here is a freebie for you to post in your classroom, FIND IT HERE