Classroom Freebies Too, Monsters, and Adding One!

   Happy Halloween!

I hope your little monsters are sweet to you today.  We are going on a field trip to a corn maze…and it’s freezing cold!  It was 80 a few days ago and now…brrr!  Pray for us! 

I’m so excited that this will be my first post writing for Classroom Freebies Too!  Thanks so much, Charity, for the opportunity!

For all you CF fans I am sharing a game that I made tonight to help some of my sweeties master the math strategy of Adding One.  Most all caught on quickly, but some still need more practice.  Click the pic to go grab it at my TPT “store”. 

We had Monster Day on Friday and read some of our favorite monster books such as I Need My Monster and  Monster Manners .

We created our own monsters after this.  I wanted to tie into our geometry Envision topic so we talked about how we could create monsters by cutting the shapes that we know.  There are some c.u.t.e monster patterns out there for the snagging lately, but this time I wanted my kids to be able to completely make the monster how they wanted it.  We don’t have an art special anymore so I worry about hindering creativity.

So I put out every color construction paper I own and let them have at it.  They turned out soooo cute!  

Here are a few:

One fella made one with wings (I forgot pic of it) and it is the only one that keeps falling off the wall.  Too funny! 

They completed a My Monster description page after that.  

Here is Maddy’s (hers is the green monster above).  If you’d like a blank copy of this sheet, just click Maddy’s page and it will take you to Google docs. 

 

Do you know about Dogzilla?  I’ll have to post about him soon!  They LOVE! 

I hope you can use some of these!  Have a great rest of October!

If you give a kid a pencil....

He's going to chew and eat it!  WHAT?  Yep, I have several kiddos that I lovingly refer to as my "woodchucks".  We have gone through more pencils this year than I have ever used.  The "To Be Sharpened" bucket is always full of half eaten, otherwise perfectly good pencils.  I can't help but say...."Hey, you woodchucks! Stop chucking that wood!!"  They don't get it but it cracks me up every time.

So I tried a new strategy this week.  On Monday, I gave each child a brand-new sharpened pencil with their name on it.  I told them that if they can show me this pencil on Friday and it has not been chewed or otherwise mauled, I will give them their very own mechanical lead pencil.  Ooooo, aaahhhh....insert Vanna White waving her hand over a beautiful new lead pencil.  I made it very clear that it was their responsibility to keep up with the pencil.  I would not be swayed by tears and excuses.  I was really surprised about how sweet they were about these pencils.  When they would find one, they would make sure it got back to its owner immediately.  This was amazing because other than that they have been grumpy with each other lately.  WE.NEED.SPRING.BREAK!!

Anyhoo...back to the pencils.  All but 5 were able to show me an intact pencil.  Some of my smarties had hidden it so they wouldn't take the chance of losing it.  I'm giving the other 5 another shot this week so hopefully they'll make it.

The Desk Fairy, Deskerella, also made an appearance this week.  Does the Desk Fairy visit your children?  I have an overall neat group this year so she was able to leave Pixie Stix (I know I'm crazy!) for 12 out of 20 kiddos.  The others immediately got those rat's nests cleaned out.  Hee, hee..

Our reading story this week is The Story of a Bluebird out of Harcourt Trophies.  I made a chart to go with our bird study.   I'm going to try to share it.  Hold on...

Find it HERE

Okay, gonna have to find out how you guys make the picture go to Goggle Docs.  The newbie couldn't get it to work.  :-)

Have a great Monday.  I cannot WAIT to see William Levy on Dancing with the Stars tomorrow night.  

Spring Break starts on Friday at 3:15.  I think I can, I think I can....