I'm so excited that tomorrow is December 1st!  It's my first "advent calendar" gift basket.  Each day the kiddo's get to open a gift until the night that Santa arrives!  I love this time of year!
                                                                                            PeACe-ouT!

No post yesterday due to the fact that I was so busy planning my math lesson on probability for today.  Unfortunately, I wasn't able to implement the lesson because I didn't end up winning the lottery!  I was preparing to explain to the class how normally it would be close to "impossible" and that yes, the odds were that it would be "unlikely"...however I was "certain" that I had won the jackpot.  Sorry to say, I couldn't teach that lesson.

No win = I guess it's just more of this thing called "work" for me.  So not only another day at work, but another night as well. It was our school's holiday sing.  During this time of year, it is always touching to see all of the kids wearing their finest get-ups and seeing their eyes twinkling with excitement.  I guess I am in the right profession...they were all adorable.

            

The best part of the night was seeing our shining stars playing guitar.      

                         

Pretty ladies.                                Wild fellows.

Pretty much sums it up!

      

Happy Holidays! Peace-out!      

 

 

                                                                                                         It was rough.  I came down with a serious illness...a bad case of stripes!  We learned all about writing descriptive essays.  We found that you need to use lots of details, descriptive adjectives, and sensory language.  I read the book A Bad Case of Stripes by David Shannon, as an introduction for word choice and using detail in writing.  Can you believe it?  The sickness started to spread! 

Soon, the majority of our class came down with the stripes! 

It was contagious!

                               

      

                        

 

                  

                                                                       peace-out!

      

Today one of my guided reading groups started having a conversation about using a book's table of contents to help a reader pinpoint specific content in a book.  We have been working on inferencing and have been searching for clues as we try to make understanding of the author's purpose.  One of the ways that we have been doing this is through the use of the table of contents in our book.  Ironically, my first grade son came home from school the day before Thanksgiving break with a completed story that he wrote...complete with a table of contents!  Not only did it have a table of contents, but the story had a magnificient opening sentence, as well as a surprise ending!  I never thought that my 1st grade kids' work would help me with tomorrow's instruction during guided reading (proud mommy moment...of course). 

            

(I typed the story too, so that grandpa & grandma could read it.)

Another moment to love!                                            PEAce-oUT!

      

Scarecrows, caramel apples, and turkey spoons, oh my!  Ended the work week with our fall festival.

Happy Thanksgiving!

                  

                  

Giving Thanks.  Words spoken & rewritten by Chief Jake Swamp of the mohawk tribe.  This tribe has taught their children to start each day by giving thanks to Mother Earth. Also known as the Thanksgiving Address, this daily good morning message is based on the belief that the natural world is a precious and rare gift.

                                          

As a reflection of this holiday season & in coherence with the Thanksgiving Address,

each student created a poem of giving thanks.  Parents were asked to let their child share this poem of thanks during their family holiday time.  The finished products are always special.

                                    

 

      Thankful I am!  peaCe-OuT!

      

Vertices. faces. edges. sides. angles. polygons. quadrilaterals. paralleograms. prisms. 2D. 3D. 
Oh, it's all so confusing!  Remember...make it real.  Math is all around us.
                                                                                                               peace-out!

            

            

      

Sunday fire

Click here to view these pictures larger      

A great way to end the weekend, &
 a great way to start the two day work week!

The end of the week!  Friday's are the day we devote a small portion of our time to catching up and finishing our assignments from the week.  In addition, the student's that have completed all requirements get to have time to pick something fun to do.  Therefore, our classroom wouldn't be complete without our non-verbal signs....

                        

Ketch-up Friday and Friday Pick'les

 
                                                                                                                   peace-OUT!

Ah, family fun nights in the schools.  This week I was busy attending with my own children, instead of hosting for my school.  The kids always get so excited to be at school, during a "non" school time.

                  

      

 
 I'm a little worried about parent involvement in education.  I could, and I'm sure I will at some point, express my views on the amount of true, quality time parents are investing in their children.  Now, don't get me wrong...I do kinda dread going to these functions.  But...it's worth it.  It's for the kids!

            

      

                                                                                                                       pEace-oUt!

Think-Pair-Share

      

            

I couldn't believe my eyes.  I couldn't believe my ears. 

You would think I was staging these pictures! 

The rich conversations that were happening today were so encouraging. 

These kiddo's really can be quite adorable as they develop and evolve into critical thinkers. 

            

 

The Think-Pair-Share strategy is designed to differentiate instruction by providing students time and structure for thinking on a given topic.  This in turn enables them to formulate individual ideas and share these ideas with a peer.  Sometimes the conversations are quite comical.  Today they were so serious.  They were right on point!                             
                                                                                                                     peaCE-OuT!

Lattice.

We’ve been discussing common core and using the 8 standards for mathematical practices in our daily instruction.  These standards of best practice are based on the belief that mathematical knowledge is learned through the actual process of doing, being able to critically think, and give appropriate reasoning.

It is still my responsibility to model a variety of ways to solve problems.

                  

      

 

Lattice multiplication (also known as sieve multiplication) is a method of multiplication that uses a lattice to multiply two multi-digit numbers. It is algorithmically the same as regular long multiplication, but it breaks the process into smaller steps. 

Again, this is nothing “new” to teaching.  Lattice has been around since medieval times…it’s just always fun when we come to this concept and I get to introduce this cool method.

Some schools have banned this method of learning double digit multiplication.  For some reason I have found that my lower performing student’s have such a better grasp on this method than that of a traditional algorithm! 

*Always find ways to make it work!                                   peaCe-out!

We honored our veteran's today in the frigid outdoor temperatures.  The veterans that were present of the U.S. military saluted, while we placed our right hands over our hearts.  We listened to Taps play on the trumpet by our district's band instructor, participated in the lowering and proper folding of the flag, and ended with the entire student body singing our nation's anthem.

            

Not only was the flag lowering done today, but the raising and lowering of the flag is done daily at our school.  It is customary to raise the flag at dawn and lower it at dusk.  Each day our students complete this task with a veteran from our community. 

                        

During our classroom community time we discussed and showed appreciation for the veteran's of our great country.  What made it even more special was that one of very own student's father was honored and asked to be in attendance to speak about his experience as a member of the United States military.  (I was his older daughters teacher when he was stationed in Afghanistan for the year.  He would send the class mail every month for the entire school year).  Just another way to make sense of the real world around us.  That's what education is all about!                  PEAce-Out!

 

 

      

Headline News?  Now you know that you live in a small town when this is in the newspaper!  Beloit population: 40,000.  Open the newspaper, what do I find? Hmmm, looks like our school secretary was trying to do a little public relations work for our school.  Just another day in B-town.
peAce-OUT!