favorite thanksgiving book

My favorite part of this time of year is sharing 1621 A New Look at Thanksgiving with my students.  It tells the story of the pilgrims and the local Native Americans, the myths, and the facts.  It's told from both viewpoints, which is what makes it so interesting.  You can find it at a great price here, and you can find more Thanksgiving books for kids here. 

                                         

What Thanksgiving books do you love?

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the thanksgiving interview project

Teaching writing has never been a strength of mine.  Something about all the lack of rule following just makes me nervous.  I am structured and analytical.  I like order.  Except for my bedroom.  That's a mess.  Laundry everywhere.  But I digress.

This year, I have been concentrating on improving the way I teach writing.  My first thought was, "AHHHHHH, WHERE DO I BEGIN???"  I decided to start with what I know: the assignments I currently have.  I'd make them better.

If you are anything like me, you are reading this and thinking, "Yeh that's great and all, but WHAT DO YOU MEAN?"

Here's what I mean.

Last year, I gave a 4-week writing assignment that spanned over Thanksgiving break.  The assignment was to generate questions, interview a family member, and then reflect on what they've learned.  Overall, this project was a success and the kids enjoyed it.  

Buuuuuuut, it lacked refinement.  And more importantly, it lacked excitement.  Take a look at the layout for example.  

See what I mean?  Ugh.  Just looking at it makes me want to fall asleep.

Here's what it looks like now:

So much better.  And my class was so. so. so. excited.  You know when the kids won't stop asking questions the entire time you are trying to explain, to the point where you have to say "STOP ASKING ME QUESTIONS SO I CAN TRY TO EXPLAIN!!!"  Yeh.  That happened.  

I also changed the layout.  I created a page that gives an overview of the project with the due dates for each of the 4 parts.  Now it's easy for the parents kids to stay organized and manage their time.

Then I gave each part it's own page.  No more pages full of language that are hard to follow.

Currently, we are set to begin part 2 of this assignment on Monday.  But I am already receiving lots of positive feedback from parents.  

-My child is excited about her writing assignments.

-There's no anxiety at home.

-My child isn't waiting until the last minute this year.  

-We haven't had one night end in tears.

Assigning this project right before Parent/Teacher conferences was an unexpected bonus!

Psst!  This project is for sale at my TeachersPayTeachers store and IT'S ONLY 3 DOLLARS!

(Note: To save your job ink, I recommend only printing the first page in color.)

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new beginnings

At the end of last year, I decided to make a change.  A big change.  I decided to leave the school where I have worked for the past 6 years, the school that gave me my first teaching job.  It was a wonderful school with amazing teachers, but, as my mentor put it, I was given wings and now it's time to fly.  

The start of this school year marked a new beginning as well as fresh challenges.  I had to learn a new culture, recreate a new classroom, and meet  many  MANY new faces.  At first it was scary...you never know if the grass is going to be greener.  But as hectic as the last six weeks have been, it has been wonderful!  My team is awesome, the kids are great (but I already knew that), and the administration and parents are soooo supportive.

One of the most exciting new challenges I have this year is implementing the Daily 5 into my daily routines.  I have been reading about the Daily 5 from many of you bloggers out there, and so I'm very excited to have the chance to try it out myself! 

We have been working hard on Read to Someone for the last couple weeks.  Yesterday, my class teamed up with Miss G's kindergarteners to introduce our weekly Reading Buddies.  

During Library, each of my students picked out a picture book they felt their kindergarten Reading Buddy would enjoy.  Then they practiced reading aloud during Daily 5 this week.

My 5th graders were soooo excited to meet their buddies.  As the oldest members of the school, they really stepped up as role models: greeting their buddies and making them feel comfortable, and practicing good expression when reading.  Many of them also found they had a lot in common with their buddy!

I hope everyone has a great long weekend!  And don't forget to head on over to Principal Principles and share your blog!  I'd love to check out what's going on in your classroom!

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classroom court case

The other day I was cleaning my desk (a rare occurrence) and I found a letter from a couple of my students. Now, to understand the letter, I first need to give you a bit of background:

1. We have a classroom economy in my class where kids apply for classroom jobs and then are paid weekly in classroom money.  They can buy homework passes, lunch parties with me, and raffle tickets for prizes.  They can also be fined for calling out, losing worksheets, whining, etc.  
2. Some of my kids have created book companies and are selling their published work to each other for classroom money.
3. LW Books is owned by two boys.
4. NNE Books is owned by three girls.

Okay, back to the letter.

Dear Mrs. Eddy,

We feel we have the right to sue LW Books.  Emily willingly bought one of our "How to Survive School" books.  LW Books writers came up to us and told us that they told Emily to write a bad review on "How to Survive School."  We feel we have the right to sue LW Books for this. We would also like you to know that we have hired Connor as our lawyer.

Sincerely,

NNE Books

Well, at first I told NNE Books that they didn't have a right to sue because Emily has the freedom to write whatever she wants.  But then I thought about it a little.  LW Books hired Emily to write the review and because of this, other kids aren't buying books from NNE.  Well I am no legal expert, and so I emailed my sister (who is a lawyer).  Turns out that NNE Books does have a case!  So I decided that we would wrap up the year by pulling together many of the writing skills we have learned and put together a mock trial.  My sister has volunteered to help each side with preparing their case, and then she plans to come in and oversee the trial.  Ahhhh!  This is going to be great.  I simply cannot wait!

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where babies come from

Recently, one of my book groups began reading Out of the Dust by Karen Hesse.

This book is about a 13 year-old girl and the hardships she faces while living in the Dustbowl period during the Great Depression.  I picked this book because of its rich, descriptive language and also because its structure is free verse poetry and reads like journal entries.

To give the group some background information, we read a National Geographic article that explained what lead to the Great Depression and the dust storms. 

When we opened the book, one of my students noticed that the date on the first page said 1920.  Immediately, he asked, "How can this book be set in the Great Depression if the date says 1920?" 

So we began to read together the first page, where it describes the main character being born "on the swept floorboards of the kitchen because that's where Daddy said it would be best."  All I am intending is for the group to recognize that this is a sort of prologue since the next section skips to 1932.

The same student says, "I don't understand how women could have babies back then and live if they weren't in a hospital.  How do they get the baby out of the stomach without surgery?"

I responded, "Well, some women have surgery and the baby is taken out of the stomach and some women don't."  (moving on.)

We continue to read and then the boy stops and says, "But wait.  If the baby doesn't come out of the stomach, where does it come from?"  He thinks for a minute, while I stammer a couple "ums" and try to change the subject.  

Finally, he looks back at the text (nice use of a reading skill!) and says, "I see here it says that the mom was crouching.  Wait a minute," (thinks) "Does the baby come out of her butt?"  

At that exact moment, I look across the table at another student.  He is shaking his head and repeatedly whispering, "That's not where babies come from.  That's not where babies come from."

I can feel my face burning, and all I can think is "I did NOT anticipate this conversation when I planned this lesson!"  Finally, I manage to blurt out "I think you should ask your mom where they come from when you get home.  Let's move on."

five for friday

I am excited to link up with Doodle Bugs Teaching for this Five for Friday linky party!  As this is my first Five for Friday, I didn't take a whole lot of classroom pics.  Note to self for next time.

                             



This week was a crazy one.  I was one sick puppy all week and the kids were jumping out of their skin with excitement for April vacation to begin.  But thankfully, we all made it through in one piece.



1. We continued our reading groups this week.  This is the second full week and so the kids are really getting   into them.  Below are the books we are reading:

                                           


                                   

In addition to reading their assignment, they all have to fill out a "Think Book" which helps them brainstorm topics to discuss when we meet.  One requirement is for them to record any new words they come across.  We discuss the strategies they used to discover the meaning or if they still don't know, we figure it out together as a group.  In particular, this set of books contain many words that are specific to the culture, location, or time period where the book takes place.  The kids are having fun pointing out these new words to their classmates.



2. We finished up our dividing fractions unit this week.  Since this was the last operation we studied on fractions, the kids had the chance to put them all together.  They worked in partners to solve word problems that included all operations on fractions.  To help them remember the steps, they used a top down web they created.

                                           





3. In Social Studies, we finished learning about how the 13 colonies were formed (I'll blog more about this later).  Instead of making them memorize the colonies, the kids learned where each one is located by piecing together their own maps.

4. A small group of teachers and I are training for the Tough Mudder in June.  We met a couple times after school this week to run together in addition to training individually.  It's so nice to have workout buddies!!

                                              

5. The third book in The Infernal Devices series came out last month, and I finally had the chance to begin it this week.  It's a young adult fantasy series and the second from this author.  I always like reading books that I know my students will be interested in because it makes my book talks much less contrived.  So I'll be excited when I finish this one and can add it to our classroom library. 

                                       

I hope everyone in the New England area has a wonderful April vacation!!

fractions in quilting

Several factors led to the making of this lesson.  1) Friday was Community Reading Day, 2) It was the end of a very long testing week (we NEEDED a fun project) and 3) my IA is getting her certification and needed practice creating and teaching lessons.  Therefore, my IA, Mrs. M, planned this great lesson that integrates quilting and the math behind it.  

First, while the kids were at Library, we draped the room in quilts that Mrs. M's mom made.  

These quilts are amazing, and the kids were so excited to see them.  They got a chance to look at each one, and Mrs. M taught them the history behind quilting in America.  She also discussed the different patterns, color choices, and materials that are used.  Then we went to the library where our community member read A Cloak for the Dreamer to celebrate Community Reading Day.  

This book lead to a discussion about which shapes can be used to make quilts and which ones cannot.  (BTW, this book is great for a lesson on tesselations!)  Then Mrs. M introduced the activity: each student was given a tangram template, scrapbook paper, scissors, and glue and told to create an original quilt square.  They were allowed to alter their tangram shapes as long as they kept to the shape of the square.   

It was interesting to watch how the kids problem solved throughout the activity.  This one planned hers out first and even used numbers to label the different patterns.  That's my girl!

The kids took time to check out each other's squares to get ideas, but each one ended up completely original.

After the kids finished their quilt squares, they needed to figure out what fraction of the square each shape represented.  This ended up being a real challenge: they needed to combine their skills of adding, multiplying, and dividing fractions.  It was refreshing to see them rise to the occasion (and without any complaints I might add).

When everyone completed their project, we put them all together to make our class quilt.

So amazing!  Thanks Mrs. M for putting together a great lesson!

Angry Verbs

Okay, these last few weeks have been absolutely crazy with report cards coming up. But we have completed some pretty fun lessons that I'm excited to share with you. I came across this Angry Verbs lesson on Pinterest and thought I would try it out.  We have been working a lot on grammar basics this year (in September, my students could not consistently identify the verb in a sentence).  They have been making a lot of progress and last Friday, we reviewed action verbs and helping verbs.  Then each student wrote a sentence on their angry bird, underlined the helping verb, and circled the action verb.  Here is how they turned out.

They had a blast working on this and it's been all they've talked about since.  I can't wait to see their little faces tomorrow morning when they see the display!

library dogs

Today I came across Library Dogs, a website that promotes using therapy dogs to help children improve their reading skills.  Check out some pictures from their website.

Sunny is paying careful attention.

Maggie loves listening to Arthur's adventures.

This student has learned how relaxing a good book can be.

Sunny enjoys a Star Wars book.

What an awesome idea!  I know my students would die for the chance to read to a dog.  The great part about this program is that it gets ALL kids excited about reading, but especially the ones who struggle with fluency.  Reading to a dog relieves all the stress of reading out loud because dogs don't judge.  They don't care if you read below grade level, or if you stumble on a word.  They just want to spend time with you.

Unfortunately, these Library Dogs aren't as widespread as I had hoped.  The closest trainer is almost 90 miles away!  But there's hope.  If you own a dog, you can do this at home.

Click here to see if a R.E.A.D. (Reading Education Assistance Dogs) program is in your area.