Secret Partners

2 posts in one week!  This is a quick one...all about partner selection!  Some teachers have the students choose partners to work with in cooperative settings.  Some teachers have sticks with names or numbers and pull out two random sticks to match up students.  I'm sure there are many other ways that the boys and girls get matched up to be partners.  I've seen much cuter cards or tags made up for secret partners, but I wanted to show everyone that it doesn't have to always be cute or something to purchase...You can make these really quick and the kids will love it!  Plus, it's a great way to review math facts.  I would probably take a guess that since we are all creative teachers, we could find other things to put on the cards to match up students.  I chose math facts/vocabulary and it worked well.

Each student gets a card with either two addends, or a sum, a solid figure, the name of the figure, etc.  They look at their card and when they have figured out what their match would be (8+6 would match up with 14) then they stand up, hold their card in front of their body, and search for their partner, without making a sound!  For first graders, this was hard.  I can't say it was SILENT, but they were so good about finding their partner and did it quickly!

I started this now towards the end of the year, but that's ok!  As we all know, the end of the year means students (and teachers) are less likely to stay motivated and put forth effort in their work.  It's okay to do something new in order to keep everyone motivated!  Try it and let me know how it goes!  Congrats to those terrific teachers who are ending their school year this week!  We have about 7.5 days left!  

Election 2016

Today's post is all about the election.  WAAAITT!! Not THAT election!  Let's talk voting in first grade world!  We had today off of school, so yesterday was our "official" voting day in first grade!  We started off by reading Duck for President.  The class discussed the qualities of a good president (oh those sweet innocent minds), the job of a president, and whether or not Duck should/should not be president.  They voted and here is the result...

Then, came the REAL voting....Oreos or Chocolate Chip?!?!?!?!  We discussed the qualities of a good cookie, flavors that may/may not make it delicious, etc!!!  Each first grader received a cookie of each type...I mean, how could they vote without a taste test, right?!  After they taste tested and gave it some thought, ballots were given and a choice was selected.  The kiddos got to go up to a ballot box to drop off their vote and received an "I Voted" sticker!  The votes were carefully counted and recorded and the winner was.....OREOS!!! 

Well, here's to Election 2016 and the OREO!!  Hope everyone has a great rest of the week!  







Pumpkin Fun

The past several weeks have been more than busy! Oh, who am I kidding?  Yes, it's been busy hectic with parent-teacher conferences and all, but as any teacher knows the feeling, there have been many nights of coming home from work, barely having enough energy to make dinner, and vegging on the couch (umm, can you say, World Series?? GO CUBBIES!!!)  I'm finally getting a chance to post about the pumpkin themed activities we did over a week ago.  Several years ago I came across the Pumpkin Unit from Mrs. Ricca's store on TpT.  I was able to incorporate some activities with my first graders and added some of my own.  Depending on the availability of parent volunteers I can have for that day, I can have the kiddos move around to different centers.  This year, we were only able to complete three, but had a nice mix of science, math, and reading.   One of my fabulous parent volunteers read a book about the life cycle of the pumpkin and then the groups completed the cut and sort activity.

On this particular day, the groups rotated around to: The Life Cycle of the Pumpkin, Pumpkin Math Facts, and Pumpkin Investigations.  The plastic pumpkin cups are from the Dollar Tree.  Two dice were added to each pumpkin.  The kiddos had to shake their pumpkin and roll out the dice.  Then, they had to add up two addends.  I created the corresponding sheet for them to use and write down the number sentence and sum.

I was going to wait and post this later, but didn't want to wait too long!  There's still time for those who want to use some of these activities on Monday!  We haven't finished the pumpkin investigations just yet!  On Monday, we will estimate How Many Seeds (click on the title to get the book) are in our pumpkin, put the seeds in groups of five or ten, and then count to see how many seeds were inside.  We predicted how many cubes tall the pumpkin was, counted how many lines were around the pumpkin, described if the pumpkin was small, medium, or large.  Lastly, the kiddos predicted whether the pumpkin would sink or float in a bucket of water. 

I spent some time with the whole class and we used the different sized pumpkins to estimate how many cubes it would take to measure each pumpkin.  This was such a great pre-teaching activity for measurement.   In addition to counting our seeds, the kiddos will use the Halloween themed word cards to unscramble the sentences on Monday.

My firsties had so much fun working on all of these activities.  They stayed engaged and enjoyed tying together math, science, and literacy!  How much better could it get?!?!  I hope this post can give some primary teachers some last minute Halloween ideas for Monday! If you choose to do any of these activities, leave me a comment letting me know how they went!   Wishing you all a spookatuclar Halloween filled with many sweet treats!