Five for Friday...Sweet Summertime!

Five for Friday

Sweet Summertime

My first FULL week of summer vacation is off to a great start!  I am linking up here with Doodle Bugs Teaching for the Five for Friday Linky.  Here are things from my week!  

1.  I started my week at Lake Norman State Park on Sunday.  It is about 40 minutes north of Charlotte and has great hiking and biking trails and it has a little beach.    It was a beautiful day. I am ready to head back there again soon!

2.  This week was my first week working.  I have nannied for a family for about 6 years.  I only work about 2-3 days a week and it is a great summer job.  Today we went to see Monsters University.  It was a great movie!  It was super cute with a great message.  

       SPOILER ALERT... for those of you with little kids, who may actually see this movie, you may NOT want to read this!  The overall message was that each monster has his/her own special qualities and it isn't about following a mold or being just like the other scarers, it is about being yourself.  It was great.  Afterwards the littlest "monster" I take care of had her picture with the life-sized monsters!

3.  Giveaways!  I am helping out with a couple of giveaways.  Head on over to Literacy Sparks and Magic, Mistakes, and Mayhem to enter into their giveaways.  Congrats to both of them for reaching 200 followers!

4.  Likewise, I am SO excited to say that in December I had made a goal of having 100 followers by the end of this year.  I was SUPER excited to see today that I had reached 151 followers as of today.  Woo Hoo!!! I am amazed.  Thank you to all of my followers!

5.  I think the the BEACH is calling!  I may need to make a short visit this weekend!  The best part of living only a few hours away from the beach is that I can drive down for the day and come back that evening.  :)

Happy Friday

-Michelle 

Throwback Thursday with a FREEBIE!

Throwback Thursday Linky

   I am linking up with Cara Carroll at The First Grade Parade for her Throwback Thursday Linky.  The idea is to reflect back upon a pervious post.  This really made me go back and start looking at my old posts.  I have been blogging since 2011, but really didn't get fully into the groove until last fall.  See, even though I had a blog, I was mostly just blog stalking all the other amazing bloggers instead of actually writing my own posts!  

    Since so many of us are already thinking about how to do things next year, I figured I would share a little something that could be a beginning of the year activity for you!  

---------------------------------------------------------------

Originally posted on July 27, 2011

Click HERE to go to the actual post.  This was one of my first posts as a blogger!!  

    The school year is about to begin and while we anticipate the new crew of kiddos I wanted to share a little something that I do at the beginning of the year.    Kindergarten to First Grade is a huge transition for parents and kids.  The beginning of the year is difficult even for me!  A First Grader in August is VERY different than a First Grader in June!
    For many of our students the transition is overwhelming as expectations begin to increase.  The last thing we want to do is scare the students away from their love of learning.  A teddy bear can make most 6 year-olds comfy at home, so we use one at school too!
     Each year I buy a class Teddy bear.  AC Moore usually has them pretty cheap.  I tie a cute ribbon around his neck to dress him up a bit.  This year I added this cute flower...maybe our teddy is a she this year!  Each night a different child takes home Teddy and spends the evening playing with him.  The student writes 1-3 sentences about what he/she does with Teddy and then draws and colors a picture in the journal.  The next day the student bring Teddy and his journal back to share with the class.  The kids love taking Teddy home and we love hearing about Teddy's adventures!
     At the end of the year I pull a name of a student to take home Teddy to keep forever!  This years winner looked like he won the lottery!  We also share the stories that they wrote in the beginning of the year.  This is a highlight of the year for me.  The students can't believe that the page he/she wrote actually belonged to them!   This is a nice way to see how far they have grown by the spring!
   I hope your new "BIG" first graders get a chance to cuddle up with your new class Teddy!

          Click on Teddy's picture to download the letter I use inside his journal.     

---------------------------------------------------------------

      So...the picture above links to an old google doc of the letter I used to use.   Feel free to click on that one.  Or, you can click HERE and head over to my TpT store to download a free copy of a newer version!  The new version is a little cuter!  If you download it, I would love for you to leave some feedback.  Thanks! :)

Thanks for going back a few years with me!  Enjoy the freebie!  I hope you can use it in some way.

-Michelle

Science Mentor Text- Stellaluna

   I am linking up again with the Collaboration Cuties for their Mentor Text Linky.  This week the focus is on science!  

      One of my favorite science books is Stellaluna by Janell Cannon.  Stellaluna is the story of a fruit bat who gets separated from her mother.  Stellaluna lives with a family of birds who accept her for who she is and teach her how to live like a bird!  I love this book because it teaches SO many skills.  I generally use this text in the fall when we are learning about bats. We read and learn about fruit bats and birds.  We examine the different ways they eat, sleep, and live within their habitats.  We talk a lot about what it means to be nocturnal.  
     I read this aloud with all of my students, however, I have my advanced students use this as a book study.  The students examine the vocabulary, compare and contrast birds and bats,  and discuss and answer comprehension questions that require them to think beyond the basic text.  This book lends itself well to cause and effect situations.  I provide my students with effects and have them use the text to find the cause. This is usually very difficult for even my advanced readers.  I like to push them above and beyond and this is a great way to do so.  
      One of my favorite extension activities for this book is to ask my students these questions:  
      If you were to land in any animal's habitat, which habitat would you want to land in and why?  Stellaluna adapted to live with the birds. If you landed in your new habitat, which adaptations would you need to survive?  
       I am sure you have read this to your kiddos, but if not, I would highly suggest this book.  This book also has a Project U-Stars unit which goes along with the book.  If your school district has access to Project U-Stars lessons, this is an excellent resource to pull into your teaching.  Project U-Stars is a program that integrates science and literature and requires students to think critically!  

Make sure to head on over to the Collaboration Cuties to link up and to see what other great science books are being shared!

-Michelle

Five for Friday and A LOVE for Reading!

    I’m linking up again with Doodle Bugs Teaching, for another Five for Friday Linky!  This week I didn't do a whole lot.  I mean I did a few things, pack up my classroom, get a pedicure, get a haircut, blah blah, but a few of these things I have already blogged about.  SO, I decided to do my Five for Friday a little differently.  

    My summer break is finally here and I actually have time to read.  I love reading a good book.  As a first grade teacher my goal is to instill a love of reading in each of my students.  One way I do this is by expressing my love for reading.  You can ask any of my students what I do at the beach and pool (my favorite places).  They will tell you that I read! I was at the gym this morning, reading on the elliptical machine and I started thinking.  I wonder if my students think that I read "my favorite books" during my free time. I tell them that I love to read, but they think that my favorite books are my favorite children's books.  I tell them all the time about how I love certain children's books.  

     SO, to get to  my point...I decided that my Five for Friday today will be all about reading.  Today is my first Friday since school ended and I have already finished reading two books and have started a third.  I thought I would share some books today!!

1.  I read And The Mountains Echoed.  This book was wonderful and I would highly recommend it!  I started it on Sunday and finished Tuesday!  The author also wrote these other books, too!  They are all great reads.

2.  This was just a random mystery novel I chose from the library's new book section.  It was an easy, yet interesting read.  I started this on Wednesday and finished this morning!  Another good beach/pool read.  

3.  These are a few books that I read last summer or the summer before.  I loved all of these books.  I also love anything by Kristin Hannah and Jodi Picoult.  They are great authors.  

4.  Now, if you ask my students, they will probably tell you these are some of my favorite series of books.  They are partially right!  I love these characters and so I get SO excited reading them to my students in hopes that they will begin to love characters as well.  This summer I am hoping to create some more activity packets for Cam Jansen and Amelia Bedelia!

5.  This week, I started creating my TO DO list!  Each summer I work on different projects for the school year.  On the top of my list is to finally finish reading The Book Whisperer.  I am about finished, but need to read just a bit more!  Last summer I created my first ever reading journals for my students.  I had never used these before this past year and I was AMAZED at the ideas of my little readers.  This week I started revamping my ideas for my reading journals and started a mega pack for my TpT store that will include mini-anchor charts for each student to put in his/her own reading notebook and the journal prompts that we used this year for fiction and non-fiction.  I am excited to be working on this project!!  

Happy Friday!  I'm heading to the pool!!!

-Michelle

12 on the 12th and a Giveaway!

  School's out and I am linking up with Stacy over at Simpson's Superstars for her 12 on the 12th Linky Party!  I haven't done this in a few months and thought I would join in the fun since school is out. Unfortunately, I learned that it is much easier taking 12 pictures of your day when you are actually teaching!!  I decided to still do 12 pictures from my day, so here goes nothing!  (It wasn't a very exciting day, but a relaxing one!)

1.  After a couple weeks of being WAY too tired to get up to go to the YMCA in the morning, me and these old shoes met again! I went to the Y this morning and yesterday morning.  I am ready to get back into my routine.

2.  Today was our final teacher workday.  I had a half comp day, so I only had to stay until lunchtime.  I was all packed up and ready to go around 10!

3.  I made friends with this fabulous copy machine!  HAHA!  Our school allots us a certain number of copies a year.  At the end of the year we go ahead and copy anything we KNOW we will need in the fall. I spent about an hour at this copy machine today!  

4.  I had a little extra time until I could leave, so I played on my school-issued MacBook Air.  I LOVE it!

5.  I stopped by the library to grab a few books for my summer reading.  Sunday I started a book and finished it last night!  I read And the Mountains Echoed by Khaled Hosseini.  This is the same author who wrote The Kite Runner and A Thousand Splendid Suns.  It was another amazing book!  I love reading and usually read 1-3 books a week during the summer. :)

6.  One of my end of year gifts from a student was a gift certificate to a nail salon.  YAY!  I went and got a pedicure before heading home for the day!  This is the color I got on my toes.  It is called Mermaid Tears. 

7.  Here is what I brought home.  I have a LOT of summer projects planned and hope to do some creating for my TpT store as well.

8.  I went on my patio today to see my tomato plant.  AHHH!  It is HUGE!  All of the rain and high temperatures have turned it into a monster.

9.  After a little TLC my living wreath is coming back to life!

10.  I took a little nap and did a little reading at the pool this afternoon!  I love reading and napping at the pool.  It is so relaxing and a great way to end my day.  

11.  I was THRILLED to see the sun!  We have had SO much rain lately.  The sun is a rarity.  

12.......GIVEAWAY.......

Click on the picture above to head over and enter to win the giveaway at Enchanting Elementary!  

Happy 12th on the 12th! Happy Summer!  Tomorrow is officially my first day off!  

-Michelle