More Dr. Seuss - as promised :)

Yay! I remembered to take pictures of some of our fun Dr. Seuss week activities :)

The Cat in the Hat - 100s chart picture/mosaic:

The Cat gets a New Hat art activity with do-a-dot markers:

Oh the Thinks you can Think following directions paper craft:
These were fun! We also practiced making them "Think left and Think right, Think low and Think high" by moving all kinds of Dr. Seuss characters around on the white board with those labels!

 

 Anyone who knows me knows I cannot stand touching feet! But, I couldn't resist the combo of "The Foot Book" and "The Cat in the Hat" art project - each of my kiddos got to make another cat hat out of their footprints!

Here's another quick activity with The Foot Book - labeling, cutting, gluing, and reading/rhyming practice :)

This week was lots of fun!
Oh! I almost forgot my Cat in the Hat inspired bulletin board ---

Each picture in the window is a copy of a photo of my students reading a Dr. Seuss book with a rhyme like "I love to read in a boat! I love to read with a goat!" They have loved naming their friends' pictures and the animals chosen to read with them all week and I gotta say I'm pretty proud of this one!

Til next time...
:)Amanda

Dr. Seuss "Pin-spirational" Stuff

So, I went to pick my daughter up at daycare on Friday and saw that they are diving into the Dr. Seuss birthday celebration and Read Across America Day/Literacy Month theme too! I had just talked with my student council members about helping our school librarian promote Literacy Week activities and get their classmates involved, so I was already planning a Dr. Seuss week instructional unit in my head! I spend lots of time over the weekend planning for this week, and I sent home a few things today without taking pictures - I'll try to remember tomorrow! - but I wanted to go ahead and share Caylee's artwork inspiration from her daycare!

I think my kiddos get a little tired of me always asking them to do handprint artwork, so we read One fish two fish red fish blue fish this morning with some rhyming and labeling practice!

How cute is this "Green Eggs and Ham" activity!?? It's pretty simple, we'll try to squeeze it in later this week, but I just realized I don't have this book in my classroom library! How did that happen!??

And the Lorax's mustache of course! One of my favorite activities planned for this week (I think Friday) - we're going to make a Truffula tree out of a pool noodle, tape, and tissue paper then take pictures holding it with Lorax mustaches! CAN-NOT WAIT for that one!

More pictures to come, as promised!
:)Amanda

Minions!

Maybe I should've posted this one first tonight... keep scrolling down for the recent updates on actual classroom related goodies! I just can't get enough laughs out of the Minion meme!

I think I'm more like the last one a little more often than the other 2 but I have my good professional meeting days and my crazy "purple" days too! :D gotta love the minions!

Oh! And the OLYMPICS!!

We also spent 2 days this week on the Winter Olympics... we talk a little able it every morning during our Calendar math, but we also made some cute skiers and Olympic rings art projects! I forgot to take pictures of the skiers but here's a run down of what we did!
1. Cover the table in blue butcher paper
2. Cover a styrofoam ball in white paint and prepare for a mess!
3. Roll the ball gently to your friend across the table
4. Repeat until the blue paper looks like it's covered in snowy hills!
5. Move the paper to another table to dry while everyone colors and cuts out coloring page skiers...
6. Glue the skiers to the painted sheets of paper and write the student's name with "Going for the Gold!"

They turned out so cute and the kids LOVED the chance to "paint" with something different than the same old brushes!

I did remember to photograph a couple of the other crafty project... We used an empty paper towel roll and different colors of paint on a paper plate to "stamp" rings! I didn't worry so much about color and placement, but we did talk about how the rings represent all of the country's competing and that they are connected with 3 on top and 2 on the bottom! I personally love the "not-so-perfect" art projects we get when the kids just want to be creative!

While posting this, I've been checking up on the stats and results of more 2014 Winter Olympics events! I am enjoying this year's excitement, but I gotta say I really look forward to the summer games more, only 2 more years! haha!

On an unrelated note... I just saw on facebook there are less than 30 days until SPRING! Hallelujah! Bring on the sunshine!!

Presidents' Day!!

I found some great books at the library about presidents and everyone - adults included! - loved the presidential fun trivia! We only spent 2 days on presidents' day activities, so here's a look at our anchor chart with describing words and activities! I had a bunch cut out and gave them out one at a time to the kiddos - if it was a word/phrase that did not describe the president, they got to crumble it up and throw it in the trash!

 

Next, we made these crafty George Washingtons - Coffee filter neckpieces and cotton ball wigs!

The last fun Presidents' Day activity: Our faces on Mount Rushmore! Here's our speech therapist, Ms. Dexter rocking George's space - the kids were cracking up and I got some great pics to share with their parents... still need to print them out though! It's been a busy week!

Presidents' Day was fun - hard to believe how much stuff we've squeezed into February and there's still a week to go! I had to create a separate school board on Pinterest for all of the Winter Olympics, Valentines, 100th day, winter ending, dental health, Groundhog Day and Presidents; Day stuff! Next week, we're focusing on money and getting ready for March... I need some new fun bulletin board ideas! Pinterest, here I come again!

Don't Blink... 100th day of school!

Finally! With all the snow this year, I thought we'd get to the 100th day in April! Haha! But, our daily count in our morning routine finally promised just 2 more days... just 1 more day... the 100th day is here! Our monkey friend, Zero the Hero brought 100 paper bananas to our sticker board! We also made posters with 100 stickers, 100 pom-poms, and 100 puzzle pieces! We built stacks and invented games using 100 styrofoam cups - definitely my favorite part ;)  and we even created art pieces using 100 post-it notes (time 5 different colors I think... I'm not sure, I know there were a lot and the white board looked awesome!) Here's a quick pic of all our activities!

On to Valentine's Day and Presidents' Day and SPRING!!!! :)

Groundhog Day

Super cute Groundhog Day crafts!
Peek-A-Boo Punxatawny Phil!

We also painted paper plates and made groundhogs holding signs that showed a sorting page (winter/spring) and the kids circled "Winter" since Phil saw his shadow this year...man, I'm so ready for Spring!!!