All About Books - We're Almost Finished!

Valentine's Day, President's Day, and lots of staff development has gotten in the way of us completing our All About Books, but I am happy to say we are in the final stages!!

I wanted to show you all a sneak peek of our hard work:

Cover Pages:
 

Dedication pages:
 I dedicate this book to my brother, Max, because if I'm sick he will do my chores for me.
Hahahaha!

 I dedicate this book to my mom and dad because they help me learn to do math, reading, and writing. And I love them more than chocolate ice cream.

Diagram:

Different Kinds:

Over the next two days we are editing and finishing our how-to pages, our research paragraphs, and our about the author pages! This year I asked my students to write their "About the Author" in the third person and they are AH-DOR-UH-BLE!

If all goes as planned we will be having goldfish, animal crackers, and sparkling cider next Friday to celebrate our hard work :)

If you would like to make your own All About Books, just click on the cover image below and you can see more about it!


Happy Hump Day!


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5 For Friday!

I am linking up with Doodle Bugs for her weekly "Five For Friday" part-ay!


 I am sorry that I have been M.I.A.!!

For lots of good reasons of course... here are some of them:

((1))
Last weekend I went to Louisville and Cincinnati and spent some time with my FAVE blogging buddies: 
 Katie, Me, Steph

 Michelle, Nicole, Stephanie, Megan, Me, Katie, Squirrels, Jessica, Monica

Back: Squirrels, Stephanie, Me, Hadar, Megan, Jessica, Monica
Front: Tessa, Kelley, Michelle

Some ridiculous ones:

((2))
After a fun-filled weekend away, I came home to this:
 too.many.papers.to.grade.

((3))
And now my baby brother is here in Vegas!!
 I cheated. This photo is from Christmas. But he is here, I swear.

((4))
We had a 3 day week, so we reviewed this:
 ^^Super cute freebie from Smitten with First^^
  
((5)) 
Last, but not least, I am off to the Ice Bar at Mandalay Bay with my brother and some friends! I l-o-v-e when friends and family come to visit Vegas. It gives me a reason to get out of my sweats and head out on the town!

I will be back this week with our almost finished All About Books & a fun, new daily math activity!

 
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Our Proposal...

On this day of love, I thought I would share our proposal story... my side of it at least....
 
 
All I wanted was a letter...

Parker spoiled me our first year dating. He has a way with words and wrote the sweetest letters and love notes a girl could ever ask for! I was smitten. Then... the letters stopped for a few years...

Each birthday, anniversary, and holiday he would shower me with gifts (who's complaining?!) but alas... I still wouldn't receive my letter. I would beg him to forget the gifts and just write me something, anything! Well, the night of December 29th 2011 I got everything I asked for and more.

Parker was away for Christmas with his family and I was home in our apartment waiting anxiously for him to come back. We always spent Christmas apart, but it was still a long 10 days that we couldn't see eachother. We spoke often over the phone and he had been extra "lovey-dovey" the few days leading up to his proposal, but I thought nothing of it. I knew FOR SURE we would not be getting engaged any time soon. FOR SURE, I tell you.

Thursday night came. It was a night that would change my life and I had no idea it was coming. I was too busy complaining, whining, and being a brat because Parker wanted me to dress up. He was taking me out for a Christmas surprise. "Can't I just wear jeans?!?!??" I asked him repeatedly. 

With the patience of a saint, he assured me over and over "yes, you can wear jeans... but I prefer you wear a dress." I thought we were going to a show... he isn't very good at surprises... or so I thought.

A knock came at the door. It was him, finally! When I opened the door his smile was HUGE! "He must be happy I decided to wear a dress," I thought to myself. He told me I would have to wait a little bit longer to get my surprise and he asked if I wanted to open up some of the gifts his family got me.

Of course I did! The first was an envelope with a gift certificate from his mother. It was exactly what I wanted (thank you again, Wendes)! Next, was a big box with an envelope inside. Inside the box were some glass bowls from IKEA that were overlooked because all I could see was that the envelope had Parker's handwriting on the front.

MY LETTER!!!
(I was already crying)

My letter consisted of 4 different index cards filled with honest words of love and tenderness, most of which is too intimate to share with you all. What I will tell you, is that by card 3 I could feel the energy in the room shift. I knew something was happening. Tears will filling my eyes faster than I could read.

Card 4:
"I just want you to know that regardless of whether it is hurried or written, I will wholeheartedly love you for the rest of my life. Be my Partner, My Lover, My Wife. Please accept this ring and marry me. Love - now and always, Parker"
I looked up to see him on one knee, my canary diamond in his hand, asking me to be his wife. 

I have never been as happy as I was in that moment.
I hope to feel that way many more time in our lives together.
xoxo


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Dental Health Freebie!

This morning we had our dental health presentation by a local orthodontist.

This lady is ah-mazing! I love this presentation and the kids eat it up. She talks allllll about how eating too much sugar makes little sugar bugs in your mouth... and when you don't brush your teeth, those little bugs leave little.... presents.... in your mouth.

My kids couldn't stop talking about how they HAD to brush their teeth because the sugar bugs would go to the bathroom in their mouth - EWWW!

Whatever works, right?!

After she gives her presentation, she calls up some students to show them exactly how to brush!

Here are some sweeties dressed as teeth:

Here comes the gums!
She talks about healthy/unhealthy choices and sticks the food to the teeth!

After all that food, we have to BRUSH!
We learn how to brush the cheek side, the tongue side, then the top side. Tooth-by-tooth.

Lastly, we learned how to floss:
 The kids think this is the funniest thing ever and they learn a lot! She also asks one of the students to duck down below the gums and the students learn that they must brush their gums even if one of their baby teeth has fallen out!

After our presentation, I had my students complete a couple writing activities. I thought I would offer them up for free in case anyone else is learning about dental health!

Just click on the image below to see what's inside :)

I hope everyone has a *SWEET* Valentine's Day tomorrow!

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Sweethearts or Sweet Tarts?! What's your opinion?

This week is going to FLY by! 
(If I say it, it must be true. Right?!)

We have Valentine's Day, a big dental presentation, and President's Day information to cover.
Bring - it - on!

We started off our week getting excited for V-Day by writing some opinion pieces:

Sweethearts or Sweet Tarts?
Which one do you like better?! 
My answer is easy.... Sweet Tarts! I DETEST Sweethearts... blek... I am gagging just thinking about them.

We reviewed writing opinion pieces and then my students got to taste each one.
Waiting patiently....

 and GO!

Next, students got to write reasons why they liked both:

Lastly, they wrote their opinion papers!
 This was such an easy writing lesson and the students loved getting to taste the different Valentine's Day candy. Lucky for me, most of my students liked the Sweethearts better. Which means I took home LOTS of Sweet Tarts! Happy Valentine's Day to ME!

On the agenda for tomorrow:
Love Tickets! Our parent gifts :)

These activities are just some of many in my Be Mine, Valentine Pack.
It will be on sale for only $2 until Friday!!


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*FLASH GIVEAWAY*

Happy Sunday!

I am giving away TWO of my Writing Through the Seasons {Spring} today!!

To enter you must head over to my Facebook page
Make sure you "like" it while you're there to get the scoop on more giveaways and freebies!

Goodluck!


1

Poetry & Technology in the Classroom!

My good friend, Katie King, has been hosting a fantastic linky lately and I have been missing out!

I used a few fun websites this morning so I thought I would link up and share!

This morning I was the presenter for our grade level's lesson study.

(I am nosy...) Does your school do this?!?!

A couple times a year our grade level team gets together to design a lesson aligned to the common core. Then, we pick a name out of the hat to see who will present the lesson to their class.... in front of all the other teachers....well... lucky me! I got chosen!

The lesson we designed was to meet the Common Core Standard RL.1.4: Students will identify words or phrases in stories or poems that suggest feelings or apply to the senses.

Here was our 45 minute lesson:

First, I got two 2nd grade poems off of Super Teacher Worksheets {Snowy School Day & Reading Forever}! I have used this site since my first year teaching - it was free then. It is only 25$ for the whole year and I use it a lot for extra practice sheets and homework.
 I read both poems aloud twice. The first time for enjoyment and the second time we listened for feeling words and words that appeal to our senses. I had my kiddos close their eyes to help them visualize what I was reading. After we discussed the words we heard, we watched a Brain Pop Jr. video on writing with our senses:
 I seriously love me some Annie and Moby and my kids love them too! This video focuses on the reasons we should add details to our writing by using our 5 senses. It makes our writing much more exciting to read and helps the reader visualize the work.
Next stop, Read, Write, Think!

 

This website is free and has some great lesson plans. I searched the site last week and found these theme poems. As a class, we chose the sun poem and brainstormed some feeling/sensory words to describe the sun. Lastly, my kiddos went back to their seats and wrote cute poems to describe the sun!
There are plenty of other themed templates that have made their way to our writing center:

My kids were really excited to write their poems and share them with the class! It will be a perfect lead into our Valentine's Day poems we will write to our parents next week :)

That's all I have for Techy Teacher Tuesday (Thursday?)
Go link up with Katie and see all the other teachers' tips!


3

Writing Through the Seasons {Spring}!

TGIF!

Although.... for most of you it is already Saturday!

This will be short & sweet because I am exhausted.

If you are familiar with my Writing Through the Seasons packs then you will be excited to hear that I  finally finished my Writing Through the Seasons {Spring} pack! 

I wanted to show you all a little *sneak peek*

In the pack there are plenty of Spring themed writing prompts (narrative, informative, and opinion):

I also added 2 crafts with writing activities:

Parts of speech flip books:

and more!

You can click on HERE to head over to TPT and check it out.

Before I go, I wanted to let you know that TPT is having a HA-UGE sale on Sunday (and I am extending it to Monday). My shop will be 20% off and if you enter the Promo code: SUPER you can receive another 10% off your purchase!
Thanks to the amazing Ashley Hughes for the button!


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