The One with Just a Minute

Yesterday I started brainstorming my kiddos Valentine’s Day party. Valentine’s Day is a major holiday at our school so I probably should have thought it out further than four days ahead.  We are celebrating on Thursday because we have a lovely data day Friday. (The day off is not in observance of Valentine’s Day like some of my students think) 

Last year I made these adorable little robots – they were a hit! Mostly because the amount of candy involved.

This year I was on the Pinterest search for both homemade Valentines and an activity. After putting together some different ideas I came up with *drum roll please*

Minute to Win It,Valentines Edition!

The Minute to Win It activities aren’t revolutionary, all are taken from their website and the YouTube example videos. I did turn them into a Valentines goodie bag which will double as my gift to them. They can also take home their baggie and play over and over at home – sorry parents!

Here is a look at the activities we will play – I also turned the labels into a freebie. Check it out if you’re a last minute Valentine planner like myself!The titles link to the YouTube example of the game...it's an easy way to explain how each is done! 

Separation Anxiety

In this game students have 1 minute to separate the colors of M&Ms into the mini cups! 

Suck it Up

Students will have one minute to take the tart hearts from one mini cup, across their table to the other mini cup using a straw.

Candy Pick Up

Using two straws like chop sticks students will have to move the candy hearts from one mini cup to another mini cup across the room. 

This Blows

Students will stack their cups across the table, blow up their balloon, and knock the cups over with the air in the balloon in one minute.

My students LOVED Minute to Win It last year for our end of the year party – I’m hoping this will be another fun-filled day! Updates will come Thursday with student participation!

The One with a Freebie…And a Dog

Today I’m going to try my hand at TpT! For now, just freebies until I perfect my skills. (I did create a literacy center game to pair with Bananagrams a while ago, but that was a copyright issue, oops – I’m new!) 

A few weeks ago I did a mini lesson around the book, The Daythe Crayons Quit by Drew Daywalt. Amazing book! There are many different writing ideas you can take out of it but since our overall unit is Opinion we went the persuasive route. Recently we jumped into Lucy Calkins with two feet. While my Lucy fandom varies from day-to-day it can be monotonous – cue our crayon mini lesson. 

For us third graders who have been working on voice and persuasion in speeches the lesson took 3 days, for others it may take longer depending on the level of exposure to opinion writing.

In the lesson freebie it goes in to MUCH more detail but I will keep it short and sweet for all of you! 

Day 1

We read the first page of the book with purpose, trying to hear what the crayon was persuading the boy to do. Then we read it again listening to his great voice and examples. I read a few more colors which we added to a chart that organized what the crayons wanted and examples of how they spoke directly to the audience. 

That was all the more time we needed to start brain storming objects in our lives that would want to quit. My class example was our pencils, (something students have knowledge on and something that really would quit in room 21) students came up with their Xbox, tablets, couch, grass, soccer ball and much more! 

After our objects were decided we did many partner brainstorms and class share-outs to decide why they want to quit, examples the object will use, and how they will address the audience (them!).

They did surprisingly well taking on the role of the object and writing to themselves – it’s something we’ve never worked on but they fooled some teachers around the district who came to observe. 

Day 2

Most students wrote more the day before than they have all year. I think that has to do consistently using Lucy and having a motivating activity in front of them. Either way we were done drafting and ready to revise! 

Today students heard three other crayon colors stories (they begged for even more!) and this time really listened to the emotion and vocabulary the crayon used. We took this as an opportunity to add better emotion and vocabulary to our own writing. 

Day 3

We finished the book, The Day the Crayons quit, spoiler – the last crayon is the funniest and will have your class in stiches. Add an extra minute to your lesson so they can come down back to class. 

Today students finished revising, did minor editing, and published their page for our class book. Students who finished early could add a drawing to enhance their writing. 

My kids really enjoyed this lesson and I’m happy to pass the idea along! As promised in the title of this post … a puppy! 

This weekend I had the absolute JOY of dog sitting my 3^rd grade teammate/dear friend’s sweet dog. My dog fix was not satisfied this weekend and instead I’m toggling back and forth between doggie websites. A puppy here I come! Tagdog is a beautiful Alaskan Malamute whose beauty you all need to see. Thanks for sharing him for the weekend, Em! In true Colorado fashion it was 70 all weekend and we got to spend a lot of time outdoors – he also received more compliments at dinner than a supermodel (or so I would suppose) a record 30-40+. Luckily it doesn’t go to his head. 

 

For sticking out the lengthy post, here’s Tag!

The One with Scissors and Glue

Is “Tried it Tuesday” a blogging thing? If not I’ll make it my thing! Yesterday and today we tried interactive notebooks in math. I know, I know – we are just now trying interactive notebooks. We’re stuck in dinosaur times in room 21. Actually I just really love how fabulous math already works for us. “If it ain’t broke don’t fix it” ya know? I’ll share more about what’s working another day!

The motivation came from buying Not So Wimpy Teacher's  Interactive Notebook on fractions forever ago, printing it a while ago, and finally having the courage to jump in with the scissors and glue! 

Yesterday I modeled it briefly (yes, cutting rectangles in third grade still needs to be modeled) and then set them loose to tackle the chaos in math centers. I believe my saving grace was a model notebook that they could refer to ANNNNND the fact that our wonderful para-educator was in the room to assist. It also helped that we are well into our fractions unit and most of the heavy lifting (thinking) was review. 

Overall I would say I am a fan of interactive notebooks and will continue to use it as a center rotation! (no need to use our very little, and even more valuable, whole group time) 

Take a look our process and progress:

Examples of my examples :)

Here is our set up, fool proof and OCD approved. Everything has a place and stays organized is unrecognizable after. Such is life. 

Interactive Notebooks in Action!

Day 2… a little less messy? They know how to make their clean-freak teacher proud.

Student samples, not bad! Only two students ripped them out of their notebooks and took them home.  And only one glued their flaps right over their answers.*face palm*

Thanks for another read! I appreciate the friends who read through all the teacher talk and other teachers who read and share their own experiences!