Last Friday of Summer? and a wagon load of freebies

Five for Friday link

Here in B.C. we go back to school the Monday after Labour Day.  Usually.  Almost always.  Every year I can remember since I started grade 1 myself (and that was a LONG time ago).
But not this year.  We are on strike.  We went out on strike on June 13th after being locked out by the government before school, during recess and lunch hour, and after school :(

We are all hoping this will be resolved soon so we can get back into our classrooms (hastily abandoned in June) and do what we love and want to do - TEACH!

Meanwhile, I'm resolved to put on my Pollyanna face and make the most of my extended summer "holiday".  Five for Friday is a perfect venue for that.  And it was a wonderful week!
The weather was beautiful, with warm days and cool nights, and a hint of fall in the air.  Here are my five weekly highlights:

I have done a better job of blogging this week.  I am resolved to get this thing under control and become a fluent blogger. I offered several freebies this week.  I'm going to include them again in this post.  They'll be available for free in my TpT store until Saturday morning, and then I'll make them paid items again.  If you want them PLEASE follow my blog, then go download them by clicking on the titles.
1. Monday - Pattern Train Task Cards

2. Tuesday - Back to School Survey Questions

3. Thursday - Weigh Away

5. Friday - Two for today because I missed Wednesday!
Telling Time

and Roll and Order

My daughter did the weather this week on our local television station.  She did a terrific job and I'm so proud of her!

I walked 3 miles every day this week!  I started walking 2-3 miles a day at the end of July and have managed to keep it up at least 4 days a week since.  My dog, Jack, loves to come along. My grandson Noah came along yesterday, too.

We live in a hilly area that is built on silt bluffs.  This makes walking a bit more challenging and provides spectacular views of the South Thompson River Valley.

This actually happened last week, but I'm still reaping the rewards:
I won a HUGE Giveaway from Marcy at Saddle Up for Second Grade. THANKS SO MUCH and congratulations on your 1000 followers milestone.

I received amazing items from a generous bunch of teachers who donated to the giveaway.  Thanks to:

Marcy at Saddle Up for Second Grade,  Courtenay form Ramoma Recommends, Angela from Hippo Hooray for Second Grade, Heather from Second Grade Perks, Chelsea from Kickin' It Whole Brain in Texas, Arisbeth from Sailing Into Second, Dixie from Teachin' Little Texans, Allison from Stuckey in Second, Sarah from Rocky Top Teacher, Lori from Owl in a Vowel Tree, and Cassandra from Mrs.3rd Grade!!!!!!!!!!!

As if that wasn't lucky enough, earlier this month I won a $10 TpT gift coupon from Victoria at Enchanted Learning. It was just in time to use it in the Back to School sale!

Victoria has uploaded a whole bunch of books that she reads for kids onto YouTube (and run through safeshare software). They are available in her store in sets of 4. I spent a chunk of my windfall on a couple of her sets. My kids love listening to books. I bet yours do too.  

Have a wonderful Labour Day weekend!

Mark Less and a FLASH FREEBIE

Anyone out there having issues with time?  Management, I mean.  

It seems to me that the days at school FLY by and even though I work through most recesses, and usually only grab 15 minutes for lunch, I was still ending up at school until 5:00 most nights.

Not that I didn't love being there (I do), but by the time I got home, cooked supper, watched a TV show or two, and read a couple of blogs I was worn out and ready for bed.  I had no time left for healthy planning, exercise, keeping up with friends, social activities, or blogging.  I was done.

One of the things I've done to try to rectify this situation is MARK LESS.  It's taken me 20+ years to realize that I do not need to see everything that the kids in my class do, much less mark it.  Most of what they do in Language Arts or Math centers is practice what they've previously learned (and I've seen and marked).  When I set up the centers I put a cover sheet with the instructions in a sheet protector, back to back with the answer key so that they can mark their own when they've finished.  When I first started doing this I thought there might be a problem with students who just copied the answers down instead of figuring out the answers for themselves.  This actually rarely happened for two reasons:
1.  Davey Do-Gooder and Watchful Wanda (every class has a couple) were quick to report that copying was taking place.

2.  I made sure that the activities in the centers were about the right length for the time available (maybe even taking a wee bit longer than time available for most kids).  Then if somebody was done a center in 5 minutes when it should take 20 to 30 I would know right away.  They didn't usually try it again.
3.  I tried really hard to provide open-ended centers that would be interesting and hands on so that they would be engaged in the activity. 

Here is a center that I just finished making for my class to use.  It is part of my start up Math unit on patterns.

The center is one I've used for years in my Math centers (it just looks better now...).  The kids love it because it's fun and I love it because it is easy for them to be successful at it.  
The kids choose a task card and make the pattern indicated on it.  This picture shows on of the more challenging patterns in this set of task cards.

Once they finish making their train they draw, colour, and label it on their sheet.  All I need to do is glance at their papers after they've finished drawing their train. I can quickly see if they're understanding the concept of a repeating pattern.

If you'd like to grab it click here.

Freebies and Five for Friday at Always Primary

                                                                                 

I am excited to be joining Doodle Bugs Teaching for their Five for Friday link up this week for the first time. I started blogging late last summer, but got cold feet and have neglected my blog for several months now - STEEP LEARNING CURVE!!!  But I'm ready to take the plunge again, so here goes:                      

Yesterday I was on my way to pick up my friend for a pedicure when a  tremendous storm hit. There was thunder and lightning, gale force wind, and an incredible downpour that luckily only lasted 25 minutes because it caused flash flooding and did all sorts of damage around town. Fortunately we were uphill when it hit because in the lower areas there were cars stranded and even floating in underpasses!

I have been busy trying to build up some things to sell for my TpT store over the past few weeks. One of the products I've been making is sets of survey questions for my Math centers. My students always love doing these so I decided to make monthly sets for the coming year. The beauty of this is that once they learn how the surveys and accompanying graphing activity work they are able to do it for the rest of the year with very little instruction, allowing me to get on with meeting with small groups. 

                                                                            

                                     In this back to School set there are four questions. This is one of them:

                                                                                

                                                             The graph page looks like this:                                                  

Last year I had a grade two class and they got the hang of the activity really quickly. I didn't need to provide them with anything but a couple of questions, a class list to keep track of who they surveyed, and a blank graph sheet to fill in. 

This fall, though, I think I'll have a combined grade one and two class, and the firsties will be just starting to read and write and will need more if they are going to be able to do this independently. So I made this sheet to support emergent readers (plus the graphics on the question cards):

                                                                                 

The firsties can cut out the pictures on the labels and glue them under the columns on the graph and the second graders can use the words.                                                                          

This survey and graph activity is in my TpT store by clicking here for FREE.  I have the October one in my store now and will be uploading others soon.  Check out the other freebies while you're there.

Next week my hubby and I and our dear friends are going HERE for two weeks!!

                                                             

                                                         Kona, Hawaii!!  I'm so excited!  

                        When we were there last my sweetie hooked this amazing billfish:

                                                       

                                                                              

Meanwhile at home I have a vegetable garden for the first time in years and we've been getting some wonderful produce. Here's one morning's pick:

The pickling cukes are already in the brine.  My family LOVES dill pickles!

                                                                                 

Hopefully people will come and pick things while we're away. The strawberries are dwindling now, but there're lots of raspberries which I like better anyway. We had a fierce competition with robins this year for the strawberries. The robins won....

The apricots are fully ready now and they're HUGE this year. They can go into the freezer before we leave. 

                                                                               

                                                    

One more small freebie to finish up the week. I give this sheet to my kiddos once a week to help them reflect on a Math activity they've done and how it has improved their understanding of a Math concept. 

                                                                                                                                     

   (This screenshot looks a bit blue...) Click here if you'd like a copy.

I did it!  (And I notice that Blogger has made some improvements in the last few months, thank goodness!). Now all I have to do is figure out how to link up........

If you read this it will mean that I've been successful, so please leave me an encouraging comment and have a wonderful weekend!

Confessions

I was just about to head to bed when I saw this hilarious (but oh, so familiar) link up with Rowdy in First Grade and I couldn't resist.  It's definitely worth checking out.

Here are my late night confessions:

1.  I just heard that the classroom next door will be third grade instead of kindergarten next year and I did a mental dance of joy.

2.  My last paid field trip I put one price on the cover letter and a different price on the payment/permission form. 

3.  I love to watch curling.  

4.  Last week I got so tired of the stuff spilling out of the kindies lockers (the ones next door now, but not next year) that I put a whole schwack of their stuff off the floor on top of their lockers. 

5. If I have to say, "Stop what you're doing and listen to the announcement," one more time, or, "Go back and show me that you know how to walk in the halls," or "Which door are you supposed to come in?"  or "Show me that you're listening," or.....or...or.......I'm going to ???

6.  I found a class set of unmarked Social Studies units from NOVEMBER a couple of weeks ago. That's two report cards back for goodness sake!  I did resist the urge to hide them under other papers in the recycle unit, though. I stamped happy faces on them and sent them home. 

7.  Way back when I was a Teacher-on-Call I sometimes couldn't face getting that early morning call, so I took the phone off the hook. 

8.  It seems to me that kids have to go to the washroom a lot more than they did 10 years ago.

9.  I reuse tea bags (drives my poor husband nuts,but an Earl Grey teabag that'll make a whole pot of tea is good for more than just one cup). 

10.  I must be crazy, but in spite of all the wild stuff that goes on at school, I can't imagine anything I could love to do more. 

A Long Time Ago There Lived.......

I'm linking up with Collaboration Cuties for their Mentor Text Monday again this week.  The theme is Language Arts mentor texts. 

If you know me, or you ask the kids in my class (or any class for the last 20 years) which is my favourite story genre they would not hesitate to tell you "FOLKTALES!!!"

I find folktales totally engaging and fascinating.   They are great stories, have interesting characters, often have an element of the supernatural, usually have a clear division of good and bad (the better to instruct young readers in life's possible pitfalls), and usually have a fairly simple storyline that is perfect for teaching setting, plot, story sequencing, problem and solution, retelling, author's purpose, and so many other Language Arts essentials.  Of course they are  awesome for Social Studies as well.  And they are easy to dramatize and often can be used as templates for writing or retelling.

Here is a fairly small miniscule sampling of my favourites:

One of the (many) things that is so great about using folk tales for LA instruction is that there are such a huge variety of them, with many variations, and that lots of them have a number of published versions that can be read and compared.  Stone Soup is one example.  Another that I love to use is the giant vegetable tale.  Here are several books that tell this tale:

If you don't know the storyline, a giant vegetable grows in a garden, and at harvest time it is too huge to pull up.  A chain of characters grows and works together until it finally comes up. At the end the fruit of their labours is often shared among the workers.

I think that Venn diagrams were INVENTED to use with folk tales!  
When I was teaching grade five I wrote a script for this story based on the one by Alexi Tolstoy.  But the family was more modern and a bit irreverent.  The kids loved practicing it.  
For younger kids this familiar tale is perfect.  There are a million versions of it:

   (Have you ever noticed that the number 3 is prominent in many folk tales?)
It can be acted out in small groups of four.  If your class doesn't divide by four evenly, no problem:  Someone can be the bridge.
When I do this story with my class it takes several days.  The first day I read at least on verson of the story to them.  One of the Another one of the great things about folk tales is that they're familiar to many kids, and even if they don't know this one, it is pretty easy to pick up the plot.  They love the repeated dialogue between the goats and the troll (and of course, who doesn't love to hate the troll?).
The story divides perfectly into five scenes, so we go over this orally.  This is also a good chance to discuss how dialogue works.
The second day, depending on the grade level, I either have them write out the 5 scenes and illustrate them, or just illustrate over my retelling.  then they get together with a partner and retell the story.  For kindies, I would just give them the illustrations and have them retell in pairs.
For the third lesson I divide them into groups and have them act out each scene in groups of four or five.  There is always some quibbling about who gets to play which character (the bridge is never a sought after role...).  To avoid this I have all of the groups act out the first scene simultaneously, having drawn their character from a "hat".  At the end of the first scene they freeze in a tableau, then when I announce scene two they all change characters.  We continue this through the 5 scenes so that everyone has had a chance to play all of the characters.
There are all sorts of extra LA activities that can be added to this basic set of activities.  A favourite of my kids' is recording their own retelling (not read from the book, but using illustrations as prompts).  There are lots of apps available now that can be used for these and can be sent to their families (and become treasured keepsakes, I hope.  I know that when my own kids were little I would've loved having something like this).  For your more advanced learners a great project is to use small props(claymation, commercially made figures, stick or fingure puppets,etc.) that they can manipulate as they retell the story for a video component.  If they can do this with a partner they can take turns between recording or retelling.  If you have a parent who can come help out, they can do the recording.  I read a helpful post on this by The Primary Techie a few weeks ago.  If you want to read it click here .

Do you love folk tales too?  I think that when I retire I'd like to study folklore.  How cool would that be?  Memorial University in Newfoundland has a degree program available online..........