Snow Beautiful

Well, it's a sunny 75% in California and I just got back from walking Harley.

He's decked out in bells and jingled all the way on our walk.

Since snow is a rare occurrence here I wanted some holiday inspiration.

"Snow" Beautiful

Falling Snow from Matt S on Vimeo.

Wishing everyone a wonderful holiday!

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Happy Turkey Day

Happy Turkey Day Song!

Click to listen:

Boy my Thanksgiving this year has me feeling like I'm running around with my head cut off.

To give some background, my family dinner is postponed this year until Sunday since my mom and dad are out of town. And since they've always cooked the turkey no one else wanted to take on that job. My ONLY job today was to take the turkey out of MY freezer and drive it over to their house to thaw out in their fridge for the next few days. Sounds simple, but not really. Yesterday my automatic garage door was acting up and not shutting properly, so I put it into manual mode.  So I got up this morning, put the frozen turkey in my car, manually lifted up the door, pulled my car out and then the trouble started. I got out of the car to pull the door back down and my middle finger got caught and pinched in the now closed garage door. I was literally stuck to the garage door. I started hollering for help like crazy.

Luckily some volunteer workers for the annual Turkey Trot heard my ruckus and I told them to call 911. After what seemed like forever a police officer saved the day and pulled up the garage door and I was released. Now I'm nursing a big, fat bruised finger and I REFUSE to park my car back in the garage until I can get someone to figure out how to get my garage door to work properly. Said car is sitting in my driveway and I'm icing my finger.

Hope everybody else's Turkey Day was a little less hectic.

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Teaching about Immigration, Ellis Island and Today's Pilgrims

My class just finished an in depth author study of Patricia Polacco.

We learned how her family immigrated to the U.S. from Russia.

I read the book Coming to America to teach more about the immigration process.

Then we explored Scholastic's site on immigrants which includes video clips of immigrant children today as well as background on Ellis Island.

Finally, we connected Patricia Polacco's family history of being Russian immigrants to the novel Molly's Pilgrim. A video is available for the story too that we compared the book to.

View a video clip

To wrap up our pilgrim and immigration focus students made their own Molly's Pilgrim doll.

 

I recently started a Facebook Group for teachers to share ideas, questions, and inspiration. 

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Classroom Management: Tips for Keeping Kids on Track

I posted over at All Things Upper Elementary today about ways help students stay focused and on track.

Pop on over to read more

~Enjoy

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Happy Birthday Harley

My Harley is 9 years old today so he got some special treats.

I got him Biscotti biscuits with chicken and cranberries

Also did you know that Chick-Fil-A hands out dog treats?

I had Harley in the back seat the other day when I went through Chick-Fil-A drive thru.

The cashier saw him and offered me a biscuit.

Since Chick-Fil-A is closed on Sundays, I couldn't treat Harley to that on his birthday, but maybe I'll take him tomorrow.

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California Dreamin: California Regions

I just love this California Region song

What a perfect way to learn about the central valley, mountains, coast and desert regions of the Golden State.

Even Harley loves cruisin' California!

A good car ride makes a dog's life.

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I recently started a Facebook Group for teachers to share ideas, questions, and inspiration. 

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The Elements

I'm soon to be wrapping up a science unit on matter.

One of the final lessons on elements, compounds and mixtures is more difficult to grasp.

So I turned to finding these catchy songs as a resource:

The Periodic Table Song

My students couldn't get enough of listening to These Are the Elements Song

Study Jams also had a quick video on compounds and mixtures

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Memoir Text

I read a wonderful memoir text to my students this week written by Lester Laminack. It's titled Saturdays and Teacakes which tells the author's memories of his Saturdays spent in the south with his mammaw. The book is filled with vivid vocabulary and descriptions of their "Every Saturday" events:

having hot biscuits with Golden Eagle Syrup, mowing the lawn, picking tomatoes for sandwiches, sitting in the glider that goes criick, crack (great for teaching onomatopoeia), and best of all making tea cakes. After reading and discussing the special relationship between Lester and his mammaw I showed my class this video retelling

A great follow up with this story is to share about the history and background of teacakes.

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In Rememberance

Birthdays Celebrations in the Classroom

Just sharing how I'm recognizing my students' birthdays in a quick but fun way this year.

The past few years my school put into place a No Food treats school birthday policy, which I do like because one year, on the same day, I had 2 sets of cupcakes dropped off unannounced and a whole sheet cake to slice up and serve from 3 separate families. YIKES, talk about sugar overload and interruption of instructional time.

My solution to still giving a bit of attention to birthdays is using this Ice Cream and Cake dance song on each students' birthday. It gets the kids' attention and celebrates the birthday girl/boy in a fun way.

Click picture for  Ice Cream and Cake song

 Happy Birthday Mice (another option)

 I print and label this free birthday calendar graph from Scholastic to keep track of every birthday so we can celebrate it Ice Cream and Cake style.

Now, I'm off to call my mom because it is her birthday today.

~Enjoy

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TPT Newsletter

I hope most of my blog readers already subscribe to TPT's weekly Sunday newsletter which is packed full of freebies, resources and teacher tips.

I was pleasantly surprised to find one of my freebies in today's edition: Swap the Squiggle Writing

If you are not yet signed up for this newsletter go to the TPT homepage and scroll down to the end of the page. Look for a subscribe box that looks like this:

Just enter your email and every Sunday you'll have tons of wonderful resources at your fingertips.

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Brain Break MUST

Happy Saturday!

With my class this year I really need to incorporate quick brain breaks.

I have several students who have sensory input needs and getting up and moving is a MUST.

 This PB & J No Crust song! is sure a hit!

Even if you do like crust on your PB & J you'll still have this song bobbing through your head!

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Dog Gone It

Harley provided some fun entertainment for me this weekend. He was spooked by a deflated balloon floating waywardly in my planters.

He was on alert, barking and not quite sure of the mystery mylar flower balloon.

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Parent Conferences Conferencing Note Freebie

It's the day before the first day of school for me and I've got a running list of a million things to do.

I'm also thinking ahead for later when conferences with parents will occur.

I made this handy reference sheet to document meeting discussions any time you might need to conference about a student. Grab this freebie in my store.

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Backyard Delights

I get to enjoy my yard, work and all, during the summer.

My backyard is a 1/2 acre. Over spring break I cut down some palms that were breaking my planters.

I replaced them with a Crape Myrtle tree which is now blooming.

Look at those pretty watermelon blooms.

I'm still battling the asparagus fern sprouts that keep popping up which I also removed from the planter. I'm avoiding the need to clean up the dead blooms of my Bird of Paradise. I'll wait to do that on a cooler day.

Wild rabbits love my backyard too.

I came back from walking Harley yesterday and saw these two eating steps away from my patio.

Harley isn't fast enough to catch the grown ones, but last summer he did corner and kill a few babies :(

And yuck, Harley loves to eat the rabbit poop all over the lawn when I don't watch him.

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Favorite Read Alouds in the Classroom

Here are my top 5 read alouds for the classroom. I'll share a snippet about each one in the order that I read them to my class this year.

First up is Gooney Bird Greene by Lois Lowry

What a character Gooney Bird Greene is. She's quirky and fun and a master storyteller.

This book lends itself wonderfully to introducing the elements of a good story writing and telling.

This author has several other Gooney books that a well worth the read too.

You can check my original blog post for this book, which includes a video find and my Gooney Unit {HERE}

Next, is Lulu and the Brontosaurs by Judith Viorst.

Lulu is a spoiled brat who demands that she wants a dinosaur for a pet.

This is a quick read, but one my class adored.

I would hear them chanting in line like Lulu, 

" I"m gonna,  I'm gonna, I'm gonna gonna get a bronta, bronta, brontosaurus for a pet."

Then, we read James and the Giant Peach by Roald Dahl.

A classic read about a lonely boy named James raised by his mean aunts.

He escapes his miserable life inside a magical peach with a crew of animated insects.

On to Charlotte's Web by E.B. White, a great tale of friendship between a little girl, a runt pig she raises and a spider.

We watched the video afterwards to compare the book to the movie.

My all time favorite I always end the year with is Dodger and Me by Jordan Sonnenblick

 The main character, Willie Ryan forms a friendship with an invisible, blue chimp in surfer shorts and his life literally changes. Cute, cute read. I originally blogged about this book {HERE}.

What are your favorite read alouds?

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To the Point Synonyms

I'm loving my newest product,  To the Point Synonyms.

"To the Point" packs for other concepts are already in the works too, so be looking for them.
I've already made other ones for Categories , Guide Words ,  Word Families,  Prefixes and Suffixes, and Analogies  also.

Click picture to take a peek

Getting to the point, this new pack is great for working with synonyms, using a thesaurus and practicing study skills, using detail and varying word choice in writing, and discussing shades of word meaning.

Check it out {HERE}

And since I haven't done a giveaway in way too long I'll be giving 3 lucky winners a copy!

Entries can be earned with Rafflecopter.

a Rafflecopter giveaway   Find more great ideas on my Pinterest page or TPT store 

Workin It Wednesday

I'm joining in on Corinna's Workin It Wednesday.

My goal this summer is to have a regular walking routine.

One week into my summer and I am pleased to stay I've stayed on track.

My exercise routine is nothing special at all.

I just leash up Harley and walk along this bridle path.

2-3 miles is my average walk.

This path is well traveled by others walkers.

But the most unusual spotting on one of my walks was someone walking their pig on a leash.

Harley knew, spot on, that this was no other dog, and was desperately sniffing the air as we came upon Mr. Pig.

Pigs don't walk very fast so we zipped right on by.

I've also seen a gentleman in his rickshaw pulled by a donkey.

My favorite is to see the horses slow galloping along the path (except for the time my sister and I encountered a scared runaway horse and hid behind one of the trees to get out of its path. That was years ago though, so I think I've recovered)

Now, I really have no excuse for NOT walking, as I can view my walking route right from my front window. But sadly during the school year, even with a front row seat, my routine literally goes out the window.

My window view

Here's Harley today post walk. The coolest spot is the tiled entry way so he's chilling there.

And I grabbed a glass of water with lemon

Tomorrow's another day to ....Walk On.

What did you do to Work It Wednesday?

Link Up

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Mother’s Day Recipe for Mom

My students celebrated their moms by making this flower pot recipe holder craft.

They attached a "Recipe for Mom" card.

The craft came from Oriental Trading, but the exact craft is no longer available on their site.

I had leftovers from years ago when I purchased it. I hope they'll bring it back because I've done this same project every year.  Happy Mother's Day!

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Edible Landforms Activity and Landforms Definitions Lesson

Have food = Will Learn

My class does this edible model of landforms every year.

We start with a graham cracker base.

Cover 3/4 with brown icing and 1/4 with blue icing.

Use various food items to represent landforms:

Brown M&M for an island

Blue M&M for a lake

SnowCap candies for mountains

Fudge Graham cookies split into pieces to form a canyon. Then use blue sprinkles to show a river between the canyon

Wafter type cookie for a plateau

Coconut colored green with food coloring for showing the plains

We also complete a Landforms Definition Booklet. Students learn five facts about hills, mountains, canyons, valleys, plateaus, plains, cliffs, islands, volcanoes, and deserts and then illustrate a picture of each geographical feature.

I also mix in some landform videos and songs I've found online

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Surprise Wake Up

I had an exciting wake up call early this morning.

 At 2:45 AM I heard my doorbell ring twice and Harley started barking.
I look out front and see police cars, an ambulance and firetruck.
Not so good to wake up to.
 I answer the door to a police officer that tells me they need to search my backyard for a suspect that might be hiding. From what information I was given, officers were responding to an unrelated call in my neighborhood. The responding police car was hit by a suspect driving in a darkened, unlit car who then fled on foot into a closeby neighbor's yard.

So, their first search was by a handful of police with night vision in my yard for the suspect.
No spotting of the suspect though.
I have a north bank hill full of very thick shrubs (perfect for hiding, I might say) and police inform me they would be returning to search it with a dog.

Fast forward to another knock on my door to more officers that prepare to search with the trained german shepard. They wanted to be sure no people or pets were in the backyard as they proceeded.

Wow, it was a sight to see 13 armed officers and the police dog surveying my yard.

They clearly announced one last warning to anyone hiding before they brought in the dog.

They fanned out in the yard and screened it a second time and I could hear the dog make his barking calls here and there. No luck in finding anything though and the police proceeded to search my nearest neighbor's yards too.  This is for sure NOT an everyday, typical event in my area, so it made for a very surprising start to my weekend. I can't remember the last time I was still awake at 5:00 AM!

Since I slept in today (I have an good excuse) I'm a little late announcing that I'm having a Spring Sale in my TPT store.

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Spending Money on Spring Break

I spent money on Spring Break, and not in the way I wanted.

If I've not shared before, I have a beautiful yard, but it is a 1/2 acre.

1/2 acre = lots of my time maintaining it over Spring Break.

Good thing I have my good buddy, Harley, along to keep me company.

He gets to lounge in the cool mondo grass while I sweat it out with weeding
The start of spending money was on replacing 2 sprinkler valves plus broken sprinkler repair.

Sidenote Harley story:  My parents dogsit Harley at their house while I work when they are in town.
My dad took him on a walk the other day, and 2 loose dogs came charging up to Harley.
Harley gave them a back off warning growl, and that's when the dogfight started.
The 2 boxers had the advantage because Harley was leashed up. My dad was hollering, and went into the middle of the street with the 2 dogs following. A car stopped and tried to help by honking repeatedly to get the dogs away but it continued. Harley came out of the tag team fight with no injuries, but my dad was upset that numerous parents walking their kids to the nearby school did not even mention to him as they passed by that these 2 dogs were laying loose up the way in a driveway.
It would have given him the chance to change paths or avoid the confrontation.

**********************

This pretty group of flowers sprouted up as a surprise.
Squirrels must have spread them to my yard.
Not quite sure what kind of flower it is though.

A big chunk of my unexpected Spring Break spending went to cutting down these 3 Queen Palms.

I wouldn't have cut them down except their roots were eventually going to destroy my brick planter. In order to save the planter, they had to go.

Cutting down in process

If yard work weren't enough add in some home maintenance.

My dishwasher has a leaking valve and needs to be repaired. 

Don't you love waiting for repairmen? I have a window of between 12pm and 3pm for it to be fixed.

Who has bets it is at 3 pm?

Hope your break will be more cost effective than mine or at least spent on something more FUN!

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Get Your Draw On

Top o' the morning on this St. Pat's Day

I wanted to share the neatest art site, Art for Kids, which is authored by Rob, a dad of 3 who shares his love of art with them. The site includes guided step by step videos plus printable "How to" sheets for each design. In shamrock spirit, here's the link to drawing a leprechaun.

Have fun exploring more "Draw It" designs from Rob {HERE}

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Zoo Fieldtrip

To kick off a unit on Living Things my class went to the zoo.

What a fun day!

Here's a simple zoo song to review many animals we saw today

And a cute habitat song

And after a long field trip day, I'm off tomorrow for a furlough day.

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