Cranberry Day!

Why do the "short" weeks always seem so long?  And why do I always try to cram so much into them?  We had school Monday and Tuesday this week.  I admit I am a bit jealous of those of you who had the entire week off!  (Especially since I am blogging from an airport.  My flight doesn't leave until 6:00 tonight.  Then I have a layover in Atlanta.  Yes, I know it is the night before Thanksgiving and there will be millions of people in the Atlanta airport!  Am I crazy?  No, it was the most reasonably priced flight and I am a teacher.  You need no further explanation!)

On Monday, we had Cranberry Day.  We used a lot of the activities from the packet on TPT from Sailing Through 1st Grade.  Click the pic to check it out!

I started our day by showing a cranberry.  We created a bubble map about cranberries.  (Thinking Maps, anyone?)  Then we predicted if cranberries would sink or float.  

I was sooooooo impressed and excited that most predicted float and justified their prediction based on what we learned from the pumpkin and pumpkin seeds sink or float investigations!  We tested our predictions!

Next we watched a video from YouTube called From Bog to Table.  It was very informational and the kids really enjoyed seeing the bogs being flooded.  

A volunteer (Mrs. Fischer's mom who is a retired teacher....those make the best volunteers!)  read A Cranberry Thanksgiving to us.  It is a great book I enjoy sharing every Thanksgiving.

After that we did a taste test.  I tweaked the one in the packet.  We tried cranberry bread (the recipe from the book above), a dried cranberry, cranberry sauce, a sugared cranberry, and cranberry juice).

Of course we graphed our results!  I was surprised how many liked the cranberry sauce....I am personally NOT a fan!

The most popular activity of the day was The Freshness Test!  Did you know that if a cranberry bounce, it is fresh? We each bounced one and they all were fresh!

Look closely, you can see the cranberry in mid air!

There are lots of other activities throughout the day.  The packet includes a great printable book with lots of facts about cranberries.  I recommend it!

I have created a Jolly Jumbled Sentences activity.  It is available on TPT for $1.  Click the picture below to check it out!  

Happy Turkey Day!   (My first flight has just been delayed, lets hope I make it to Indiana before dawn!)

Meredith 

Thanksgiving Freebie....and a Teacher Confession

Yikes!  We only have 6 school days until Thanksgiving Break!  There are too many cute Thanksgiving activities to get done in 6 days!
I started creating my Totally Turkey Math Unit before Halloween.......and kind of got distracted.  I am a little sad since I had some great ideas and fabulous new Thanksgiving clip art.  Since now you will only have a few days to use the activities, I decided to publish what I have, make it a mini unit and make it FREE!
There are Roll and Colors, Skip Counting pages, and an Addition and Subtraction Sort.  Like I said...MINI unit!
Click the cute turkey below to head on over to my TPT store to grab it for free!  Just leave me some feedback here or on TPT.

Now for my teacher confession!  

Did you know there was a NEW JUNIE B. book?  Yup, it is a Thanksgiving one.  I found it in August and have been sooooo excited to read it to my class.  I didn't read it ahead of time, which has made my daily read aloud a little different.  Like most first grade teachers, I basically have all of the Junie B.'s memorized and have certain voices for each character.  This time, I am cracking up right along with the kids because I don't know whats going to happen next.  I am loving it!

Well, last Thursday I had a sub in the afternoon for my grade level's PLC time.  This means my sub GOT TO READ A CHAPTER OF THE NEW JUNIE B. BOOK....I reluctantly put it in my sub plans.  Then the sub walked in.  I just couldn't do it.  I quick pulled a scarecrow book off my fall shelf and said, "Here read this instead of Junie. B."  And might have hid the Junie B. book behind a math tub.  

Do any of you insist on doing certain activities with your class or am I a crazy control freak of a teacher?   

Meredith

We Survived!!!!

 I am talking about Halloween week of course!  I am still trying to find out who I send my petition to about having Halloween permanently moved to the last Friday in October instead of October 31st.

We always do pumpkin math and science activities with our classes to help us keep the students engaged and learning (in spite of the candy and goblins on our brains) but this year we stepped it up a notch!  On Tuesday we had Super Science Spooktacular Day!  Each class got to visit the teachers on our team for a science investigation.  The investigations were Halloween themed.  (One was fire safety since it was still fire safety month.)  This way the students got to do 4 investigations, but each teacher only had to plan and prepare for one!

Some of the activities came from the fabulous Deanna Jump, others were from us.  The day was a HUGE success!  How could it not be since dry ice, fire, water and spiders were involved? The activities were very cool and the kiddos loved them, but I was most excited that the students were able to tell me the science concept they learned in each room!
If you want to see pictures and get more details, click the monkey below.  It will take you to the post on my classroom blog.

Meredith