Catch The Reading Bug

Each year our Reading Association sponsors a reading conference. It has become a popular spring event throughout the county. This year my school's Book Club sponsored an activity table. The students chose the book and activity. We made diaries to go along with our first book, Diary of a Wimpy Kid, and Diary of a Worm for the younger crowd. We titled our activity, Diary of a Book Worm. I'll post pictures of a sample later. Enjoy the Smilebox.

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Calculators

Not only do I get some great ideas by blogging, it also allows me to reflect while sharing what's going on in my classroom. After a math activity today, I am wondering why I haven't introduced calculators before now. I assumed since my first graders are surrounded with Wii's, ActivBoards, iPods, PDA's, and Smartphones, they knew something about calculators. I let them explore before presenting the problem.

"It's not working!" is what I heard when I told them to add the numbers in a pattern. One student was confident that he had the answer. When I walked around to see what was happening, most of the calculators had, 53535353. Yikes! We were a little late for class pictures while we went step-by-step to solve the problem. The students were amazed when they finally pressed the equals key, and the number 32 appeared.

Lesson Learned: Introduce calculators like it is a brand new form of technology. One student insisted that calculators would make a great phone. :) After we learn more about calculators, a few will be put in our math centers for students to practice independently. I'll be looking for and sharing some calculator math activities.

Fun in a Box

Thing 1 and Thing 2 (a team member and I) had fun playing phonics & sight-word games, reading Dr. Seuss books, making Green Eggs and Ham, and modeling a Dr. Seuss inspired writing activity.  The Cat in the Hat had fun in another 1st grade class.  We will continue with more Dr. Seuss activities tomorrow and Friday.

Yes, that's Justin Bieber reading to our 1st graders.  The boys were not impressed. The girls went crazy.  Thing 1 used her best Valley Girl accent to express her excitement (Funny!).

My daughter read Green Eggs and Ham while my team mate and I cooked.  My grand-daughter enjoyed eating green eggs. 

After making a clover with Whoville on it, the students listened as a helper read Horton Hears a Who. 

I found this Dr. Seuss flipchart last year.  It was perfect for this year.  Yesterday during our CASA (Collaborating Around Student Achievement) meeting, we discussed doing more activities with nonsense words. 

One Fish, Two Fish, Red Fish, Blue Fish

We started our Dr. Seuss celebration by reading One Fish, Two Fish, Red Fish, Blue Fish.  Then we sorted and graphed Goldfish crackers.  After coloring in the graphs, the students answered some questions about the information.  They ate the crackers as they worked.