A peek at my week so far :)

Ohmiword y'all, I am exhausted already, and it's only Tuesday?!!

This week we have been comparing traditional and contemporary folk/fairy tales.  On Monday, we read the traditional story, The Ugly Duckling.  After reading it, my kiddos completed a problem/solution graphic organizer.  I just made some puzzle piece tracers for them to use.  Most of puzzles didn't fit back together so well haha

This cracks me right up!  "Oh, by the way, He was a SWAN THE WHOLE STINKIN TIME!"  That's seriously cute haha!

The next day (which would be today), we read this contemporary version of "The Ugly Duckling."  It is a CUTE story, written from the perspective/language of a moose.

After reading both stories, we made a venn diagram to compare/contrast

We will continue working on other fairy tales for the rest of this week and next!

In Math, we've been working with number lines, number patterns, and number order.  Usually, I have the kids make a number line using copies that I have run off.  But, let me tell you what... we are trying to save paper in any way that we can!  With all these budget cuts, I have been making close to NO copies each week.  But, hey, I'd rather save paper than a teacher lose their job!

So, I gave each set of partners a sentence strip, and they made a number line for numbers 1-30.  Then, we marked even/odds and skip counting patterns.  I laminated them so that we can play the "Guess My Number" game as shown below.

We've been playing this fun game all week, "Guess My Number."  I think of a number in my head, and the kiddos ask me questions.  I mark off numbers as they ask questions (it's laminated so I can just use an Expo!).  The kids LOVE this game!  I pretty much made their day when I put it in the math station so they could play with a partner {It's the small things, right!}

Here is a number line activity that we are doing tomorrow (adapted from an "I Spy" time game at What the Teacher Wants).  I'm going to place these number line cards around the room, and they are going to visit each card to find out the missing number.  As they view the cards, they will record the missing numbers.  I tried to be tricky by using numbers lines that have skip counting patterns.  

Download Template and Recording Sheet 

Here's to looking ahead to next week's plans... we are introducing adding coins.  Since, it's so early in the year, we are going to start with the basics.  We will be revisiting coins in a few 6 weeks, so I'm not too worried about mastering it right away.

I bought Cara Carroll's "The Great Coin Collection" unit, and pretty much made my plans around that!  I made my bubble maps to use throughout the week (I see 2 classes a day, so I laminated mine- I plan to use a dry erase marker so I don't have to make double the charts!  Just a quick erase and we can start fresh!)  There are so many great and easy-to-prepare money games in her unit.  You should definitely check it out!

That's it for me!  I'm off to Zumba (which is quite a sight to see... I'm probably the most uncoordinated person in the world!)