Santa

     Santa, Santa, Santa!  The children are so excited for Santa!  We wrote a class letter and individual letters to Santa.  The students were so thoughtful and polite with their Christmas requests.  I already mailed out the letters to the North Pole, hopefully Santa will get the fantastic letters in time to fill our stockings this Christmas Eve.
   We also did a directed drawing of Santa.  The students had to follow step by step directions to create the Santas.  They did a wonderful job!

Elves at Work

 

The first grade elves of Connected 1.0 sure have the Christmas spirit.  They have been enjoying every minute of the season.  We have been writing, reading, doing math, creating art, and singing....all about Christmas.  Like I said, these elves have been hard at work.  This post has just a few of our Christmas themed activities.

We made this elf craft with our buddies.  For this activity, there were no directions and no tracers!  The students had to use a list of materials that told them what size of paper rectangles to collect, then they had to round and cut the corners of the rectangles to create the pieces for the elf.  They had one finished example to work from but the lack of directions made the students really think and plan their cutting and gluing.   The elves turned out so cute!

After the elf art, the students wrote an application to be an elf! They had great ideas on why they would make a great elf.  I particularly love "I enjoy present giving and caramel."  Hired!

We had many Christmas literacy and math centers too!  For example, an ABC tree where students took a letter from the letter tree and wrote as many words as they could that started with that letter.  We also had Christmas riddles and a Christmas stamp match center.  For math, we had a station called "Fa La La Fact Families," "Gingerbread Bump," and so many more.  There were tons of math and literacy games to practice all the skills we have been learning.  Mrs. Niemeyer needs to ask Santa for some more card stock!  Here is a slideshow will highlighting some of the math and literacy stations.

Busy Christmas Centers on PhotoPeach

Simile Writing

The story of the Grinch has a TON of figurative language.  The children were having so much fun on Grinch day they didn't realize we were still so busy learning.  One of our Common Core first grade objectives is to understand figurative language.  

We discussed the similes in the Grinch and then worked on writing our own similes.  First, we brainstormed lists of adjectives that describe the Grinch.  The children came up with some great words: furry, rotten, nasty, clever, lonely.  We continued with adjectives by listing words that described the Grinch's heart at the beginning of the story (tiny, empty, cold) and the end of the story (large, caring, happy).

Then it was time to write.  The students had to use a word on each chart to write a simile.  These first graders are incredibly creative.

The Grinch was as nasty as a rotten egg.    The Grinch was as cranky as a monster.

His heart was as tiny as a rat tail.          His heart was as cold as a popsicle.

At the end, the Grinch became as           At the end, the Grinch became as 

full as a jar full of jelly.                              happy as a teddy bear.

 

The Grinch was as creepy as a king cobra.     The Grinch was as mean as a bear.

His heart was as cold as a snow.                   His heart was as little as a rat.

At the end, the Grinch became as                  At the end, the Grinch became as 

 kind as Santa.                                        happy as a fish in the water. 

We also did some directed drawing to go with our writing.  The children are so proud of their drawings.  They should be because they worked so hard!

 

All the drawings are delightful.  I am working on typing up the similes and hanging the writing and drawings together in the hallway.  You will have to come take a look at all the great work on Gingerbread decorating day!

 

Grinch Day

We had a terrific Grinch day!  It was a busy, joyful day!  We started the day making a Grinch craft.  I just gave the children the paper and tracers.  In the front of the room, I put up the finished example.  I love to see them work through and problem solve to figure out how the pieces go together.

 

Of course, we reread the great book How the Grinch Stole Christmas.  We talked about how the Grinch didn't have joy.  Together we brainstormed a list of things that bring us joy.  The students made their own lists. 

After we had some great ideas listed, the students had to complete the sentence "I would make the Grinch grin by...."  The joy lists really helped with this writing activity.  The students glued their sentences to the craft. 

Here are some of the excellent examples.  

I would make the Grinch grin by singing. 

  I would make the Grinch grin by baking him a cupcake.

I would make the Grinch grin by taking him to school.

I would make the Grinch grin by helping him make a friend.

I would make the Grinch grin by adopting him into my family.  

We made some magic Grinch dust to keep the Grinches away this Christmas.  To make Grinch dust you need a small bag of something sweet.  Then you add two drops of love and two drops of joy.  You must hug the love and joy in the bag until it turns green.  I have to ask you to do the last step at home.  Sprinkle the Grinch dust on your lawn Christmas Eve to keep the Grinch away and keep all your Christmas joy.

 

Then, there was Grinch spelling.  On Grinch day, you don't do spelling with whiteboards and markers, you use cold, green noodles of course!

 

We also had an enormous QR hunt with the entire first grade.  The Grinch tried to steal our Christmas by scrambling all our Christmas words and sight words.  We had to hunt all around the first grade classrooms to unscramble all the words.

 It was a busy and exciting day!  Our fourth day of below zero temps with no recess and there were no Grinches to be found!  What a wonderful way to catch Christmas joy!

As a Matter of Fact

As written in previous posts, we have been studying ways our world changes during readers workshop.  Our first week focused on how animals and plants grow and change.  Next, we discussed the ways different animals move.  Week three focused on weather and seasons.  In our final week of how the world changes, we have been discussing the different states of matter and how matter can change.  The different groups read books about lava, geysers, and water.  We also watched this short video clip: Study Jams: Solids, Liquids, and Gases
The scientists loved playing this game on the computer.  Click here to play.  The students drag different objects into the oven or freezer and watch if the state of matter changes.

The extremely cold weather this week made for a long week of indoor recess but it would have been great for these experiments.  If it stays below zero this week I would like to try them.  Let me know if you try these states of matter experiments at home....better yet, take pictures or video of the experiments so we can share them in class. First, if you throw a cup of boiling hot water into the air, it will instantly turn to snow.

Another experiment to try: blowing bubbles in freezing temperatures. Amazing!