I got the cutest insect freebie from The First Grade Parade! One of the main philosophies of our school is student choice...and it makes for GREAT art work! I wanted you to see these amazing ants that my kids made. When I find a cute idea like this, I just change it up by not using the templates provided. I simply put out black and brown paper and gave the kids a few guidelines. They had to make sure their ants had 3 body parts, six legs, and antennae. I LOVE how individual their work turns out when there are no examples for them to look at (or very scaled down examples that I hide when they start working). You can trust them! They can do it!

Talk to you soon!
Annie

Hi Friends!

We learned a terrific method for teaching our kids to apologize. It makes the apology more sincere, and it helps the kids think about their mistakes and better ways to solve their problems. I made an anchor chart to hang in my classroom. You can pick one up here. Enjoy! Have a great Memorial Day!!

A-Z Alphabet Board Games

I am so excited about this new set of board games!! They will keep your kids moving, thinking, learning & laughing. You can get yourself a set on TPT, and rumor has it there's a sale coming soon!

Fraction Scoot

This weekend I went on a quest to find some fun fraction activities that focus on 1/4. I think I might be behind the times, but I found a SCOOT game  by the Math Maniac that was a blast! The kids loved it. Here's a link to the blog post where I found the game, and here's the link to her freebie on TPT. Here are the kiddos "scooting" around the room trying to decide if pictures are 1/4 or not 1/4.

I changed the game up a little and made it silent. As each person finished, they went to the front of the room to find a partner to compare answers with. (Yes, I missed the whole idea that you are supposed to say scoot and they all move at the same time. LOL - it will be easier next time.) There were plenty of differing answers and lots of great math discussions. We were giggling a bit when some best friends convinced each other that the wrong answers were right. They didn't want to hurt each others' feelings. That gave us some great talking points about working as a team and helping friends understand errors in a polite and supportive way.

The kids caught on really quickly that fractions have to be equal, and there were some cards in the set that showed fifths instead of fourths, but they were not equal parts, so the kids knew right away that they weren't fourths. I'm thinking of making a set that includes thirds and fifths that are equal to see if they will notice that they are not fourths. I will post the link here when I finish.  Talk to you soon!