This Week At School

This week at school I was at 3 different schools.

I wore this lovely shirt to each and every one of those 3 schools 

Ugly Christmas Sweater for Teachers

and not a single person (adult or child) commented on it!

Anyways, this week at school I attended a Christmas concert!  The funny thing about this is that on my way to work this morning while listening to the radio they were doing an "unpopular Christmas opinion" segment and one lady called in saying she hated going to her kids Christmas concerts (sounded like she had kids from elementary age to high school age).  Her reasons, you have to sit there and watch as no one actually sings the song and your kid slowly pulls his shirt over his head.  Then when you get to high school you have to sit there and listen to what sounds like a mouse dying for a band performance.  I mean, what she is saying isn't untrue... but aren't all those things just the icing on the cake of what is a school Christmas concert?

For anyone wondering, I love them!

Do you like attending your kids Christmas concerts?

I was at another school where the younger grades were having their afternoon performance while I was there (my class didn't go and watch).  It was also formal day for spirit week (my guess is so that the younger kids would dress up for their concert).  Anyways, one of the teachers was new to the grade 2 scene and one of his students may have played with chalk and gotten it all over her fancy sweater.  This teacher said "oh don't worry, it will be fine just rub it out"... then she went to visit another teacher and she said "oh no, your lovely sweater has chalk all over it!?!" and the child broke down crying.  Luckily, they have a washer and dryer at the school so they threw the sweater in there and it came out good as new!

Otherwise, it was a lot of keeping kids busy with things to do before they all go completely crazy on Friday afternoon (which is when I won't be there... so good luck to that teacher!)

We are officially on a 2 week break from school, huzzah!  Which means I'll also take this opportunity to go on a 2 week break from the blog (although I MAY post on Saturday's still... we'll see what my week fills up with first before I make any promises though).  So to all teachers and students:  Enjoy your time off!  You earned it!

Winter Bulletin Board Ideas

If Christmas isn't something that is talked about or celebrated in your school then you may be interested in a Winter Bulletin Board instead of a Christmas Bulletin Board.  Now that you have your winter themed art done (or at least the first project or so may be done... or at least on the way to being done you might be ready to decorate a bulletin board!

I couldn't find the original sources for a lot of these ideas (Pinterest)but here are some winter themed bulletin boards that I thought were nice:

For this one it looks like each students picture is on a snowflake and they each made their own snowman

I wish I could find the original source for this one as I'm curious what they wrote about.  Either way, Frozen was (is) a popular movie so I think this bulletin board would be a big hit!

This one is from Fresh Sharpened Pencils and she talks about how she got each student to write a poem to go with their snowflakes.

This one I found here although I'm unsure if this is the original source.  I just thought it looked super cute!

Do you make seasonal bulletin boards? 

What does your winter bulletin board look like?

Winter Art Ideas

Winter is right around the corner (or if you live here you'll think it's already been here for a while) so what better time than to start planning for what you are going to do in your art class during the winter season?

Here are a BUNCH of ideas

First up, Snowmen!

Clay Snowman

Snowmen at Night

This is one of my all time favourite winter art activities I did it when I was teaching grade 5/6 and I did it again when I was subbing in a grade 4/5 class.

Doily Snowmen

Hot Chocolate

If you are looking for some activities to go with this art check out my blog post on what I all did with a grade 4/5 class I was subbing in!

Trees

Evergreen Trees

I found this one to be similar to the water colour and tissue paper trees I did with my grade 4 students.

Birch Trees

Self Portrait Ideas

Snow Angels

Snowy Self Portait

Winter Landscape

Bids

Penguins

Water Colour Penguins

Warm and Cool Penguins

Paper Mache Penguins

If you are looking for more penguin art here and here some that I found in a classroom once

Polar Bears

Chalk Polar Bear

If you are looking for more polar bear activities to do with your class check out the post I did on a grade 1 polar bear unit.

Snowflakes

Tie Dye Snowflake

I love these ones so much that I've done them in a grade 4/5 class I was subbing in before.  You can see what we all did here.

Layered Snowflake

Pop Art Snowflakes

I did this one when I was teaching grade 4

You may have noticed that all my links are to just 2 other blogs... I'm sure there are many more excellent winter art themed activities but these are 2 blogs that I trust and use frequently when looking for good art activities.

What can I say, I found something I like and I've stuck with it!

Do you do any winter art activities in your classroom?

What are they, we'd love to hear about them!

This Week At School

Now that December is here it seems that my weeks have been much busier than November!

This week at school...

I had a student teacher for 2 days!

I was a French Immersion teacher (with the help of a student teacher).

I went to a new to me (this year) classroom (twice).

I helped a brand new student from India (he was new the day before I was there to sub) figure out what a school day in Canada is like!

I had a day (nearly) full of preps.  I started off the day with 3 preps and then was told to take a break for the last period of the day when the vice principal stopped by to do an observation of the student teacher.  Luckily I had a book to read this day which occupied a lot of my time!

I had my first indoor recess experience of the year as the temperatures dropped below -30 with the wind!

Two days in a row this week I did "leg day" - I follow the BBG program but I just do it an evening or afternoon here and there (so sometimes I might do 4 workouts and others 2)... it just so happened that I was finishing week 6 and starting week 7 on Tuesday and Wednesday (which coincidentally were the only days I did it this week).  Needless to say on Thursday my legs were killing me.  So while the students were doing some math I was doing some leg stretches - the ones where you pull your leg behind you and your heel touches your butt.  The kids asked me what I was doing (honestly, I was just standing on one leg essentially) and when I told them I was stretching my legs because they were sore wouldn't you know it... multiple other kids legs also happened to be sore at that exact moment and they all needed to do some stretches too!

Anywho, just 5 more possible working days until the break (I know I'm working 3 of those days so far).  Luckily, I'm already done (and have already received) all the presents I'm giving out this Christmas so I can just stay home and enjoy my days off in warmth!

What It's Like to Teach in December

Here is the link to the Board Teachers article I'm referencing for this post.

What tweets do I find most applicable to my current teaching situation?

#1 - The best way to spread holiday cheer IS to follow the instructions the first time... and failing that at the very least please follow them the 2nd time.  If I have to repeat myself a 3rd time I'm just really not going to be happy.

#3 - Although I haven't personally experienced a lot with Elf on the Shelf I can definitely see that being the talk of a classroom (especially a very early years classroom). 

#5 - It need not be Taylor Swift... any influential song writer/musician can do it but yes, let's make a song about how taking care of your responsibilities is a good thing and will get you far in life!

#7 - When I had a classroom of my own I would often bring work home with me... very rarely did I actually do any of it.

#10 - I mean this is just a similar story to #1.. let's pay attention folks!

What about you, any amusing things your telling your students (or they are doing) that you're tweeting about?

Grade 1 Polar Bear Unit

I was in a grade 1 classroom (a year ago now) and I found all these interesting things they had done with polar bears

First thing I noticed was some polar art with northern lights.

Then I saw some more art... polar bear faces

and then a polar bears den/igloo (I got mixed messages about what exactly it was)... it likely wasn't finished yet.

I'm assuming/hoping this teacher was also reading her students lots of stories about polar bears (both fiction and non fiction) and hopefully at some point they did some writing about what they learned about polar bears.  

It would have been cool if they could have teamed up with an older grade to have the older kids help the younger kids with some polar bear research but I understand that's hard to arrange.

Anyways, I needed to get this up now before the Christmas break in case anyone wanted to plan for it in the new year (I feel like if someone is going to do a polar bear unit it needs to be in the winter time).

Have you done a polar bear unit in your classroom?

What did you all do with it?

This Week At School

This week was another busy week at school!

-  I was a dance teacher!... Which means the grade 6 and 7 classes watched movies and the more responsible group of grade 8 girls led their own dance class.  This isn't the first time I've been a dance teacher either.

-  I taught in a new to me classroom!  We watched an interesting documentary on Canada for a large chunk of the afternoon in this classroom.

-  I had a student teacher not once but twice this week!

-  I walked with a group of grade 8 students to the high school nearby so we could watch their musical "Little Shop of Horrors"... having no idea what the musical even was going into it I'll say that it was... interesting (but a fun way to spend the morning)!

-  I taught in a French immersion classroom.

The countdown is on folks... only 10 more potential working days until Christmas break (so far I'm working 3 of those days).

Grey Cup Champions!

You may have heard that The Bombers are Grey Cup champions this year (and for my readers outside of Canada the Grey Cup is Canada's Super Bowl).

So last week I put this writing prompt up on the board 

Grey Cup Writing Prompt

Some of their ideas:

-  Fill it with Gatorade

-  Draw a picture of it to duplicate it and turn it into a pool to swim in

-  Break it

-  Make a fake duplicate of it so that I could keep the real one

-  Pee in it (there's one in every room isn't there?)

Tricked into Reading

Normally I would be very happy when a class excitedly requests to be read a story... but in this case it was a particular book that was being requested.  This particular book was written by BJ Novak (whom, if you don't know, played a character on The Office) so I kind of wondered what kind of book this was.  Then the class was very insistent that I could not under any circumstance read the back of the book before reading them the story.  And believe me, I tried to read the back to see what was going on, but they were always very quick to catch me no matter how sneaky I thought I was being.

Anyways, if you haven't read "The Book With No Pictures" I highly recommend you do so... and if you haven't read it to your class and have no intention of finding this book to read it to your class I've found it on Youtube for you to enjoy.

The kids loved it!

Spoiler:

If you aren't going to watch the video or read the book but still want to know why those kids were so insistent that I needed to read THAT book... it's because it's a book with a bunch of silly words and the reader talks about how wonderful the kids are that are listening to it... which is what the warning on the back was all about (which I did end up reading after I finished reading the story to them).

Have you read any books to your students lately that they absolutely loved? 

I would love to head about them!

This Week At School

Finally, it was a busier week at school!

I was in 4 different schools this week (and 4 different classrooms) but I ended up working all 5 days!

3 of the classrooms I got to teach in were huge!

This one was actually 2 different classrooms with a wall taken down between them. I like that the teacher made a desk area in one of the spaces and then more of an open and relaxing space in the other half.

Student Desk half of the room

I also love how these 2 classrooms had a ton of windows (I couldn't even get all the windows in the pictures - that's how many they had!)

At one of the schools this week we had a speaker come in and talk to us about homelessness and what we can do to help this season.

I planned and taught an art lesson in a grade 3/4 classroom about animal teeth (stay tuned in January for the lesson on this)

I apparently broke the intercom in one of the schools from calling down to the office. We joked that I had called down so frequently that I broke it (but I didn't call down THAT frequently, I just had one student that needed someone else to make some decisions for him). Whatever happened to the intercom it meant there were no bells at the end of the day. Whoops!

I ended off the week in a 4/5 classroom and all I will say is this... letting your children do whatever they want whenever they want at home (ahem screen time ahem) does not do them any service while they are at school. Kids should be doing some work and learning at home (in addition to having fun and playing). I've done a blog post about screen addiction before and here is a post that talks about a bunch of different online activities your kids/students may be into that might need another look. And no, I don't have children of my own so there's that BUT I do spend 6-8 hours of their day with them trying to teach them to learn which is likely a good chunk of the time they spend awake... so there is that.

Now it's going to seem like my day was awful but it wasn't. I'm at the point in my career where one person is not going to make or break my day anymore.

In other news I also made my husband an advent calendar! Well, if I'm being completely honest I actually made this calendar a couple of years ago and I just refilled it (with Lindt chocolates of course!). He thought he was getting an underwear advent calendar initially which just gave me an idea for next year (but you'll have to wait until then to see if I actually manage to pull that one together).

Homemade Christmas Advent Calendar

Summarizing Reading

Here is a way to get students to summarize what they've read that I saw a while ago:

The teacher called it CSIW (Colour, Symbol, Image, and Word).

In this particular example a student was summarizing on of the Hunger Game books.

She or he chose the colour red to symbolize the anger in the book (and explains why)

She/he chose the symbol of a fist to represent the power in the book (and explains why)

She/he chose a crowd of people where Katniss is volunteering as tribute as her image because it was what stood out to him/her.

This student hadn't picked a word yet to represent the book but you get the idea.

The template is super easy to make in a couple of minutes and it doesn't just involve writing (I think the drawing and colouring will hook a few more students).

If you are looking for other ways I've seen teachers get students to summarize what they've read here is another post I've done on the topic.

How do you get your students to summarize things?  

Christmas Bulletin Board Ideas

Now that you have some Christmas art done (or you are starting to think about getting some Christmas art done) you'll need to put it up!  Whether you decide to display it on a Christmas themed bulletin board or somewhere else here are some ideas for bulletin boards for the season!

Christmas Wish Tree

This one is pretty easy.  All you need is for students to make some white snowflakes and write a Christmas (or holiday) wish on it.  This one may not fit on a bulletin board but it's beautiful and I thought it was worth mentioning.

Origami Christmas Tree

This one I couldn't find a source to but I think it looks beautiful.  You'll need a bunch of wrapping paper though!

Gingerbread House

This one I thought was pretty cute (I can only imagine how long it took the person who set this up to do though!)

How the Grinch Stole Christmas

This one as well probably took FOREVER... look at all those letters this teacher had to cut out!

Ornaments

I like this one because it is simpler than some of the other examples I've listed AND you could get each of your students to make their own ornament (or 2) out of paper to put on your bulletin board.

PS. I love the reindeer ornament in the middle!

Fireplace

This teacher had her students not only design their own stockings for her bulletin board but also some mugs of hot chocolate!

If I were doing this one I would be sure to include some of my hot chocolate activities I came up with while subbing a couple of years ago!

So, do you make a Christmas theme bulletin board for your classroom?

What does it look like?

This Week At School

This week at school was another slower week at school.

I did however give it another go at a school I was not too keen on from past experiences there... mostly because it was only a half day and it was super close to where I live.  In the end I can recall why I wasn't super keen on it (although the half day there wasn't too terrible... I've definitely had worse!)

I go to one classroom quite frequently and this time when I was there it was nice to see that they are FINALLY wrapping up a project they had going on since close to the beginning of the school year (which where I live started at the beginning of September).  Looking forward to doing something new in that class in the near future!

I observed and graded some rock cycle presentations.  To be honest, I don't LOVE marking something like this as a substitute.  In the end I gave them all full marks because from what I could tell they all understood the rock cycle and were able to present on it BUT if I'm being honest some of their presentations were not as well thought out and put together as others.

Our CFL team made it to the Grey Cup (it's Canada's Super Bowl) so this city is all a buzz.  At one of the schools one of the teams mascots paid a visit and took pictures with all the classes.. I assumed it was someone who actually plays the mascot regularly in the costume (although I'm really not sure how that works) but the kids were pretty sure it was actually the teacher that I was in for that was inside the costume... hmmm....

In other news we set up our Christmas tree!  Canada's Thanksgiving is nothing but a distant memory by now (it was on October 14) so fall is officially over and Christmas is slowly getting set up!

Christmas Tree

We got a bigger one this year that better fills out bay window!

Next year I'm thinking of doing gold, white, silver, and black as the tree is prelit with colourful lights as well that I think would go well with those colours.

Here is our tree from last year

Is your tree up yet?

Do you have a colour theme for it?

Book Trailer

A while ago I was subbing in a class that was making book trailers.

This was back when I was doing a lot of subbing in the school with just a few kids and was teaching grades 1-8 all at the same time.  It was the perfect thing for the kids to do because the younger kids could do their book trailer on a picture book they read and the older kids could do it on a novel.

First, some resources that I used:

What is a Book Trailer

I used this resource for the rubric (which I wrote on the board for my students).  I used the book trailer review sheet idea but instead we watched a couple of book trailers and reviewed them together as a class.

Book Trailer Examples

More Book Trailer Examples

It was tricky showing such a wide range of student ages book trailers that would not only be appropriate for them but picking one that might be familiar to them.  So after we watched a couple we story boarded our own book trailer.

To do this I read them a picture book (because it would be quick and fresh in everyones minds).  

Then we used the rubric that I had written on the board to add in ideas that we could use in our book trailer.  For example, according to our rubric we are supposed to pick 4 adjectives to describe the overall theme of the book so we picked 4 together and I wrote them on the board.  Then we had to have a sentence to entice people to continue watching our trailer.  Now, it was a few months ago so I don't exactly remember but I do remember the book was about monsters getting their hair cut.  So, our leading question was something like "Have you ever wondered where monsters go for a hair cut?" and we wrote that on the board.

We continued to fill in the rest of the rubric with ideas we had from the picture book I read them.

Then it was time to start creating our trailer

Book Trailer Maker

We never finished our book trailer for the picture book but together we came up with about 4 slides, what the words on them would be, what the picture would be, and then added effects like music.

I wish I could show you the one we created but in order to download them you need the upgrade (otherwise it's free!)

If you are interested in other ways I've seen students share what they are reading check out my post on Book Creator.

Christmas Art

Just like I did for Halloween/Fall here are some Christmas Art projects that I've saved on my "art for the year" file on a USB to pull out with lots of ideas at any point in the year.

One of my all time favourite blogs to visit when looking for art activities to do with students is A Faithful Attempt (seriously check it out, it's so well organized and often has detailed instructions... she makes me want to be an art teacher even more than I already do!)

Anyways, if you search through her Christmas tag you'll find all of these

Oil Pastel Candy Canes

Symmetrical Nutcrackers

For this one I might even bring in some inspiration for their nutcrackers by bringing in these from The Dollar Tree (the link likely won't work out of season or next year but it's a link to $1.25 nutcracker figures - 6 different kids!)

Wycinanki Evergreen Tree

All you need is paper, hole punch, scissors, and glue!

This reindeer is from Artventurous

Finally, I was surprised at how little Christmas themed art projects I actually did and they all seem to be a little more winter themed.  Here is one super easy project that I did with an elementary school class (all you need is construction paper).

If you are looking for an art project to do that is a little less Christmasy and more Winter based stay tuned... I'll be coming out with some ideas next month!

What art projects do you do with your students for Christmas?

This Week At School

This week at school was an easy one (and only partly because I only worked 2 days).  I lucked out and worked in the same classroom both of those days as a middle school math and science teacher.  We didn't do anything too exciting (unless you find converting between fractions, decimals, and percents fascinating) but I did learn what the latest and greatest thing to do during class time is!

Apparently if you fold a sticky note a certain way and make a really really pointy tip on it you can make it get stuck in the ceiling.  By the end of the first day I was subbing at this school there were post it notes stuck in ceilings every where and the teacher in charge (because admin was away) was not having it!  By the next day he went around to all the classes and told every teacher that if we see any student making those to send them straight to him.  Needless to say there were no sticky notes sticking out of the ceiling on the 2nd day (way to go teacher in charge!)

What is the latest obsession with you students these days (I feel like Canada is always just a smidge behind the trends of the kids in the states).

My Story Parts

I saw this being used in a grade 1 classroom a while ago:

my story parts

Students used it to tell me their story (I'm sure they also used it for writing stories too though).

What they did:

The bear started in the first circle and started their story with one of the sentence starters there (or came up with one of their own).

Next, they moved the bear to the 2nd circle and told me their next sentence using one of the sentence starters at the bottom of that circle.

Finally, the bear moved over to the red circle and once again, they had some options of how to start their final sentence.

Their stories were mostly 3 sentences long (which in my opinion, for a grade 1 student, is awesome).  I would definitely use this in a classroom where they were students struggling with parts of a story.

Remembrance Day

Out of respect for those that have fought for my freedoms and for those that continue to serve my country there is no new post for today.

I you are looking for some previous Remembrance Day posts you can find them here:

A video for elementary aged students

Another video and other activities to do
Remembrance Day Bulletin Board Ideas
Remembrance Day Art Ideas

This Week At School

This week at school started off by teaching kindergarten and nursery.  This went relatively well, although I was warned about the afternoon class (14 boys and only 5 girls) but giving them lots of time to play (and not knowing which ones needed picture retakes so just sending a bunch) definitely helped!

I also went to one of the colony schools I frequent where I taught the middle school students.  When I got there one of the primary girls was looking through the windows of all the cars in the lot.  I asked her if she was checking out the contents of the cars and she told me she was!  I then asked if there was anything interesting inside and apparently there was as well (although I wasn't told what was so interesting).  Whether or not my car was peered into next I'm not sure as I went inside.

At the colony I taught gym which was actually a delight!  We played a quick game of dodgeball and then some ultimate frisbee and remarkably it went well!  We also read through a quick play in a magazine that the kids read super well (with accents and everything!) considering it was their first (and likely only) time reading it!

Then I was a grade 2/3 teacher where we spent a lot of time working on a Scaredy Squirel project (that I'll post about in a couple of months - sorry I'm very ahead of my posts at the moment!).  We also attended a Remembrance Day assembly (and not to toot my own horn or anything but I think my class was one of the best behaved during it).

I realize it's likely a little late for this but if you are looking for some ideas for your next years Remembrance Day assembly here is a post about a different Remembrance Day assembly I attended a few years ago.

Locked Out

This is a story all about how I once got locked out of school... before school had even begun.

I try to arrive at schools early that way I have time to talk to the secretaries, sign in, figure out attendance, where to meet my class, and what we'll be doing that day, etc.  Ideally it would be about 15 minutes prior to school starting.  So you would think the school would be a bustling place already with most teachers all ready there, secretaries, educational assistance, admin, and custodial staff.  But what happens when it's a colony school?

Out of the 2 colony schools that I go to one has a secretary, they each have 1 educational assistant, and about 3 teaching staff, no custodial staff.

On this particular day it was raining (of course) so I gather my stuff and get to the door only to discover it's locked... I knocked but I didn't think anyone would likely hear and as far as I can tell there is nothing more I can do... so I scamper on back to my car where it's warmer and dryer.

Luckily, I knew someone else had to be there as there was a car in the parking lot.  I also just so happened to have the principals phone number (because he contacts me on occasion to come in and sub for him).  So I sent him a quick text saying I was there and there was a car in the lot so someone was in the school but likely couldn't hear me.  About 1 minute later I see him by the door.

Apparently he had a lot to carry in that morning and after carrying it all back to his classroom forgot to come back to the door to unlock it.  Whoops!

Surprisingly, this isn't the first time this happened.  Once I left a school during the lunch hour only to find that when I returned all the front doors were locked.  I knew they weren't in a lock down or anything as I could hear the children playing in the school yard behind the school.  I also wasn't the only one locked out as there were some kids just arriving with their parents.  Eventually I decided to walk around to the back and quickly got in through one of the back doors.  Why the front doors were locked I never found out.  My guess is their secretary takes their lunch at the same time as the rest of the staff and so the front doors aren't monitored as well as they are in the morning and throughout the day.

Remembrance Day Bulletin Board Ideas

Now that you have your Remembrance (Memorial) Day art work done you can put it up on a Remembrance Day themed bulletin board!

These first 2 bulletin board ideas for Remembrance (or Memorial) Day were from Pinterest and I wasn't able to trace them back to their original source

What I especially like about this first one is that the maple leaves (how Canadian) turn into poppies.

What I like about this one is it looks like it could have been an art activity that the class did and then displaced on the bulletin board

This bulletin board was displayed in a library

And this one comes with a whole bunch of lesson ideas to go along with it from Shawna Bluhm's e-portfolio

Do you have Remembrance or Memorial Day bulletin board you'd like my readers to know about?  

Link to it in the comments below!