Freebie Friday! A Luau Activity

It's time to once again link up with Teaching Blog Addict's Freebie Friday. You can click on the button below to go check out the other great products being shared today.

Today I am offering a small sample from my larger Luau to Learn unit. This sample is a Graphing activity, which involves a taste test of tropical fruit! Check it out by clicking on the picture below.

Five for Friday

Hi readers and friends! Today I am linking up with Doodle Bugs Teaching for the Five for Friday linky party! I enjoy seeing what everyone is up to on a daily basis. It's been such a busy week in many ways. But, I think that will be the name of the game for the remainder of this school year. 

On last Friday, I had a performance with my adult classes at DanceFX Athens. I danced in a contemporary number and a pointe piece. My sweet fiance supported me and came to see me dance! I'm so inspired by the amazing dancing that goes on at my studio, and it's a lot of fun to showcase the things we are learning! Click here to learn a little bit more about my journey as an adult learning to dance and how that has affected me as a teacher. 

My little nephew had a birthday in March, but between a family wedding and Easter, his birthday party had to be postponed a few weeks! So, we celebrated this Saturday and we all had a grand time! He decided to sharpen and show off his walking skills for everyone, but refused to eat his cake (he only wanted to feed it to his Daddy). He's just so cute I can hardly stand it!

This is my "Free To A Good Home" pile. It looks like I am retiring, but I'll just be moving. There are lots of changes going on right now in my life, and I have recently accepted a new 2nd grade teaching job in the Atlanta area. So this Monday and Tuesday afternoons, I set a timer for 30  minutes of clean out time after school and I've made quite a dent in my stuff so far. This is going to be an even more bittersweet end of the year time than it usually is. 

See my blog post here about how we have begun our study of life cycles this year! The kids are not only growing their own plants, but are engaging in some inquiry and changing up variables to examine how it will affect a growing plant. 

I'm the featured blogger over at Teaching Blog Addict this week! Check out the great freebies that teachers post there every Friday by clicking on the picture. Check out my blog post about using student bloggers by clicking here.

Including Kids' Voices In Your Classroom Blog: Freebie Friday

You are here, reading this blog, because you are fluent in using the Internet and Social Media. Many of our students are already fluent, or are becoming so on their own. I would encourage you to harness their interest and provide for them a safe space to practice skills that they will use in their futures!

Today I want to share with you a new product on sale on my TPT page. Actually, it's not on sale; I'm offering it for FREE! Have you ever used a classroom blog? Ours really kicks into gear in the 3rd and 4th quarters of school. I like to use our classroom blog for  a number of purposes, including:

• Sharing pictures and happenings with parents.
• Showing off videos or alternative ways to publish writing.
• Teaching students to write comments and reply to comments.
• To provide students with an opportunity to be a guest blogger. 

Today I'd like to offer you the opportunity to download a free blog post planner to use with kids. I've found that the more I can include my Kids' voices in things like our newsletter and blog, the wider my audience reach becomes as they encourage their families to check it out! You can see some examples by clicking on the tab for my Classroom Blog above. Check out the product by clicking on the picture below!

If you download, I'd love some feedback! If you blog, I'd love for you to comment on this post to let me know how you use a classroom blog!

Freebie Friday: Smart Cookies Opinion Writing

For the last several years, I have introduced Opinion writing through the OREO graphic organizer. So, when I decided to finally take the plunge into TPT selling and teacher blogging,  I decided to start with the unit I have created around the organizer. So, a small sample of the Smart Cookie Opinion Writing pack is my featured freebie for the store!

Click on the picture!

When I used this unit with my class, I presented them with the question, "In your opinion, what is the best cookie?" I modeled writing about my favorite cookies, Oreos, and served up a double stuffed Oreo to everyone at the end of the lesson. For the rest of the week, we focused on understanding how to organize opinion writing with an Opinion, Reasons, Examples, and a closing Opinion. We also focused on understanding the difference between Reasons and Examples and learning new transition words to use (For example, like, and in addition). We added sentence starters to our anchor charts to help with this concept. These lessons were great anchors to build on through the rest of our study on Opinion Writing!Although this one is not free, the full unit is also up for sale on my TPT site. In fact, it is discounted this weekend. You will find many levels of rubric, checklists, feedback, worksheets, organizers, and publishing paper. 

Click on the picture!

Freebie Friday: Dictionary Scavenger Hunt

I don't know about yours, but my students are obsessed with using the dictionary. They will use almost any opportunity to grab those weighty books off the shelf and flip through them.

Now, I know that my 21st Century Learners will not find the opportunity to use real dictionaries very much in their lives. With a Smart Phone close by, what's the point? But, I like to harness their energy in learning about using these reference books in a fun way.

The Common Core standards do state that they need to be able to use a glossary and beginning dictionaries, so why not come up with a fun way to practice those skills?

Today, I'd like to invite you to try out my FREE Dictionary Scavenger Hunt for the month of March. This activity can easily be used for work time, center time, or even morning work. Check it out!

Well, today I sign off from school and ON for Spring Break! 8 hours and counting! Happy Friday!