3rd Grade gets Grinchy....without a camera!?!?

It's the most wonderful time of the year!!  And no, it is not summer break!  I actually enjoy Christmas break a LOT more than summer break, for quite a few reasons:

1.  I only need about 2 weeks to regenerate....2 months leads to boredom and unnecessary spending.

2.  Time with family

3.  My husband is off work for a few days

4.  Fun dresses for parties

5.  Pea Coats

6.  Presents:  hubby's birthday, our anniversary, and Christmas

7.  The crazy chance that there COULD MAYBE be a dusting of snow

Need I say more?  Christmas break is just my favorite!  

Over the past couple of weeks I have been doing a lot of super fun different Christmas activities from my classroom, and unfortunately, have not had a camera to capture every moment...blah.  That being said, here is the recap of Christmas in 3rd grade using pictures from the actual creators of the ideas!  Click the link below each picture to visit the website from where I got my idea!

Grinch Day!!

I decided this year to give "Grinch Day" a try, and it actually ended up being more of "Grinch Week".  I had to spread out the activities so that I could spend an adequate amount of time on each one!

Math-3rd grade is currently working on multi-step problem solving (I know you feel my pain here...), and it is so hard!! I chose to use a homemade powerpoint using Grinch themed questions and images to help motivate.  The kids thought it was a hoot!  

Reading-  We started out with a lesson on character traits, and I took this idea from Teaching in High Heels. First, you read aloud the book How the Grinch Stole Christmas, and then you work as a class to come up with character traits to describe the Grinch.  In the idea online, she used adjectives:

http://teachinginhighheels.blogspot.com/

The next day, we had a mini-lesson on similes and metaphors from the song "You're a mean one, Mr. Grinch".  LOVED this activity!!  That song is full of metaphors, with a few similes too!  The students had a paper copy with the lyrics from the song, and had to highlight the similes and metaphors in two different colors of highlighters.  Then, each kids wrote an acrostic poem using the letters GRINCH, and writing similes to make up the poem.  They had a great time with this, too!  We also made paper grinches to go along with the poem.  In case you need a refresher:

On the last day of school, we had Grinch punch, which is just sprite, vanilla ice cream, food coloring, and some green sprinkles, and also we made Christmas trees from Whoville, which were sugar cones, white icing, made green with food coloring, and small candies for the ornaments.  We enjoyed all of this while watching the cartoon version of the movie.

idea from:  Kids Creative Chaos

idea from:  Taste of Home

We also spent some time doing holiday writing, using apple cinnamon ornaments and The Polar Express by Chris Van Allsburg as inspiration.  The kids always enjoy these activities.  To visit my post about apple cinnamon ornaments, click HERE. To see my polar express writing unit on TPT, click HERE.

HO HO HO!  Merry Christmas!  I hope you all enjoy the Holidays as much as I will!

Revisiting the Glory Days.....and apple cinnamon ornaments!

My husband and I were hanging out with some of our friends tonight, laughing about "the good ole' days"-or the "not so good ole' days" depending on which story we are telling at the time:) HA!  When we got home I was perusing through old pictures, and what should I find but a video of us back at cheerleading practice! (My husband and I met on a college cheer team-GO PIRATES!)  Anyway-have a chuckle for yourself!

Anyway-at school this past week we dug into the vivid vocabulary from the Polar Express!  So far so good!  My kids and I are pushing through these last couple of weeks until Christmas, and I am sure that you are too!  I am taking the whole Elf on the Shelf thing really seriously:)  If you are interested in my Polar Express Unit, check it out here!  There is still time to do the unit before Christmas! 

The Polar Express

We are also going to be making Cinnamon applesauce ornaments.  The recipe is super easy, the room smells amazing when they are done!  I'll be posting my own pictures and recipe next week, but if you want to try it with your own kiddos, I found a great blog about it called 5 orange potatoes. Check it out:

http://www.5orangepotatoes.com/blog/2009/12/03/cinnamon-applesauce-ornaments/

Have a fabulous week!

Girl's Night, Thanksgiving, and Polar Express!

I hope you all had a fabulous Thanksgiving!  Now we are in the home stretch until Christmas break!  I would first of all like to say how relaxing it is to get to visit with family and friends during long breaks from school.  I was so blessed to spend my weekend before Thanksgiving with a close friend that I used to teach with. It was motivating to talk to someone who shares a positive attitude about our kids and their potential in meeting their end of the year goals in reference to testing.....and have a couple of glasses of vino:) Add to that a 6 day weekend with family in FL, and voila!  Relaxed and ready to go!

I have posted a new product on Teachers Pay Teachers that I will be using with my third graders in the weeks leading up to Christmas break.  It is a Polar Express Writing Unit, and is a BLAST!!  There are so many great options for using The Polar Express in the Classroom, but I absolutely LOVE using it for writing!  Check it out HERE:  THE POLAR EXPRESS WRITING UNIT

Also, here are a few pics of things that we did during Thanksgiving.  The newspapers and paper plates were used in a budgeting lesson teaching kids how to plan for and budget for Thanksgiving dinner.  Whew!  That was a toughie, but definitely an eye-opener for my students!  (Think:  What do you mean the turkey cost $20???)  Priceless!  It is amazing the street smarts that come out during lessons like that too!  (Think:  I am going to get green beans in a can, since they are cheaper.)  I hope you all had success teaching Thanksgiving to your kiddos too! 

Comparing and Contrasting the Pilgrims and Wampanoag Tribe

Budgeting sheet and plate with cut out food from the Sales ad.  For more, see my Thanksgiving Unit on Teachers Pay Teachers.

We don't have bulletin boards in the hallway, so this is my makeshift attempt at displaying our Thanksgiving work:)

Getting Serious!!  Budgeting our Thanksgiving dinner!

A little Pilgrim girl and flow map for the First Thanksgiving

Bulletin Board in my classroom with Pilgrims and first Thanksgiving flow maps.  Had to post this so that everyone could see the pink/blonde pilgrim:)