Seeds

One of my favorite science units is plants. We always save it for this time of the year... We have so many fun outside learning activities planned, if only the weather would cooperative that it!! It's been raining for over a week. But we didn't let that stop us.

We began by investigating the parts of a seed. I soaked the seeds over night to let them expand a little so it would be easier for littler hands to manage.  I passed out one seed to every two kids along with a magnifying glass.  We pulled back the seed coat and talked about why it's important. Then we broke the seed open to find the baby plant (embryo) and the stored food.

Next, we talked about the things seeds need in order to grow: sunlight, air, space, and water.  We wondered whether or not seeds would grow without soil.  So I pulled out the Ziplock baggies, paper towel, and seeds.  We got the paper towel damp, put it in the baggie, stapled a horizontal line around the middle of the bag, and plopped in some seeds.

Now we wait.

I thought it would be fun to incorporate some math.  I filled little cups with a variety of seeds.  Then I assigned partners to work on a seed sort.  They had some estimating to do before they could start sorting and counting.  On the back side of this page there is a graph.  They had to graph the amount of each seed they have and then analyze it to answer questions.

Stay tuned for some more plant fun! These activities and more can be found in our Plant Unit.

XtraMath and a Yummy Birthday Dinner

XtraMath is also a great FREE website for kids that we use to help with math facts.  It's super easy to set up. All you have to do is type in your students names.  Once the names are typed in you can go to "print flyers."  The flyers explain the site and how to use it.  The site generates a flyer for each student, with their name and pin number printed at the bottom.  What's great about this site is that there is no maintenance.  Every week you will receive an email with each student's scores.  This way you can see who's using it and who isn't.  We use it as an at home option.  Sometimes, after I get the report, I'll pass out our school wide positive behavior tickets as an incentive.  This usually gets a few more kids to go on!

On a personal note, tomorrow is my boyfriend's birthday. He's turning the big 2-6!  I'm right behind him... I've got 1 week to be "younger."  We're celebrating tonight with family.  What's on the menu you ask? All his favorites!

Homemade Panera spinach power salad, Coney dogs, and cheese fries! Yummm! Happy Sunday everyone!

Looking for a little easy motivation??

If you all are anything like us, we have serious cases of Spring Fever.  And by that I mean, the kids and the teachers!  This year my class needs a lot of extra love and I have been needing to change up the routine a lot as well as behavior plans and management ideas. 

Soooo...when my own 2nd grader came home and was begging to go online and do EXTRA math homework to earn a reward, I had to check it out.  I had heard of the website before www.ixl.com but didn't know much about it.  There are some awesome math testing resources here!

I sat down on Tuesday night and looked into.  I learned there is a FREE 30-day subscription (which coincidentally takes me to almost the end of the year), so I signed up.  It literally took me 10 minutes to sign up and enter my kids names.  Then, I just printed parent notes with passwords for each student.

I decided that I would give my kids a little incentive of earning tickets (our school incentive program) dependent on how many problems they completed each week.   Needless to say, I was SHOCKED when I opened my email the next morning and 10 of my kiddos had already spent a total of 3+ hours on the site!!

Today, I passed out tickets to about 80% of my kids...they loved it, I loved it, and they are getting smarter!

Check it out!

Journal Prompts

Getting second graders to write can be quite a chore but the sisters and I have found a sure fire way to get them interested!  We created a journal for each of our students.  

The kids this it's amazing that their name is TYPED on the front!  We used the binding machine to make each journal.  Within the journal are a few important features.  When you open it up they find a "Writer's Checklist."  These are the things we require them to do in every writing piece.

It's a great visual reminder.  Next are 20 writing prompts... we don't want to overwhelm them with a HUGE stack of choices.  We tell them they can pick any page to start on, that's a biggie.  Allowing them to select for themselves is a big motivation.  They love sharing their writing with a friend and of course us!

Coming up write writing prompts can be a daunting task.  So we've made it easy for you!  Check out our Journal Prompts [12 Months Worth] packet on TpT. 120 prompts for less than 10 cents each, it's a steal! 

Coming Soon....

Sister 1 here....I flew in last night from Disney World and it was quickly back to the routine today.  As teachers, we are so lucky to have quite a few breaks....however we have those breaks with nearly every other vacationer on Earth!  Needless to say, we tackled crowds and lines at all of the theme parks....but all I can say is WOW!  I am sure many of you know what I am talking about.  Disney World is hands-down a really magical place.  The crowds didn't matter, the lines didn't matter....we still had an amazing time full of fun.  We packed in about 2 weeks of activities into 6 days.  I hate to admit this on a "teaching" blog but I didn't think about school once....it was the vacation I really needed!

Now we are in the home stretch of the school year....about 46 more days!  The sisters and I were just talking about how much more we want to do in that time!  So no more day dreaming about Mickey ears, Splash Mountain, and Dole Whips!  It's time to get to work.  You will want to keep checking back here and in our TPT store over the next few weeks because we have some great units and activities in the works.  I am so excited to be currently working on updating one of my favorite things of the year....memory books!  At the end of every year my students (and their parents) LOVE, LOVE, LOVE these! 

Stay tuned.....

Back to Reality

As I'm sitting here blog hopping, Pinteresting, and TpTing creating inspiring lessons for the up coming week I decided to take a look at the weather.

Rain! Everyday. Which made me remember this Hey Girl I found a while back...

Indoor recess is quite a bummer, especially the week after spring break when we need to burn off some energy.  So I opened up my Pinterest and started pinning away.  If you've never used these Brain Break  songs in the classroom, you MUST try it! They are a life saver in more then one way.

Here are some of our favs!

There are tons more and super easy to find on Pinterest.  Do yourself a favor and play one or two of these throughout the day to give you and your students a mini-brain break! You deserve it :)

Let's Get Acquainted Linky

I'm excited to link up with Latoya from Flying into First Grade this week!

Favorite Place to Shop: I mean seriously, how can I pick just one?!?



Favorite TV Show: The Client List

Favorite Sweet Treat: Dairy Queen Chocolate Covered Strawberry Blizzard. Need I say more?

Favorite Food: Chicken Enchiladas

Favorite Restaurant: Chili's.. love their chips and salsa!

Now, go to Latoya's blog and link up!