Some New Babies Perhaps?

My boys and I were outside in the backyard enjoying the Colorado sunshine when we came across this...

At first my youngest thought the wind had just blown some tumbleweeds into the grill, but when we opened the lid we were surprised to see...

Holy, moly! Some bird, or a pterodactyl according to my boys (they are just a little too excited for the release of Jurassic Park in 3D tomorrow) is making themselves pretty comfortable. We are hoping for an owl or red tailed hawk. I think this might be a great way to get my classroom kiddos to predict what may end up in this nest.

Upcoming Dinosaur Unit

I am so excited to begin our dinosaur unit next week. We are taking our field trip to the Museum of Science in May and decided to make our own 2nd grade museum. Each of our four second grade classrooms will have a theme; Space, Insects/Bugs, Animals and Habitats, and Dinosaurs. Can I say how excited I am to have gotten dinosaurs. Having two boys that can identify any dinosaur and have so many of them that my classroom kiddos can "borrow" makes me smile. Not to mention that my oldest son is planning on being a paleontologist when he grows up!  We will spend one week learning about various dinos, their diets, size, and the lucky paleontologists that get to dig the fossils up. Then my kiddos will research a specific dinosaur and write a research report for two weeks. We will then present to our classroom friends and only lucky kiddo will even get to present their report to our first graders. I am so excited to incorporate art into our dinosaur unit before we transform our classroom into Prehistoric Journey. We will then get to tour all three of the other classrooms and share our museum with the first graders.

I have included just a few of the items we will use next week. We will add updates as we venture into our dinosaur unit and I will post my full unit in my Teachers pay Teachers account. In the mean time I have put a little freebie of my unit below.

 

Dinosaur Diets

Problem and Solution

Before we left for Spring Break last week we spent a few days reviewing problem and solution. I reviewed the concept with my kiddos using a basic "puzzle piece" anchor chart. We also discussed signal words that we may hear in a story that would let that light bulb in our brain know that we have come to the texts problem or solution. I gave my kiddos some problems and in pairs they came up with the solutions. I was so proud of their answers. I let my kiddos know they did such a good job that we were going to take a break and put together some puzzles. We were even going to race to see which color table could put their puzzle together first. Let me just say that I wanted this to still be an extension of our learning so I took one puzzle piece out of each box. (I know I am so mean!) Before we began our puzzle race each table had one minute to create strategies as to how to put their puzzle together the quickest. I was so impressed with some of their creative ideas...."Let's make an assembly line" and "You look at the picture, he will get all of the edge pieces, and I will put the middle together." Well once I said go to was like a NASA control room. My kiddos worked so well together, were polite, and then it happened. "Ms. White! We are missing a piece." "Ms. White! I think the other table stole our piece!" It was so hard for me to hold in my laughter as I watched all my kiddos look in their table caddies, on the floor, in each others pockets. Finally, I asked, "What's the problem." You could see light bulbs go off simultaneously and "ohhhhh" from around my classroom. My kiddos understood how a problem could happen in everyday life. At our table groups my kiddos came up with several solutions to solve their problem. I felt so bad though when my kiddos did ask for their puzzle piece back to solve their puzzle problem, but I had left them at home. That started a whole new PROBLEM!!!

 My little assembly line workers! I am so excited that they remembered an assembly line from our March unit.

 Working carefully with our edges and corners.

 

Welcome!

I am so excited to finally begin my journey in the blogging world! I absolutely adore the school and staff I work with...my teammates are amazing!!! I currently teach second grade, most kiddos I had last year in my combo room. With April already here it is becoming more clear that I will only have these precious kiddos in my room for a couple more weeks. MAJOR sad face.

Below I have included a few snapshots of my classroom. I am the only second grade classroom that has tables. I LOVE my tables. We use cooperative groups and hands-on activities throughout the day so my tables provide that smooth, flat surface we need. Also, my perfectionism and minor OCD would really kick in if I had to see 20 dirty desks around my room! (I am technically not OCD, but I am one who can notice if something has been moved by just walking in the classroom door.)

      My Comprehension Strategy Wall

      I use the Beanie Babies to help support the concept. It also is a great tool for my visually impaired student to "hold on" to understand what the animals characteristics are.

My Classroom Library

I am obsessed with books. I have hundreds of them that I have gotten at garage sales or Goodwill's 50% off sales. Each one is labeled with the books theme and AR level. I spend a lot of time at the beginning of the year teaching my kiddos how to match their book to the right book bin. It seriously looks that clean all year with a little training!

CAFE Menu Wall and Cubbies

This is my CAFE wall at the beginning of the year. Now it is full of all of the strategies we have learned and used. I switched the CAFE letters around to spell FACE. My header above the wall states, "Do you have a reader's FACE?" It makes more sense for my kiddos to understand.

We use the Daily 5 in second grade at my school. To make sure each kiddo is receiving literacy instruction for the skills and concepts that they need we also adopted a program called Walk to Read. We use student data and progress monitoring to determine what classroom kiddos will "walk" to receive their literacy instruction. We have an advanced, benchmark, strategic, and intensive room. I am so lucky to be working with our kiddos that need the most support in the intensive room. For 90 minutes, in three 30 minute rotations, we work on phonics, comprehension, fluency, and work work activities. One rotation kiddos will work with me using F.A.S.T. Literacy. If you have never heard of F.A.S.T. Literacy you need to visit their website. Students get to use magnetic boards to work on specific phonics skills through building words, reading, and spelling. Then, my kiddos get to work with my "fairy para" (she is so magical and I don't know what I would do without her) on work work activities on Monday and Fridays, fluency drills on Tuesday and Thursdays, and comprehension on Wednesdays. Our last rotation students receive guided reading with our Title teacher. It requires a lot of planning on my part, but it is so rewarding to see all the growth these intensive kiddos have made.

Thanks again for joining me on my blogging journey!