March Book Madness

We did a March Madness with book battles to coincide with the NCAA basketball tournament.  Last Friday was our championship book battle, but the brackets began at the beginning of the month with the Sweet 16.  The Sweet 16 match ups included: The Important Book vs Picky Mrs. Pickle, Mother Bruce vs Bullfrog Pops , Those Shoes vs Thunder Boy , Mr. Peabody's Apples vs Peanut Butter and Cupcake, The Incredible Book Eating Boy vs The Fantastic Flying Books of Morris Lessmore, Little Red Writing vs The Plot Chickens, Nadia, The Girl Who Couldn't Sit Still vs The Darkest Dark, and Now and Ben vs I Dissent. We would read each book and then take a vote on the favorite.  From these match ups, we got an Elite 8.

March Book Madness on PhotoPeach

 With 8 books in the running we opened up voting to the all kindergarten through second grade students.  Again, each classroom would read both books and take votes.  With about 200 kids now participating and voting, it took a little longer, but we soon had a Final Four.  We announced the final four in an "Oscar like" assembly.  We even had the music. The book winners were sealed in an envelope and students were chosen to come up and make the important winning announcements.  You should have heard the students cheering wildly for their favorite books!  So awesome!

 

The final four included Nadia, The Girl Who Couldn't Sit Still vs I Dissent and Picky Mrs. Pickle vs Peanut Butter and a Cupcake.  In this third read of the books students were becoming very attached to their favorites.  Here is our table of the voting.  There were definitely two clear winners for "The Game."

 

We all gathered together for the reading of the final game! Mrs. Jensen read Peanut Butter and Cupcake.  Mrs. Wolverton read Nadia, The Girl Who Couldn't Sit Still . It was so exciting that via Twitter,  the one and only Nadia Comaneci, Olympic gold medalist, and the author of her book Karlin Gray tweeted our class!  How amazing is that?!  We even got so see a first draft of Ms. Gray's book.

   

After a huge vote and lots of adding, the results were in......drum roll.....the 2017 book of the year......

 

 

Thank you, Ms. Gray for not only writing our favorite book in the tournament but also for reaching out to our students.  We just love the #readinglikechampions! 

Money, Money, Money

We are continuing to practice, practice, practice counting coins and solving problems involving money.  This week we used the Chromebook lab and this list on the blog to practice with online interactive games.   The students worked very hard.  You can access any of these learning games from home by clicking on the links.  The children already know their favorites!

 1. Money Sort

2. Counting Money

3. Enough Money

4. Count the Amount

5. Feed the Dolphin

6. Fruit Shoot 

Not only do we use computers and iPads to practice counting coins, we also use manipulatives.  One example of a game the students love is called race to a quarter.  This is a game students can play at home.  To play, you will need a di and many pennies, nickels, and dimes.  Players take turns rolling the di and taking that many pennies.  When students have enough pennies to trade for a nickel, they can make the exchange.  Further, when a player has two nickels,  he/she exchanges for a dime.  Play continues until a player gets a quarter.  For second graders and first graders ready for a challenge, the game can be extended to race to a dollar. 

We have had all sorts of games to help us with identifying and counting coins. Of course, the best way to practice counting coins...is to practice counting coins.  The students love to use real money!  First graders should be able to identify pennies, nickels, dimes, and quarters and count amounts up to 25 cents.  However, I find these students love a challenge.  We have been counting MUCH higher than 25 cents.  Second graders solve word problems involving money. We also have been working on making change for a dollar.

 

Another activity we did to was making words with a coin code.  We used this coin code to show coins that represent each letter.  Then we would spell words, match the coins, and count the amount. Students even found the worth of their first and last names. Then, the children uploaded a photo of their coin name to their digital portfolios in the app SeeSaw.  With the photos on SeeSaw, the students could compare the value of their name to their classmates. You can try out this activity at home.  Who's name is worth the most in your family?

Camp Read-A-Lot

Read~A~Thon, Camp Read-A-Lot started Wednesday, the 22nd!! The children are so excited. I hope you will continue recording those minutes at home. We will be honoring the top three readers, the students reading the most minutes, with a medal.  I know I have several students in contention for a medal. There is also a class trophy for the classroom that has the most students meeting the 300 minute reading goal. I have been telling all the classes that we are going to win! I may be slightly competitive! We NEED that trophy! Trophy and joking aside, this Read~A~Thon will only benefit our students. Extra at home reading makes a huge difference in academic success! Please work hard these next ten days and READ, READ, READ! If I can support you in anyway, feel free to call. Don't forget to join us at Reading Club every morning starting Wednesday, 8:00-8:15 in the library.

We are doing lots to stay motivated at school!  Our entire hallway is decorated to go with the camp theme.  Our classroom has been transformed to look like a campsite, including a reading tent and a fire.  The students are loving reading inside the tent or beside the fire.  Several of our centers this week our camp themed.  Wednesday, the students got a s'mores snack to enjoy as they logged their minutes.



Thanks for keeping me current with the reading logs.  Each time a child reads 30 minutes, they earn a badge.  First graders are collecting badges on sashes.  Second graders each have a banner.  We also have a place for students with 5 or more sponsors to sign.  Signing the wall is pretty cool, but the prizes from Mrs. Wolverton seem to be a bigger hit!  Students are also earning badges for exploring genres of books in class.  Every day during the readathon, we get a genre basket of 20 books from the library.  So far, we have explored poetry, realistic fiction, and mystery.  See if your child can tell you about genre.

We are also participating in some dress up days!  Read my shirt was a blast!  The children loved sharing their shirts, counting words, and even getting together in groups to make sentences.  Ha!  They are so clever.  Flannel Friday was a blast too!  Look at these happy campers!  They look like a group of Read-a-Thon champs to me!  Keep up the hard work.  Camp Read-A-Lot ends Friday, March 31st!

O'Lucky Day

We had a terrific St. Patrick's Day in the combo!  Our day started with a surprise.  Some naughty leprechauns had visited!  They made a mess with school supplies, left green footprints on the tables, and turned the toilet water green.  Tricky!  They even took our treats.  I had made the kids a treat bag with some candies and Lucky Charms.  When we came in, we noticed the green footprints and our BreakOut box!  The leprechaun had locked up all our treats!  Good thing he left clues to help us break out.  There were 4 clues to solve for the four locks.  Students grabbed their lock tracker and got to work.  Look at the concentration!







The best treat of the day wasn't the bags I made, it was the STEM projects!  The second graders presented their leprechaun traps and the first graders got to show off their rainbow bridges.  They all did an awesome job explaining both how their projects worked and the challenges that were involved in the design process.  Great work engineers!

This free digital slideshow customized with Smilebox

Blue Raiders Visit

With the NAIA basketball tournament in town, we were so lucky to get a visit from the Blue Raiders Women's team!  The women gave a school wide assembly on important character traits required to be at the top of your game: integrity, responsibility, respect, and sportsmanship.  The Blue Raiders are from Kentucky.  We wore our blue to show our support.



After the all school assembly, we were lucky enough to have the Blue Raiders come down to our classroom!  We did a shoot out graphing activity.  Students were working in groups with our Blue Raider players to count and tally shots.  After collecting the data students had to create and interpret a graph of the makes and misses.  I'm not sure who was having more fun, the college students or the first and second graders!  Hopefully, the extra shooting practice with help our Blue Raiders in the tournament.



Also with the tournament, we took some time to learn how a bracket works.  Every day this week, we have been having morning Tric-Trac tournaments.  Tric-Trac is a math game that can be played on the iPad.  Click here to see purchasing information.  Students would check their bracket partner at the beginning of the day and begin playing.  After the first game, they added their name to the next bracket. 



The first day of tournament play the students needed some guidance to work through the bracket.  By Thursday, I wasn't even making the bracket anymore.  Students used their recess time to come up with the pairings.  The Connected Combo is just the best.  Each morning, when we were down to the final game, we would turn on the game lighting and inspirational music.  The final two played their game in the middle of our morning circle and a champ was crowned.  In each days tournament, I witnessed those important character traits our Blue Raiders discussed: integrity, responsibility, respect, and sportsmanship.  Plus, I think the students had a whole lot of fun while practicing math skills.  Win, win, WIN!