Reading Rainbow

Last year I donated to my first ever Kickstarter campaign, and so I eagerly awaited the backer awards.

They finally arrived this week! Check them out. We're going to wear them together and take a family picture wearing the shirts. I'm really excited!

Baby Shower

No not for me, but one of our staff, and we threw her a baby shower before she went on leave last week. I didn't take a lot of pictures, but here is a game and the diaper and beer cake my husband made for her husband.

We each had to craft a baby out of a can of playdough. Here's my blanket wrapped baby drinking from a bottle.

My husband was a little sad that the boys he worked with when I was pregnant didn't do anything for him, at least I think that, lol. My mom gave him a tshirt that said Super dad, and my dad passed on an apron he was given at my moms shower for me, but other than that he wasn't given any recognition. 

So it was no surprise to me that he wanted our co-workers husband to feel included. He saw this cake online, and had to make it for him. I prettied it up.

Frozen theme

I know I'm supposed to be blogging about school, but I'm going to take a bit of a detour today and share pictures from my daughters third birthday. I made NONE of the products you see, but all are available free somewhere on the Internet. Pinterest is my best party planning companion. I wasn't thinking about blogging this before today, so I don't recall right off which page each resource came from.

So take this only as INSPIRATION for your own child's party or classroom celebration.

 

 

Pre-school/daycare Valentines Parent Cards

My daughter made my husband and I some really cute Valentine gifts at Daycare this year.
Since I think they'd be great made at a Kindergarten or grade 1 level as well, just with more independence, I'm sharing them with you so you can pin and be inspired next February!

Spirit Week February 2015

Do you do Spirit Week? We do several a year. This particular Spirit week was put on by our fourth grade class.

As you can see, 

Monday was PJ day, and it was quite popular.

Tuesday was Jersey Day. I was very glad my husband bought me  Leafs Jersey for Christmas.

Wednesday was crazy hair day. I didn't do this day. I ran out of time and didn't know what I wanted to do.

Thursday was Gender Day. I participated by not wearing Pink. It wasn't a popular day, although I had 3 boys wear pink shirts!

Friday was red day, which is awesome because I often try to wear red on Fridays. Both of my Grandfathers were in the Canadian Service, and ever since 9/11, we've been encouraged to wear red for them. I think a lot of people have forgotten. Recently there have also been a few Fridays where people wore red for the Mounties who've been injured or slain while on duty as well.

What are your favourite Spirit Week themes?

100th day of school

This year our 100th day of school fell on Valentine's Day, so neither celebration got the attention it did last year, but that's OK. We still got a few activities done.

I created a new version of an activity in my 100th day of school freebie. and instead of a Chocolate Chip Cookie like last year, we made a box of Candy! We had a lot of fun cutting out and decorating our 100 pieces of chocolate candy. 

Later in the day for math I handed out some copies of my feet to cut out and we guessed how far down the hall we could lay them. Great measurement activity for first grade!

If you only had time for one or two activities, what would you make sure got done?

Valentine's Day First Grade displays 2015

The first picture here is what the other first grade teacher did outside her classroom. Their were notes on each little heart. Very cute!

My door wasn't quite so fancy. I put the kiddos names on every heart, and they got to take it home on Friday if they wanted to.

Valentine's Day Parent Art 2015

For Valentine's Day art this year I decided my kiddos were ready to try painting again (we lost he privilege earlier in the year....).

I gave each student on Thursday a sheet of hearts to randomly paint. While I modeled the below page, most of my kiddos still individually painted their hearts.

On Friday morning we cut out our hearts (now dry) and made Valentine Men. I also suggested animals, and one student made a heart rainbow. It was beautiful. Most students duplicated my sample, lol.

Valentine Bags 2015

My kiddos were each given a paper bag and construction paper to cut hearts out of the day before Valentine's day. The only rule was that their name had to be visible.

I think they turned out pretty cute.

I only had a few card issues on Valentines Day. While I sent home the names a week in advance, I had THREE students who had unopened boxes of cards that morning which their parents either expected me to have the time to speed write on all of, or they expected their child to have the time and speed to finish addressing. Putting the cards in our bags on Friday morning took significantly longer than expected. Other than sending home the list in advance, what else can I do to make this part of Valentine's Day less stressful for below average first graders?

Valentine Exchange 2015

This year my class participated in a Valentine Exchange with 20 other classrooms in Canada.

Next year we'll do better! 

I gave my kiddos very loose instructions and a strip of Pink paper to make their cards out of, but the cards we got in the mail were absolutely gorgeous. Look at my door below with almost all o them on it! We got three more after this. I think one got lost in the mail :(

Build your Own Lego Dudes

I can't take credit for this project, but my class did the art. 

This week the grade 12 art class was short most of their students due to a trip, and so their lovely teacher brought the remaining students into our building one morning to do an art project with us!

Check out the beautiful Lego people (dudes) my kiddos created!