Addition and Subtraction

We started working on addition and subtraction stories today. I gave the children story problems and the children acted them out using candy corn and a jack o lantern. They then made up thier own stories up using the candy corn.

They really enjoyed this activity and I of course let them eat two at the end and couldn't resist showing them this fun trick.

Our Week

We made tens and ones using manipulatives. We also used the laptops to go to different websites to make tens.

Here is a look at our week.

Shapes

We worked on shapes this week and the children made shapes using marshmallows and toothpicks. I didn't show them how to make the circle I wanted to see what they would come up with and I was really surprised at the different ways they made the circle. They just love anything to do with food.

Graphs and Surveys

We have been working on graphs and surveys this week. The children made thier own graph using M&M's, and they also conducted a survey of the class on thier favorite color apple then had to use the data to make thier own graph. We learned the difference between bar and picture graph and the different parts of the graph.

First Two weeks of school

Wow I can't believe the first two weeks are over, they just flew by. As I have mentioned this is my first year with first grade and I just love it. I have the pleasure of having most of my students back from last year, they were quite surprised when they showed up on the first day and I was their teacher again. One very sweet girl came running down the hall to give me a very big hug.

I finally finished the rocking chair I got this summer, here is a picture of before and after. It has been so very hot here which isn't the best time to be outside painting so this took longer than anticipated. We have had extremly high temperatures which isn't unusual for Texas but this year we have been setting records with the heat, were on our 58th day of over 100 degrees.

Bucket Fillers

We started bucket fillers this week and the kids and I just love it. I read the book "Bucket Fillers For Kids" and then we talked about how when we say nice things we fill our friends bucket but we say mean things we are dipping in our friends bucket and it makes them feel bad. Everyone made a bucket and we made an anchor chart to help with what was appropriate to write. When they arrive in the morning and during work on writing they are aloud to write a note to their friends. On Friday they were able to look in their buckets to get their notes, they were so excited to see what their friends had written, it was so cute.






Thanks to these great bloggers for the ideas.
I got the idea for the anchor chart at Mrs. Farmers blog
I got the papers and charts from Mrs. Walker's blog

Classroom pictures

I made it! Today was the first day and wow what a great day. I am going to be doing daily five this year and was a little hesitant about starting day one but everywhere I read said to start right away so I jumped in. It went great and they could have lasted longer than the three minutes reading to themselves, can't wait to see how the rest go.

Here are some more pictures of the outside of the classroom.