Friday Already?? Oh, Well! Five for Friday it is...

When on spring break, as Friday rolls around, it's not necessarily a YAHOO moment!  But Friday does means Five for Friday, so we are linking up with Doodle Bugs Teaching.

More Time to Blog

Click here to read, Let's Take a Dive: Ocean Unit--Part One.  Finally had a chance to blog about our ocean explorations. Part Two from Courtney is still to come!

Time to Create

I spent some time this week creating some new items for my kids--AND you have a chance to win one of them!

First up is a game/center that I have overhauled for use this April.  Earth Day Fact & Opinion: Learning Game & Center.  Included are 48 fact/opinion cards, two game boards (one letter and one legal sized), and student directions for board game and sorting center.

I also discovered that my kids really enjoy checking their work with QR codes.  I recently purchased and prepared some super hero themed QR code inference cards (Fun in 5th Grade) that my kids loved---SO I decided to whip up some Whacky Watches telling time task cards.  I created the watch graphics last summer, and I still had not put them to use.  I created telling time to the five minute and minute versions. I wanted to provide independent work options for all of my students--therefore, I created the minute version to meet the needs of some of my students who are ready to move beyond the second grade standard. The kids will love them!

Lastly, the kids were doing very well with fractions before leaving for spring break, so I created four spring-themed games, Flying High with Fractions.  The games have rectangular and circle shaded models, and they will be used in guided math rotations and math workstation time.  I also wanted to get some students thinking about equivalent fractions for one half, so two of the games meet this need.

 

Time to Read

Spring break is a perfect time to get some reading done.  I thought about reading something non-school related, but I have had Mentor Texts: Teaching Writing Though Children's Literature, K-6 for several months and have been wanting to get started on it.  Can't say enough what a wonderful teaching resource this is.  Lots of lesson ideas, mentor texts, and student samples. I have oodles of Post-Its marking pages.  You can take a look inside at amazon.com!  I also purchased the nonfiction version, but have not really gotten into it yet. Would love to hear your thoughts if you have read either...

 

Courtney's Five for Friday!

Here are a few words from Courtney that may ring true in your case as well, when it comes to having time off, "My Five for Friday is basically me getting NOTHING done that I had planned to do this week!"  Ha!  The BREAK part of spring break is really the most important anyway!

Fabulous Finds Friday Linky

We have started up our Fabulous Finds Friday linky again.  We hope you can stop back and link up your fabulous finds next Friday.  Don't have a blog, we would love for you to share your finds in a comment! To learn more, just click our logo. :0)

Now for your chance to WIN!  Three lucky winners will get to choose one of the TpT products shared in this post.  Hurry to enter---giveaway will end Sunday night at 12:00 a.m.  Monday night at 12:00 a.m.  I messed up setting up the giveaway, so I have extended the time.  Please enter!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Don't forget to fly on over to read more Five for Fridays!

 All the best to you for a fabulous weekend!

Let's Take a Dive! Ocean Unit in Review--Part One

Our kids have been studying the ocean habitat, ocean food chains, and animal adaptations.  The following are some activities and resources our students have enjoyed in this cross curricular unit.  This is Part One of our sharing...

Guided Reading 

There are numerous nonfiction text resources related to the ocean.  Here are some of the text I used in guided reading groups.  

Ocean Life by Brenda Z. Guiberson (Scholastic Storia eBook)

Ocean Giants by Kate Waters (Scholastic Storia eBook)

Weird Sea Creatures by Laura Marsh (National Geographic Kids Leveled Reader)

Great Migrations: Whales by Laura Marsh (National Geographic Series)

Splash! A Book About Whales and Dolphins by Melvin & Gilda Berger (Scholastic Storia eBook)

Each group focused on problem solving the meanings of unknown words.  This is a continued focus at all levels and all of the texts provided opportunities to problem solve and make predictions about new words.

Ocean Zones & Ocean Animal Profiles

Students learned about the oceans zones and the special adaptations that animals have to help them survive in each of the zones.  Students also researched an animal and created an ocean animal profile.  You will notice more animals in the sunlight zone, as 90% percent of ocean life is found in this zone.  Students also made ocean zone accordion books.

Feel free to download a copy of the ocean animal profile sheet here!

Scuba Kid Craftivity and Poems

The scuba kids turned out super cute!  Students chose to write a lantern or haiku poem, followed the rules of writing the type of poem chosen, and typed their poem for display on their scuba kids' bellies.

Tessellated School of Fish!

My kids have created tessellating fish in past years, but this year we used a new technique.  Students tore blue paint tape to create stripes on their fish.  These areas resisted watercolor and created white stripes on their tropical fish. The kids loved how they turned out, but the tape was not as easy to remove as I would have liked--had to lay them on the heater to get the tape to remove easily.  Will be trying a different tape next time... :0)

A giant googley eye was the icing on the cake!

Ocean Animal Food Chain Pyramids

Found this idea last year on First Grade Wow! What a great visual to help students understand the food chain concept as it relates to the ocean.  This can be used for any food chain, of course!

Sides--animal illustrations, names of animals, producer or consumer labels.

We have even more great ocean unit ideas and student work to share! Stop back to read more from Courtney!