My Real, Messy Life. : End of School Recap

Ahhhh, Christmas Break. Can I just mention that it's currently 6:30 and I don't have to work... yet I'm up? #teacherprobs

Anyway. Since school just ended yesterday, I'll recap some of the fun that we've had at the end of the quarter at school!

With my 5th grade reading class, we had been discussing folktales & the different genres and how to distinguish between them. Here's the setup I did for their project- read 12 different tales, decide which genre they fall into, and then compare and contrast two stories from two different genres. They loved it! I had kids asking for some other suggestions on books to read, which always makes me happy!

My 8th graders built towers with blocks and cards to show how Newton's first law works. Ya know the tablecloth trick where you pull it off the table without knocking the stuff over? It's that, but with blocks or cups instead. The kids loved getting to build (and knock over) their towers.

Our Christmas break countdown!

Elfis spent our last week perusing the new library books I ordered.

My 6th graders completed a webquest and foldable poster on the six terrestrial biomes. They love getting to see their work displayed in the hallway!

On Monday, it was our last day before party day. In my science classes, we completed a STEM challenge. The kids split into their lab groups, got 50 gumdrops each and 100 toothpicks. They then spent the hour seeing who could build the tallest "tree." Let me just say, our engineering skills need some work.

Here's their towers on Tuesday morning.

My reading class had a simile and metaphor contest that afternoon. I hung up task cards around the room & they had to go around decide if the sentence was a metaphor or a simile, and then correctly tell what it was saying.

By the way, this is how I've started doing most of my review worksheets as well! I print out a larger copy on colored paper, cut apart the questions, and tape them in a random order around the room. The kids then get to go around the room and answer them like normal, but it has seriously lessened the amount of classroom management I need! My rowdy kids are already up and moving, so I don't get onto them for distracting people, my kids with focus issues somehow stay more focused, and my higher level kids love it because they get to chat a little more while they move around. ;)

On party day yesterday, I took Pie Face. Since all the pictures showed the kiddos faces, here's some of Monster instead ;). We went through three cans of whipped cream at school. SOSOSOSOSOSO much fun! We also played Disney Scene It! in my room, which was hilarious. Also because I whooped their butts. ;) I know my Disney!

Here's a recap of the 17 days of festive! The kids thought it was great, and I had fun doing it! I repeated a few shirts, but just the ones that I can't get enough of! ;)