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Wednesday, April 30, 2014

Wordless Wednesday: Root Beer Float {Yummy}

Hello, Friends!

I hope you all have had a GREAT day.  Today, I'm linking up with Miss DeCarbo from Sugar and Spice for her Wordless Wednesday linky.



We've been learning all about solids, liquids, and gases. To put it all together, we made a root beer float and wrote about what's really found inside a root beer float.  So much fun!

So, any other fun ideas you have for teaching matter? 

Lots of love,
Jeannie



Monday, April 28, 2014

Must Read Monday {Cindy Ellen}

Hello, Friends!

I hope that you all have had a GREAT Monday.  Today, I am linking up with the sweet Amanda from Teaching Maddeness for her Must Read Monday linky.



Last week, we started our fairy tale genre.  One of our standards is to compare and contrast different versions of stories like Cinderella stories.  Our favorite book to read was Cindy Ellen: A Wild Western Cinderella story.  I LOVE this story because I get to pull out my strong Southern accent.  I was born and raised in South Carolina and have a pretty strong accent.  With this book, I get to let it shine.  

They love the story and love that it takes place in the South.  They even stopped me to say that they knew what the words mean in the story.  By words they mean like 'gettin' hitched' and 'yonder'.  LOVE it!  You better believe that we were experts on comparing and contrasting different Cinderella stories lasts week.  They are always amazed at how many versions there are.  


What's your favorite version of Cinderella?  Leave me a comment below.  I'd love to see which books I need to check out.

Lots of love,
Jeannie

Saturday, April 12, 2014

Drama (the Good Kind) in the Classroom

Hello, Friends!

Today, I am sharing another bright idea and joining some fabulous bloggers in the Bright Ideas Blog Hop. 

Today I want to quickly share how I integrate drama into my classroom.  Even though we use Reader's Theaters and sing all sorts of songs to help us learn, acting through tableaus is one of our favorite ways to learn. 

During my first year of teaching,  I was introduced to a word called 'tableau'. During one of our faculty meetings, we had to work together and decide how we wanted to act out a word we were given. Then we decided how to show our word thr
ough a pose. We had to become statues of our word.  I immediately went and implemented this into my room. I've been having my students create tableaus for 5 years.  Every year, they love it. 

When students create a tableau (hello higher order thinking) they have to first decide how they want their statue to look (hello Speaking and Listening Standards). Then they get to act it out. I also have my students create individual tableaus as well. I give them time to think and then we start creating. 

My students absolutely love creating their  tableaus. I love how quick and easy it is to scan the room and immediately see who understands and who needs a little more assistance.

So, here's how it looks in my room.  And...ACTION! 


Here we were creating landforms. 

In the picture above and below, my students individually created goods and services.  I spy a computer, a dog walker, hairdresser, and a taxi driver. ;-) I walked around the room and when I tapped each person on their shoulder, they had to let me know what good or service they had created. 

If you enjoyed this bright idea, please consider joining me on Facebook or Instagram for more great ideas.

For more bright ideas from 150 different bloggers, please browse through the link-up 
below and choose a topic/grade level that interests you. Thanks for visiting! 




Lots of love,
Jeannie