First school day of 2013!

I went back to work today and it was great! My kids were so happy to see me that it really made my day special! They all told me about their presents and family memories! Can you believe that a seven year old got an Ipad for Christmas and another one got an Iphone 4S? Well. sometimes I feel I am just getting old. When I was kid, Santa Clause would give me dolls and board games. Time Changes!!!!

This week I am going to use all the enthusiasm my kids have to put some writing skills on practice. They are going to write about their winter break and their goals for 2013! I don't think I'm going to get the usual new-year resolution --- to lose weight.

Also I am going to review verbs in the past tense so I think it's going to be perfect!

I am planning to use my Winter Craftivites to make the activity fun! You can download one of my Winter Craftivities for FREE!

I am going to use this Writing Craftivity to let my students write about their Winter  Break using verb in the past tense!

 I am going to use this Activity to let my students write about their 2013 goals! You can find this craftivity HERE!

Here is another cute Craftivity perfect for the Winter!

I hope you had a wonderful Christmas Break and feel as full of energy as I feel right now. It will probably change in a couple of days, but I am just going to enjoy it as long as it last!

Oh! I almost forgot to mention that we got a little bit of snow on Christmas Day! I am from Puerto Rico so it doesn't matter if it's half of an inch, I  still celebrate and enjoy it! My husband says that I act like a baby every time the weather man says there is a chance of snow! And I really think I do. The last time it snowed, I was the only one outside... even my son stayed inside! LOL!

Here is a picture of a mini snowman I made with my Mom, who saw snow for the first time this past Christmas! (She is just like me)!

Have a wonderful week!

Mynda

Happy New Year!

I have been so busy since my last post that I was not able to tell you all the fun things my students did before our Christmas break!

For our Christmas around the World Unit we learned about Mexico, Germany, Italy and Puerto Rico. We made crafts for each country, read stories, watched videos and compared each country making a table of content. It was fun! You can visist my Facebook page and find some pics!

Last night I was thinking about school again (no matter that I still have one more week off). I decided I am going to let my students set their goals for the New Year. At the same time I am going to review my expectations and talk a little bit about behavior. You know that after Christmas break sometimes you need to set the rules one more time!

So I decided to make a cute and fun craftivtiy that will help my little ones write their goals and have fun at the same time. I love to let my students write, so I try to make it fun all the time!

Here is a peek of the activity I made. I hope you like it too!

You can find this craftivity here

Have a Happy New Year!

Mynda

Christmas is here!!!

We are ready for Christmas!!!!

My students started to write their Santa's letter on Monday. Since then they have been writing draft after draft, but they finally got it done today. As you may know I love crafts, so I needed to add a craftivity to it!! Here you can see their final work. And of course, I decorated my hallway already!!!

Here is one of my students Santa's letter.

My Teacher Assistant helped me made this cute Santa last year!

A peek of my hallway!

You can find this cute craftivity and a Christmas Literacy Activity at my store!

English & Spanish Abbreviation Activity

Have fun!

Mynda

Famous Americans, turkeys and a present!

Teaching about famous Americans to a 7-year-old can be a challenge unless you make it fun.


My kiddos enjoyed learning about John Hancock, Thurgood Marshall, Abigail Adams, Amelia Earhart and Irma Rangel.

We started the week dividing the class in groups. Each group researched a famous person. On Tuesday, they used a graphic organizer to write important facts about that person.On Wednesday, the fun begun! 

Each group started typing their paper and started creating a figure of their famous person. On Thursday, they put one the last touches and on Friday, each group made a presentation! I was very impressed with their final work... It was great! Look at their final presentation...

Amelia Earhart

Famous Americans

We got ready for Thanksgiving and made our turkeys! I tweaked my original activity and made a graphic organizer, instead of a writing paper. I let my bilingual partners talked about how they celebrated Thanksgiving with their families. Later they completed a Venn Diagram about how their Thanksgiving are similar and different. Here you can take a look of their cute turkeys!

Now our hallways has a cute Fall decoration with our turkeys and scarecrows! 

You can find these two craftivities HERE and HERE! :)

I ended the week with a sweet surprise from one of my little friends! She made me this cute bracelet and really gave me a happy ending to my week!
I hope you had a great week too!

Mynda

Dia de los muertos and a little bit about Science

We celebrated "El dia de los muertos" at school with a parade! Dual Language students from PK to 4th grade decorated their "calaveras" and walked around the school to celebrate the day! 

Here are some pics....

Besides celebrating "El dia de los muertos", we also studied the states of matter (solid,  liquid and gas). They had fun learning how the states of matter have similar and different characteristics. 

They did a "matter hunt" around the classroom on Monday! They classified objects by solid , liquid and gas. Later in the week, we learned how a liquid can change its shapes depending on the container. Here is a pic of how they change the shape of a liquid ;).

By the end of the week we learned about gas. And the best way to show    that a gas occupies the entire space of a container is using a BALLOON! :)

This is how I did it.. I placed 3/4 cup of white vinegar into an empty plastic bottle. Then I added 2 teaspoons of baking soda into a balloon. I stretched the balloon over the mouth of the bottle keeping the balloon to the side of the bottle. I then pulled the balloon up straight over the bottle, allowing the baking soda to enter into the vinegar. Finally, I stepped back as the kids  watched the balloon get inflated with carbon dioxide. 

You can find more activities about states of matter HERE!

Have a great weekend!

Mynda