Celebrating Earth Day!

Happy Earth Day!
We had a great time learning about Earth Day today. One of the flowers we planted on Monday even sprouted for us! Each student has their own little seedling pod.

Most of my students had no idea what Earth Day was so it was fun introducing it to them. We read The Lorax and watched lots of great videos throughout the day:

Let It Grow song from The Lorax movie

Going Green song by Harry Kindergarten Music

Franklin Plants a Tree

Reading Rainbow: How Trash Is Recycled (We pretended we were on a virtual field trip for this one!) 

Then the students had to show what they learned by sharing four things they learned.

These kiddos loved using an addition code to create an Earth Day picture!

Tomorrow I plan on using these interactive notebook freebies from All Students Can Shine:

Plant Unit 

April Birchbox

These boxes just keep getting prettier! I always love the designs. Plus all of the goodies inside! ;) This month's theme was spring and the box design was from Rifle Paper Co.

This was the first time I have ever been upset when I opened my Birchbox. One of the eyeshadows in the trio palette was broken. Thankfully it wasn't too messy and I was still able to use it. Here is what was in my box this month:

Number 4 Volumizing Shampoo

Last month I tried the Number 4 clarifying shampoo and thought it was too thick for my hair. I liked the volumizing shampoo much better! It lathered up well and didn't feel heavy on my fine hair.  

Whish Shave Crave Shaving Cream in Blueberry

I have tried Whish products before, but never in the blueberry scent. The scent is pretty strong, so I wouldn't get it if you aren't a blueberry fan. However, it feels great on your skin and leaves it silky and smooth. I didn't have any razor burn after using this product. 

Beauty Protector Protect & Oil

This oil is designed to protect your hair against UV rays, heat, and breakage. I have been having some trouble with tangles when I used a blow spray, so I added this oil to the ends of my hair. It worked great! I didn't have the tangles and my hair felt smooth after blow drying. I was impressed that it didn't leave my thin hair feeling oily. 

POP Beauty Portfolio Eyeshadow Palette- Peach Parfait Trio

The full size version of this palette has a ton of colors! This sample had three different colors from the palette and I loved them all! They went on easily, had a great finish, and I loved the shimmer in them. This would be a great palette for those of you who like to try out different colors and looks everyday. 

Real Chemistry Luminious 3 Minute Peel

The term "peel" is a little misleading for this product. After applying to your skin, you massage your face. The gel combines with dead skin creating little solid balls that can be washed away. I would recommend applying this product to one area of your face at a time (forehead, then nose, then chin) so you can focus on massaging that area. It was hard for me to gauge how much product to use, but my skin did feel smoother afterwards. I would like to see what the long term results with this product are. 

I used all of these products yesterday to get ready for the rodeo! I also used some of my favorite Birchbox hair products for my messy braid.

Parlor Sea Salt Spray

amika Bombshell Blowout Spray 

Thank you for helping me create my cowgirl look Birchbox!

Use my referral link to sign up for your own Birchbox:

 https://www.birchbox.com/invite/growandenjoy

Dinosaur Week

Today we wrapped up our fun unit on dinosaurs! You can see my previous post for a couple of resources we used earlier in the week. Yesterday we made shape dinosaurs and dinosaur fossils.

I used the Ellison die cutting machine to cut out pattern block shapes from construction paper. The rest of the project was up to the students' creativity! They loved creating their own dinos.

We used Crayola air dry clay and Dollar Tree dinosaurs to create the dinosaur fossils. We let them dry over night and the kiddos took them home in plastic baggies today. We discussed how real fossils are made, the job of a paleontologist, and what "extinct" means.

I created a Dino-mite door to display all of our dino themed work from this week. I love displaying student work in as many places as possible. 

Here are some other dino-mite resources we used throughout the week that are free:

Dinosaur Make Ten True/False by First Grade Kate 

Dino Dominoes by Wild About Teaching

Number Line Addition and Subtraction by The Teaching Treehouse

Next week we are on to plants!

If I met a dinosaur...

We have been having a blast this week learning about dinosaurs! The kiddos absolutely love all of the dino activities. I am also happy to say that I completed my KTIP internship making this week even better.

Here are just a couple of the resources and activities that we have been enjoying.

First off, the Dinosaur Literacy and Math Activities pack from Ms. Makinson has been awesome! We have used these activities during centers every day this week. Today the kiddos wrote about what they would do if they met a dinosaur. I loved reading their hilarious answers!

We also read Dinosaur Farm  by Frann Preston-Ganoon. It was a great read aloud and my students thought it was hilarious. They were practically rolling on the floor when the baby dinosaurs started biting the farmer.

Tomorrow and Friday we will be making fossils and shape dinosaurs so see the next post for those projects! Our dino door will also be complete.  

Tone It Up Bikini Series

With only 52 days until school is out I am catching summer fever. To get ready for the summer I signed up for the Tone It Up Bikini Series. This fitness challenge starts tomorrow and runs for eight weeks. It is the perfect length to prepare me for my summer vacation! 

The challenge includes workouts, daily inspiration, recipes, beauty and lifestyle tips, and more. All you have to do to participate is sign up with your email. No personal information required. You can learn more about the program at toneitup.com  

Today you are supposed to make 5 goals for the challenge. I'm not the fitness person that posts every single workout and meal, but I do want to make my goals public to hold me accountable. Here are my goals for the next 8 weeks:

Drinking water, reaching 100 miles, and staying active for 30 minutes daily are all part of the challenge so I want to stick to those goals. The other goals are for my personal well-being.

Day one I am starting at 113 lbs and 32 inches around my waist. I am a 5'2'' girl who has always been pretty active but I'm hoping this challenge keeps me more accountable and helps me feel more confident this summer. 

If you want to join head on over to Tone It Up to get started! You can also find them on Twitter and Instagram for daily inspiration.

Wild Weather Week

Thank goodness it is Friday! We have had a crazy week back after spring break. But we did have fun learning all about the weather and seasons this week. My classroom was in charge of the school writing board this month, so we wrote about what we like to do in the spring.

We discussed what the weather is like in each season and illustrated what it looks like. I am so happy to see my kinders beginning to add more details to their illustrations. That has been a struggle this year.

The kiddos LOVED reading Little Cloud by Eric Carle. Then they were able to create their own little cloud using a white crayon on blue construction paper. We are going to hang these up for Family Fun Night this year which is Eric Carle themed.

Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs was another hit! They had some great ideas for what it should rain. Some of my favorites included french fries, doughnuts, and giant cookies!

We have been reading informational texts about weather all week. Today we read about storms. Then we conducted a rain experiment. The students made predictions about what they thought would happen when the blue water was put on top of the shaving cream cloud. Some of them thought it was going to make thunder. They were very excited when it started to "rain" in the cup and wanted a close-up look.

See my previous post to get the resources and freebies that I used for this unit.

Now I'm getting ready for dinosaur week!

Weather Sneek Peak

I have had a great spring break! I completed the Color Me Rad 5k, went to the movies, had a pampering day, and spent time with family.

Of course, there was also some work mixed in there too. There is always something to be done for a teacher. I was busy getting ready for this coming week's unit on weather and seasons!

In addition to the books I got out for the students, I also went through my Scholastic book box and pulled out the books I want to use for read alouds. I got all of these books free for our classroom based on teacher points! As a new teacher, Scholastic has been instrumental in providing my classroom with books.

Here is a little sneak peek at our weather week with resources that I will be using. 

Monday:  We will start with a KWL chart about weather and seasons to connect to the students' prior knowledge. We will then create a chart that depicts and describes each season.

Tuesday: We will read Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs and complete the free writing prompt from First and Second Grade Fever.

Wednesday: We will read Little Cloud by Eric Carle and the students will draw and write about their own cloud.

Thursday: We will discuss rain and simulate a rain cloud using water and shaving cream.

Friday: I really want to take the kiddos on a nature walk and discuss the five senses, but the weather for this week is look awful. If the walk does not happen we will still discuss the senses and what we see, feel, and hear during the spring time. We will be using one of the prompts from my Spring Writing Prompts packet. 

We will also be using my Spring Weather Journal FREEBIE! Download it now and enjoy your week!