Playing Catch Up

Hello Everybody!

I am back!  This past month has been such a blur!  I admit that I had grand plans of checking in and sharing, but life has once again gotten in the way.  In addition to all things school, daughter #1, who is LOVING middle school, has had quite a busy schedule.  She added choir to her daily schedule (which means a loss of a study hall and WAY more homework), and she joined yearbook club and art club.  Also, in addition to her regular ballet classes, she auditioned for The Nutcracker and is a Russian dancer.  PHEW!  Thank goodness daughter #2 is not that busy yet (just Girls Scouts now since the soccer season ended) or we would never be home!

Okay...on to school...

We have been incredibly busy in our classroom.  Here are a few of the projects that we worked on this month.

First, we made these Batty Number Collections. 

The students chose a 3-digit number that they wrote on the cauldron.  Then they had to come up with different ways to make that number, which they added to the wings of the bats.  Some of the ways they showed the numbers were with place value blocks, with tally marks, with addition and subtraction problems, using the properties of addition, and in dollars and cents.  They did an awesome job.

To go along with our number collections, we read a book from Reading A-Z about Bats.  If you have not heard about Reading A-Z, you need to check it out!  There are so many amazing downloadable books for every level of reader.  After reading the book, we then wrote about what we learned and created these adorable bats using this FREEBIE from A Cupcake for the Teacher.

http://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/going-batty-free-craftivity

 

Here's how ours turned out.  Wish I had a better picture.



My students created cinquain poems about autumn which they wrote on pumpkin patterned paper.  We mounted them on construction paper and added leaves from The Dollar Store.  LOVE that place! 

Continuing on with poetry, my students wrote an acrostic poem about autumn for the bulletin board outside the classroom.  

 

When it was time to take down our pumpkins, we were ready with these adoable turkeys!  There is a letter to a family member or friend (one cutie even wrote to his cat) on the inside flap of the belly about something that they are thankful that the person (or animal) does for them. 

Finally, the students created this awesome chain using their spelling words from an autumn themed list. 

Before writing the words on the strips, the students had to write the words in ABC order.  They used this page to help them get the words in the correct order.  Simple, but effective!  Plus, it had the added benefit of having them write their words two more times for practice. 

 

I have added this page to my TpT store as a freebie, so if you think it might benefit your students, please download!

I am very pleased with all that we accomplished in the last month, but I am also excited to move on to some holiday activities!  I've got some great things planned.  More on that in the coming weeks!