I LOVE the holiday season in the classroom. It is hands down one of my favorite times of the year. There is so much excitement and joy to be found by watching and experiencing the holiday cheer through the eyes of children. Over the next few posts, I am going to be sharing pictures and short explanations about what are some of our favorite things to do during the holidays in 5th grade! During the season, my goal as an educator is to help provide fun yet purposeful activities for the kiddos to do! And, the season may be over but these are great to save for next year! I love Grinch day, and 5th graders love Grinch Day, too! Every year I try to do different things in the classroom so I switch things up a lot! This year we dressed up in green, read the story, watched the old animated film, and did a Readers' Theater which the students LOVED. They did such a great job with it. I am constantly so impressed with how much students embrace amazing opportunities to showcase ...
christmas
Grinch Day at the Cottage
The Christmas holiday may be behind us, but I still have a few holiday posts to add to the blog. I know that it is too late to use them now, but save the photos and ideas for next year. It will be here before we know it! This year was my first year celebrating all things "Grinch" with my kiddos. We read the book, wrote about random acts of kindness that we could provide for the Grinch to make him happier, drank some awesome Grinch punch, and finished out the day with my FAVORITE NEW ACTIVITY EVER! It is a well known fact that I can't draw. However, that hasn't stopped me from doing it all.the.time-especially now that I am in the classroom! A lot of my students love to draw as well. Their drawing is more than just "doodles". It is art, and it is beautiful. So, when I came across a post on Instagram from Rachel at The Tattooed Teacher that showed a kid's step-by-step video on how to draw the Grinch, I knew I had to check it out. Art for Kids ...
Holiday Book Classroom Countdown
For the last couple of years, my students have enjoyed visits from Duende', our Elf on the Shelf. The whole holiday elf tradition is a blast, and I have really enjoyed the thrill of getting our elf ready each morning. However, I have come to believe that the elf tradition may not be the best fit for every class so I began to search for something different to prepare for the holidays in our Learning Cottage this year. I am very fortunate to have a group of students who are big time readers this school year, and I really wanted to do something holiday themed around their love for such an important skill. My aunt sent me a link about a book advent activity, and I knew that I had to do something like this in my classroom. I needed to keep the price low so I began searching for winter/holiday themed books at our local used book stores. I also grabbed a few books through Scholastic using their dollar deals and my book club points. I was able to get 25 books for ...
