We worked so hard in December! Here are some things we did:
We worked on descriptive writing by telling about the things we hear, smell, see, feel, taste, and do during the month of December. The students worked hard to use WOW words and similes in their writing.
"In December...the trees are dead and bare. We smell the aroma of gingerbread and peppermint." - Alyvia
"Winter is as cold as the North Pole. That's why animals hibernate....The snow flakes look like tiny ice cubes." - Delaney
"December is about making gingerbread men with your family and sitting by the fire and drinking hot cocoa.....Winter means snow, leaves falling, and more." - Ashton
We also wrote persuasive letters to Santa Claus. Some of these kiddos are awfully convincing! They tried to get on his good side by paying him compliments and offering to do him favors.
"Did Mrs. Claus make you a new suit? It makes you look handsome." -Kyle
Did you get a whiter beard? Did you get a redder suit? It sure looks nice." - Sebastian
We wrote "How To" manuals for stopping a gingerbread man. Some of their ideas were sneaky and others were a little mean!
"You can trap him and tell him a story. This will make him fall asleep and he won't run away. Another choice is to eat him." - Kayden
"I will bake a gingerbread house with a trap all over it...When he walks by the trap it will fall on him, and he will be stuck." - Ben
We used the various shapes we learned about in our Geometry unit to make reindeer.
We learned about onomatopoeias and came up with some weather sounds (since we were also doing weather research projects).
The students worked together in small groups to research and make a presentation board about different natural disasters.
Hurricanes by Ben, Kyle, Giovanny, and Connor
Earthquakes by Sage, Syndee, and Cameron
Tornadoes by Delaney, Aiden, Ashton, and Alyvia
Volcanoes by Nadia, Alexis, and Sebastian
Thunderstorms by Josalynn, Logan, and Kayden
After all that work, celebration was deserved. We had soooo much fun on the Friday before Christmas break! First we had our December school convo. Congratulations to Delaney, our December Student of the Month! When we got back to class, the kids kept asking to open their presents. I caved and let them open presents at 9:45am (it didn't take too much convincing...I was excited too).
Next we watched The Polar Express. While everyone got to watch the movie, students who met their behavior goal for the month of December were allowed to wear pajamas, and I made them hot cocoa and peppermint marshmallow sticks to enjoy while watching the movie.
Congrats to Ashton, Alyvia, Sage, Alexis, Nadia, Syndee, Kyle, Ben, Delaney, Madelyn, Giovanny, Aiden, Sebastian, and Cameron for making the Polar Express Party! Hard work pays off!
Next we had a Mystery Reader! Santa Claus paid us a visit to read The Polar Express!!! Santa's gloves were a little too slippery so he asked Alyvia to sit with him and help turn the pages. After the story, I gave each student a bell to remind them to always believe.
Santa even came to our classroom to take pictures with us! Ho-ho-ho!!!
Students who met their December AR goal celebrated by making a frosted Christmas tree out of ice cream cones while we watched the movie.
We ended the day with our Christmas party, which was full of fun and sugar!
A HUGE thank you to Kyle's mom and Delaney's dad for helping at the party!
Above: Kyle and his mom
Below: Delaney and her dad
After we chowed down on all our goodies, the kids played a game in teams. The goal was to cover whoever was the snowman with as much toilet paper as possible. Whoever had the most at the end of 3 minutes won.
Hope you had a very merry Christmas! Welcome to 2014!
