Make Learning Fun This Winter!

What if there was just one thing standing between you and a fun winter filled with students happy about learning?

I know it seems hard to believe but hear me out…

Interesting lessons that are fun for you and students don’t just happen from a teacher’s manual on most occasions.
(Wouldn’t that be nice!)
You have to decide what you’re teaching, choose what needs differentiated, gather all the supplies, run the copies, and then prepare everything. Not to mention lining it up with all your standards. And the domino that starts it all is knowing what you’re going to teach. In other words, the path to instruction begins with a plan.
I'm going to share some ready made resources that will get me through the winter, and have my kids engaged in learning to get them (and me) out of the winter slump that usually comes with the last half of the year.

For my classroom personally, my students have benefitted from the hot chocolate blends game.

They choose the marshmellow that matches the picture in the cup, and write the blend and the word on the recording sheet! They ABSOLUTELY loved this center activity! And it gets them practicing their blends, much needed at this time of year!!

My second activity that I came across is the Word Work for January, but you can keep using it well into February! It focuses on 20 winter words, and teaches them by having fun games that reinforce the vocabulary. There are activities for the entire month! The games are so easy to use, and self explanatory.

GAME CHANGER!!!

The subtract the room game helped me reinforce math facts, while students got up and moved around, and most importantly, HAD FUN!! Post the cards all around the room, and students walk around with their recording sheet, and write the equation with the corresponding letter next to it, and solve it!

The activities shared above are part of a complete planning solution made up of 20 classroom resources, which are all winter themed, including Valentines Day, Groundhog Day, Black History Month, and more.
Each bundle contains classroom manipulatives to print and cut, games, puzzles, mini-books, assessments, decor, and ready-made lessons plans (and even slideshows!). No matter how you plan, there are multiple resources that are perfect for you and there are two buying options:

Option 1: Choose ONE bundle that is targeted close to your grade level: PK-2 or Grades 3-5.

Option 2: For less than the price of two separate bundles, get the ENTIRE package with about 2,000 pages of made-for-you lesson plans, so you’ve got total control no matter how your grade level and curriculum needs change from year to year for grades PK-5.
You really can have winter fun and learning at the same time in your classroom, starting today.
Make those dominos winter by picking up your copy of the CF Collective Winter Bundle right
here.

If you purchase any of the bundles above, please treat yourself to a complimentary NO PREP Valentine's Day Pack from me in addition! Just fill out the form below to grab this freebie! https://goo.gl/forms/P8l0vh49B0lw5HFB3

Let It Snow!

Hi everyone!  I am Jane Feener and I am so excited to be a part of this blog.  A big thank you to Hilary for inviting me to contribute as I am newbie when it comes to blogging.  I have enjoyed reading all of the daily blog posts and I have already gathered up a number of ideas I can't wait to try in my class.  I am a grade 5 teacher from Newfoundland and Labrador, Canada.  In case you are wondering, Newfoundland is a beautiful island located in the north Atlantic.   We are also located in the most easterly part of North America. When you live where I do you need to embrace winter and the snow.  This is what can often face you when you open the front door after one of our nor'easter storms.

You might be asking what are some of the ways we make the best of our long winters.  One activity we always enjoy is decorating our classroom doors and holding a competition for the best decorated door.  Using a combination of ideas I saw on Pinterest my class managed to receive a honorable mention with this one.

Due to all the snow outside our students usually have to stay inside during recess and lunch.  This can be challenging for my class at times because I have 13 boys this year who love to get up and move.  Since returning after the Christmas break my students are slowly beginning to settle back into their school routines.  To help with classroom management, I have created a bulletin board in the class which helps students to work towards a group reward.  The students refer to it as the "OSCAR board".  I guess you figured out that I have a Hollywood theme going on in my room this year.  O.S.C.A.R -stands for "Our Students Can Act Responsibly"

  

Basically, the way it works is that students can receive compliments from the teachers who are on lunch and recess duty for displaying good behavior.  If a teacher compliments them on their excellent behavior they earn numbers which we track on our whiteboard.

On Friday afternoon the student of the week gets to draw numbers from a box which contains the numbers 1 -100 which have been cut into small squares.  The number of numbers drawn from the box depends on how many points were earned that week.  This week so far my students have earned the right to have 9 numbers  drawn.  As the student calls out the numbers, another student uses a whiteboard marker to place an X on the corresponding number on the hundreds chart that was called.  The students try to form a straight line either vertically, horizontally or diagonally.  If it sounds like playing Bingo, you are correct.  It is a big hit in my class and the students are so excited when they get Bingo and earn a class reward.  Our last class reward was a movie and popcorn. 

Finally, the best way I have found to embrace winter is to incorporate it whenever I can as part of our daily curriculum.  This year I am so excited about the upcoming winter games.  I plan to use this theme to cover many of my learning outcomes or standards in the upcoming weeks.  In math, we will be graphing the medal results for Canada, United States, Russia, and Germany.  We are learning about double bar graphs so we will be comparing our results with the medal count from the Vancouver winter games.  As part of our guided reading program we will be completing word work and work on writing activities using writing prompts and vocabulary that pertain to the winter games.  I created some vocabulary cards to help my students with spelling all the different sports.  You can grab this freebie by clicking (here)

15 Sporting events word cards

How are you planning on embracing winter and having your students take part in the upcoming winter games?