TpT Sale!

Do you like Sales?  I'm sure you have heard about the upcoming TpT sale!  This is a Thursday-Friday Sale!  I love TpT Sales!  

 I'm putting my store on sale for 20% and when you enter the promo code TPT3, you will receive the 28% discount on all items in my store!

If you 're not sure what to buy, here are a few suggestions!  :-)

 



 

 

 

 

I'm busy finishing up a few new products that will be up and ready for the sale!  Check out my store for the latest!

Teacher Open House

This last weekend, I had the opportunity to attend a Teacher Open House at the Monterey Bay Aquarium!  It was a fantastic experience!  Luckily, I attended with my teaching team which made it even more fun.

This was a real life Night at the Museum!  We arrived just after closing and stored our sleeping bags and overnight bags.  Then we had full run of the aquarium!  At 10:00 we set up our "beds" and then changed into jammies and went to the auditorium.

We watched an amazing documentary on the 501st sea otter rescued by the aquarium staff.  The movie, "Otter 501", provided a fasinating look at the amazing sea otter.  I learned so many new things about this amazing animal.


You know how when you go to a museum, aquarium or amusement park and you're surrounded by people?  Well, that was the best part of the experience!  I truly experienced the aquarium.  I read the signs, stayed at the exhibits as long as I wanted, took pictures,  and didn't have to worry about anyone else!  It was magical!

My favorite little birds (penguins) had to go to sleep early, so I didn't get to see them the first night.  But, we were able to get a re-entry stamp for the next day.  After stowing our bags in the car, we re-entered and went straight to the penguins!  Unfortunately, there were other people...but not too many :-)  I felt really spoiled at that point.  But we did get to see the cute little black footed penguin.

This little girl was hatched at the aquarium.  She is still young and played with me through the glass!  Highlight of my trip! 

We used instagram while at the aquarium.  If you want to look at more pictures from our experience, you can click on my instagram button in the left side bar or search #mbaqed for participant pictures from the weekend.

Thanks for stopping by!

I'm so excited to be enjoying a restful 4 day weekend!  That's right...4 days!  Thank you President Lincoln and Thank you President Washington!

I really need this weekend, too!  There is so much going on at school...my head is spinning.  I'll give you a little background...way back in 2008, our school was awarded 8.4 million dollars in Prop 1D funding!  In the state of California that means we got lots of money to finally build the school of our dreams.  As a charter school, we had to take residence in commercial buildings or the district left overs.  So needless to say we were thrilled.  Well, a mere 6 years later we are finally seeing this dream begin to take shape.

What does this mean for me?  Well, I have to pack and have my entire classroom moved by March 7 and ready to teach in by March 10!  Hmmm.  Panicked much?

So I have been packing and teaching and going a bit crazy!

This last week we finished up our penguin unit and began learning about our former presidents who we are honoring with this four day weekend.

Beginning, Middle and End with Tacky the Penguin!

Cute Tacky Craftivity!

 

 

Our life size Chinstrap and Rockhopper penguins!

Penguin identification station!  The kiddos had so much fun testing their skills!

And then we began learning about Abe!

                  


 I love this craftivity!  We do this every year with our little firsties!  Of course we learn lots of facts about our 16th president, too!


And just in time for the weekend, I want to remind you about two giveaways that I am participating in!  These are great and you won't want to miss your chance to win the goods!!

First, head over to Where the Magic Happens Daily to check out her launching giveaway!

Then make sure you enter to win at Teach 2 Love

Have a great weekend!  Have fun!

Bee in my Bonnet?

I am exhausted when I come home from school...and I'm sure most of you can relate!  So, that leads me to the bee in my bonnet...I don't know what happened, but I came home today and did the following:

1.  Made my girls a healthy smoothie with my new Vitamix!

2.  Made HOMEMADE meatballs...like from scratch (Not a Costco bag!) for our spaghetti dinner!

3.  Browned and seasoned the meat from tomorrow's Taco Salad!

4.  Then my daughter, Emily helped make pepperoni rolls!  Yum!

Ok, I'm not trying to brag, but that is quite a list for me!  I'm usually too tired to lift a finger after a day with my Firsties!  I did have two absences today, but they were my "role models" so go figure!

We did get to make our life size penguins today!

First, we measured our penguin's heights with linker cubes!

Second, did a directed draw!

Third, we painted our cute little creations!  Final project pictures coming soon!

That was fun for the kiddos!  But, now I have two that were absent...what do you do about that?  Ugh! That's a lot of one on one to get those kiddos caught up!

What do you do about student absences?  Do you have kiddos complete all of the missed work and projects?

Ch.ch.ch...changes!

Changes

I am so excited about some plans I have for my blog...I can't give anything away yet, but you will not want to miss it!

Olympic Love

On another topic, are you L.O.V.I.N.G. the Olympics?  I watched the Opening Ceremonies three times!  It was so incredible!  The dancers and the music were fantastic.

I am usually all about figure skating...and this year I'm watching it all!  I love the snowboarding!  It's so amazing how far those athletes "fly" through the air and then land so gracefully!  Amazing!  I'm enjoying my On Demand feature on cable.  I feel like I'm able to see so much more of the actual events because I can watch it when I have time!

I made this cute little game to help my students practice their sight words while enjoying an Olympic Theme!

Antarctic Adventure Day...Part 1 and Part 2

This week my little firsties will finish up our unit on Penguins!  Friday was supposed to be our "culminating" celebration, but Antarctic Adventure Day turned into Antarctic Adventure Day part 1!
Tomorrow, my students will finish up some of the fun activities that we ran out of time to complete on Friday.  I'm glad my teaching team is flexible!

These kiddos are using their "scientific identification"
charts to identify penguins!

Some of these were pretty tricky!  They really had to look at the coloration of each species. 

We also measured ourselves to see if we are taller than an Emperor Penguin!  

 Tomorrow we will begin drawing our life size penguins.

Here's what they looked like last year:

I love the way the turn out...each one so unique!

Valentine's Day

Of course, I'll also be getting ready for Valentine's Day!  We have a four day week this week so we will celebrate on Thursday with our Friendship Party!  Here is a Valentine Themed Freebie for your math centers this week:

Just click on the picture to download!

I'll be using these in my literacy and math centers this week:

And last but not least, I am participating in a couple of giveaways this month!  You'll definitely want to check these out!

Here is the first one:

and a Spring Into Learning Giveaway over at

  Teach2Love will go live later this month!  Stay tuned!

Have a great week!