Silence for Sandy Hook Elementary

Time PLEASE slow down!

It's that time of year...the holidays are upon us! I don't know about you, but I am certainly feeling the crunch to find the perfect balance between addressing all the material and sharing the spirit of the season with my students. Here are a few peeks at our Thanksgiving unit.

This adorable poem came from Deanna Jump. I added the food cards for the students to choose what to eat instead of turkey. This turned into a great vocabulary and visualization lesson as I added a response sheet for students to fill out after filling in the blank. 

I have always loved morning messages. This week we got really into making lists of our favorite Thanksgiving foods. I shared the pen and had students come up to the front and help me sound words out. We are also still working on mastering that /th/ digraph. 

What holiday unit is complete without an I Know an Old Lady Who .... book? After reading I Know an Old Lady Who Swallowed a Pie, students talked with their partner about what they would eat if they were the old lady. Even though this was an easier writing assignment for us, I took advantage of the simplicity of the project by reinforcing capital letters and punctuation, as well as spacing. I love how they came out and they really brighten up our hallway!

This last part is from before Thanksgiving but I wanted to share our first attempt at non-fiction writing. During shared reading we read about worms and worked on topic, main idea and details. Then during Writer's Workshop we constructed on a brace map (see below) where we charted our new learning. Students then used the map to help them write an informational book about worms. They loved trying to write their own "Fun Facts."