Frames, Oceans, and Vertebrates

The week before school started ((((way back in August)))) I created one of the "First Day" frames. Of course the only willing models I had were my puppies! How cute! On the first day of school I had each one of my sweets stand in front of my (then blank) blue bulletin board and hold the frame. There were some SUPER adorable pictures. I will definitely be tweaking the frame for the 100th day and the last day of school. Then I will take all the photos and give them to the parents as a memory keepsake!

What's hilarious is Dasher was AFRAID of the frame. How funny is that?

This is my baby Wesley! He wasn't afraid one bit. It's true small dogs think they are bigger than they truly are. 

Puppy Love

This is what each students desk looked like on the first day of school. I created a little "goodie" bag for each sweet.  The label on the polka dot treat bag says: "I'm bursting with excitement to have a smarty like you in my class!" I put starbursts,  smarties, pen/pencil, and notepad in the goody bags for my sweets. They LOVED them. I do have the labels and was trying to find them to add as a freebie. I will find it before next year rolls around :)

My mom came to my class the 3rd day of school with my back-to-school basket. Growing up she always made each of  her kids a back-to-school basket. . . and well I'm still in school so I still get one!

My mother then took a picture of me with each of my sweets holding the red m&m chilling in the basket! That blue bulletin board was our back drop!

We just wrapped up our Oceans unit in science. It was so much fun. Our reading story was Dear Mr. Blueberry. For those of you who don't know, the story is an informational story. A little girl is writing letters to her teacher, Mr. Blueberry,  asking questions about the blue whale living in her pond. It is super cute and ties in perfectly with our Oceans unit. To kick it all off we watched a video from United Streaming about the blue whale. We filled out an adjective map about the blue whale. I used the one from Deanna Jump's Ocean unit (which is awesome!)  I also created a Whale Research Notes (it's available as a FREEBIE at my TPT store) book for each of my sweets to complete.
 I went to our school library and checked out every book we had on whales. I brought all the books to my classroom meeting area. Here are some of the ones I checked out: 


Here is an example of some their Whale Research Notes:










I went over my expectations for using the library books to help them complete their Whale Research Notes project booklet. My sweets did an AMAZING job with the project and they completed it INDEPENDENTLY!!! (YES that's a huge accomplishment) Then we began reading our science book and matching up vocabulary words. I used United Streaming to watch the Magic School Bus: Takes a Dive video. WOW between that and the blue whale information we had already learned they were hooked on the Ocean unit. For our science curriculum the kids have to know what an island, trench, continental shelf, undersea mountain, bottom-dweller, free-swimmer, and a floater all are and where they are in the ocean. I split my class into 4 groups and gave them all those labels and four colors of bulletin board paper and said make your own ocean! At first they were unsure of how to do it. They wanted me to give them step-by-step instructions. After I continued to encourage them to keep it up and create their own ocean they became absorbed in it! Here is an a peak at one group's work:
That's how I do oceans and I'm looking forward to adding even more things to our unit for next year. It's all about tweaking what you have and improving with experience.

In science we are off in the land of vertebrates starting on Monday! I just finished a mini science unit to help us with our learning. 
It's posted at my TPT store HERE. I would love to know how you teach vertebrates, cold-blooded and warm-blooded animals, and amphibians, mammals, and reptiles????!!!

I will email the first person who comments (with their email address) my new unit!