Five for Friday (Finally) and a Character Banner Freebie

Well, these first few weeks have a been a whirlwind, and it's the first time this school year that I've been able to hook up with Doode Bugs Teaching's Five For Friday. 

Here we go!

 

1.

Did you know this past week was Fire Prevention Week?  We don't pay as close attention to it in third grade as I had when I was teacking K and 1, but I did want to work it in somehow.  We used this app during station time:

I also used some fire related books during guided reading time, like Firehouse Dog and The Great Fire.

 

2.

We did some lessons on context clues and I created this anchor chart:

I made up the word "derzle" and asked the students what it could mean based on the other clues in the sentence.  I love that someone thought that it could be a leaf blower!

 

3.

I found out my first Donors Choose project was funded!  Hooray!

I had requested subscriptions to Scholastic News as our school no longer funds them, and they are great for teaching non-fiction. And the students write and mark all over them.

The project was funded within a month by the NEA Foundation and U.S. Cellular!

 4.

We have conferences three nights next week (ugh) so we prepared some projects to hang in the hallway.  We are currently studying character traits so I created banner pieces share favorite characters and traits. 

You can access the banner piece here, but I'm not sure how to delete the bottom triangle so the students just cut that part off.

Can anyone help with telling me how you delete lines in powerpoint?

 

5.

My classroom is right across from our sensory room and next to a EEN classroom.

Yesterday one of the EEN students had a major meltdown which happened right outside our room and it got physical.  We were just on our way out the door to go to our weekly grade 3/4 gathering and were told we had to stay in our room until the situation was over.

We had to stay in our room for 45 minutes!

It was tense.......

for the people in the hallway I mean.

My students were great.

We turned on a video about Christopher Columbus and all was fine.

Only one person asked to get a drink of water but I discreetly told her we weren't allowed to go into the hallway just yet.

Apparently the principal hurt his back trying to settle the  EEN student.

What a way to end a week.

 

Hope YOU had a great week.

 

 

Currently October - Pumpkin Book Log

Hurray - it's time for another Currently.  Thanks to  Farley at Oh' Boy 4th Grade for hosting  - I like the idea for "Trick or Treat" this month.

I love the new TV season!  The only problem this year is that two of my favorites - Parenthood and Scandal are now on the same night at the same time!  The big question is - which to watch, and which to DVR?

 

One of my sweet friends left two beautiful mums on my porch yesterday as an early birthday present.  I was so happy to see them!  I had wanted some fall flowers but never got around to buying them.

 

We have a field trip to a nature center tomorrow, and the weather is calling for rain. And we've had gorgeous weather for the last two weeks.  Couldn't this run have gone on for one more day??

 

My class is the only one in the school that hasn't had someone come forward to volunteer as the Room Parent.  This volunteer usually coordinates classroom helpers and field trip chaperones.  Very disappointing....

 

We got $500 worth of new books for our classroom libraries at the beginning of the year.  Mine are still sitting in a box in the corner of my room.  I may use one of the rainy days this weekend to tackle that project.

 

Click this link to access a pumpkin book log to use with your students.  I usually have a bin of Halloween books out for a station, and students record the ones they read on the sheet.  They can also rate the book on a scale of 1-5 for how much they like the book. 
The product includes free Reading Response Journal labels, too!