Thanskgiving =)

I'm on a roll with a second post in November... say what?!? Lol.
Happy belated Thanksgiving Bloggy Friends! I hope your Thanksgiving was Fantabulous... more than likely, you all are working off the extra pounds by doing some Black Friday shopping for yourselves, the family, and the non-related little ones. I'm sure the deals are amazing, but I value my life waaaay too much to risk getting trampled by all those crazy deal hunters.... call me crazy but I rather pay full price. =)

Top 10 Things I'm Thankful for this year...

10. My alarm clock: God only knows how hard it is for me to wake up in the morning.

9. My neighborhood Dunkin Donuts: I go there so often that when I pull up, the guy pretty much says my order before I do and I’m outta there in NO TIME.

8. Starbucks: even though they require more of my bucks, their hot latte’s are incredible and always at the perfect temperature!

7. My Pathfinder: OK, so it finds more potholes than actual paths, but it gets me to work and right back home AND keeps my bottom warm in the brutal cold.

6. Facebook: It keeps me in contact with the people that actually matter in my life, aside from my immediate family.

5. My Dog: her looks alone make people weary and I know that as long as she’s around, not only will I be “safe” but also, there will never be any leftovers.

4. My job: My coworkers continue to be amazing and my students are incredible this year… except for one or two. Lol.

3. For old and new friends both online and offline: Let's face it, as teachers we are SUPER busy and it's nice that there are people that help you stay grounded and keep you from losing your mind half of the time... it's also nice knowing that I'm not the only one going through those things. Thank you Blog friends for helping keep the sanity under control. =)

2. My family: They support my decisions and I love them for it.

1. My Incredible Little Boy: he’s makes me laugh, he’s smart, he’s talented… he’s me in a nutshell. lol.

OK, enough yapping and onto my original reason for this post...

Every month we have family projects. Our project for November was our Turkeys in Disguise Family Project. Have you had your students and their families disguise paper turkeys before? The results are AMAZING!

I usually kick off the project by reading the following book:

It's about a Turkey that knows he'll probably be eaten for Thanksgiving so he decides to disguise himself as other farm animals. It's such a CUTE book!

Then, We send home a family letter pleading to help us save the turkeys (along with the turkey template):

And TADA!!!!!!! You get the most incredible results! Some are better than others... can you figure out what they are? My favorite is the very last one! Lol.

Did you guess the last one? Lol. It's Psy... the Singer and creator of Gangnam Style!

Good Kids + Good Parents + Good Teacher = Good Combo =)

A 2-Month No Show =(

Anyone out there still reading this? Anyone?! Lol. This year I'm not only teaching a Bilingual Classroom, I'm also teaching a 1st/2nd split classroom and it's been the CRAZIEST roller coaster ride ever! It really feels like I'm teaching a group of K-3 because these kiddo's are all over the place; talk about the pressure being on! Anywho, I'm still alive and even more MIA than usual; and although I have not blogged in a while, I have taken many pics for all the future posts I'm planning to write and am looking forward to giving you guys a little inside peeks to the last couple of months school. =)

Let's get this ball rollin'... Was at the Target dollar section a couple of months back and found this:

In case you're wondering what it is, I believe it's an ice cube tray. Being a hoarder teacher I thought, "this is pretty cool! The kids can sort; add; subtract; etc." and since it came in various colors (pink, blue, green, and purple), I bought one of each. Fast forward a couple of months, they were still in my closet... with the tags on! Hmm... what happened to all the fun activities I had planned in my head when I first saw it? I don't know, but apparently they were hibernating along with all the other stuff I bought for my classroom that day! Apparently, that same day I also bought this:

I'm thinking that the theory behind my thinking was that I could figure out a way for my students to use this simultaneously as a math activity. (Don't you think "math" when you see this?!) In case you were wondering what it is, it's table scatter from the $2.50 section of the Dollar Spot. ;)
So, on with my story.... I somehow convince my coworker and work-bestie to buy the same stuff (lol); she asked me the other day, "so what was your plan for this?!" and proceeds to show me the above items.... my plan, Ladies and Gentlemen? Well, my plan was a subtraction game with a 20 sided dice (and as I'm typing this It came to me that I could have done addition as well, duh! Lol.) Simple enough, right?

Since the tray has 21 spaces you start of with 21... you throw the 20 sided dice. Then fill the ice cube tray with the amount of table scatter indicated on the dice (that's the number you're subtracting from 21). The amount of spaces not filled would be the difference. I hope that makes sense.
I tried it out with two of my second graders they loved it; the only problem was that I didn't have a worksheet to match so there could be some sort of student accountability, sooo.... as you may have guessed.... I created one. (Now I'm thinking I should make an addition one for my Firsties.)

Click HERE to get a copy of 21 Squares Subtraction in Spanish



Click HERE to get a copy of 21 Squares Subtraction in English


The best part about it is that the table scatter changes year round to match the holidays or season, so the "oooo la la" factor will always be there because the fun stuff (manipulatives) are ever changing. =)