DR. SEUSS-OMANIA!! Because a bug went kachoo.

HELLO--This week as we all know was Dr. Seuss' Birthday. NEA's Read Across America week!! Found below are activities as well as writings that we completed everyday this week. Note: Tuesday was another "rain day" for us, so we were unable to do  an activity!! 



MONDAY
All Because a Bug Went Ka-Choo!



To Introduce the lesson, I read "All Because a Bug Went Ka-choo!" 

After Reading, The students and I discussed cause and effect some more. The students already know from their reading skills that an effect is something that happened and a cause is why it happened! I told them to think about some cause-and-effects similar to the story we read! I told the students to try to make it Rhyme Like Dr. Seuss  (if they could)....These are just a few!! I thought they turned out great!! 

"Because a Cat fell off a tree, a boy skint his knee and it was in the city." (she used a high-frequency word of the week). 

A Little Dog got stuck on a log then it saw a green frog!

"Because a little bug went Ka-choo! A crown hit a city and sat it down and a man cried, "Ha, I'm taking a lovely nap here!" 

"Because the Bug Fell out of the tree, he scared me!" 

Because a Little Nut hit me on the head, I went OUCH!  But it hurt me so I got on the Couch! 

Because a Little Bug Went Kachoo, it blew a house down hit a ship fail in the ocean blue! Hit a starfish and went Kachoo! 

A little bug went Kachoo because a cat fell out of a tree and the boy fell and skint his knee. Because a Monkey jumped out of the zoo!! 

Because a Clown Ran to Town, everyone sat down! 

One day, a monkey got out of the tar, and ran in the street  and hit a car!!......(hahaha!! LOVE HIS'!!)!!! 



HOPE These find you in great spirits~~


Bless,
Mr. Haggard 

Cloudy With A Chance Of Meatballs Part 2

As promised from the previous post...here is the lesson that was found on a spur. 

This week in reading, the students listened to me read "Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs" aloud. 

For the writing assignment, the students had to brainstorm weather words and food words. Then write a report like they were giving the weather. 

Once the students were done, they were able to PRESENT THEIR WEATHER REPORTS TO THE CLASS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 

I tried to edit all (most) of them that you could hear into 1 video...but that didn't workout.  I have posted a FEW of the reports that I liked the best, AND  that you could hear the students clearly in. I loved all of my students' post sooo MAYBE you'll be able to hear all of them SOON. 


I have also blurred the videos for safety reasons....enjoy the weather from (some of my students) 

Bless, 

Mr. Haggard 

Technology Mishap and Cloudy with a chance of meat balls part 1

Prologue: Technology! Don'tcha love it?? At the school that I am completing Student Teaching  we have loads of technology from Smartboards, IPADS (1 for each teacher), and even "TeachLogic" sound system. 

NOW TO THE LESSON......

AS you know, I picked up my writing block FIRST for student teaching. AS the weeks have progressed, I have struggled to find new ideas!! I came across TEACHHUB video responses: teachhub site. The site has videos (some trailers, some songs, etc...) for the students to respond to after watching. I have tried to use 1 a week (once I found the site). 

Now going back to the prologue.....As you know, technology can be your friend one minute and hate you the next....with the new sound system our school got placed in each classroom, It is often hard to hear video clips, due to the humming noise! So on Tuesday afternoon (the day before the teach-hub lesson), I decided to test it out. Come to find out, the video wasn't in it's normal place! Something must have been wrong with the site. 

SO being the resourceful teacher that I am, I tried to check all of the "video" sites to find the "monsters' inc. trailer." Since the video is not listed under "education," YOUTUBE would not pull it up, and had a block (via; our school). So I checked teachertube, and schooltube, NOTHING. 

BUT THEN..............................

I had a fantastic Idea! Since we had read a snippet of "Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs" from our Anthology book (for problem and solution) the day before, I attempted to find that trailer. When I typed it into  schooltube, I found these collections of gems, and I KNEW that my students would LOVE THEM!!! Thank you to Allisa Bruce for the idea found here: Cloudy Video . So around 4:00, I got BUSY!!! I rapidly typed up a short little prompt, ran to the copy room to make the copies for the next day, got some bulletin board paper to wrap around the podium (news desk), 

AND THEN RECORDED MYSELF as a surprise to my students at the end of the lesson:

******Check Back for my next post, where  I will share some of my students responses, the writing prompt i used, and the instructions.....this will be found at 

Cloudy with a chance of meatballs (part 2) found here: 
PART 2 CLICK HERE

Groundhog, Groundhog, what do you see?

With the month of February came many events, first we had Groundhog's day, then Valentines, then starting Monday,  Presidents Day. 

But.....THIS blog post is all about the groundhog. During the week before groundhog day, my master teacher and I completed many activities. As you know, writing was the first subject I picked up. I have tried REALLY hard to find something new and interesting to incorporate each week, so the students do not get bored. The easiest solution comes when a week has a holiday! 

During the week, my master teacher had the students complete a "Yes/No prediction" of groundhog day. The students were given a small groundhog to color, and they would add it to the chart of yes or no. THEN we tallied the results. Many believed the groundhog would not see his shadow, so we told them to wait and see :)! 
(Results: The Pennsylvania groundhog did not see his shadow, however OUR ATLANTA BEAU LEE, did see his shadow [great teachable moment of sun shinning in different places around the world]). 

To incorporate this into my writing lesson, I read the students two poems. I let them vote on which poem they would rather have. The majority chose this poem from DLTK: 
"I see a little ground hog, furry and round, he's coming up to look all around, if he sees his shadow down he'll go. Six more weeks of winter, Oh no!" ....

Since Mr. Haggard displayed the poem on the smartboard, he expected capital letters and punctuations!! 

The students were told to WRITE first, then they would be able to get a groundhog craft template found here at DLTK:
Ground Hog Template

After making an example for myself, I figured out what would work best. Found below are materials and directions:

Materials
--Brads (brass tack thingys ;) )!
--Ground Hog Template
--Hole Punch
-(Glue)
-(writing prompt/white paper). 


Directions: 
1. To begin, the students had to copy the poem off of the smart board.

2. The students were given the ground hog template, (body, head, feet, arms, hole). THE students were told to not worry with the feet, since they would have been covered up by the POEM. 

3. The students were told to color everything but the "hole" and "feet.   Once they did this, they could cut it out!

4. After cutting, the students were supposed to glue the head to the body and top of their writing prompt to the lower body of the ground hog. Then glue the "February 2nd" (optional) sign to one of the hands. 

5. The teacher would then punch holes in the body/arm and attach it by a brad, to give it that moving property. 

Found below are some of our little groundhogs:

Other Poem: "Shadow Shadow what do you see?" 

This was a very CUTE craft to complete, I am Glad I found it!!


BLESS<><

-MR. Haggard 

OUR 100th day of school

Ahhhh the 100th day of school. A time for making crafty hats/glasses/etc.... while counting to 100, a billion times (if you're in the younger grades, you will realize that when your students "Lose" count, it's often up to you to help them recount, and fix their mistakes! 

For the 100th day of school, my kiddos made 100th day hats to wear throughout the day (we made necklaces at the end of the day). 

For MY WRITING LESSON    I informed the students that we would be "making" our 100 year old selves. First, they had to "Write" though. I had the students write on a writing prompt, what they would do/where they would be/etc... when they're  100 years old. I even told them the year that MOST of them would turn 100. 2106-2107.  AFTER they wrote their response, they were able to make a "self portrait" of themselves. 

Listed are the materials:
---Long Construction paper
----Skinned color construction paper
----Assortment colored paper
----Cotton Balls or cotton pads
--Hot glue
---googly Eyes


Directions:

1. The students had to write their prompt BEFORE they were allowed to do their activity. 

2. The students had to draw a circle on skin toned construction paper (face).

3. The student chose 1-2 different pieces of colored paper to create an outfit. 

4. The student glued their writing prompt,  head and clothes to the long paper.

5. The teacher hot glued eyes, and cotton balls/pads (hair,mustaches) in the places they wanted them. 

6. The student finished adding any extra features to their person. 


Found below is the awesome outcome of this little activity:

Then........Mr. Haggard gave his class a little gift, to celebrate 100 days smarter, the students received: "We're 100 day smarties" candies. 

I wish I could have used a pair of pants, but we didn't have that dicut.


This has been one of my most favorite activities that I have completed, EVER!!!!! The Students' 100 day selves all turned out soooooo cute!!! I will also continue to have a painful memory branded on me forever. When hot gluing cotton on to something, make sure that you know what end has the hot glue on it, and make sure it NEVER makes contact with your skin
:)!!!


BLESS,
MR. HAGGARD 

I Have a dream......

During my very first week of (picking up classes) Student Teaching, I took the writing block. I have completed several writing prompts, creative ideas, etc... with my students. The week before Martin Luther King Day, I looked around for many different pinterest pins/blogs/etc... for a very cute MLK Creative Art/Writing Activity. Thanks to the teacher at this blog, for inspiring me and giving me this cute idea:
Awesome Teacher Blog

Materials Needed: 
-Brown Construction Paper
-Manilla/tan colored construction paper
-Long Construction paper 
-Heart Dicuts 
-Writing Prompt 

To begin my lesson, I discussed Martin Luther King with my first graders a little more. This gave them an appropriate understanding. This is the social studies content our first grade teachers chose to focus on that week, so the students already had some background knowledge.  I explained there are many things that we would LOVE to help change for the better for OTHERS (not just ourselves). For example: "Some students bring sad attitudes to school everyday.......I HAVE A DREAM THAT ALL STUDENTS WOULD COME TO SCHOOL EXCITED TO LEARN EVERYDAY!" 
I gave my students the procedural directions for the next step AFTER writing, these will be found further down. 

I sent my friends on their way to writing, while checking/helping with SOME spelling, making sure there were capitals, punctuation marks, and all that jazz!  When my students were done writing, and it was approved by my master teacher, the coteacher, or me THEN THEY SHOULD: 

1. Go to the back table and get 1 piece of long construction paper (black), 1 brown construction paper, 1 tan paper, and 1 heart dicut (and outline) with the words "I have a dream" wrote on it. 

2. The student took these items back to their desk, and traced their hands/wrist on the brown and tan construction paper. (NOTE: you often learn after your first time of implementing something, that children may have a hard time seeing their lines on the brown paper, so you may want to trace it in marker). 

3. The students would then cut out their arm/hands as well as any excess from their writing prompt.

4. Next the students were required to glue their writing prompt to the top of the long paper FIRST!!!

5. Then the students should glue their arms/hand in the bottom corners of the long paper, overlapping the fingers of the hand. In the middle of the hands, the students will glue their "I have a dream" heart dicut. 

6. Let these dry....we all have these students (my self sometimes included; can't be a hypocrite) who overload their cuttings with TOO much glue, or place it on the paper in the wrong spot, and the glue smears :)!!

Basic Prompt and Heart Dicuts:

FOUND BELOW ARE SOME OF MY Students' work....ENJOY: 

Mr. Haggard's Example 

I have a dream that we would clean up Ocilla to make it a beautiful place to live!

I have a dream that everyone would have peace!

Although MLK Day has passed, I hope this post finds you having a great day!

Bless,

Mr. Haggard 

Rainy Day? Holiday!

Over the past several days, it has been raining in our counties of South Georgia!! With many children (and myself) that live down dirt roads, it is dangerous to drive on. Today, one of our "rain" days was used. 

This is a perfect day to get caught up on my blogging of student teaching, so far! 

Coming up you will see:
-MLK DAY Activities 
-100 day of school activity
-Ground HOG
-Valentines

Hopefully, I will be able to blog a lot more, now that I am writing modified lesson plans.


Bless,
Mr. Haggard!