Catholic Schools Week

Catholic Schools Week is a National celebration sponsored by the NCEA (National Catholic Education Association) that runs the last week of January every year.  This week Catholic schools across the United States take time to consider the gift of Catholic education.  We spend time being grateful for our families and parish, who support and believe in Catholic education.  Our church leaders who have devoted their lives to the Church.  Our community for constantly serving others.  Our staff, teachers, and volunteers who have answered the call to Catholic education and work tirelessly for its sake.  Last, but not least....our students.  The students who are learning how to listen to God, follow Jesus, and grow into compassionate and competent adults.

Each year we follow the NCEA's theme, which for 2018/2019 was LEARN-SERVE-LEAD-SUCCEED.  We also hold our new student open house at the beginning of Catholic Schools Week so it is a great time to show off our school.  This year our school-wide hallway display were rockets with the phrase "Catholic Schools Make Every Mission Possible."  Each student in the entire school made one to hang and then added his/her self portrait.  The students love looking for their project among the huge group!

We asked for each FAMILY to provide a 4x6 family picture to create a one of a kind family appreciation bulletin board.  I could barely get the pictures up and kids were already enthralled by this!!

                   
A small token of appreciation the students do for our parishioners is thank you notes/letters on the CSW logo.  We print two per page and make enough in our homerooms for our 1,000 bulletins!



Throughout the week we complete various writing projects.  We include thank you letters to our families and staff, as well as some that focus on our school and all the things that make it amazing!  Click either one of these pictures for a FREE set of Catholic Schools Week activities!

 Also, check out my Teachers Pay Teachers store to access these FREE Catholic Schools Week writing templates!  It includes a variety of sheets that can be folded into cards, given to parents, handed out to staff members, or even kept as keepsakes!

Our entire school participated in a service project to say thank-you to the unsung heroes in our community.  These treat bags (over 250!!) were given to various civic organizations that work endlessly for the less fortunate and those who are struggling emotionally, financially, and physically. 

Our volunteers received these adorable key chains and pens!  Both of these items were purchased off of Oriental Trading.  Teachers were also celebrated this week and enjoyed a morning drink stop from Sonic that was anonymously donated.  The PTO also sponsored a special meal for the teachers too!  Even our PSR program leader jumped in to help us celebrate teachers with a yummy drink and treat for each of us!

The students had a fun week spending time interacting with each other, their families, and doing fun activities focused on Catholic education.  The students participated in Orange You Glad to be at a Catholic School? by wearing their orange gear! The students also got a day to dress as their future careers after hearing from school alumni and their current careers!

One of the favorite ways to really make this week special is an invite to the families to attend a "Family Picnic" with their child!  We assigned two grade levels each day at their regular lunch time.  We made sure the grade levels had some time between their lunches to allow for an easy flow of family members in and out of the building.  This requires basically no prep from teachers except sending home an invitation to families!

Back to School

Hi Ho, Hi Ho, it's off to work we go!  We are just shy of one month into the new school year and I will just say my class is FULL of little darlings!  I am so thankful that there are a variety of personalities and each of us seem to have found exactly where we fit!  I have found myself saying so much this year with our new math curriculum (Eureka) that we are all the smartest!  There will always be something smarter than you at something and you will always be smarter than someone else at something...so THERE you have it! We are all the smartest. 

Speaking of smartest.....of course we know the old saying....You Can Lead a Horse to Water But You Can't Force Him to Drink.  GROWTH MINDSET!  I remembered this darling book last year that I found in the Scholastic Book Club and ordered, but never really found a good use for it - Rufus Goes to School by Kim Griswell.

This year I was determined to put this sweet story to use.  I just loved little Rufus and his determination to learn and could be adapted to such a large variety of character education lessons!  First, we read the story and had a discussion of course.   All the little, sweet, 3rd graders gathered around the carpet... it was DARLING!!  Then we used Mandy Neals Growth Mindset resources to create a class anchor chart for our learning.

I just DIE for these directed drawing activities so I created my own for Rufus Leroy Williams III!  The students and I worked through the anchor chart, then the directed drawing, and finally added our own speech bubbles to Rufus to display our Growth Mindsets!

So here we are...starting a new year, with new kiddos, and new goals for growth!  You can grab my directed drawing directions for Rufus by clicking one of the four pictures above of Rufus!

Solar Eclipse 2017

Are you gearing up for the Solar Eclipse 2017?  We are one city that has over 2 minutes and 30 seconds of totality and our city is going all out!  We have a weekend full of fun, but first we have to get through the first three days of school and I know if all are like me then you are searching for the best Solar Eclipse resources you can find!!  Here I have compiled what I plan to use, some I made, some I bought, and some are FREE!!

Of course we needed an observation sheet to document the fabulous things we will be seeing at this once in a lifetime event!  I was having trouble finding something for middle to upper elementary so I created my own!  The good thing is since we are all obsessed such fans of our projectors and interactive whiteboards then the reflection questions can be done whole group for younger elementary students.  Click the pictures below to grab this in my store for just $1!!

After getting the observation in order I was then on the hunt for some specific 2017 Eclipse information.  One thing I have heard over the past year is "What is the big deal?"  This resource, AGAIN a steal for just $1.50, will give your students a chance to get up and move around and still learn about this amazing event!  There is a version for younger students that simply states the fact and a more challenging option that gives some additional information.  The beauty is this could be used in the same classroom for differentiation because the recording sheet is the same!

This is another paid product, but not one of mine.  I love the webquests in this pack, as well as the variety of reading skills that are being addressed!  Of course at under $2, the price isn't bad either!

I am pretty sure the entire world has an Amazon Prime membership or at least knows someone to grab this great movie for FREE!  The run time is only 44 minutes so enough to get in a class period for the teacher who are departmentalized. I also found a corresponding follow along sheet on TPT for free as well!  

I am not sure about school's around the nation, but for us we were pretty nervous about just letting our kids wonder around outside for the entire duration of the eclipse (over 2 hours) and just HOPING they keep their eclipse glasses on the entire time.  Therefore, we are designated approved observation times, which of course covers the totality as well.  Because of this, we are responsible for coming up with educational activities to complete indoors until the next observation period.  Below are three links to some free activities that may be useful if you are doing something similar!

Hopefully some of these resources ease the search for the first day or the first few days back to school before the eclipse! 

Will a freebie make it better? Part 2~Pronouns

In my last post I revealed the reason I hadn't blogged in forever!!  I promised to come back and discuss how my class has moved from verbs to pronouns and where we are going from there.

First, we reviewed nouns.  We wrote what each noun was and then came up with some examples.  This was the perfect transition into pronouns.  You can grab this freebie from the Not So Wimpy Teacher.

After a quick intro we dived straight into first, second, and third person subject/object and singular/plural nouns......if that isn't a mouthful!  The kids were looking at me like I was crazy and speaking a language they had NEVER heard.  Luckily we knew what singular, plural, and subject meant...the rest of it seemed difficult to fully understand.  We only did subject and object pronouns for the first week and then moved to possessives the second week.  This chart opened up a lot of conversation and was very helpful in getting all the information to the kids in a systematic way.  We glued ours in our grammar notebooks.  You can get a FREE copy by clicking the picture!

We spent two days working on these pronoun pockets.  This opened a lot of discussion about singular and plural pronouns and whether or not we were included in the group or if the noun was talking about ourselves.  You can grab your FREE copy of the template I used by clicking either of the pictures below.  We even threw in a little alliteration review ;)

We practiced what we had learned with these task cards from the Not So Wimpy Teacher and Polka-Dots in the Panhandle which are both FREE in their stores!  Click the pictures to grab them.

 

We had a short week due to Easter so there wasn't much time to work on possessives.  We played this super fun game and of course task cards are always sooo easy and versatile!  Grab the game from Melissa's Teaching Mall for FREE and the task cards from Jennifer Bennett for FREE as well!

After our WEEK LONG BREAK....that's right an entire week, we will be combining our learning with pronoun-verb agreement.  I am only on day 1 of break and loving it!!  The last 8 weeks will be rough, but that is NOT what I am focusing on right now :)

We will get back into the swing of things by reviewing pronouns with this four square game which is FREE from my store.  Just click the picture to grab it!

Another one of my favorite things to do as an alternative to worksheets is interactive ppt/pdf.  The questions are displayed on the board and the kids respond with whiteboards or if you are SUPER BRAVE you can let the kids write on their desks!  This is an exclusive FREEBIE just for making it this far!  This is a paid product from my store.  In this pdf the kids will respond to each sentence displayed on the screen with the correct verb that agrees with pronoun.  There are also three intro pages as well!

Will a freebie make it better? Part 1~Verbs

4 months since my last blog post.  I am not sure time is even an excuse, but I promise I have one.

Some one says "hi" from the inards!  The journey getting to this place has not been easy.  We have had some tragic events occur in our path to having another child, but trust in God's plan for us and his will.  I am counting this blessing, but will be even more at peace when she makes it to Earth happy and healthy!

Lately we have been deep in verbs and pronouns for weeks!  To kick off we started with a game to remind ourselves exactly what verbs are!  This is a great freebie from Lindy du Plessis. You can grab yourself a copy by clicking the picture below.

We then moved quickly to verb tenses and more specifically spelling of different tenses.  I used both these $1.00 products to make learning fun and very low prep for myself!  You can click on both to take you to the stores of Vanessa Crown and Teaching with Wit and Wonder.

Next came linking and helping verbs.....oh my, was that chore!  It seemed no matter which one we were working on the kids would refer to the opposite!!  I found these task cards and had the kids identify the verb and write A for action or L for linking.  This is a GREAT freebie, not only because it is free, but also because the text is a bit more challenging for a third grade level. You can grab it from Foreman Teaches.

The last topic was irregular verbs.  Another freebie we used was from Amy Berry. I projected the ppt on the big screen and the kids wrote the irregular past tense verb on whiteboards.  I love activities like this where the kids get WAY more practice then on a worksheet, no grading, engagement, and much more entertaining!

Tune in tomorrow and get the scoop on what we have done with pronouns and where we are going, plus an exclusive FREEBIE from my store!  I will leave you with a picture, compliments of my 3 yr old daughter!