"DS" Day

The students saved up enough behavior stickers to earn a day when they were allowed to bring electronic games to school. They thoroughly enjoyed playing them when they were done with their work today!

100th Day

Thursday was the 100th day of school! I enjoy making this into a super special day full of fun (and learning) for my students. Here’s a peek into our day.

The students were greeted with this sign,

 

and a streamer curtain at the door. They walked into the classroom saying “Whoa!” and “Wow, what is this?”

(Pardon the blurry picture.)

Their faces were full of smiles, and that made this teacher’s heart very happy!

For one student, the day was even more special because he had earned enough stickers to trade in and use the teacher’s chair for the day!

 

In Bible class, we did sword drills, looking up verses that contained the word “hundred.” The student who found the most Scriptures got a prize.

Since it was a special day, we moved desks into groups after we were done with spelling pretests and Language.

Each student colored 1/4 of a poster with 100 puzzle pieces on it.

 

There were some very creative posters when the pieces were put together.

 

 

Although the students might have told you that we didn’t have math, they spent 1/2 hour estimating, adding, subtracting, using money, and learning about ordering from catalogs.  

Each student was given a school supply catalog, and told that they had $100 to spend. They had to buy at least three things, and their goal was to get as close to $100 as they could without going over.

One of my mathematicians was only $0.05 away and received a prize for his hard work! Several others were less than a quarter away.

Throughout the day, we did quite a few other fun activities. We did 100 exercises (20 jumping jacks, 10 jumping high fives, 10 stretches, etc.). The students guessed which of three bags of jelly beans had 100, and how many jelly beans were in the other two bags. Two students were only 1 jelly bean off in their guesses, so they each got a prize.

 

We ended the day with several 100 yard dashes.

One of the students commented that they were glad we had a whole day where they didn’t have to learn anything!

 

But it thrills my heart to know that not only did they learn quite a few things, but they also will have memories to last them for a long, long time!

Rocket Language

I very clearly remember 4th grade Language class. That was the year when we learned parts of speech and began to . . . diagram.

As a fourth grader, I hated diagramming. All the way through Jr. high and high school I hated it. However, when I got to college I found out that those endless many long lessons about diagramming and those many hours of practice paid off. Thanks in part to the in depth lessons diagramming had given me about parts of speech, I was able to test out of both Grammar and Composition I class in college.

So, when I became a teacher, I determined that my dear fourth graders would not have the same dislike for diagramming that I did. . . if I could help it, that is. So I sat down and brainstormed.

This is the first diagramming that 4th graders encounter after basic subject/verb diagrams. Do you remember these from your days in school? Don’t they kind of look like rockets to you? I thought they did!

 

This is what I came up with.

I start by talking about Clumsy Captain Conjunction (which we have talked about before as connecting words). The students already know what subjects and verbs are, so I teach them that if there is a captain for the subject, then it goes on a rocket, and the same with a verb. Of course, the captain is rather clumsy and smashes those subject/verbs right into a wall. . . but. . . the students absolutely love it. I let them practice with sentences by writing on the rockets with dry erase markers.

I throw in a countdown or two, and it makes my third graders super eager to get to “Rocket language” next year!