Biography Scrapbook Projects



Alright, I think it's time for a crayon post! We just finished the CUTEST project. Just in case you don't remember I teach Texas History. We just finished a unit on the Texas Revolution.  Ya know the Alamo and all that jazz. I kinda found this part of our history ironic. We agreed to move to "Mexico", learn their language and practice their religion. Then we get here and are like nah this whole Spanish Catholic thing isn't really working out for me. Can you please change your laws? No, well ok guess we're gonna fight. If today's immigrants tried that with current Texans how well do you think that would go??? Anywho.. back to the projects. I originally wanted to have the kiddos create a Facebook page. I searched and searched and searched and found nothing to my liking. So then, I kept thinking and thinking and thinking. BAM scrapbook popped in my head. I did a Google search. I found this and used it as my foundation. I work with 4th graders so I made my instructions a bit more detailed. I told them exactly what to put on the cover page and pages 1-4. They came out oober doober cute. I'll go through the page requirements with you.

Cover Page- Texas Hero Name, Student's Name, Social Studies Block, and Homeroom

 

Page 1: Timeline of your hero's life

 

I love how she made out foldable for her timeline.

 

Page 2: Create a written correspondence pretending that you are your hero writing to a loved one during the revolution.

 

 

Page 3: Pretend that you went back in time and interviewed your hero about the Revolution. You have to ask at least 4 questions.

 





I love how he made it like a real newspaper artifact!

 

 

Page 4: Character Traits- create a bubble map with a picture of your hero in the center. You need at least 4 traits to describe your hero.

 

 

I gave the students the option to create extra pages if they wanted. I told them sky is the limit whatever they would like to do. This little girl had twice as many pages as she needed. My favorite was the family tree. It was very creative.

 

I didn't require them to actually buy a real scrapbook. The Sam Houston project used a real book. The Davy Crockett project used scrapbook paper, hole punched it, and added 2 metal rings to bind it all. I was TRUELY amazed with these projects. This was a take home end of unit project. If needed a provided 5 pieces of plain card stock and 2 metal rings. The kids did such a great job. If I had time I could easily show you another 90 books as examples. I hope you enjoy and are inspired to scrapbook!

 

I plan to share this idea with other teachers at Fourth Grade Frolics.

 



 

 



 



Online Stories for Toddlers

I try to read with the little princess everyday. It's a part of our bedtime routine. Sometimes when she stays up later than usual we quickly say prayers and skip the book. At that point, she is not into reading a book. A friend of mine posted on FB a while back(yes Gomez if you're reading this I'm talking about you) that her hubby told her not to call b/c their son is watching youtube on the phone. I found it wildly hilarious and then I thought to myself what the heck is a 1yr old watching on youtube. So... I opened youtube and began to explore. Then I thought guh duh!! He's watching the same stories I read to little princess. So, I called little princess over and we started to watch. At this point she wasn't watching TV yet. We just started letting her watch TV late this fall. Anywho... I started looking for my favorite books. I'll share the videos that I like below. I have to say, the one wierd thing was when you've sang a song a million times or read a book and then you hear it read differently. It totally throws me off. :) I hope you and your little tots enjoy the book videos.

50 Below

 

Love you forever

 



Pete the Cat

I also have a double bonus for you. :) I mentioned above about letting little princess watch TV. The only shows we let her watch are Barney, Sesame Street, and Mickey Mouse Club. She really isn't a fan of Sesame Street yet. But she LOVES Barney because of all the singing and dancing. And she really doesn't care for Mickey Mouse Club she just likes the Hotdog song. So pretty much she just likes to watch Barney and that's fine with me. She even holds on to me and rocks side to side to the I love you song. And... gives hugs and kisses on the right part. SO STINKIN CUTE! I found the songs on youtube and they play over and over again. On the Hotdog song she waves buy to Mickey each time at the end of the song, starts to whine b/c she knows it's over, and then gets excited when she sees it's starting over. Kinda funny

Barney I Love You Song 15 times back to back

Mickey Mouse Clubhouse Hot Dog song 5X back to back

Enjoy!

 

P.S.

I big puffy heart Robert Munsch!!

 



QR Codes In the Classroom

The last post I made I mentioned I was going to try QR Codes in the classroom. Well, I tried it and my kids LOVED it. I just took the textbook pulled out the important info from the chapter and made a QR code from it. I placed them around the room and the kids had to find them and scan them.

After they finished all the scans they had to color code their notes. I had them code by if the fact told about the tribes region, way of life, government, or a fun fact. Sorry, I totally didn't realize this picture was upside down.

After we finished doing 2 tribes we compared them using a venn diagram foldable. My principal did a walk through while I taught this lesson. He said it was perfect! I was glad but honestly I was secretly hoping he caught one of my QR code lessons. I knew he would think it was super cool. The kids did a good job on the foldables.

I decided to share my codes with you all. I hope your kiddos enjoy or that this has given you an idea :) Enjoy! I'm sharing these ideas with other teachers here and here.

Social Studies Stations

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I'm loving my job. But I will admit, I can't let go of the other subjects so easily. I decided to try out stations in Social Studies. I mean if you can have them for Reading, Science, and Math then why not Social Studies right?!?!? Also, for the last four years my Fridays have always been laid back. We always assessed for each subject on Friday at my other school. I taught 2nd grade and it was the way we made sure we actually had paper pencil grades. I want my laid back Fridays back. :) So we've tried stations out twice and it went well both times. Well...it went well with 4 out of 5 blocks. So one unlucky group has only done stations one time. We have 4 stations and we spend about 7-8 minutes at each station. I set the timer and when it beeps they rotate. I split the desk into 4 groups and lay all the materials at for each group on the desk. The only thing they take around with them is a pencil and a dry erase marker. I'll walk you through each station. 
Station 1: Vocabulary Review

I create a vocabulary crossword. I use words we've covered throughout the week. The clues are the definitions. That's it! Easy enough and the kids like to do it.

Station 2: Social Studies Problem Solving

I use vocabulary that we've covered to review math skills. I've heard the math teacher say they need practice with subtracting. I place four problems out on the table and white boards. The markers travel with them. They divide the board into a four square and show their work. That way whenever I get to that station I can look over all their work.

Station 3: Making Words

This is probably my favorite station. I'm just a ELA girl at heart. I take a word that we've covered and they have to make as many words with it as they can. The word has to have at least 3 letters and can't be a proper noun. The only reason I made that rule is b/c originally they just kept trying to spell each others names. It's fun to watch them problem solve and try trail and error. The writing teacher has said spelling sight words is an issue so hopefully this will help a little...eventually.

Station 4: Number of the Day

This really has nothing to do with Social Studies. Before my I start my lesson with each block every day I have to do a math review warm up. So this is just a little added math practice. I found these for free here. Well that's all I have for now. I am sharing these ideas with other teachers here and here.

Technology Tip Tuesday

Flocabulary is awesome. This will be my first year in 4th grade but I used it for Math in 2nd grade. They have it for Math, Reading, Social Studies, and Vocabulary. My kids loved the Tens song. I always made sure that they learned the words before I really let them break it down. They would get so into the beat and just start having dance offs and not really saying the words. The promise of getting to break it down once they learned the concept and words was great incentive.

Also, I just found this video floating around pinterest. So funny and the DMSB was stuck in my head afterward.





Must Have Monday

Well most Texas teachers started their contracts today. It is Teacher Week over at Blog Hoppin. I'll try to keep up the best I can. Today is Must Have Monday so I'll share a few of my must haves.

1. Document Camera

These are awesome. This is my first year to have the lady bug. At my old school I had a different kind that took up tons of space. Actually, last year I got the bright link. Ya know, like a Smart Board but this is a fair trade for the new job :) I'll happily downsize. If you're not familiar with these basically they replace the "old school" overhead projector type things. It makes modeling and guided practice 10 times easier.

2. Microwave

When you have a whopping 30 minutes for lunch and that includes escorting your kiddos and picking them up, waiting in line to microwave your food is simply not an option. Well, not for me anyway! Also, I usually eat oatmeal every morning and sometimes pop popcorn during conference time.

3. Discovery Education

Our district has a subscription to this and I LOVE LOVE LOVE IT! You can filter to find videos on almost any topic according to grade, full video, segments, content. The Math videos are pretty awesome and so are the Social Studies. And...they have like every single Magic School Bus movie on there. Oh and Time Warp Trio, oh and Maya and Miguel, oh and Kenny the Shark. Perfect videos for those indoor recess days. Last year I figured out they had the Reading Rainbow videos! That made me BEYOND excited. It gave me a whole nutha reason to love those inside recess days. The math videos are good to use for your "hook". The kids get all in to it. Mine would get carried away and start yelling at the characters that were problem solving.

4.  A Fun Environment and Faculty





If you can have fun and be happy on the job then you will get the best results. This is a group of old co-workers at a team mates wedding. We were making crazy faces. This is one of my favorite pictures lol. I'm sure they'll send me lovely text later for posting this :)

Made it Monday

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Yes, I know technically right now it's Sunday. Tomorrow my contract begins and it's time to get back to work. I've started working on a few school related things. I'm sure you'll start seeing more "crayon" related post instead of "chicken" or "diapers". Tonight is a mix of all three. I thought I would link up w/Tara at 4th Grade Frolics for the first time and share what I've made.

Made it #1

I'm starting a new school and new grade this year. My class is painted yellow so I thought I would go off that to accent. I decided to add little touches of gray, yellow, and white. I didn't want anything "themey" just some pops of color here and there. This is a little canvas art project I did. I'm thinking I'll put it near my desk. I just got a 5pk of canvas mats from Michael's and went to my trusted friend decoupage. I also did a little spray paint art with a doily. I didn't have any pinspiration so after I made them I just kinda flipped them around until I thought it looked artsy.

Made it # 2

Baby girl has to start daycare this week since I'm back to work. I wanted to start her out earning brownie points. I hate getting gifts from students said no teacher ever :) I wanted it to be more thoughtful than time consuming. Yes, I could of done something all fancy in word and made it prettier. I got the little boxes from the dollar spot at Target. I cut out a little circle and wrote: Every successful classroom needs: love, patience, caffeine, and chocolate. In my mind I thought that sounded pretty on target. On the back it says looking forward to a great year! Love, Layla Grayce. I filled the boxes with mini candy bars and of course some good 'ol Dr. Pepper.

Made it #3

I've seen these floating all around pinterest. But, when I thought about my go to treat it wasn't anything out there that fit me. So, I took a look at the original and played around and made my own. I think it's pretty okay.

Made it #4

Baby girl needs to wear shoes to school each day. At first I thought no biggie seeing how she has a shoe wall in her nursery and all. Well, apparently her shoes weren't made for walking. She has a small foot for her size so she wears a 6-9mos. None of the shoes had a grip. She just slipped and fell all over the place. I didn't Mr. Hubs didn't want all the shoes to go to waste. So, I headed back to Michael's and got some puff paint. I put it on the bottoms of all her shoes and let it dry over night. Now, we can say they are made for walking :)

Made it #5

These are 3 ingredient and 3 steps Ranch Pork Chops. Mr. Hubs loves these. They are super easy. Hopefully, I'll have time to post a how-to later this week. I came up with this after the slow cooking explosion version on pinterest. I forgot to put them in the slow cooker one day and had to bake them instead.

Made it #6

Finally, this yummy brownie. Mr. Hubs said this was the best brownie I ever made. They were yummy but my heart still belongs to Slutty Brownies. I shared some with our family but the pan was still gone w/i 24hrs.( Remember the baked goods sign above?) This is a recipe from pioneer woman.

Alright, that's all for tonight. It's time to get started on Insanity (baked goods obsession, remember...) if I survive you'll hear from me again soon. :)