Five for Friday {March 22, 2013}

Hello everyone! :)

So excited to share my week with everyone! :)  It was a good one!  The last week before spring break! :)  I love my little ones, but can I say that I was just EX.HAUST.ED?  Ugh...having spring break so late was hard on them, but hard on me too! :(

Thank you to Kacey for sharing this linky with all of us! :)  Click on the picture to link up with her, if you're interested in meeting a few new bloggers! :)  I find someone new to talk to every week! :)  I love a good linky! :)

Random item #1: I have finally figured out how to use photobucket to hyperlink images!!!  I'm like a REAL blogger now, people! :)  If Katie King is still doing her Techy Teacher Tuesday, I plan to link up with her and share how I learned! :)

Random item #2: This week, I rolled out my new Egg-static About Phonics centers to review CVC words and long vowel exceptions.  We've been working on these patterns in class and the students really seemed to enjoy working on these centers.  I was really excited about them because they can last a loooong time and not be switched out! :)  The kids can play multiple times and still get great practice!

 Random item #3:  This week, I taught about landforms.  I got a really cute landform dinosaur from a sweet teacher out of Illinois named Mrs. Castro.  She adapted the idea for her dual language class...from another teacher.  The kids got a chance to make a dinosaur and then label the parts of the dinosaur as if they were actual landforms.  They made some pretty neat connections! :)  It's a FREEBIE!!! :)  Go check out the link! :)

Check out these landform dinosaurs on TPT.  Click here for the link! :)

Random item #4:  We worked on 'Pot of Gold' writing.  This is an idea from Erica Bohrer's St. Patty's pack.  The students wrote about something that was more precious than gold to them.  It was a really great idea for informational writing.  I loved reading them.  I had a student who is an animal LOVER write about his pet hamster that died this week.  He cried on every stage of writing, but was so proud of what he produced.  I was proud of him too...and shed a tear or two myself while reading it!  Good stuff! :)

Random Item #5:  My co-teacher and partner in crime, Daina Roberts loves anything pink or jungle themed. I picked up these pink camo egs and the jungle print eggs at Walmart for her this week!  She was SO EXCITED!!!  Totally random, but totally cool to find something that fits a friend so perfectly.  Now all she has to do is write a lesson plan for us to use with them! :)  I was thinking...Little Grunt and the Big Egg by Tommie De Paola.  We could make volcanoes and teach it as our literary text connection while we're teaching informational texts on landforms.  Welp!  Guess there's the idea, Daina! :)

Have a wonderful weekend!  I'm on Spring Break and SO EXCITED to get a chance to RELAX! :)