March in Action

I am giving myself the award for the World's Worst Blogger! Y'all don't even know how many posts I have in draft :) Seriously adding the third kid to the mix, made my evenings SO crazy!

So here is March is super speed before the baby finds the cords now that he is full on crawling!

Library Lion was a HUGE hit with my kids. We have become such a fan of Rooted in Reading. It has enough routine for them not to be too thrown off, with enough variety to keep them excited!

We have taken the time in our writing to do quite a bit of "proving" based on the text. The kids know that Mrs. King will ALWAYS ask, "How do you know that?" or "Why?"

The crafts that Amy makes keep them so engaged that they don't even realize I am challenging them in their responses to reading. Which brings up a good point! I am a writer's workshop teacher through and through. That time is completely separate for me. I think responding to reading is obviously extremely important, but so is workshop so I keep both of these kinds of writing in my day, every day!

I texted Amy the other day and told her that the grammar focus in these units has kept me SO much more organized than I have ever been before! And that Lion non-fiction reader? It is still floating around my room, because the kids love it so much!

After Library Lion we headed straight into Jane Goodall and the amazing book Me...Jane. Y'all I haven't gotten through that text once without crying! To see someone's childhood dream realized the way that this book shows....just amazing! Here is a picture of the books that I used during several different times throughout the day. Amy and I are working on a list of supplemental texts to pair with Rooted in Reading, but that won't be ready until this summer!

In addition to being the worst blogger, I am also terrible at remembering to take pictures too! Katie over at The Homeschool Style on instagram does an amazing job documenting her use of RIR with her son so I snagged one of her beautiful pictures! Everything you see in this picture content-wise if from our unit!

On Fridays I like to change up math and science a little bit. A lot of times that looks like a STEM project. I had a parent help me out hugely this week by completely coming up with our project. I told her my kids were fascinated with the idea that chimpanzees can use tools and that shattered our idea of what makes people "humans." That is before Jane Goodall! So she brought in tupperware, paperclips, straws, notecards, string, popsicle sticks, and bouncy balls. All materials that I would have had in my classroom too. She told the kids that they had to design a tool to get the balls out of the tupperware, without their hands going into the tub. Y'all they worked for an HOUR on this. They were so engaged, so competitive, and so everything. I almost can't even articulate how awesome it is to see kids use their science vocabulary to solve a problem.

Afterwards my super mom and I explained to the kids how important it is in today's job market to be problem solvers! How STEM challenges push them to work together and communicate.

Here is a picture of my winning team that got the ball out after 53 minutes!

Here is a quick picture of my hallway with our chimpanzee writing!

Phew on to week 3... That's What Leprechauns Do! Our grammar skill this week has been collective nouns. My kids have thoroughly enjoyed this skill and the activities!

I love the next little girl's writing because I felt like I could see her love of reading coming out in her writing when she talked about the pack of wolves racing like the wind! That is the world's best feeling- to see a child's love of reading coming through in their writing!

And last but not least, check out this ADORABLE Leprechaun from the pack. This little girl's mother is from England, hence the "cheeky" little green guy :).