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Monday 31 August 2015

RIC surprise!

A couple of weeks ago I received these books in the mail from RIC Publications





The exciting thing about these books is that they are all related to the Australian Curriculum, which really makes them easy to fit in with your planning.

So if you are not an Aussie teacher I will apologise in advance as some of this may not apply to you, I will also forgive you for not reading any further :)

If you are a long time reader then you will know I teach Grade 2 and Grade 3 this year so I was so excited to see both Grade levels in this little surprise.

Let me say that I have been struggling with teaching an area of Geography in Grade 3, the standard that talks about the feelings people have about places and this book just rescued me.  Seriously it has everything I will need including web links, blackline masters, background information and extension activities or further studies.  Last week we looked at the poem by Dorothea MacKellar, "My Country" and I was able to use so many ideas from the book, even better so many of my kids were able to dig quite deeply in to the poem and understand how she felt about Australia.  I really loved it and we will definitely be using this book for the rest of this term and going into next term.

I actually used some of the Poems for Grade 3-4 with my Grade 2's last week as well.  I did have to adjust the activity a little but they were still able to complete the task without any problems.  We looked at Onomatopeia in poems and they created one for themselves.

I haven't had an opportunity to use the Grade 2 History book yet but my teaching partners were oohing and aahing and already making plans for next year.

Let me show you just a quick peek inside so you can see what I mean.


You can see that these books are more than just BLM's, I love that there are links and further information.

If you want to check out some of their other Australian Curriculum resources just head over to their website here


Disclosure: These books were provided for an unbiased review.

Sunday 23 August 2015

Bright Ideas- Student Timelines

Welcome back for another Bright Idea for the classroom!  Today I am going to share how I use timelines in the classroom.



We have come to the time of year when we are looking at time and timelines, this is something we cover both in Mats and History.  

I really think it is important to get kiddos up and moving during learning activities to help them.  For our first timeline I got the kiddos to write their birthdays on a card and then I taped it onto their shirts.  They had to then get in order from youngest to oldest without any assistance from me.  It was great to see how they worked together to make sure everyone was in the correct place.  This was when we were working on calendars in Maths and on our personal histories.
There was so much discussion about how many days, weeks and months were between people's birthdays and how long between our oldest student and our youngest.  So much Maths!!!!




Our next timeline adventure was using clocks!  Students were given an analogue clock and they had to write an o'clock, half past, quarter past or quarter to.  They then had to get in order from earliest to latest time, again I didn't intervene but just listened to the discussions about time.  We then had to make sure we didn't have any double ups and the students decided who would change times and what that would be.  

We then followed that up with a discussion about AM and PM and how we would need to write that on the time to ensure it was in correct order.

This is just 2 ways I have used student timelines in the classroom in just the last couple of weeks, there are so many other ways you could use this!  The hardest part is standing back and letting them put themselves in order but you need to remember that right there is your teaching moment and instead of correcting THEM, ask them to justify why it is correct/incorrect.

I hope this has given you a couple of ideas to use student timelines in your classroom, to make sure you don't miss any other Bright Ideas make sure you follow me on Instagram or Facebook.

Now just click on the links below to see what some other fab teacher bloggers have to share with you!



Monday 10 August 2015

Healthy Eats for Teachers linky


I took last week off from all technology as it was my birthday and I spent time with my family.  I am back though with another week of meal prep and recipes for the busy working week :) Make sure you download the prep and recipes for this week via the link below.

This weeks recipes and meal prep can all be down loaded by clicking here.  

Hi All! Welcome for another delicious recipe!  Today's recipe will make you feel like you are eating something naughty but it is certainly a lot healthier than take away chicken that is deep fried. This meal is a regular in our household and there is rarely left overs, our plates often look like a chicken graveyard at the end of the meal.  If you don't like chicken wings you can make this with drumsticks or other cuts of the chicken, you may have to adjust the cooking time.

Crispy Baked Chicken Wings (serves 4)

Ingredients

1.5 kg of chicken wings
1 cup plain flour
1 Tbspn of smoked paprika
1 tspn of garlic powder
1 tspn of onion powder
1 Tbspn of dried oregano
(If you live in Australia you can buy Smoky Barbecue Seasoning and substitute this for the paprika, garlic and onion powder)

Preheat oven to 180 C

Combine the flour and spices in a plastic freezer bag or in a large mixing bowl.  Shake the chicken wings in the flour and then place on to a lined baking tray (for easy cleaning), discard the flour mixture.  Spread the wings out so they have some space between them, you may need two trays.  Bake for 25 minutes, turn and bake for another 15 minutes.  Turn the oven up to 200 C and blast those wings for about 10 minutes to get super crispy.

Serve with a salad or mixed steamed vegetables. 


Now it is your turn to link up with any quick, healthy recipes you have.  Use the button above and ink up a blog post, Pinterest pin or Instagram post.





Sunday 9 August 2015

Five for Frunday

Yay for Five for Friday!  Well I am a bit late this week as I have had a busy week. Head over to Doodlebugs to link up as well!








I had a birthday last week and I took the weekend off the computer and spent some quality time with my family :) We had a lovely lunch at one of our local restaurants and I was surprised with this delicious chocolate cake for dessert.  I also went out for a High Tea with some friends the next day, so lovely.  Overall it was a great birthday and although I didn't get the palm tree that I asked for :) I did get a lovely gold necklace and I was blessed with my gorgeous family around me.





It snowed down to sea level in our city this week!  We regularly get snow on the mountain here (sometimes even in Summer!) but the last time it snowed down to sea level was in 1986 so this is a pretty rare occurrence.  Our dogs weren't really too sure about it, but the kids were excited.




I spent up BIG during the Back to School Sale on TpT this week and used this Picture of the Day inferring packet from Hello Literacy with my Year 3's.  I loved it, they loved it, we all loved it.  I think it is really going to get them using more descriptive language in their writing and dig deeper when they are observing and inferring



 We went out for a yummy Italian meal this week and I swear it was the BEST gnocchi I have ever tasted, just melt in your mouth.  Oh and that is not a weird smile I am doing I was actually eating when my husband too that pic, although it does make me look a bit smug, hmmm.



I am getting ready for my next Healthy Eats for Teachers linky so make sure you check back tomorrow to link up with your yummy, healthy recipes!  Click on the pic to see the previous post and linky






Thursday 6 August 2015

Amazing First and Second Grade Educents Deal!



Many of us are in back to school mode already!

So some friends and I have teamed up to load you up with resources to make teaching a bit easier!  

You will get 72% off First and Second Grade Curriculum. 16 instant downloads with 682 pages of materials including interactive notebooks, craftivities, centers, printables, and more!  




Stock up on curriculum that you need! This download includes 682 pages of materials covering everything from reading to math and even some great science too!

Full retail value of $71.98 and only available for a limited time.  $19.99 which is 72% off!  

Extreme value alert!

Includes 19 instant downloads and materials including printables, lap book, reading curriculum, easy to play games, and much, much more.

Academic Concepts Covered
nouns
decoding
addition with regrouping
geometry
adjectives
comprehension
spelling
and more!


You get 16 great products in this bundle and two of those are from me!  From me you will receive: 
   
2D Shapes
* Posters for display
* Trace, cut and paste sheets (no prep)
* Find and Color work sheets (no prep)
* Clip and Flip- self correcting cards that help students identify the attributes of a 2D shape.


Blends No Prep Pack
This pack includes sooo many fun activities for teaching blends and digraphs!
* Posters for digraph and l, s and r controlled blends
* Fold and Flip interactive activity using both sounds and pictures
* Sort blends and add to your list
* Read it, Highlight it, Write it- students read the words, highlight the blend and write a sentence for each word
* Fill in the blanks to identify the correct blend
* Spin it, Say it, Write it- interactive individual or partner game
* Flip Flaps interactive activity using both sounds and pictures.



But that's not all!  Check out what else you get:
















72% off and only for a limited time!  
Head on over to Educents to stock up for your first or second grade year!