Let it snow! PLEASE! :)

I just cannot seem to get back into the groove ever since Christmas break. Partially because we have to do all of our winter testing (no fun). And that full moon that seemed to last ALLLLLL week this past week didn't help either. I am loving the nice weather we are having, but it does NOT feel like January at all. I have secretly been waiting and waiting for some snow days.... but since it doesn't seem like that will happen anytime in the near future, we had a snow unit at school for the past week and a half!

This is a long post! So grab a coffee and enjoy :) 

After reading some books about snowmen, we made this "Snowmen are.." chart. Always good to review adjectives :)

We learned the three states of water by observing the The Life Cycle of a Snowman. Uh, have I mentioned that I. LOVE. PINTEREST?? (this photo is not mine-from Pinterest)

I didn't do it exactly like it says in the link above... I bought Sonic ice and formed a snowman in front of my kids and put him in the skillet immediately. I turned the heat WAY up and we watched and discussed what was happening. Who knew that watching ice melt and turn to steam would be SO. COOL. The kids loooved this activity. Then I had them write what they observed and how the snowman changed. They had to determine if he was a solid, liquid or gas.

We made snowman glyphs one day. The kids had to answer questions such as, "What is your favorite snowy day activity?" "Do you like snow?" etc.

We read

and I had the kids pick any item they wanted to hide in dream snow! They had to draw it, then they got a piece of white paper to tape on top of it. They had to write 5 descriptive sentences about their item that was hidden in the snow. Then they all got up to share, and we all got to guess what was hidden. They did AWESOME! I forgot to photograph my class' writing/pictures, so here is one from Amy's class! So cute!

 It's a horse! Super cute and EASY activity to do :)

We worked on synonyms this week too. I was inspired by Pinterest yet again! We spent a few days discussing synonyms and doing some group activities, then my kiddos used paint chips to come up with three synonyms. We talked about how the words are similar, and the colors on the paint chips are similar. Then I made Synonym Snowflakes to display their work. **NOTE: Do not let your kiddos use black magic marker to write on paint chips. It smudges. Pencil would have worked juuuust fine :) I learned that the hard way!**

For my observation I did a lesson on symmetry. I (bravely) brought my iPad to start the lesson, and the kids were going nuts! :) I showed them photos of real snowflakes and we discussed what they noticed about them, which lead into talk about symmetry. I used the "mirror" in photobooth to show that symmetry is a mirror image, and they thought it was THE. COOLEST. THING. EVER! Then we made Cara's Symmetrical Snowflakes. I just LOVE how they all turned out! :) And they were all different, just like real snowflakes!

I read them a few books about snow and snowflakes and we completed this chart together, and then they did one independently:

The past three days we focused on characters (and how they change), setting, and summarizing the beginning, middle and end of a story. We read

I just love this book, and so do the kids :) We made this anchor chart together after reading the story a couple of times:

At the end of the week, we wrote directions on how to build a snowman, and made snowmen with snow paint. This was my first experience with this stuff (equal parts glue and shaving cream). I don't know if all of my kids put enough of the paint on... I really wasn't sure what to expect!! So we will see what they look like when I go in tomorrow morning :) Yet another learning experience for me!

Not gonna lie, it's gonna be a little hard going back to school tomorrow, but I am excited to teach about tolerance and MLK :) If you read this whole thing, THANK YOU :) Have a great week!