As February ends.....

My camera is not the greatest, but the pictures do give you the

idea of how much the students like Flashlight Friday.

It's like they are getting away with something....

Do you remember taking a flashlight and hiding under the covers

so that your parents wouldn't know that you were reading?

That's what it is like in the classroom....

It's so lovely to watch the kiddos fully immersed in their books!

An even more engaging activity was taking Fruit Loop cereal

and laying out enough to cover 100 circles,

then stringing those cereal circles onto a ribbon,

to make a necklace.

They were so happy to do this (and there was the added

bonus of having to count to 100 AND work those little fine 

motor muscles at the same time!)

Outside in our hallway over the coat cubbies, are the students'

writing about what they could not do on the first day of school

that they can now do on the 100th day of school.

HOORAY!

We are really focusing on putting small groups together,

or taking a large group and making it into two smaller groups.

These plastic plates are helping the students think of those numbers 

as part-part-whole.

They worked on telling stories about the numbers on their own first,

and then sharing their stories with another student in the room.

It might have sounded like this:

I have seven Santas.  My mom has three Santas. 

(there would be 3 and 7 in the smaller compartments of the plate)

When you put seven and three together, there are 10 Santas.

(the two groups would be moved into the larger compartment,

to show the whole number)

Shrove Tuesday!

Thanks to the wonderful mommy who came in and made these delicious

pancakes for us.  (AND AN EXTRA BIG  THANK YOU TO THE

PARENTS WHO OWN HEADQUARTERS RESTAURANT FOR  

MIXING UP AND DONATING THE BATTER TO OUR SCHOOL!

Here's what 100 little pancakes look like!

Our question to answer was 

"Can a Grade One class eat 100 pancakes?"

The answer was "Absolutely!!"

We asked that question because the wolf tries to fatten up the 

chicken for his stew by leaving her 100 pancakes, 100 donuts, 

and a 100 lb. cake on her porch.

The students paired up and read this shortened 'rebus' version

of the story.

After recess, the students went on a hunt to find the 100 chicks from the

story that were hiding around the classroom.  The real challenge was to

put those little chicks onto the 100 board when there were no numbers on the board.

I was really impressed with their thinking.  I heard these great conversations:

I put the 45 there because I saw 40 at the end, and then I counted these empty boxes

41, 42, 43, 44 so I knew that the 45 needed to go here.

I put 67 here because I know you count like this:  65, 66 and next would be 67.

I put 21 here because you count down like this:  1, then 11 and then it would be 21.

All those mornings at Calendar work is paying off!!

100th Day of School

We started our day with a fashion show.

We used our hallway stools to create a runway and

talked about how to walk with confidence.

At the end, each student got to pose for a picture.

What a wonderful shirt!  I loved the tally marks on the hockey sticks.

I can't remember exactly what it said on front but it might have been something like

" I crushed the first 100 days of school!"

Too cool!

I don't know how this little girl got one hundred photos

of herself onto this shirt, but I was super impressed with

the creativity.

I knew what this little guy was going to wear before I

saw him.  His sister was so proud of her brother that

she came and told me all about it before school started.

He is a 'bright' little boy!

Look at this confidence!  She is so proud of her pom pom shirt.

She told me that she chose where mama was going to glue each

one on.  I hope that you all enjoyed working with your child

 to make this memory!

 Here's the kings and queens of the day!  They have learned so much.  As them how to count to 100 in a different way than by 1's!

Challenging activities included writing one hundred words....

doing a scavenger hunt around the room and by highlighting 

the numbers that were found, in the colours of purple and pink 

(you can see them in the background), the students found the

surprise....the correct answers create the number 100...

and writing their name over and over again in 100 squares, colouring

each letter a different colour to create a special name pattern.

Look at this proud little one.....she can write (and read) 100 words!

One Hundred Days Smarter!

Tuesday may have been the official 100th day of school this year, but we have kept busy doing great learning activities for the last three days!

Our favourite principal came down to our class to see what all the fuss was about!

The parents outdid themselves as they helped their shining stars get a t-shirt together to wear to our 'fashion show' where the models were my little kiddos....THANKS PARENTS!

So creative....

They loved being the centre of attention!

We read, and coloured, and counted, and helped and enjoyed so many different centres!

Every student was engaged with their learning!

They all loved building with 100 tiny red Solo cups and were proud when it stood up tall.

One centre was about creating a pizza graph,

and another challenged the students to print 100 words!

There were dice games,

Lego building,

and everyone got to make a 100 Fruit Loop necklace!

They were a hit!

There was also a scavenger hunt around the room, looking for all 100 number cards

and filling in the chart to reveal a little surprise!

The students wrote about what they could not do on the first day of school and what they can now do, 100 days later.  They were very proud of their accomplishments and....

I hope you are too!