SIX for Friday {May 9}

It's Friday!  Hip, hip hooray!  And time for Doodlebugs' "Five for Friday"!

Remember last week when I only had THREE for Friday, and I posted it on Saturday?

Well, this week I am back to posting on Friday, but I have SIX!  Hope you don't mind!  Ha!  Lots and lots going on in Kindergarten these days!

1. We're headed on a field trip next week to a local farm and we're busy getting ready!  Research and crafting!  So far....pigs and sheep!

I found these farm animal templates and the writing pages for free HERE.

2. I enjoyed spoiling my own kids' teachers this week for teacher appreciation week!  I love sending a small gift for them every day.  I had a student so that for me one year and I thought it was SO thoughtful!  

One of my sweet kiddos brought me this gift on Wednesday --  all of my favorites!  A GREEN cup filled with GUMMI BEARS, and a bowl full of delicious RASPBERRIES.  I loved this special gift!

 3. I had a new student join my class a few weeks ago.  I was checking his paper the other day and he asked me to add a word to the top.  When I asked him which word he wanted, he said "Happy!"....I thought that was sweet!

4. We have moved into our final science unit -- living and non-living.  This week we took a science nature walk outside and looked for living and non-living things.  We made this list when we came back in.

 And then we completed this science journal page.  These come with our science curriculum.

5. I was so excited to come home from school the other day and see a box from Lakeshore Learning on my doorstep.  These cuties were inside!  Lakeshore's math manipulatives are awesome!  So colorful and durable!  

 It's the perfect time of year to introduce a new manipulative and re-energize the kidlets as we wrap up our final weeks of Kindergarten.  I know that they will flip over these!  I can't wait to introduce them next week!

6. We whipped up fun and easy handprint gardens for our moms for Mother's Day.  The kids did a great job -- they turned out really cute!  What mom doesn't LOVE anything with a precious little handprint???  

Happy weekend, friends!!!

Five for Friday {May 31}

Well, I'm a day late, but I still wanted to share my FIVE for the week!  We are down to 3 days left, and life at school is b-u-s-y!  Lots of fun, a little bit of fighting (some of my sweeties just need a break from each other!!), and some great learning is still happening.

Here's what went on this week!

1.  The end of the year means loads of assessments!  The kiddos got comfy to complete their final writing assessments of the year.  So proud of my talented writers!!

2. WORMS!!  I LOVE teaching worms at the end of the school year.  The kids are CRAZY about the squirmy worms.  So much fun.  I took an idea from my bloggy friend, Nicole, and had them feel cooked spaghetti noodles without looking and then guess what they were feeling.  Lots of great predictions and a really fun way to introduce our worm study!

Eeeeee!  The worms!  We all LOVE them!!!  After lots of discussion about how to care for our worms respectfully, we enjoyed an abundance of time with them this week.  

3. The balloon-popping has been an absolute riot.  My students come in EVERY day soooooo excited to see what the activity or special treat for that day will be!  And then to hear their little conversations like "Pick your own seat day has been soooo fun!  Better than bubble gum day even!!" and "Every day gets more and more fun!!".  Makes my teacher heart feel all warm and fuzzy!  A couple of the fun things we did this week were:

Smelly Marker Hand Shapes

I have a "Star of the Day" program in my classroom.  Every day, the STAR gets to choose a Mr. Sketch scented marker and I draw a star on their hand.  The kids loooove this, so on this particular day everyone got to choose a color and special shape for their hand.

Sidewalk Chalk Party

We enjoyed this special activity with our 4th grade reading buddies during our last time together.  The sidewalk in front of our school looked so bright and colorful when we were done!

4. We took one final field trip for the year to the Outdoor Discovery Center near our school.  Outdoors + animals + a smart guide that shared LOTS of fun facts = an awesome way to spend one of our final afternoons together! 

 5. The town I grew up in hosts a 5k race each Spring to benefit the American Cancer Society.  I decided not to run it this year, but my son wanted to sign up for the 1-mile fun run.  A few minutes before race time, he was so excited to see his teacher show up to cheer him on!  What an awesome teacher he's been blessed with this year.

He ended up coming in 2nd place for his age group.  Way to go, Trey!  You persevered and met your goal!  We're so proud of you!!

  

One more weekend of report cards and schoolwork... I think I can, I think I can!

Five for Friday {May 24}

Thank goodness for Kacey's Five for Friday link-up or I might never update the blog in May!  'Tis the season for late nights and no free time!  8 more days of school here and I've been throwing myself a pathetic pity party all week because my hard drive crashed on Monday night and I have been without a computer all week.  BOO!  I think that they (the techy, waaaaay-smarter-than-me guys for my school district) were able to save everything from my computer, but I've been on a loaner machine all week with just the very basics and (GASP!!) NO cute fonts.  Not a single DJ or Rowdy font to be found, which is just about too much for me to handle.  I'm pretty sure that my co-workers have had enough of my whining and complaining, but I will be sooooo happy to have my computer back in my hands again next week!

Anyway...onto the fun of my week!  We have been busily wrapping up our school year!

1. We took a field trip on Tuesday to a local farm called the Critter Barn.  I have taken my students on this trip for the past several years and they LOVE it.  The baby animals are soooo sweet and the day (although a bit smelly) is always a super fun experience for the kids.  Plus, this year, we were sure we were going to get rained on all day long, but NO!  It was sunny and GORGEOUS!  A perfect day!

Serenity loved the ducks...

...Seth loved the bag swings...

...and Keagan loved the peacock.

Isn't his drawing so sweet?  He's taking a picture of the peacock. :)  There was LOTS of picture-taking on our field trip!

2. Wednesday marked 10 days of school left for us.  I have had an idea stored away in my mind since last Spring (Thank you, Pinterest).  I knew that I wanted to CELEBRATE our final 10 days this year, so I printed off some fun activities and grabbed some balloons.

I stuffed the slips of paper into the balloons and hung them from the ceiling.

We've popped a balloon each day.  We're having so much FUN!!

 

I plan to do another post listing all of the things we're doing.

3. Oh. my. goodness.  We've been working on writing letters during our writing workshop time.  This is the sweetest letter ever that one of my students wrote to another student this week.

 Dear Thomas, I wish you were my brother.  You would be a great brother.  You are soooo kind.  Love, Emily

This next one made me smile for a couple of reasons.  He was the first person to think of writing a letter to ME!

 Dear Mrs. Sloothaak, You do hard work to make fun thongs (ahem...things) for us.  Love, Thomas

He wrote thongs instead of things!  hee hee

But still, so sweet.  I love Kindergarteners.

 4.  We've been discussing habitats and animal characteristics in Science.  Today, the students got to make animals out of clay.  Melt my heart...they were SO cute.  Not to mention that the clay kept them engaged and calm for close to 30 minutes.  A PERFECT end-of-May science lesson.

 Mama and baby penguin

 Black widow

Elephant

5. Not school-related at all....my new TOMS!  Happy Mother's Day to me!!  I love TOMS and these are super duper adorable and OH so comfy!!!

Happy holiday weekend to you!!