Five for Friday: Weather

Have you had a busy week? 

I sure have but in between Picture day, Easter chapel, a fire drill, and a surprise birthday treat for my teaching assistant...we still found plenty of time to study the weather !


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We made Weather Wheels to kick off the learning.  I'm always pleasantly reminded how the simplest crafts turn into everyone's favorite activity!  The kids took these home but everyday since then, they've told me where they moved their clothespin clip and what kind of weather we're having.  

 

 

Weather Wheel supplies ...

1. cheap white paper plate
2. small length of yarn
3. hole punch
4. clothespin
5. crayons

Now if those Weather Wheels were one of the simplest crafts...then our Weather Mobiles were one of the most time-consuming and tedious things we've done all year!  Well, it really wasn't necessarily that way for the kids but it sure felt like it was for ME !  Each child made five weather pieces for their mobile...two watercolored raindrops, a glittery sunshine, one big puffy cloud, and a snowflake circle.   Everything needed lots of overnight drying time but I punched a hole in each weathery item and then laced a length of rainbow yarn after school.  The next morning, I tied all the weather pieces on wire hangers.  Took awhile to tie all those knots.

 

I must admit the Weather Mobiles look absolutely gorgeous hanging in our classroom and they were certainly worth the effort!  It was challenging to snap a photo before the mobile  moved and turned so it's hard to see the full effect.  But the kids oohed & aahed when they saw them giving me their seal of approval and they've already asked when they can make another mobile!

 

 

We read numerous non-fiction weather books throughout the week but I had to include the funny story Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs, too.  The kids laughed & laughed as they created pages for our silly class book. 



Today it is cloudy with a chance of peanuts.

(I think that's due to our recent study of Georgia!)

 

 

Today it is cloudy with a chance of donuts.

 

 

Today it is cloudy with a chance of popcorn.

 

 

 

I've been working on my spring assessments and wanted an incentive to motivate my Young 5's to master our sight word list.  Frankly, I believe that each and every word they can read from our Word Wall gives them a huge head start when they go to Kindergarten in the fall.  But since many students are so very close to reading the entire list,  I came up with a fun sticker chart to encourage them to practice their words and achieve 100% mastery.   

 

I already had a package of reward/incentive charts with a fun Popcorn theme.  These charts go along perfectly with our class Popcorn Word Wall!  Once my little learners  read a word, they'll put a cute popcorn sticker on the chart.  I know they'll be quite excited to fill their charts!

 

 

The sweetie pictured in the middle was my student last year and is an awesome reader.  Her sister (on the left) is in this year's class and is well on her way to reading adventures, too.  As I was chatting with their mom after school one day, we realized how quiet & still the room had gotten.  My little reader held quite a captive audience as she made her way, page by page, through one of our more advanced Weather books.  So proud of all my young readers!