Day 5: Teachers and Paraprofessionals

Whew! We made it through a very exciting and fun filled week! I know that the children are itching to be at home with their families, patiently awaiting the arrival of one of their favorite people! To wrap up our week of random acts of Christmas kindness, we made thank you cards for each teacher and paraprofessional in our school! Each student was in charge of making one thank you card and attaching our "rack'd" letter as well as a candy cane to the care package. Two second grade elves helped me to deliver all of the beautiful card to the faculty mailboxes. I apologize, but with the extremely busy day we had today, I completely forgot to take pictures of the elves in action today! I promise that once again they were excited to be doing something special for other people, and the cards that they made were just amazing! I hope that the faculty of Hartland School know just how much the second grade and I appreciate each and every one of them!

As I final note, I am attaching my bi-weekly newsletter. It describes all of this weeks' acts of kindness, as well as includes a little plug for my website :) Please feel free to check it out when you a get a chance. Now I am off to start baking for the annual Forler/Swanson Christmas Eve party. I wish all of my students and their families a safe and relaxing break! Be sure to squeeze your loved ones a little tighter tonight and let them know just how much you appreciate them!

Weeks 16 & 17 Newsletter

Day 4: Superintendent, Principal & Nurse

Here we are at Thursday, and that means another act of random kindness! Today the second graders and I recognized Dr. Fish, our school superintendent, Ms. Hollingsworth, our school principal, and Mrs. Casey, our school nurse. We had a difficult time deciding what to offer as our act of kindness, but we finally decided upon a bag of trail mix. Once again, I provided all of the essentials (granola, chocolate chips. peanuts, raisins, and craisins), and my little elves went to work! They filled the bags will all of the goodies, and when the bags were ready, we attached our "rack'd" letter and off they went!

Although Dr. Fish and Ms. Hollingsworth were in a meeting, I hope that they were still able to enjoy our treat! Mrs. Casey was very grateful for a healthy treat at this time of the year!

Now I'm off to plan for our biggest act of kindness yet: all of the teachers and paraprofessionals in our building! Yikes!

Day #3: Specials Teachers

Welcome to Wednesday! As we continue our theme of Random Acts of Christmas Kindness, the kids were very excited to find out that today we would be honoring our four specials teachers: gym, music, art, and library. These four educators are absolutely amazing with all that they do in the one or two periods that they have the children each week. Recognizing them for their greatness has been long overdue! The children chose to deliver a bag of popcorn along with a handmade card to each of these teachers. Here they are hard at work decorating and writing out those thoughtful cards!

Finally when all of the gifts and cards were ready, the second grade elves were eager to deliver them! I hope that all four of the teachers felt the kindness that is simply radiating from Room 3!

Day #2: Janitors!

Hello! The second graders and I are continuing our acts of kindness around the school, and today we focused on the janitors. The kids decided that they wanted to decorate cookies, so I brought in the sugar cookies and supplies, and my little elves went to work! Pictured here is just some of the hard work!

Once the cookies were done, we put them on two separate plates for our two wonderful janitors. I asked for volunteers to deliver the goodies, along with our "rack'd" letter. Here they are right before being delivered! This time the recipients had no idea where their sweet treat came from, and the kids were very excited about this! I think that they felt very sneaky, and I am hoping that they felt a great sense of pride in themselves for participating in such a kind act!

Random Acts of Christmas Kindness

In lieu of everything that has happened in Newtown and as a tribute to the 26 precious lives that were taken from this earth, the second graders and I have decided to participate in an abbreviated version of the 25 days of Random Acts of Christmas Kindness (RACK). Our acts of kindness will be delivered on each day of this school week, for 5 days total. The second graders and I discussed how there are many people who work seamlessly together to keep our school operating efficiently and safely. It is the perfect time of the year to thank these people for all that they do, and to recognize them for the amazing people that they are.

On the first day, Monday, December 17, we decided to"RACK" the four amazing ladies in the school office. I had brewed four cups of water earlier in the morning, and the four student elves for today's act, stirred in some yummy hot chocolate mix. Each student elf was in charge of delivering one cup of steaming hot chocolate, along with our "RACK'd" letter (pictured below) to one of the four ladies in the office. The kids were extremely excited about this act, and the response from the recipients was very appreciative. Mission accomplished!

I will continue to talk with the students about how acts of kindness make our world a better place. Simple things such as holding a door open for someone, helping someone find their way when they are lost, or smiling and saying hello to a stranger can make a single person's day. Who even knows if that one action will set in motion another act of kindness, and then another, and another. Instilling these values and ideas in my kiddos will be a continued goal of mine for the remainder of the year! Now on to planning for Tuesday's random act of kindness: janitor edition! 

Day of Silence

T.G.I.F.

Here we are at the weekend already! It has been a fun filled week in Room 3 and as we get closer to the holidays, I'm sure the excitement of the children will continue to grow. Attached to this link is the class newsletter for weeks #14 and 15. Enjoy and talk to you again on Monday!

Weeks 14 & 15 Newsletter

Secret Writing...Come Alive!

I had my master's class this evening, and it was extremely enlightening. We presented all of our hard work from throughout the semester and it was so refreshing to see all of the great, creative ideas for projects and activities that people were able to come up with. The assignment was this: conduct a science experiment with your class and then research how a science fair works in your school. Not so difficult right? Well the kids and I put together a great experiment about invisible writing. The kids really wanted to know what was the best way to send secret notes to their friends and so the experiment began! We tested five different methods: white crayon, lemon juice, milk, corn starch, and baking powder. The kids predicted that the milk would prove to be the best material to compose a secret message with.

Lemon Juice Group

Corn Starch Group

Baking Soda Group

White Crayon Group

Milk Group

The kids composed their secret messages and then set them on the windowsill to dry. Although it was torturous, we waited one whole hour before attempting to reveal our messages. This time around the children chose a different message to reveal than the one they had originally created. Each group was given an item to help them in revealing their messages. The lemon juice and milk groups used the heat from a light bulb, the white crayon group used a highlighter, the corn starch group used iodine, and finally the baking powder group used grape juice. I wonder which method worked the best???

Baking Soda with Grape Juice

White Crayon with Highlighter

Corn Starch with Iodine

Milk with Heat

Lemon Juice with Heat

And the winner is....white crayon with highlighter! The kids were a little disappointed that none of the other methods were successful and that their hypothesis was incorrect, but overall it was an extremely fun experiment to do together!

Little Bird Tales

After a wonderful recommendation from a fellow classmate in my master's class, I found the Little Bird Tales website. It is an interactive website that allows you to create your own online storybook. Since the second graders and I are wrapping up a science unit on plants, I decided that this would be a great project from them to complete in order to show all that they had learned. Each student contributed one page to the book and then they even had the opportunity to record their voice as the narration on the page. They were extremely excited about this, and everyday wondered who was going to be the next to record their voice! I was extremely impressed with how easy the website was to use, and how simple the whole book making process was. I scanned in the students' pages individually and then added their voice recordings right to their own page. It was a huge success! Each parent received the link to access the storybook, and I got some pretty positive feedback in return! I would absolutely recommend this website to other teachers, and I know that I will certainly be using it again the near future!

Little Bird Tales - All About Plants