Elements of Fiction & Emojis 🤗 😁 🤓

It's been too long since I've sat down to blog. Sorry, but this thing called life just gets in the way sometimes. Today is "World Emoji Day" 🙂  and I've decided this would be a good day for me to get back to blogging. I would like to share how I used emoji's in my classroom to review the elements of fiction...so here we go.  

One of the first review lessons I teach is over the elements of fiction (character, setting and plot). By the sixth grade most students are very familiar with this basic concepts. So, in effort to spice up the review I turned to emojis (🙂 😉 😌). Instead of having students read and complete some worksheet about the various elements of the story, I had them use emoji's to describe each element.  Take a look at some of the examples below.

Example I shared with students. 

Student Example 1 

Student Example 2

Student Example 3

Each student read the same story, but yet their emoji summary is a little different. We use Seesaw in my class, so each student had to record themselves explaining their emojis and how they relate to the story. I liked this activity because it led us into some interesting discussions about characters, setting and plot. Looking forward to using this lesson again in the upcoming school year. 

  

Happy World Emoji Day! 🙂

Spark Student Motivation: Twelve Nights of Reading

Today, I'm linking up with Head Over Heels For Teaching for her Spark Student Motivation Linky. I'm sharing an idea I started this week in my classroom that will keep students reading up until winter break. 

Just in time to count down the last 12 school nights before winter break, I introduced my students to 12 nights of reading. For 12 nights students are encouraged to read 20 minutes each night. Each day students will receive a different colored reading slip that they use to document their 20 minutes of reading.  Each slip requires parent signature. Slips are returned the following school day for entry into a raffle. Each day their chance for winning a prize increases as the number of prizes being raffled off goes up. 

Our first night was Wednesday night, and I had over half of my students return their slips on Thursday. On Friday, I had even more students return a slip. We are linking all of the slips to track our progress. Students have been very excited about this! Which really makes me happy! I've struggled with getting this group of students reading this year.

Here are some pictures from our first two nights: 

Students have taken over the responsibility of putting the links together. 

After the first night of reading Ms. Roland raffled off 1 bag of popcorn to be popped! Since I teach two ELA classes there's one raffle per class. I even popped the popcorn for them during lunch. 

After the second night of reading Ms. Roland raffled off 2 Skyzone passes. Students were really excited about this prize. 

I can't wait to see how many students remember to read over the weekend. Here is my list of prizes for the rest of this challenge: 

After the...night of reading Ms. Roland raffled off...

...3 ice cream sandwiches 

...4 scholastic books 

...5 candy canes 

...6 lunch passes 

...7  sparkly pencils 

...8 new notebooks  

....9 handy bookmarks 

...10 bulldog bucks 

...11 jolly ranchers 

...12 delicious doughnuts 

This is definitely a new yearly tradition in my classroom.

I hope you have a great couple of weeks before break! 

Sunday Scoop & A First Day Activity

Happy Sunday! Today I'm linking up with Teaching Trio for their Sunday Scoop Linky. 

Here's the Scoop...

Friday was the first day of school, so that means it's back to the normal Sunday routine of lesson planning, laundry, and ironing! Soon I'll add grading and football to my Sunday routine. 

I'm hoping to get back into the habit of walking each evening. I did well the month of June, but then the heat came and I lost all motivation! Yesterday, I walked/ran a pop up 5k put on by Kevin Hart, so I'm feeling a little motivated to get back to my walking routine. I'm known for fixing lunch and leaving it at home. I hoping to do that less and less this year! 

I'm really excited about seeing Frozen on ice Saturday!  

There you have it my Sunday Scoop! 

Now, I want to share a first day activity I did with my students that went really well. It was a KWL chart all about me, Ms.Roland. 

Students used sticky notes for each section. It was a lot of fun (definitely broke the ice)! It's surprising what students already know about you from their older siblings and friends. I answered every question they asked; there were a wide range of them from what is my favorite candy to where did I get my hair done. And in the end they learned a lot about Ms. Roland.  Lots of good conversation...Monday it will be all about them! I'll post about it later in the week. Have a great week!!!

  

Five For Friday: July 31, 2015

Time for another Five For Friday post with Doodle Bugs Teaching. Let the randomness begin...

One of my coworkers sent me this picture  today! WOW!!! A framed picture hanging on the wall at the board office honoring my district teacher of the year (secondary) accomplishment. I had no idea this picture was there. I'm really excited about the opportunities I'll have this school year with this accomplishment. 

The share a Coke Tour stopped in our city this week, and after searching for two summers, I finally have a coke can with my name (and my last name) on it!!! And it didn't cost me a dime. Thank you Coke!  I'm now a happy Coke drinker! 

I enrolled my 3 year old in preschool this week (tear)! He was born at 25 weeks and has come a long way; I can honestly say he is ready for preschool! Three years ago I could not even imagine being here, now he's getting ready to start his school journey, such a bittersweet milestone. 

Only one more Friday left of my summer vacation, so it's time to start thinking, seriously, about back to school. The first task is getting my house in order. For over a year, or more, I've been saying I want to do some MAJOR cleaning. Well I can say that I spent this week doing just that! I've gone through each room (except mine) and done a deep cleaning! I can now lounge around with less guilt about what I should be doing. The plan this weekend is to give my room a good cleaning...so much has got to go!!! 

Finally, I have thought about school a bit. Being in a one-to-one school I have to think about how I'm going to implement the iPad's from day one. We're going to start with using the video camera to create paperslide videos, but from there I've thought about the first app I want them using...a QR code reader is the best way to begin. There are a ton of QR code readers out there, but I like Redlaser. It's simple for students to use. They can scan and create QR codes using this app. I'll have a QR code for them to scan to watch a video all about me. I will them teach them how to create and save a video all about themselves and turn it into a QR code. The QR codes will be hung so students can scan and get to know their classmates. What apps or features do you teach your students to use the first few days of school? 

There you have it my randomness from the week. You can check out more Five for Friday post over at Doodle Bugs teaching. Have a great week! 

Five for Friday: 7-24-15

Happy Friday! I hope everyone has had a great week! It's been a good week for me!!! I'm linking up with Doodles Bugs Teaching for her Five for Friday linky...here we go: 

Nineteen days until I return to work! Such a bittersweet thought. I'm slowly but surely getting into the back to school mood. I'm slowing down my summer... I've had a busy summer and have been on the go a lot. So I'm gong to use these next couple of weeks to slow down... I've started thinking about my classroom and ideas galore! Below are some of my thoughts. 

#I❤️hashtags: I love exploring hashtags, I've come across some really great people and ideas by simply clicking on a hashtag. This week I found a new hashtag on Twitter that I think will go over well in my classroom. I just need to work out a plan on how the use it,  #emojigrading. Using emojis in grading. Has anyone done this? I actually think my students would love the emojis more than letter or percentages. I don't have a plan on what assignments or the best use for them yet, but I'm working on it. 

Ryan Reed (@Ryan7Reed) on Twitter has posted several resources for #emojigrading. He also tweeted the emoji grading translation below. If you're interested in finding out more about #emojigrading I suggest following Ryan and Jon Smith, he began #emojigrading, on Twitter @Ryan7Reed  @theipodteacher  

Movies, I've seen a ton of them this summer! Knowing that movies are a great way to connect with students, I've been thinking about ways to incorporate some of this summer's blockbusters into my classroom. Pixels is one of the movies I anticipate my sixth graders to select as their favorites of the summer. I attended a prescreening earlier this week with my 12 year old nephew and he thought the movie was funny and AWESOME!!! If you're familiar with this age group there isn't a lot they find awesome!  I asked him what made it awesome and his response was the video games were life like and the actors were playing the games. I would have to agree! I also like the use of "old school" games. I was a pretty good gamer back in the 80s:) I just don't get these video games the kids play today, including my nephew. However, I do know it's a great way to connect with students, so I picked up some Pixel posters and plan to use them in my classrom...possibly having a gaming reading section. 

Another movie that I plan on bringing into my classroom this year is the Minions! I personally did not like this movie, but it's appealing to kids especially with all of the merchandise available. While cleaning out some files this summer I found 5 sheets of these stickers...

I'm going to use them to motivate students to read. I plan on selecting a variety of books, from my classroom library, and  placing one of these stickers inside the book. Students will then be encouraged to read the books, write a review and they will earn a minion reward...I've already started collecting the rewards thanks to Target's dollar spot.

This year I'm planning on using paperslide videos. If you aren't familiar with a paperslide videos take a look at this video created by Lodge McCammon. He was our convocation speaker last year and introduced us to paperslide videos. I didn't use them last year, honestly I'd forgotten about them until I saw another presentation on them last week at Podstock, an edtech conference. On the first day of school students will create an "All About Me" paperslide video. Take a look at my example: 

There you have it my Five for Friday! Have a great weekend and an even better week! See you next Friday. 

Five for Friday: July 3, 2015

Happy Fourth of July Weekend!!!  I'm linking up with Doodle Bugs Teaching for Five for Friday. Is it me or did this week zip by quickly!? Check out my randomness from the week: 

I did it! I've finally signed up to sell products on TPT...Yay me! Now I just need some help getting started. What TPT tips do you have for this newbie? Anyone willing to mentor me in this new adventure? How did you get started? What as your first product? HELP!!! I have so many questions...I hope to have 1 or 2 freebies up before I return to work.

Wednesday we had some VERY severe weather in our area! In Fact, a tornado touched down minutes from my house! Luckily, I was not home and had just moved out of the path of the tornado as I arrived at the movie theater! Unfortunately, we were too late to the movie screening of The Gallows and had to hang out at the theater until all was clear. We did receive passes to attend another prescreening on Tuesday of next week. When all was clear we headed home and I saw a lovely  rainbow! It has been a long time since I've seen an actual rainbow in the sky, I was pretty excited. 

Summer just wouldn't be summer without a visit to a zoo. My son and I headed out early Thursday morning to the zoo, and I must say being there early in the day was a nice treat. I was able to have some one-on-one conversation with some of the zookeepers. My favorite was at the penguin exhibit. We've visited this exhibit several times, but have never visited with the zookeepers about these lovely animals! Some interesting facts I learned about penguins is that they molt about every ten months, and they're fed 3 different types of fish a day. 

My son and I also had a bit of a (map) scavenger hunt. He had a zoo map and I asked him what animal he saw on the map then we set out to find it. This lasted for about 5 animals and was a fun beginning map skills activity for a toddler.  This was an impromptu activity, but one that we could/ should repeat again. 

A penguin molting

The ISTE conference was held this week!  I was at home and not at the conference but thanks to a new app, Periscope, I felt as though I was there. Periscope is a live streaming app. Several people I follow on twitter were at ISTE and lived streamed their experiences several times throughout the conference.  I was able to take notes and actually learned a few new things even though I was not at the conference. I'm hoping I can find a few people that will be live streaming their TPT Vegas experience next week. So sad I can't be there. I am going to a conference in a couple of weeks...more about that later. 

Periscope app icon 

It's my Blogoversary tomorrow, July 4th! Three years ago I decided to start this blog and it's been slow going ever since, but I've meet some wonderful bloggers, and have built my PLN tremendously which is what I set out to do. To celebrate I'm having my very first give away! Enter for a chance to win a $15 gift card. Don't forget to stop by and check out other Five for Fridays! 

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Five for Friday: Birthday Week 2015

Hello! I'm taking some time today to link up with Doodle Bugs Teaching, for her Five for Friday linky. Trying to get my blogging groove back.

Our summer theme this year is "Summer of the Parks!" I've taken a step back from the traditional 'Summer Bucket List ' and we're visiting a new (different) park in the city each week. This week we found a park with a rocking school bus and all he wanted to do was drive the bus.

Tuesday was my birthday! I had a painting party...these places are popping up all around town. It was everyone's first time and we had a GREAT time!!! Our paintings turned out pretty cute as well, and I'm no artist. It was a real "Royal" celebration!!!

Also on my birthday I visited a new vintage arcade in our area and recevied some free tokens, sixty  tokens to be exact. All games are just 1 token...I'm telling you I felt like a kid at Chuck E. Cheese! Super Mario Brothers, Dig Dug, Donkey Kong, Ms. Pac Man were just a few of the games I played before heading to my painting party. Since I didn't use very many of the tokens, I'm going back tomorrow night to wrap up my birthday week. What's your favorite video game? 

I LOVE summer because you get to do absolutely nothing and don't have to feel guilty about it. Wednesday we just hung out on the couch and watched Netflix. My little one didn't even want to go any where, and I was totally OK with that! 

As I continue to celebrate my birthday week,  I had a chance to attend a prescreening of Magic Mike XXL. It was AWESOME!!! I loved watching Channing Tatum! Great girls night out movie! 

Check out more "Five for Friday" post here or link up your own.