Cristina's Birthday from way back in March

It's quite late, but here is Cristina's birthday pics.

Cristina decided that she didn't want a party this year. She wanted to go to Rain Forest Cafe. We let her invite two friends, but the big problem with a birthday over spring break is that everyone is busy. So it was just the four of us for lunch.

Before we left she opened her pile of presents. 

She wanted the Poly Pockets that attached to the wall. She already had a few of the smaller pieces.

We got her several more.

She has continued to add to her collection since her birthday. My favorite thing about it is no toys end up on the floor so there is no clean up involved. We have a small table that we keep next to the wall where she can put the small pieces that move around, but other than that it all stays on the wall. Another plus is no other storage place is required. Once we found the wall space for it we didn't need a shelf or cabinet to store it in.

 The main thing Cristina wanted was the chocolate volcano dessert. Last time we were here she saw someone else get it. She couldn't wait to get it herself. Victoria enjoyed the Wiki sticks. 

Cristina's favorite part of her birthday was getting sang to. The waiters at Rain forest Cafe sang to her, then the workers at Build-a-Bear sang to her. She is every bit of an extrovert that I am an introvert. 

The Bombardment of an Introvert

    I am an introvert. My favorite things to do are stay at home with my family and read books on my kindle. In general I don't like people. It is really hard to find people that I feel comfortable with. Kids I like. That is why I love my job: lots of kids, few adults. I am very blessed to work with two of the few people in this world that I do feel comfortable with (On a side note, one of them surprised me tremendously. I am learning that you should not judge a person by other peoples opinions of them) One of the things I hate more than anything is defending myself or debating an issue because I usually feel like I can't get the other person to understand my point of view. I'm not necessarily even trying to change their viewpoint, just show that another valid viewpoint exists. Because I can't get them to understand my viewpoint on a particular matter I often feel like they dismiss my viewpoint altogether and I go back to wondering why I spoke up in the first place.
Today I felt bombarded by the need to defend my viewpoint on a situation that I am dealing with. I was told what I needed. (Please don't tell me what I need. I may be quiet but I am actually quiet capable of meeting my own needs, and my needs may not be the same as yours. Just because you need something does not mean everyone needs that. - Not to mention the difference between a need and a want but that is a different matter) I was told how much could be handled (Again please don't tell me how much can be handled. If a person is choosing to take on a certain amount only that person can decide if it is too much. Maybe others can handle more than you can. Don't put your limitations onto other people. They may be striving to achieve more than you are). Lastly, the situation was judged to quickly. I understand that changes and doing things differently can be uncomfortable for people (they usually are for me) but you cannot judge the validity of something before it has been given the time to succeed. Successful people don't quit after the first attempt and being forced to quit before a full first attempt has been made makes all of us failures.
      I live by the motto that things will work themselves out (again so that I don't have to talk to people to makes things work out) and I am sure this will work itself out also. I also believe that everything happens exactly they way it is supposed to happen even if it is not the way we want it to happen. I am quite sure all my stressing on this matter won't have any effect on the final outcome. However I do wish that people not involve in the matter would stay out of it . . .

Shapes Shapes Shapes

We have been working hard to learn all the vocabulary that goes along with shapes. Vertices, faces, edges its hard for English Language Learners to keep all these words straight. Today we got to have some fun and be creative with out work. First we use nets of seven different shapes to make the solid shapes and filled out a chart about the number of vertices, faces, edges and a real world object that is that shape, then we got creative and started building things out of out shapes.

 This is the beginning of a robot. The legs and body started out really well, 

but then the top of the body and head got too heavy. 

 Different versions of cities. 

Several years ago when I was still in first grade I got some inflatable shapes from 

Donor's Choose. 

It did not come with a rectangular prism so I took a box that the math papers came in and covered it with construction paper. This worked for my first year in second grade, but this year we have new state standards (for us in Texas called TEKS) and the shapes we learn about have increased. We have added rectangular pyramid and triangular prism. So while the students were creating there shapes, I tried my hand at creating my own. I think they came out pretty well. I don't like how messy the tape looks, but maybe I can improve on them next year.

 Rectangular pyramid made during my morning class. Triangular prism made during my afternoon class. 

And here they are all hanging up and labeled. I really wish the fire marshal would let us hang things from the ceiling. I think it would be awesome to have these hanging around the room all the time. Unfortunately, we are not allowed to hang things from the ceiling and I need the board space that I covered up when I hung these up. As soon as geometry is finish these have to go back on the shelf. Maybe next year I will work on finding a permanent place to hang them up in my room when I set my room up in August. 

So Much Happening

We have been crazy busy lately, but for the most part it has been all fun stuff.

 Victoria's favorite TV show is Jake and the Neverland Pirates. I found these dress up boxes at Wal-Greens on clearance. Victoria and Cristina enjoyed playing Jack and Captain Hook over spring break. Then they went to stay at their grandparents house where they can play with their cousin. I love that they have as much fun dressing up as pirates as they do dressing up as princesses. Sometimes they mix it up and play pirate princess. Who says you can't have it all, right?


Last weekend we had tickets to the Dallas Stars game. We are not really hockey fans, but it was fun to do something different. Only problems was we thought it was a night game. We realized at 12:40 that they game was at 2:00 and we still had to drive to Dallas. We were already out, so we just jumped on the freeway and drove straight there. The only problem was we only had three jackets with us. It was not a cold day, but it is cold at the hockey game. Being the good dad that he is, Eddie gave his jacket to Victoria and she used it like a blanket. During the first period the Stars were not playing very well and Victoria wondered aloud "Maybe they have never hockeyed before?" So cute! And luckily the Stars remembered how to hockey and won the game.

On the way home we stopped for a special treat. Krispy Kreme donuts! We used to have some near us, but they have all closed. There was one on the way home, so we stopped for a treat and took home a box, too. 

Cristina has loved art since she was old enough to hold a crayon, marker, or paintbrush in her hand. She would spend hours drawing and painting. She had no interest in coloring books. The first time she colored in a coloring sheet was at her meet the teacher when she was entering kindergarten. She colored the entire picture pink then asked if she could turn it over and draw her own picture on the back. This interest of hers has made her drawing ability quite good (although her coloring in the lines skills were delayed). This week she came home excited because her art teacher had entered one of her pictures in the art show at a local library. I do think her flower is pretty awesome.

Paper Craft Club

We got to have have several meetings of out Paper Craft Club before we had to shut down and getting ready for state testing. Testing will be over in a few weeks and we will start another round of clubs. I already have several ideas pinned for spring paper crafts. 

Here are some of the crafts we made. 

My partner read the story Snowballs while I set out the supplies. The students were so creative in the way they decorated their snowman/snowgirl/snowhorse.

This time around my partner read animal poems then the students created animal faces. 

I've spent a lot of time searching paper crafts on Pinterest looking for cute, easy, and quick crafts that a group of 30 second and third graders can finish in 30-40 minutes. I came across this pirate and it was perfect. A quick pirate story and the children were off creating paper plate pirates. Their favorite part? The binder ring earring. 

 I was out on one of the days when they made penguins.
The club was a lot of fun. It was amazing to see how creative the students could be when given so much freedom on how they wanted to do something. No right or wrong answer or grading rubric, just freedom to complete the project the way they wanted. Most of the time they exceeded my expectations. I can't wait for the next group of students to start crafting.

Elf on the Shelf Day 19

The elves took out the girls air rocket and tried to go for a ride. One elf hugged the rocket while the other jumped off the table on to the launcher. Unfortunately the elves are heavier than foam rockets so they didn't really go anywhere. 

Working as Partners

I work in a Dual Language Enrichment program. One of the major componets of the program is that students are to work as partners. I did a lot of partner work last year, but this year I have been distracted with new math curriculum, new students (I looped with my students last year), a class that makes me question why I am a teacher (luckily my other class makes me so happy that I am a teacher) that I just haven't done very much with the partner thing. Every year we are required to do six hours of training to refresh or increase our knowledge of the program and of teaching ELL students. I chose a training on making partners work. This idea came a day or two after the training as I was reflecting on what I could do to increase partner work in my room. We have privacy folders for when we take tests. Now we have partner folders for when we do work as partners. The point of the partner folder is to remind the student that they have to work with their partner (not take turns doing the work, but discuss the work together) and that it is not a time that the whole table can sit around talking. One of my classes LOVES to talk about anything anytime. So far this has really worked well and the kids are loving that they get to talk to each other and I am loving that I can stop telling them to be quiet. Other great benefits are they share papers so I make half the copies. That also means when they do something I want to grade I only have to grade half as many. Totally a win win. After Christmas I want to introduce rubrics where they grade their partner on how well they worked together and what they can do to improve next time. I am also thinking of ways I could get them working with other partners. My husband uses a clock where they sign up for twelve different partners and he tells them which hour partner they have to work with that day. I'm not sure I want to use that many partner choices, but I am trying to think of something that would give them four or five choices. 

So here are pictures of my students working as partners with their new partner folders.