April Showers Bring...Lots of Fun!

Boy have we had a busy month! Once Spring Break is over, the school year seems to just fly by! My second graders have struggled to stay focused, so I’ve been throwing in as many new ways to keep them engaged as possible! We’ve been working hands-on, getting creative, watching videos, making projects, and working collaboratively on just about everything!

To celebrate Easter and all things spring, we jumped on the “Zendoodle Bunny” project that took over Education Social Media this year. Students created their bunny head, cut it apart, chose a colorful background, and displayed in the classroom. Additionally, students chose a writing genre (poetry, nonfiction) about “What Easter Means to Me.” Because we are a Catholic school, we were able to go all in on the Easter celebrations! :)

Leprechaun Traps

Well, I hadn't planned on making Leprechaun Traps this year, but when the student interest is high, how could I say no? After reading How to Catch a Leprechaun by Adam Wallace, the students begged to make Leprechaun traps. I pulled out various STEM and craft materials and let the students work individually or in small groups to plan out a way to construct the perfect trap.

As the students were planning, some were requesting to bring items from home, so we postponed construction until the next day. 

Here are some things the students came up with:

I love the conversations I hear when we do STEM type activities:
"What if this doesn't work?"

"How ELSE could we make sure he can't escape?"

"What if the door trap fails? Can we still capture him?"

"I think we should try it your way this time."

"That won't work. What other ideas can we come up with?"

By the end of the day, we had 18 Leprechaun traps set up throughout the classroom. We were sure to catch one this year!

When we entered the room this morning, there was no Leprechaun in site, but there was a trail of gold and chocolate coins leading from the doorway, through every failed trap, and back out of the room again! We were so close this year!

Happy New Year!!

Happy 2017- it's a new year, a new blog, and our first post! We are so excited to share our classroom adventures with everyone. While we might teach different grade levels, we love to share ideas with each other and love to try new things in our classrooms.  We'd like to say everything goes as planned, but we definitely have our "What was I thinking moments??"- we can't wait to share the good, the bad, and the crazy from our classrooms with you through this blog.   We've both relaxed and recharged over break so keep checking back- great things are sure to come...  
Andrea and Ashley