What Presidents are Made Of! Great Mentor Text

Presidents' Day is coming up on February 17th. This is suppose to be a teacher professional learning day for our district, but might turn into our icy make up day. Thursday evening, our temperature dropped to below freezing with precipitation in the air . . . result . . . thin layer of ice coating the city . . .  shutting the city of San Antonio down.  No school! Those of you up north, don't laugh too hard.

It was fun having an icy day. Icicles dangling from the roof and car . . .  leaves with a thin layer of ice that would just slide right off into your hand, the exact shape of the leaf  - You would walk outside and it was just . . . quiet. Pretty much all melted by mid afternoon! Nonetheless, a great ice day!

So, all that brings me to . . .  the mentor text I share today . . . 

What Presidents are Made Of, is an fun book filled with illustrations that are actually collages that depict a president. The collage of each president is created with items that give the reader clues about what that particular president enjoyed doing in their every day life. 

Each president is represented by a word or a phrase that describes their character. The collage is accompanied by a short paragraph that describes an event or trait of the president. This book is perfect for lessons on character traits, paragraph structure and main idea with supporting details. Throw in a bit of comparing and contrasting of the presidents . . . too fun!

I love checking out all the other posts linked up on Amanda & Stacia's, Collaboration Cuties mentor text linky. I've mentioned it before, but social studies is where I struggle the most in making it engaging, so having a place to check out other great ideas is so nice!

I found this website, President for a Day! It is created by PBS from the Democracy Project. Students have the opportunity to role play a virtual day of a president.

Students fill out an application (remember, no last names!) that leads them through a series of questions based on their interests. Once, they have answered a question, they are given a bit of information that matches a president.

 There was a nice surprise at the end. A news article popped up about my first day as president! You can have students take a screen shot and print! All of these printed would make a cute bulletin board.

Here is a fun free app for recognizing the presidents. It is basic and simple, but fun. I enjoyed trying to recognize the presidents.

If you have a Brainpop account, there are many short videos on US presidents. It's a great way to highlight a president each day . . .  leading up to Presidents' Day.

Well, it will be a high of 77 degrees today . . . only in Texas! I think I'll open some windows and enjoy the beautiful weather. It's almost like the ice day was just a dream. :)

Head over to Collaboration Cuties for some other great social studies mentor texts!
Happy Sunday!

Padlet, QR Codes, Amusement Parks and Weather

I love when I can sit down with a teacher and within a few minutes we have created an engaging lesson that students are going to love!

She brought the standards and I brought the technology. The standard was . . . identify the importance of weather and seasonal information to make choices in clothing, activities, and transportation;

A great way to start a weather unit (or any unit for that matter) is to use Padlet  - formerly known as Wallwishers. Create a wall where students can post questions that they have about weather. It's as simple as having your students double click on the wall and post their question.

Once, students have posted their questions share, Why does Lightening Strike? with your students.
It is such a cute book about questions students ask about weather.

Simple text and great pictures.

 Add in another book, World Book Encyclopedia's, Weather.

We took a lesson from StemScopes and tweaked it a bit . . . ok, a bunch. The task was to have each student travel to various amusement parks around the world, investigate the temperature and determine what clothing to pack. Students used a QR Code to take them to the weather for that day for each location. The weather for that day helped them determine what items to pack in their suitcase. 

As each student traveled from station to station, they took their file folder with them to record their findings. The file folder contained a map of the world with each amusement park location, one suitcase per location full of clothing (they circled the appropriate clothing), a box to write the temperature, and finally a writing prompt asking which location they would choose for their next holiday and why. Students traveled to Hong Kong, California, Florida, Paris . . . 

I love that a map of the amusement park was added to each station. It was fun to listen to students compare what was at each amusement park.

These second graders tweeted about their experience! Check it out and follow this awesome 2nd grade classroom, @learninginTX!

Head over to Collaboration Cuties for some other science mentor texts!

Happy Sunday!

January ~ Currently

Happy 2014!
First Currently for the new year!

Listening: My husband and I are on this crazy out of control watching frenzy of Breaking Bad.
Oh, my! I honestly never wanted to watch this show. Teacher turn drug dealer . . . uh, no thanks! I have been totally sucked in by this major drama!

Loving: I have already cooked two things in my new crockpot! Tortilla soup and now, Creamy White Chicken Chili! I love, love, love my new water

Thinking: There are several projects that I need to get started on, but can't seem to get it going. Maybe, after Breaking Bad.

Wanting: Google Glass! These are so cool. How cool would they be for a day in the life of . . . taking them on a field trip . . . pretty wild!

Needing: I feel like I do a drive by reading of blog posts that I see in my Bloglovin' feed. My goal (not resolution) is to respond to more blog posts. I know I love when there is a response to something I've posted.

Memory: Really, it's about creating memories! I just posted in my 13 in 13 linky post about our boat we purchased this year. It is so much fun! We love taking my daughter and her friends out on the lake. Creating experiences and making memories.

Happy new year and be sure to head over to Farley's for some more Currently action!

13 of 13

I have a few hours left to reflect on 2013!
It has been an unbelievable year full of transformations, fun, surprises, anxiety, honors, humbling moments, and connections!

Take a bit of . . . PVC pipe, duct tape and some cloth to transform desks into Conestoga Wagons for our quest for Westward Expansion! Will we make it or not?!

In no particular order . . . and filled with exclamation points because how else do you show excitement for a fabulous year?

And 13 in 13!

ISTE, loved every moment!

 Change from 22 years as a classroom teacher to Instructional Technology Specialist.

My office! (Not that I'm ever in it!)

Little "Happys" to start the year off for the teachers at my school!

(The "I" pads - cuz you can never have too much technology!)

My vision coming to life . . . outdoor learning enviroment!

Thank you PTO, HEB and Scottie Tissues!

Students helping build a pond . . . ownership!

Learning huts being built so authors can write!

Apparently, the anniversary gift I wanted, I just didn't know it!

Has brought balance to our life! (And FUN!)

 Several honors this year! 

I'm learning to embrace them!

District Teacher of the Year, Trinity Prize of Excellence, 

HEB Excellence in Education Award for Leadership, Region 20 Teacher of the Year and 

Faye Langly Cowden Chair Award!

 Blogger meet ups!

Making connections!

Having fun with augmented reality! 

Even more fun, working with classes and augmented reality!

 Sharing ways to use QR Codes in the classroom and around school!

 Professional Development in the form of . . . Speed Sharing!

Coding with kinders!

Extremely proud of my child!

First student council president at our school!

How cool is that?!!!

I look forward to 2014!

Winter Mentor Texts and Antarctic Crittercam

There is nothing I love more than reading to my students. It is so exciting to share books with students, talking about the way the way an author puts words on a page and sharing connections.
Not a lot of snow down her in south Texas, so sharing as many mentor texts, videos and sites to create experiences for students is always fun.

I am in love with this book! Our second grade just finished up a unit on the water cycle. Here is a blog post about our fun lesson that has students experiencing the water cycle as a rain drop.
In this book, the journey of the snowflake starts in in the month of January and moves through the months, with the ever changing seasons. Beautiful pictures, lyrical text and a surprising plot unlike most water cycle stories. The Snowflake: A Water Cycle Story, is a perfect book to revisit the water cycle.

"Waldman traces the journey of a single drop of water throughout the year, with each month receiving its own spread. The water begins as a snowflake that melts into a droplet, flows into the ground, bubbles up in a spring, flows into a farm's irrigation system, evaporates into the morning fog, becomes part of a cloud, rains down, enters a plumbing system, washes a little girl's face, flows out to the ocean, gets swept onto the shore and evaporates into the sky to become a snowflake once more." -Amazon

Next up . . . 

In, A Snowflake Fell, there are numerous poems written by some great authors that share winter experiences. 

Ice skating, building snow forts, sledding down big hills, nights by the fire . . . 

It's a beautiful book that lends itself to having students create original winter themed poems.

One of my favorite go-to sites is Read, Write, Think. Diamante poems are a fun type of poem to share with students. Read, Write, Think has a great interactive poem generator for students, plus it gives a few examples. 

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Last one . . .

This book introduces the geography and animal inhabitants of Antarctica.

Mentor texts can come in many different forms, such as a really fun crittercam! You should venture over to Crittercam Chronicles to explore Antarctica through the eyes of a leopard seal. A fun adventure! 

In keeping with the winter theme, why not transform your reading center into an igloo made out of milk jugs? How great would it be to create this with your students? Click on the picture for the directions on creating this milk jug igloo.

Head over to Collaboration Cuties for some other great winter mentor texts. 

Happy Sunday!

Gave it a Go . . . Tweetin' in 2013

I started Tweeting this year. I have followed some amazing people and tweeted very little.
I'm been getting the lay of the land . . . scoping out the scene . . .

At first, Twitter land was extremely intimidating! Ok, it still is at times. It's like learning a secret language. Gotta learn the lingo. I started searching for some educational chats to follow and jumped into the land of Twitter.

I love participating (or sometimes just lurking) in these chats. Sometimes the tweets fly by so fast my head spins! By the time I have answered Q2 with A2, they are starting Q4! How did I miss Q3?!!! Sometimes, I just sit back and watch the conversation unfold.


I'm a sticky note girl, real and virtual! When I'm following a conversation, I have the Twitter feed open and a sticky note ready to go to add notes, resources, links and others to follow.
Yes, I could use some other online notetaking system, but I love a sticky note!
I'll be the first to admit, I'm still not sure I know what I'm doing.
Half the time, I forget to add the hashtag when I'm adding my 2 cents during a chat.
Do I really have anything meaningful to say?
When do you actually use the @ sign? Am I tagging someone?

Most often, I tweet when I'm at a conference. How do you think I got my Teach Like a Pirate
T-shirt and autographed book?!!!

Social media at its finest! For me, it's about just-in-time professional development that is best practices, innovative thinking, authentic that is differentiated just for me. It's a place to collaborate, connect, share ideas, and learn from others.

We ask our students to take risks. We want them to collaborate. Therefore, we really need to model this behavior. So, here is my video of 2013 Start of Tweeting! No, my numbers aren't like many of the others out there, but that's ok because, I gave it a go!

I look forward to my 2014 Tweeting!