Embrace the madness

Halloween week in kindergarten = madness.

Fight the madness?

No, embrace it! I'm all about channeling that excitement and energy into some positive, cognitive experiences.

Here's one way we did it...

On Nov. 1, each kinder was invited to bring 4 treats from their night of fun. First, we sat in a big circle and sorted our candy by many, many attributes (all student-generated attributes... chocolate/no chocolate, one piece/many pieces, color of wrapper, etc.).

Then, we ate our candy, kept the wrappers and sorted them by beginning letter.

We ended up with a fun class book -- A-Z Trick-Or-Treat. The kids love "reading" this book at the library center.

I got this idea from a teammate of mine who got it from another teacher! All I can say is Thank Goodness! It is a lifesaver the day after Halloween!

  

Some letters had a lot... some had none (so we made up our own candy!)

Like I said... embrace the madness. :) It might lend itself to a great lesson!

Apples and pumpkins

To transition from our unit on apples to our unit on pumpkins, we have been comparing the 2 fruits -- both great for the Fall!

 I love saving the last 15-20 minutes of the day for old-school traditional units. You know... apples, pumpkins, insects, animals, holidays, etc. They are a great way to get the kids interested in literature, shared writing, questions, charts, graphic organizers, etc.

Evidence: This adorable Venn diagram. Yes, it's cutesy (I love it!), but it was a very valuable tool this week. We ended our day all week by sitting at the carpet and reading a non-fiction book about pumpkins. The kids then suggested facts to add to the poster -- comparing apples (from the last 2 weeks) to pumpkins.

Every one of my kids was able to tell their fact (ex: "They're both round.") and point to where on the diagram it should go (ex: in the middle). Great, valuable way to use the last 15 minutes of the school day (a.k.a. the death hour in kindergarten).