Going With the Flow

We Arizonans are a bit out of our element as we have been prepping for the wrath of Hurricane Odile. Supposedly we are supposed to be hit with heavy rain with possibility of severe flooding. So far it's just been slight drizzle. Even so, I'm sure you can imagine how my kiddos arrived to school this morning!

They COULD NOT stop talking and asking questions about the upcoming flood! That combined with the fact that I had 10 absent, that's right 10 ABSENT I knew that the plans I had made for the day needed to go! So I went with where their brains were at and tried to still make it educational....

I quickly pulled up some reading passages on flooding that we read and took Cornell Notes on together. 

So thankful for my school's subscription to DiscoveryEd as I was able to quickly find some videos on flash floods and severe weather. We also watched some weather forecasts. 

While in the middle of reading safety tips a math review came to me so we went with it!

We learned that in case of an emergency we should have 3 gallons of water for each person in our house...and there was a multiplication problem that fell right into my lap! We all took out our slates and figured out how much water we should have for the people who live in our house. They proved their findings by drawing multiplication models. 

Last we created safety posters to share with our families tonight to prepare for tonight's weather. 

I've got flashlights, candles, batteries, and chocolate;P all the essentials in case it does get ugly. I'm totally fine with huddling up by candlelight tonight if need be... all I ask is that Mother Nature could wait till after Big Brother...I need my BB fix ; P

September Currently

Oh my goodness this months' Currently is ADORABLE! How could I resist!

Listening- My boys are taking a nap and I am enjoying some peace, quiet, and blogging!

Loving- Seriously it has been the BEST weekend in awhile. My past few weekends have been full of lesson planning, cutting, laminating, prepping, researching, etc. While I still did some work I had a lot more moments like these....

And it was wonderful:)

Thinking- I maybe should have done a little less working and little more cleaning because I am typing this amongst a pile of papers and such...ooopps!

Wanting- I desperately want to take the plunge and get a custom blog design and am so close to just doing it! I really want to make sure I can take the time to blog over the next few weeks and if I can stick to it and make a regular blog entry then I am doing it!

Needing- I really need another weekend just like this one...it was perfect:)

3 Trips- Have ya'll heard they are setting up a coffee shop in NYC that is made to look just like Central Perk from the show???

Words cannot express how much I NEED to be there! No seriously...I'm obsessed with the show and would LOVE more than anything to go here. Ticket to NYC should be cheap right? *sigh*

Besides being a Friends addict, I believe I am a Disney addict as well and DisneyWorld is for sure on my bucket list. And to enjoy pasta and wine in Italy would be a dream...someday:)

Miss Rumphius Freebie and a New Product

So I read Miss Rumphius for the first time EVER with my kids this week and I fell in love. Such a beautiful story and I loved every second we spent with this story! 

I was happy to find the read aloud on YouTube which my kids enjoyed during their Listen to Reading time. 

We did some activities with Miss Rumphius which you'll find as my newest freebie in my store! 

This is how we started out.... We get our Bear Essential News newspapers once a month and I sometimes like to do something with them before I send them home. We worked on answering the who, what, when, where, why, and how for an article in groups this week. We were also able to point out captivating titles and topic sentences and how they catch their readers' attention. 

After seeing how well the kids did with taking apart an article I decided to have them write one! I told them to imagine that Miss Rumphius was real and to write an article about her. I loved how they turned out!

We also did this writing during our Work on Writing time. 

These past few weeks we've been working on close reading so we used those strategies to read through this informative passage on Lupines. 

You can find each of these activities in my store for FREE...just click here. 

Now on to math! We've been reviewing multiplication. I created these multiplication puzzles for my kids and they really were a hit. They are doing more than just finding the answer, they are connecting the equation to models and repeated addition. It really was difficult at first but they worked together and figured it out! We will try again this week in pairs and then independently. 

You can purchase this activity in my store now! Just click the image below:)