Area and Perimeter Fun!

Happy Teacher Appreciation Week! 

Okay - before I get into writing about the awesome, fantastic, superb, amazing lessons that I did on Area and Perimeter, I want to remind everyone that TpT is having a SALE. I am LOADING up my shopping cart. Seriously. 5 items in there already - and I'm counting down til tomorrow! I am participating in the sale, and my ENTIRE store will be 20% off! 

If you're like me, Area and Perimeter just doesn't EVER seem to sink in with your kiddos  (I teach 3rd graders). Sure, they understand the unit while you are teaching it, and a week or two later. By the time you are doing end of year review, every year they start to mix them up again! Since we missed SO many school days because of snow, and state testing starts THIS WEEK, there isn't as much time for forgetfulness this year. It's also VERY frustrating to hear the 4th and 5th grade teachers talk about how they don't remember things I KNOW I've taught them! This year would be different......

After putting together some definitions of Area and Perimeter based on our background knowledge of area models of multiplication, we showcased the area and perimeter of our desks with sticky notes. You may remember reading it on a 5 for Friday post (Just click the picture if you want to read about it!) 

Then, I had my students create Area Robots. In 3rd grade, Virginia says we must find the area of "a shaded region". Basically, they give our kids this funky shape that has been colored in on graph paper and ask them to determine the area. What better way to practice that, than to DO that! SO....here's my "Anchor Chart" we made to go along with the activity: 

Here are my students' robots! The boys LOVED creating Mine Craft Creepers! 

Students drew robots on graph paper, and calculated the area of the head, body, arms and legs. Then, students found the total area of their robots and compared to a partner. 

The next day, we did a lesson practicing area and perimeter using Educreations on the iPad. This app lets students complete problems on multiple types of paper, and record their voice explaining their work. As you can tell by some of the faces, the word problems were TOUGH. They had to work with a partner to explain their thinking. Check out some of these faces! The best thing about Educreations, is that your students can save their work to your account with just a code.

 After we finished our problems, we watched groups explanation of problems. There were some "Ah-ha" moments -- you know, the teacher has said this 1,000,000 times and I don't get it, but my friend says it one time the exact same way, and I get it "ah-ha" moments! My favorite thing about Educreations is that students could change their plain paper to lined or graph paper. They could also insert photos from the camera roll, or take a photo. I had students take a photo of an area model for one problem, and record their voice and writing on top. This app is AWESOME for science vocabulary books, social studies reports on famous people, the list is endless!

Exciting Week Back at Work!

Last week was the teacher's first week back, and our school had SFA (Success for All) reading training for TWO of the days. FREAK-OUT! We have been doing SFA at our school for over 15 years, and I've been doing it since I was there, new changes are exciting. I love the program, and I know our success at our school in reading is because of this program. I am excited to get into the program and begin! So - we were in our room on Monday, training Tuesday and Wednesday, and then kiddos were coming in from 11-7 on Thursday for Business Day! The hubs picked up a new phone case for my iPhone for me on Wednesday. My otterbox broke at the end of last year- and I knew I needed one.

The hubs bought me this pink and black Griffin case @Best Buy -- It even matches my classroom! 

On Business Day, my sister came to register my niece, and since I didn't have any kiddos, I kept little niece in my room, and ate the delicious wendy's chicken she brought me (I was STARVING!) 

My teacher chair was her favorite. (Side note- I'm dying to recover that chair, and the file cabinets, but there are only so many hours in a day! 

She LOVED the pattern blocks too! 

So - most of my new students came in -and I'm SO excited because I have some super sweet kids! Several parents were very impressed by the organization and cleanliness of the room- and all I could think was "If you only knew how long....." It's ALL worth it though! 

Friday was Convocation. This is the bright idea that our county has to shove ALL our teachers into our High School Auditorium from 8:00-12:00. It gets hot and sweaty and sticky and miserable - but NOT this year! This year our county got it RIGHT!!! They brought in a motivational educational speaker - Tara Brown. WOW -- WOW -- WOW!! She was GREAT! She talked about how it is SO important to make our students feel safe, and decorating the room, and on and on and on. Check her out on YouTube, or check out her website HERE

Then, our county always gives out prizes to schools with the best attendance for the year - and our school won 3rd place! (That means we get $1,000 to spend on our students!) THEN - we received 3rd place for attendance at the Technology Professional Development - which is MORE $ to spend on Technology. Then- the BEST thing happened-- I was in the right place at the RIGHT time! my seat was the winner of a voucher for $100 worth of iPad apps! *Even though it says iPad on the envelope- it was just a voucher for apps* I was super excited about that - but then I got even MORE excited because I DID win an iPad for going to all the summer classes for Technology this summer!! It was VERY much worth giving up my summer for work and classes!! I was SO happy! I can think of about a MILLION things I'm going to do, and all the apps I want to buy for my classroom!!! 

Today, the hubs and I got up early, and hit the gym. We were done pretty early, and we swung by the new Big Lots that just opened over in Roanoke. It's about 25 minutes from our house- but much closer and nicer than any other. Holy Storage Batman!! They had EVERYTHING. I wanted to buy everything - but I just got a new clothes hamper for my bathroom (The youngest dog likes to go hamper diving for dirty socks, so I needed a taller one), a wax warmer (my living room is a lavender oasis right now!), a new broom for my classroom, some velcro for my classroom, and a few other small things. They also gave me 10% off with my teacher ID!! I was also excited to find the contact paper I had purchased from Dollar General there-- and it was HALF THE PRICE!! (I was a little annoyed at that!) 

I am super excited to be going back to school Monday - and I have about a MILLION things I should be doing. Instead- I'm, enjoying a movie on the couch with my pooches and doing some laundry! I hope you are all enjoying your weekend! 

PS-- look forward to a GIVEAWAY from my Thirty One Goody Bag when I reach 50 followers-- help get there faster by sharing my blog!