A Little Faculty FUN

So, this is the slack partner of Kindergarten Squared!!! I have been missing in action and Cristy probably about ready to fire me!!  So what have I been doing?? Mostly trying to get my 4 year old acclimated to pre-k! From the time he was 10 weeks old until last Friday, Brooks stayed with Nana. Let's just say the first day was a mess!!! Luckily he only ran from class once and the principal only had to call my husband once!! Each day has been getting a little better, but we still have Nana on reserve, just in case.!! Keep your fingers crossed we both survive!

My little one resting after running away from pre-k!!

Wish me luck!!

At our first faculty meeting we decided to have a little fun!!! We borrowed a STEM idea from one of our awesome new teachers, Mrs. Hardin. We have a pretty competitive staff so we knew a competition would be great for getting teams working together and having fun!! What was the prize???  Lunch out and the school foots the bill!! Yay!! Well all except for tip and taxes!! Our book keeper keeps us in line! We challenged each team to stack cups into a tower using a rubber band with strings attached. Each team member had to control a string and no one could use their hands. Unfortunately we did not give very specific instructions. However, in our mind we imagined these super tall towers where each row had one less cup! Of course the kindergarten team in conjunction with out REACH teacher decided to create their own interpretation of a tower.  We sent three teams to lunch!! It was really fun!!

We would love to hear some fun ideas you guys do at your faculty meetings!!! 

Thanks for reading!!

STEM Day!

Our county has really put a huge emphasis on teaching STEM lessons! Most of you probably are familiar with this, but if not...here's a quick what's up!

STEM stands for Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math.  Teaching STEM lessons means you create plans that involve all 4 curricular areas.  There's a big focus on children having the chance to work with ideas or materials to engineer their own designs.  There's also a focus on giving them the time to experiment with their designs, learn from their mistakes, and make modifications to enhance it.

It's really quite amazing to watch. The best part is the teacher basically sets the task and let's the kiddos take the reigns. We move throughout the room encouraging their thought processes and asking questions that help them further their own thinking. We are constantly amazed at what our 5 and 6 year olds come up with!

To make sure we keep our school focused on STEM, we have our annual STEM Science day!  We usually work with our grade level teachers as well as some non-homeroom teachers to create, plan, and execute science rotations.  This year our K team set up 3 classrooms with 3 different lessons in each. The principal and counselor worked with us this year to guide the lessons. 

We basically made sure materials were ready, packs were printed and ready to go, and groups of 3 had been predetermined based on focus, writing ability, and cohesiveness!

We used Fairy Tale themed lessons that we purchased from the awesome Regina Davis on TPT! 

Lesson 1: Rub-a-Dub 3 Men in a Tub! Kiddos had to design, test, and record the outcome of building a boat from aluminum foil. 

Lesson 2: Run, Run, Run as Fast as You Can! Groups worked to construct a bridge for the gingerbread man out of toothpicks and marshmallows.

Lesson 3: I'll Huff and I'll Puff!  This last lesson had kiddos building a structure that would keep the pigs safe and withstand the wolf's huffs and puffs.

We always take time after the lessons to talk with the kids and reflect on how things went.  What modifications did they make that worked/didn't work, how well they worked with their groups, basically anything that gets them thinking.

The science and engineering are pretty evident.  The math comes in when they measure the height of structures or count and record the number of bears their boat held.  They count, measure, tally...the sky is the limit.  The technology comes in in a variety of ways. We let the kids use the IPad to take pictures and videos of their work. We've used them in the past to put them into a PowerPoint. We show that on the Activboard and the kids make notes right onto the photos.

So... If you haven't tried STEM yet...what are you waiting for? Grab a lesson from TPT or create your own...and go wild!!!

Here are 2 lessons we've created, tested, and added to our store.  We loved them both and so did our kiddos. 

Let us know if you give it a try, or if you're already a STEM expert and have some great ideas to share!

Bubbles Bubbles Everywhere!!

Awesome day today!!! End of the year theme days are so much more fun when you have structure and academic goals!!

Today we used our end of the year, Bubbles are a Blast pack!

We also used our new Bubbles, Bubbles Everywhere S.T.E.M. activity! It was really, really fun!

Check it out! We are giving it away to a randomly picked friend who let us what he/she thinks!!

Sugar Problem & Easter STEM Project-Comments?

Ha ha!! I am blogging while my 3 year old takes a late afternoon nap!! Probably not a great idea!! I wonder who will be up with him when he is swinging from the furniture at midnight!! ME!! Yay!!!

Here is a real problem! Help!!! Please!!! Hide anything and everything with sugar!! We went on an awesome Disney Cruise and ate every dessert imaginable (including yummy Mickey bars)!  The cruise is over, but I am still eating like I am on that fabulous boat, the Disney Dream!!

I really am about to go into sugar shock!! I feel awful, but I keep stuffing my face with M&Ms, Hershey Kisses, peanut butter brownies with butter cream frosting, Cadbury chocolate eggs!!!!   Any advice with my sugar problem???? Those sugary treats listed above were just from today!!

OK, sorry to ramble about personal problems!! How about a S.T.E.M. project to go with your Easter activities??

Cristy and I decided we love S.T.E.M. lessons and maybe we can write our own! Here is our first attempt at creating a S.T.E.M. lesson. Let us know what you think. We added an emergent reader to help set up the problem.

Poor Bobby the Bunny lost his basket. He has so many eggs to deliver to friends! How can we help???

We can make a new basket for Bobby the Bunny!  We can...
Design, Build, Test, Photograph, Evaluate and Redesign a basket to hold eggs for Bobby by using only paper and tape!!

Let us know if you found any great S.T.E.M lessons! Thanks for reading!!
Ahhh! 12 day count down until the Nashville Rock and Roll Marathon!! Feeling scared and excited!!

You can grab this pack for 1/2 price for today only!  Leave a comment and we'll pick a couple of you to WIN the pack for FREE!

Spring Fever and STEM

Who has Spring Fever????? We do!! It is so beautiful here TODAY!! But what will it be like tomorrow??  This GA weather is crazy!!

SO we are gearing up for Spring Break!! We are trying to keep those ANGELS out of TROUBLE!! Of course they are always ANGELS and never in TROUBLE!! But just in case they think about getting ANTS in their PANTS, what are you guys doing to prevent disruptions???

Well friends, We are having a blast with STEM lessons!!!! What are we doing???

Working in cooperative groups to DESIGN, CONSTRUCT, TEST, MEASURE, and REFLECT!!!

We built houses for the 3 Pigs, bridges for the Gingerbread Man, towers for Repunzel, boats for the 3 Men in a Tub, and  traps for the leprechaun! Check out the fun!!

We asked the kids what they liked the best and most of them told us BUILDING!!
We also asked them what they liked the least and almost all of them told us it was hard COOPERATING!

Thank you Regina Davis for this super, awesome, fabulous pack!! We had tons of fun integrating language arts with STEM! Click the image below to link to this pack!

Happy Spring!! Yahoo for ALLERGIES, training for the Rock N Roll Marathon in Nashville, warm weather,  practicing for the kindergarten play and ASSESSING!!

Well we do love warm weather and training for the marathon is super exciting!! We ran 22 miles last weekend! Thank goodness that was the last of our runs in the 20s until April 26 when we run 26.2 (hopefully)!!

St. Patrick's Day STEM Lesson

St. Patrick's Day is almost here, so we thought why not turn one of our FUN activities into a STEM lesson! Our county  has put a HUGE emphasis on creating lessons that meet the STEM requirements.  (Lessons that integrate Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math).  We have even seen STEAM lessons that add the ARTS to that list of requirements.

SOOO...we have been looking at some of our science lessons that we have been tweaking over the years, and many of them fit 3 of the STEM requirements.  All we needed to do was add a component here or there and we had a TON of STEM lessons on our hands.

So here's our St. Patrick's Day plan.  We always have the kiddos work with a partner to create a Leprechaun Trap.  We either set the traps the night before St. Patrick's Day or we set them after the little guy has come and done some mischief in our room.  Since St. Patrick's Day is on a Monday this year, we plan on setting them once we see he has crashed our room.

So...the plan!

Step 1:  The kiddos will work with a partner to plan, design, and build their Leprechaun Trap using classroom materials.  (This covers the ENGINEERING portion.)  They will record their plan on the sheet below.

Step 2:  We will evaluate each other's traps and talk about what we think may or may not work.  We will use terms such as longer, shorter, heavier, lighter, materials used, 5 senses (will he smell the gold candy coins you left for him...).  This will support the ENGINEERING portion and add in the MATH and SCIENCE portions as well.

Step 3:  We will take pictures of our traps.  (This is the 1st part of the TECHNOLOGY portion.)

Step 4:  We will wait!  Will we catch a Leprechaun?

Step 5:  We will check the traps the following day.  Were some of them sprung?  Did we catch a Leprechaun?  We will discuss our traps and talk about why we think they DID or DID not work.

Step 6:  We will choose 1 or 2 trap photographs to put into an Activboard flipchart.  We will then make notes on the photo of design changes we could make that may have made the trap more effective.  (This will really hit the TECHNOLOGY part right on the money and we will revisit ALL the other components too.)

Here's the Trap Design sheet we will be using!

You can find the trap design sheet and other St. Patrick's Day goodies in our 

St. Patrick's Day Galore: Photo Booth, Games, and More! pack!

And if you need a FUN game for St. Patrick's Day, 

you might want to grab our FREE CCVC Leprechaun Leap Game!

We hope you have a great weekend and Happy St. Patrick's Day!