After Labor Day Weekend, I've always tried to ease kids back into the working mode by starting off with an art project. It gave the kids time to relax, and share with their friends all the things that happened over the long weekend. We made 3-D pop-up apples--an art project that I haven't done for a long time.
We also had a great class meeting, went to the media center, and finished our class book, Among the Hidden. We all started our next book, Pax. Kids are hooked already after reading the first chapter. And...we also had time for independent reading which is quickly becoming a favorite time of day for the kids.
The kids also really enjoyed the MysteryScience lesson about why apples are different colors. I used cooperative learning for the discussions throughout the lesson. They always enjoy the opportunity to talk and share ideas especially when there really are no right or wrong answers.
For part of math, I read the Apple Fractions book. It's a little Primary but I still have a couple of kids struggling with the basic concepts of fractions. It was a way to review the basics without drawing attention to those couple of kids who are struggling.
At the end of the day, kids wrote a descriptive paragraph about their apple. Normally, we don't do writing at the end of the day, but because I switched the schedule around a bit, we wrote and without any complaining. :) We put all of the apples back in the basket. Tomorrow we'll read the paragraphs and see if we can match their description with the correct apple.
I was really proud of my class today. We laughed, had fun, and yet when we needed to, we were able to focus and do our work. (most of us)
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