Our Gifts to Dr. King

There have been so many great things happening in our class since my last posting.  This month in conjunction with the study of our January character trait (FAIRNESS), we learned all about the great contributions that Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. made that have allowed us to enjoy the liberties we do today.  As a thank you, each one of us, I included, wrote about a gift that we would give to Dr. King.  I got the idea of a gift from another blog.   (Forgive me! I can’t remember which one.)

I don’t know about you all but so many times I think adults think that a concept is over the heads of kids.  I must admit I was guilty of it.  I just knew my kiddies would say that they would give Dr. King something like an Xbox.  Happily and surprisingly, that was not the case.  Their responses were beautiful and right on point.  They brought me to tears to hear all of the great gifts that they said they would give.  All I could say is “yes!” and “you’ve got it!” They really did impress me!

Below are pictures of our door display and some samples of my students’ work.

Penguin Problem Solving

I really love visiting other blogs to see all of the great things that other people are doing.  One of my favorite blogs, http://ericabohrer.blogspot.com/search/label/Penguins is written by Erica Bohrer.  A while back I saw a Penguin Addition problem that her students solved.  What I liked most is that the kids did a penguin craft to go along with their problem.  I knew I wanted to do something like that, however I really wanted it to focus on what we were currently learning.  Around the same time I decided I was definitely going to do this penguin activity, our principal mentioned in our staff meeting that she wanted up to use more nursery rhymes in class to assist with learning.

So here’s what I did.  I created a rhyme that was a culmination of several math skills taught.  My kiddies had to solve a story problem which required them to divide a given number of pink and purple fish equally.  I wanted my students to focus on creating equations that were equal without trying to give each side the same amount of each color. So they were given an odd number of each color.  However, each penguin had to receive some purple and some pink fish. 

I know I just went around the world and back with that explanation.  But the kids did great.  Here are samples of our finished product.