Walkin' in a Winter Wonderland - The Applicious Teacher

Well, we’ve been getting our winter on down here is sunny Fl (well for 3 days at least!)

It was fun to wear a scarf and gloves to work for a few mornings. Even though the cold winter weather didn’t hold (seriously was 85 today!) our snow unit did!

We used the biography of Wilson Bentley as our “close read” for the week.

(You can grab this beautiful book here on amazon!)

Here’s a video reading of the book I found on YouTube that we watched as well.

After reading and discussing the book (MANY TIMES…), we worked on identifying the central topic and supporting details. Loved using my interactive anchor chart to support this often difficult lesson.

As a class we came up with the “main idea” of Snowflake Bentley. Then each student was charged with coming up with their own supporting detail on a sticky note.

and then stick it onto our chart

As a class we combed through the supporting details. We sent back any details that weren’t quite right to be fixed or added too, and then organized the supporting details into groups.

After our group discussion, it was time for the students to write the main idea of “Snowflake Bentley” in their Reading Response Journals. They had to support their main idea with at least three details.

They did an AWESOME job!

We also used some older Scholastic News Magazine this week.

Although I LOVE my Scholastic News Magazines, I know they are not a guaranteed resource in my classroom from year to year. So last year, I laminated my extra copies of a few issues. So glad I did this because we used those issue this week during centers.

We used dry erase markers to find information and to complete the activities.

(Must remember to do this for next year as well!)

We also started to put my Snow Days Literacy Center pack to work this week…

Here we are working on Central Topic and supporting details using “Snow Globe Details”…

Look at that brain sweat!

The kiddos also worked on sequencing and using transition words.

To wrap up our unit, I used this adorable art project I found on Pinterest

It was just a photo, but I *KNEW* I had to find a way to work this project into our week…

So after reading, “Names for Snow” by Judi K. Beach

We brainstormed some adjectives and verbs for snow…

(totally NOT fancy, but it worked! Isn’t this why we have blackboards anyway?!)

Then we used the words we brainstormed to write a short “Snow Poem”…

Here’s a peek at our finished projects!

The kiddos had a blast making these. I showed them how to draw the head and bodies. Then let them color in with crayon. I’ve seen this done with construction paper and color pastels (but we didn’t have the time or the energy… ok… maybe the teacher didn’t have the time or energy… but still)

You can grab the cute writing paper I used for the poem here.

We also started working on our snowflakes for our, “There’s Snowbody Like Me” writings. (Also available in my Snow unit)