The Ship Has Sailed Me Mateys!

Ahoy Mateys...

Piratey week has come and gone. It was a very successful one at that. Today was the culmination of the entire week. Many boats, flags, and costumed. My own son put in some serious effort and made a pirate ship out of a book, an amazing flag and pole that actually worked, and

well... here is part of his costume. He really had a good time dressing like a pirate. He was cracking me up. Every picture that we took he was either super serious, stern looking, or crazy. I will try to get pictures posted of his book boat and flag. I told him that I am keeping his boat book on my shelf. I LOVE the whole idea of reading is an adventure.


 As I explained in my last post, I had my class read a short book and then make posters with partners. Today was the great unveiling. The students were able to show off their amazing work. It never ceases to amaze me that you can hand students a blank sheet of paper and then get amazing results like these from the student's creative minds. I love sharing and posting student work on the walls- especially the walls outside my room so the whole school and enjoy them. The students ALL did amazing work and their presentations were well given and very informative. (These presentations were give yesterday- on Thursday- and the poster hung up). Below are two examples of the seven that were created. I think the kids really enjoyed reading, learning, and creating. My low readers were of great support in the art and presenting department. I also had a parent in the room during the presentations and she too thought the kids did a marvelous job.

We are currently trying to research and write pirate reports in the computer lab. That has been interesting. Every year it is a challenge to have the kids find websites to read, pull the information they need, and then write a simple 3-5 paragraph report. A few of my students really get how to do it... the rest are struggling. I can only hope that it is not just because their teacher is a bad communicator of information.

Anywho... I be digressin', I be...

After getting reading buddies successfully completed today, we started right in to a fun morning. We read a couple picture books, played P-I-R-A-Te (a variation of a math game I play called SKUNK). We had cupcakes (thanks to a gracious parent) and juice pouches. We did pirate math, announced the winners of the piratey contests,  and we had a pirate auction. I think the kids really enjoyed it.

I think my only reason for being glad that it is over is that speakin' all pirate like this week has taken its toll on my voice. lol. But it was grand glorious time. One that I shan't be forgetin' any time soon.

I stayed until after 6pm (and that was with the help of my wife for the last couple of hours) and got all my planning and such done for Monday. With Parent/Teacher/Student conferences coming up on Wednesday, I wanted to have all the regular stuff taken care of so that I can focus my attention on having a good weekend.

Well, there is plenty more to share, but this pirate is goin' to hunt some Z's....

Later...