Comparing and Contrasting Freebie and Spring Fun!

This week was seriously the longest..............week..............EVER! With hour long meetings 3 days after school and morning duty the week back from spring break, I just felt like I was swimming all week.  My kids were chatty Cathy's ALL week long!! It was crazy! Despite this craziness, we were super busy this week!

We focused on comparing and contrasting characters all week as we read books. We read some really great books and the kids REALLY enjoyed it!

I used Dog and Bear to introduce the concept because the story lines were SO simple! This book has three mini stories in it.  It was on the 2x2 list about 5 years ago. Great book!

We are very familiar with Kevin Henkes and his books so the kids loved this one! 

Then we all worked to make a Venn Diagram with the kiddos doing it individually. Toot and Puddle was PERFECT for this!! I should've had them do this one independently.  It was much easier.  We did the contrasting together and they did the comparing independently.

By Friday the kids worked on this independently after we read Miss Nelson is Missing and watched Miss Nelson is Back on Discovery Education. (I seriously use this website all the time! I'm so glad our district has a subscription!)

The friend above was not happy to have to do this assignment. She didn't even want to write the characters' names on top. I just went with it! Picking my battles!!

Grab a FREE copy of this paper by clicking the picture below!

We also revised, edited, and published our How To writings this week.  It was time to do another "I earned my ______!" This time it was a spring chick!! I LOVE this type of activity because it really makes them focus on revising and editing.  We worked together to create a check-list of what How To writing should include.  Then I assigned a part of the chick to each writing convention we listed. After they revise and edit, I sit with each child and we discuss each element they should have.  Right then and there I give them the part for their chick if they have earned it.

I couldn't find packages of just yellow feathers, so we had to use white.  The kids didn't care....well, most of them didn't. I had one say, "uhhhh, no thanks on the white feathers."  (This kid does this EVERY time! She always has problems with my craft projects!!...no...this doesn't annoy me....HA! :) )

They did a great job on their writing! I let them chose what they wanted to write about last week.  They wrote several how tos, then picked their best writing to fix-up and fancy-up!  After all, isn't that part of having them take ownership of their writing?

(Oops! No wings or feet!)

This little craftivity will soon be in my TpT store. :)


 My wonderful husband snuck in this picture as he was editing the others for me! I thought it was only fair to share it! :)