Halloween Ideas

Does your school celebrate Halloween?  Last year, we were not allowed to celebrate anything.  I'm not usually a Halloween person, but I am happy that this year, students and teachers are allowed to wear costumes!  Halloween is also the last day of the quarter for us, so I'm okay with breaking our usual routine a little bit, to have a little fun.  Here are some of my ideas for Halloween this year!

• Paper Bag Pumpkins

I just LOVE these little bag pumpkins from This Old Art Room.  Kristin made these with her kindergarten students, but I want to try them with my 3rd graders!

• EEK!  Spiders!

I found this cool book on Reading A-Z.  It's a Level M, which is a 2nd grade level according to their system.  Remember, I teach 3rd grade, but actually, this book will be too hard for the majority of my students.  Most of my students are at a 1st grade or early 2nd grade level.  But, I know my kids will be really into it.  So... I will fight through the gross pictures and we will read it together.  And hopefully, learn something new about our friendly arachnids!

• Halloween Treat

Seriously, Pinterest is just loaded with ideas for cute little treats for Halloween!   I'm looking for something simple to make and share with my students.  Last year, I did little treat bags of popcorn, M&M's, and candy corn.  They loved it!  I think this year, I will do something similar.  It was easy to pull together and share.

• Should I play dress-up?

Since we are allowed to wear costumes this year, I should really dress up.  I have cat ears and a tail, so I could wear all black and be a cat.  I also have a witch hat.  The 3rd grade team (four of us), had talked about doing a group thing, but we couldn't decide on what to do.

In the past, I've been...

 A Lumberjack

 A Cat (with Mrs. Elbert, a Ladybug!)

So, serious question-  Do you have any simple (and cheap) ideas of what I could be for Halloween?  Let me know in the comments below!

• Scary Stories...........

Last week, 3rd grade started a project that the kids are just begging to work on all. the. time.  Each 3rd grade class is working with their teacher to write a scary story.  We talked about figurative language (and made a bubble map of how "scary" sounds, looks, feels, smells, and tastes).  Then we voted on a character and setting and started writing!  I occasionally give them ideas, but usually we just listen to everyone's ideas and then choose which one we like best.  Sometimes we are able to combine ideas, too.  Seriously, some of the stuff they have come up with is creepy.

But here's the best part:  This coming week, we are making an audio recording of our scary stories, complete with sound effects by the students and an app on Ms. Meredith's iPad.  On Halloween, we will listen to each class' story and be scared together.  The kids are pumped!

What kinds of activities will you do for Halloween this year?  I would love to hear about it!

Until next time,

-Miss Woodward

Painting Time!

Yesterday, I posted about our current Author Study about Eric Carle.  Since we had finished the writing part, it was time for illustrating.  I didn't want to just have the kids draw and color their stories... I wanted it to be the way Eric Carle does his.

Eric Carle uses acrylic paint to paint tissue papers in different colors.  He then uses them to create collages for his stories.  Here is a brief look of how he creates his papers:

I planned to have one day where we would just paint papers to use.  I was really nervous, because I didn't know how the kids would handle such a large and messy project.  But, I'm happy to say that it went really, really well!!

I set up all of the expectations before we started, and I had three other teachers in the room for help.  I had gathered all of the art materials we would need, and set up tarps and butcher paper on the desks.  I put together many different painting "tools" they could use to create textures on their paper.  I found sponges, forks (for scratching at the paint), and paper towel tubes (to use as a circle stamper).

Before we started, I had them think about their story's characters and settings, so they would have an idea of what color papers they would need.  I also did a demo to show all the different tools and techniques they could use to create their papers.

Once we let them work, it was (surprisingly) a very calm environment.  They were very focused on their work!

We let them paint for about an hour and a half (they would have gone longer, but we ran out of drying space!)  After we filled the two drying racks I borrowed from the art teacher, we used every spare corner of the classroom to dry papers.  

Cleanup was a breeze.  All of the kids really pitched in to pick up the butcher paper, clean the brushes and sponges, and wipe down the desks and chairs.

The next step of our book making process is to let the papers dry and then use them to create collages on their final drafts.  I'll keep you updated!

Have you done an Author Study before?  What sort of project did you do for it?

Until next time,

-Miss Woodward