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Friday, June 17, 2011

Go FIRST GRADE, It's Your BIRTHDAY! A Birthday Month Mini Unit Coming Soon!

So this idea came to me when I realized at the beginning of last school year that a TON of my students came to school and DID NOT know their birthday! My literacy coach was doing a pull out group with ELL students and came back and reported the same thing months later.
No more!
I'm creating a mini-unit that will include tons of super fun birthday activities, and a study of the months. This will be perfect for those first few weeks of school.
I also don't want to admit this but i *hate* celebrating birthdays in school. Our district has a wellness policy- so they ask parents not to bring in cakes and cookies and I have to tell them no.

I'm not totally ungrateful. I learned my lesson my first year of teaching when a parent brought in a FULL-BLOWN-PARTY for my class (different school district).  I'm talking: table cloths, party hats, and noisemakers. Took up an hour and a half. Oops.
This is what I KNOW they were thinking in their hearts. Photo: My first year circa 2006.
LOL. I'm so embarrassed! Oh no I di-int let this happen!! Seriously, there was all but a blow-up Jump Jump and petting zoo in the back of the school. Ha ha ha. =)

SO in an effort to avoid turning my classroom into Chuck E. Cheese's but still celebrate and recognize birthdays, I'm creating a mini unit called:

"GO FIRST GRADE, IT'S YOUR BIRTHDAY!"
Included, we'll...
* Study the months (Holidays etc...)
* Make birthday "presents" for each other. These activities will be made at one time, then stored away by me. Then, when the day comes around- there is no scrambling for a birthday pencil and certificate- we already made a fun present!
*Have fun with lots of birthday related balanced literacy activities and thinking sheets
*Read lots of Birthday themed books (book list will be included with accountable talk prompts- of course!)
*Shared Reading: Original Poetry by Yours Truly :)
* Do a little birthday themed math
* Printable book for guided reading
*Anchor Charts for each month of the year
*Kid-Friendly CELEBRITY birthday match up activities
(who has the same b-day as the Biebs?FUN. They'll be SO into it.)
and much more!

Here is a sneak peak of a FEW items!

 I love y'all, but there are no promises on when this will be done. I'm L-O-V-I-N-G my first summer where I don't have to work waaaaaaaay too much!!!

I'm trying a lot of these activities out on my friend's children (bwhaha!) I'll post photos of the activities when I'm all done!
Hope you're enjoying summer,

23 comments:

  1. This is such a fab idea! I love it!

    Amanda
    http://www.oneextradegree.blogspot.com

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  2. I hope you sing, "Go Hadar, it's your birthday!" on my birthday! hahhaah!

    Hadar
    Miss Kindergarten

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  3. Great Idea! For 4 of the last 8 years i have been co-teaching. We have had 36 1st graders- can you imagine if we stopped and celebrated all of their birthdays on their birthday? We adopted a Once a month birthday celebration :-) We still have some parents that try to get around that but we explain it. To keep it special in it's own right- this celebration is not on the same day as any other celebration.

    Primary Connections

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  4. What a great idea! I too have had the hour and half birthday fiasco happen so I feel for you! Since then I have become the worst birthday celebration teacher EVER! Can't wait to hear more!

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  5. Love this! Can't wait to check it out :)

    Jodi
    fun-in-first.blogspot.com

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  6. This is great.. I always feel so bad too because my kids never know their own birthdays!

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  7. Wow such a great idea! By the way you are not alon... I also hate celebrating birthdays at school. ha ha


    Luvsteachn@gmail.com

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  8. Yay! I can't wait for this. Your units are always so cute, and I loooove birthdays. :)

    Magnificent Multiagers!

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  9. SHUT HE FRONT DOOR! OMG! This is fantastic and I LOVE the Christmas tree! How do you get the pictures so darn big?

    littlemisskindergarten.blogspot.com

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  10. thanks mrs coe!

    I take the photos and click "extra large" when posting and they blow up! =)

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  11. Enjoyed surfing onto your site today. Looks like we have some of the same books on our vacation reading lists. Happy summer!! :)
    JG
    http://abcsofreading.blogspot.com/

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  12. ok. This is THE BEST idea I've seen in FOREVER. I love it! I too do not like all the birthday business--it stresses me out, but this will make it sooooo much easier! Can't wait to see the whole unit!

    *Sarah*

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  13. What a great idea! I like this idea of doing a unit for them- my kids don't know their birthdays either, especially at the beginning of the year. Umm and that little word wheel I saw, SUPER cute!
    Lessons Learned

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  14. This looks so cute! I just ignore birthdays as most kids don't know when theirs is. It works out well, really. But, if I had something like this in my arsenal, I might think twice about b'day celebrations! Thanks!

    Kristen
    socalteacherstuff.blogspot.com

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  15. Looks fun! Can't wait to see :)

    Justy
    confessionsofakteacher.blogspot.com

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  16. love tyhe idea...we JUST eliminated kids passing out cuppycakes to teachers cuz they would be out of the room FOREVER...I cant wait for this and to use it!

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  17. Olá, sou do Brasil e sou educadora de crianças de 5 anos, passeando pela net encontrei o seu blog e gostei muito. Parabéns. Estou salvando alguns de seus trabalhos e gostaria de agradecer por disponibiliza-los para nós. Já coloquei você na minha lista de blogs de visita.


    Marta
    http://eucraftemuitomais.blogspot.com

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  18. I can't wait to see this. I had a similar situation a few years ago (my first year). I was so worried that the party patrol was going to walk in and issue me a citation. I'm glad I can laugh about it now.

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  19. I absolutely love your blog!! What great resources!!! :)
    -Krista
    Long Island Teacher

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