The Volume Song

I have a gift.

One, simple, little gift.  I have the ability to write math songs to the tune of the pop music our kiddoes love.  And I do it while they're at P.E.

Here are the lyrics to "Volume, Maybe".

It's about volume.  It's to the tune of....

....."Call Me, Maybe".  teehee.

The chorus is the most important part.  The verses are a little less vital, more silly.  You have to sing it with the real song a few times to get the timing right.  Just remember, I made the syllables match as much as possible.  Then, sing it with your kids to the karaoke version!

Find the volume of a shape

It sounds like it’s so inane

But just know you’ll be okay

I will show you the way

There’s a simple formula

You’ll know it, you’ll be like, “Duh!”

And then you’ll never forget

I will show you the way

You know what the length is

You know what the width is

You know what the height is

Halfway there, you know it, baby!

Hey, find the volume

It isn’t crazy

Just multiply

For volume, baby

You know the length

The width and height

Just multiply

For volume, baby

You know the length

The width and height

Just multiply

For volume, baby

You know the length

The width and height

Just multiply

For volume, baby

For your personal practice:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RWAdb1vgoik

When you're ready to do it for realz:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0j7msD4INr0

It's tricky to figure out where to start on this one.  Listen closely and... count 2 measures or count two 4-counts or count one 8-count or start at 0:05.  Whatever floats your boat.  I promise you won't be disappointed.

I also did "Composite Number" to "Moves Like Jagger" by Maroon 5 (did NOT know the actual lyrics until it was too late), "It's Prime, It's Prime" to "Tonight, Tonight" by Hot Chelle Rae, "Quadrangle" to "Firework" by Katy Perry, and "Trapezoid" to "Dynamite" by Taio Cruz.

I also wrote a super complicated song about classifying polygons to "I Gotta Feelin'" by the Black Eyed Peas, but it was wayyyyyy too ambitious.

I did actually get this strategy from an ELL course.  But making up songs to help kids remember stuff helps everyone, not just ELL kids.  The chickadees love for me to take a video of them so they can watch it over and over.  I'm teaching it tomorrow.  I always worry they judge me.  I told them it was happening and I heard a lot of "YES!!!" but at least one, "I hate that song!"  I told that student he/she could do a worksheet instead :)

Wish me luck!

Poster Museum

1. Students make posters or create other work you can put up around the room.

We're wrapping up our Tall Tales unit in Reading!  Our posters had 4 parts: Sensory Images, Exaggeration, Sequence of events, and Character Traits.  

I hung a few posters on my line at the back of the room, a bunch on the whiteboard with magnets, and some over existing bulletin boards with push pins.

Sneak peek at my Tall Tales bulletin board:

2. Students walk around the room, looking at each other's posters silently.  I made sure to tell them it was a poster museum, and they treated it as such.  Be sure you put the posters in places that are easy to get to (i.e. not behind your desk or squished in the corner by the sink). I gave them about 10 minutes, and it was awesome.

3. Students get sticky notes and may whisper as they write only kind comments and put them on posters.  I floated around, adding notes to posters that weren't getting as much love.  I also suggest removing the unkind notes as you go.

I happen to have the sweetest children on the planet, so quite a few of them told me afterward that they tried to put one nice note on everyone's.  If only I could put pictures of them on this, you'd see how hard they worked and how much they studied each poster!

Matting a Letter with Scrapbook Paper

Hi everyone!

I'm a failed blogger.  I was going to post 5 crafts that had nothing to do with school over April break and then I posted one like 2 weeks ago.  Well, here's another one I did over break.  I had a very special letter and wanted to display it.  I was also in a crafty mood!  Also, I had like $3.

I took my butt over to Walmart and got this frame:

It's 8x10 WITHOUT the matting and 5x7 with.  I took the matting out and have no idea what to do with it.  Thanks for ignoring the piece of paper on my floor.  Cute dust ruffle, huh?

Then, I painted it with many coats of acrylic paint.

I tend to paint with a large piece of cardboard to cover the floor so I don't get stuff everywhere.  It kinda works!  I used Steel Gray for the color.  It's my favorite color because it reminds me of Blue Steel.

I particularly enjoy getting my scrapbook paper from this fancy Marshall's near where I work.  I got this pack for $5 and picked my background.  They have scrapbook paper in lots of places but at Marshall's it's DISCOUNTED.  I might devote an entire post to pretty paper and that you should buy it in Marshall's.

I traced the glass from the frame on the back of the scrapbook paper (the white side with no pattern).  I lined up the corner of the glass with the corner of the paper so I'd only have to cut two sides.  Then, I glued the letter to the center of the paper.  I put the glass in the frame, the paper on that, and put on the back!  I wish I had more process pictures for you, but I don't.  I'm a teacher.  I want you to learn, explore, try, do, take risks!

Orrrrrrr I forgot.

The finished product!

Layers!  I love non-flat frames.  I don't know what the word is for frames like this, but anything more exciting than a flat rectangle makes me feel like I'm classy.

My curtains are thermal, not pretty.  You can't really have both.  Also my lamp is boring and I have candles in a vase.  I live a very luxurious life.

The frame is ginormous, so I'm glad I used softer colors.  I wanted to have a special way to remember someone without being like, IN YO FACE about it.  Framing a letter instead of a picture of a dead person is a little easier on the eyes.  

It was the only frame long enough for the letter in the first place.  I suggest measuring the thing you want to frame BEFORE you drive 30 minutes to go buy it.  Or, it's an excuse to buy 10 frames, just in case.

Happy April Vacation!

My plan was to post a non-school-related artsy-craftsy do-it-yourself-y creation a day, Monday-Friday, over April vacation to celebrate our freedom.  You know the moment you realize you've wasted your vacation watching TV and sleeping?

It's Thursday.  But I have one!  One little craft I did over vacation.  Maybe by Sunday, I'll have a decent number of posts and won't be so ashamed.  For now, you'll have to enjoy my simple painting.

I printed out a picture of Massachusetts and traced it in pencil on my Walmart canvas.  I picked yellow acrylic paint for a background color because I like it and it was handy.  I painted the yellow around the state, using the tiniest brush to get it all the details around the harbor and islands.

I let the paint dry, which didn't take too long, and erased all the pencil.  Then came the blue for the state! Again, I selected the color because it was handy, and I like blue, and it goes with yellow.  My old elementary school colors were blue and gold.  Maybe those colors are deeply embedded in my psyche.

Again, I used my tiniest paint brush for the details.  While that dried, I found some crinkly deep pink paper from a stationery collection and cut out a small heart.  You could also take some construction paper and crumple it with your hands.  I took my Tacky Glue and glued it over my beloved Boston.

I've seen paintings of states done with the heart cut out or painted on, but I wanted to be creative and 3D.  I'm also really into appliques right now.

I've had a few glasses of wine.

Final product again, this time hanging on my dark blue wall:

Artistic style:

That's my lamp.

Bye!

Late nights

I'm sure you've had that moment.  You leave work around 7 and think to yourself, "Whose van is that?  Normally the parking lot is empty when I go home on Wednesdays."

Pencil Trade-Out

Remember the crayon vases I made?  I had to buy a large pack of mason jars instead of just a few.  Silly Walmart.  I have found many uses for mason jars, including my fancy, wonderful, slightly impractical pencil trade-out system.

Like the new camera?  It has a lot of settings and I like to play with them.

I took a mason jar, found a cute pencil-themed font from dafont.com, typed up the labels, glued them to pencil-colored card stock, and packing-taped them to the jars.  Then, I screwed on the jar rims, throwing the top disc things under my bed next to that green styrofoam crap and some old boxes.

You don't have to do that part.

Next, instruct your children to keep pencils IN THEIR PENCIL CASES and only to trade out a dull for a sharp if they have NO SHARP PENCILS IN THEIR PENCIL CASES.  Then, make sure the dull ones go in the dull jar, and the sharp ones in the sharp jar.  We have a Pencil Sharpener job during Job Time, and that is the ONLY time students can sharpen pencils during school.

My pencil sharpener was $50 and I love it like I love my own unborn children.  It sharpens pencils in seconds!  I highly recommend that investment.

I caution you: my sweet little chicadees ADORE trading out their pencils.  They all demand a perfectly sharp one, and are also too lazy to get them from their blue bins at the back of the classroom (we don't have desks, just tables).  I have had to crack down, I tell you!  But now we've got the hang of it.  In March!  Also, they're glass jars, so maybe they're not the most brilliant container.  Luckily, my cherubs are delicate and cautious.

...

I think the blurry part in the back is called "bokeh" and you adjust the aperture to make it focused in the front and get that lovely "bokeh".  I might be talking out of my butt.

Here's how they know when to throw out a pencil that is too small:

This is taped to the table in front of the pencil jars.  The kids hold the pencils up to the one drawn on here and throw it away if it's too small.  This helps avoid their love of sharpening their pencils until there's barely anything left and then trying to write with it!

Keeping It Real

Someone pinned this picture from my blog and commented, "I wish I was this organized!!!"

HA.

HA.

HA.

Note the chairs taped together there on the left side?

That means school hadn't started yet.  Flash forward to today:

That stack of papers on the left with a bag on top?  The bag is leftover supplies the kids brought in SEPTEMBER that I STILL don't know what to do with.  The stack of papers?  It is a pile of extra worksheets.

The stack next to the bigger stack?  A pile of crap someone left in my room.  I don't know whose it is.  I think it's an accumulation of other people's paper and overheads and folders and math games.  The tray?  Rocks and minerals exploration.  The pile next to that?  I have no idea.

Ugly red bag?  Emergency grab and go bag that I still have not figured out where to put.  It is collecting dust.

Don't get me started on the giant box of Goldfish.  Do the words "salty snack craving" and "binge" mean anything to you?

Yes, it's great to have "a place for everything, and everything in its place," as my Grandma taught me.  But to have the discipline to put things where they belong in the moment?  Knowing where to put the random crap you didn't plan on?  I have yet to master that.  I have done the opposite of mastering that.