Learning Together and Working Together: Integrating STEM and Social Emotional Learning

Have you check out my newest product? It is called ‘Learning Together and Working Together: Integrating STEM and Social Emotional Learning’. Long title, I know! 

To sum it up, this innovative unit is all about teaching students social and leadership skills like: how to cooperate, how to disagree and still get along, how to persevere, and how to be a leader by practicing these skills while doing STEM projects. This unit includes 24 different activities including social emotional activities, STEM graphic organizers, unique STEM projects, and formative assessments to go along with these activities. This is a great unit full of many essential skills! This unit would be perfect for any grade 3-6 classroom. 

Above is a cooperation activity that I used in my classroom last week, and that you can find in this great new unit, it is used to reinforce the importance of cooperating with your group members during STEM time. With this cutting and pasting activity, students cut out the situation cards and sort them into 2 categories. Is it showing cooperation or not? 

To go along with my new unit, I also wanted
to brag about some of the terrific STEM projects I have done in my own classroom! 

This year we build toothpick and candy bridges that stretched across a 1 foot distance. 

My favourite challenge this year has been the marble mazes! These turned out terrific! And we have also built and tested parachutes for an egg drop. For STEM activities I usually have my class work in groups of 2-4, and I usually set a half an hour time limit for building. Students are also challenged by the materials they are allowed to use. They are only allowed to use the material that I provide them with. 

Canadian Math Practice Stations

When I designed my Canadian Math Practice Stations Unit I purposely choose 3 math topics that I find students often need more practice with. The topics highlighted in this unit plan are money (this is a Canadian Unit so the questions are all about Canadian money), time, and comparing and ordering fractions. Each of these three topics includes 3 different stations to help reinforce the learning for these challenging math topics. 

Each math topic includes:

-A practice station including 3 different worksheets each containing a variety of practice questions.

-A math word problem station each math topic has 2 pages of unique math word problems, each page includes lots of room to show your work

-And lastly, a math games stations each of the 3 topics include: 1-4 math games to help reinforce the learning of each concept. 

This resource can be used in a variety of different ways, it is meant to be used for review, or it can also be used as extra practice or supplementary activities.

The Canadian money section includes:  a counting only coins practice page, a counting bills only practice page, and a mixture of counting both bills and coins page. The money section also includes 6 word problems, and 2 unique and fun math games!

These math topics were chosen out of the new BC curriculum for grade 4 level math, but will be relevant for other provinces and territories in Canada as well, and can be used as review for older students or enrichment for younger students.

If you are looking for more Canadian money resources check out my Canadian Money Unit! 

Higher Level Thinking Writing

My Higher Level Thinking Writing Unit includes a variety, 20 to be exact, deeper level thinking questions to get your students using their brains in a creative and innovative way! 

The activities encourage students to think about their surroundings, their community, and their school. Many of the writing assignments encourage students to think outside of the box, find ways to make improvements in their community, and to invent new things. And good news! Many of the writing assignments can be easily connected to your STEM curriculum too! 

Each question comes with a graphic organizer, and additionally I have included 6 unique writing paper templates. After students have completed a graphic organizer they could practice their proper paragraph writing skills with the help of their graphic organizer, they could build a prototype of invention, or they could write a story about their findings. Before Spring Break my class did a terrific job of completing the: invent your own candy, invent a new type of playground equipment, and if I were principal for a day… 

These activities can be easily adapted for differentiation, and allows for student creativity and inspiration. My students really like to share their writing with their classmates. Check out this unique and innovative unit! 

Learning All About Salmon!

I’ve been super busy teaching and working on my Masters that I haven’t made too many blog posts, but exciting things have been happening in my classroom! This past November we completed our Salmon Unit which included a very informative trip to our local salmon hatchery. 

Before we attended the field trip, students learned about the life cycle of the salmon, the parts of the salmon, and the salmon habitat and food chain. 

A highlight of our salmon unit in the classroom was our salmon unit scavenger hunt. With the scavenger hunt, students worked with a partner to find the answers to the salmon questions. The answers were hidden around the classroom and my students did a great job of finding all of the answers.   

During our trip to the hatchery, my class had the opportunity to go on a guided walk and see the spawning salmon and salmon habitat. Students also got to witness the dissection of an adult salmon and touch and hold all of the salmon’s organs. 

Students also learned more about the life cycle of salmon by getting the opportunity to see each stage of the life cycle from egg to adult. I highly recommend looking for learning experiences like this one to help reinforce the learning in the classroom. Below is more information about my Salmon Unit which can be purchased in my TPT store. 

My salmon unit contains 20 highly engaging and interactive activities including: a make your own salmon life cycle board game, a salmon scavenger hunt, a variety of cutting and pasting activities, and an end of unit quiz. 

Exciting News! It Includes a Sale and a $30 Giveaway....

It is that time again! And I am super excited! TPT is having a site wide sale, and as always everything in my store will be 20% off. Additionally you can use the coupon code XOXO to get an additional percentage off from Teachers Pay Teachers. 

To help you celebrate the sale, myself along with two other sellers; Coreas Creations and Essie's Classroom Resources have teamed up to give our customers a giveaway! One lucky winner, who will be chosen on February 15th will be given a $30 TPT gift card to spend during the final day of the sale. Good luck everyone! Keep reading to learn more: 

Have you heard? TpT is throwing another site-wide sale on Feb. 14th and 15th! To celebrate, I've teamed up with two awesome teacher-authors to host a $30 TPT GIFT CARD GIVEAWAY!! Follow this link >>> http://bit.ly/2Ekh4xK<<< to enter!  The winner will be announced on Thursday, Feb. 15th at 7:30 AM (EST). Good luck!!

Jessicca

The Cyber Monday Sale!!!

It’s almost time for Teacher Pay Teacher’s annual Cyber Monday Sale! This year the sale falls on November 27th & November 28th. My entire store will be on sale for 20% off including all of my bundles which are already discounted! I’m teaching a grade 4/5 split class this year and I will definitely be stocking up on some resources for the second half of the school year! My store has tons for Christmas and Winter themed resources click on the link to check out The Third Grade Zoo's Christmas themed resources! 

My Arctic Unit is one of my newest units in my store! This comprehensive unit includes 82 pages of resources which includes: Arctic vocabulary cards, Arctic animals fact posters and supporting activities, climate change in the Arctic activities, and Inuit culture and traditions activities and resources. A highlight of this unit is the end of unit Inquiry project. Check out the images below for a sneak peak into this fabulous learning resource! 

Halloween Activities!

Halloween is upon us and I wanted to share a little about some of the Halloween activities my class has been enjoying! Below are examples of some of the witch feet that we created using oil pastels and a boot stencil. My students did an excellent job of making their witch legs colourful and fun! 

We have been working on spooky paragraph writing. My students have been learning about proper paragraph writing including: making interesting topic sentences, three detail sentences, and a proper closing sentence, but the main focus for this writing assignment was to add more descriptive language to our writing to make our writing more interesting! 

To start this assignment my students drew a picture of a monster. This monster ended up ultimately being the focus  of their writing. Students then wrote down a minimum of three descriptive words to describe their monster’s: eyes, skin, breath, and teeth. Students then used the paragraph writing planning page found in my Halloween Language Arts and Math Resource Package to help them write an interesting topic sentence, three detail sentences, and their concluding sentence and students used their

descriptive words to make their sentences more interesting. After students had completed their paragraph planning page they then wrote out their paragraphs on Halloween themed writing paper.  All graphic organizers seen above can be found in my Halloween Math and Language Arts Resource Package. 

Today is the first day of Fall, and in celebration I thought it might be a fun idea to have a giveaway! I haven't made a blog post in a very long time because I've been busy teaching full time, and I've gotten to the place where I've gone though all of the activities that I initially prepped for the back to school season and I'm starting to prep for some new Autumn activities, so I thought maybe some of you might be in the same boat? So let's celebrate Fall with a giveaway, and one of you will win a $10 TPT gift card to purchase some new Fall curriculum and a product of your choice from my store as well! 

All you have to do to enter is: comment with a creative Fall classroom activities or lesson idea, follow me on Facebook, TPT, or Pinterest. Find the Rafflecopter widget at the bottom of the page. 

But first! Here are some terrific Autumn themed products from my TPT store: 

https://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/Halloween-Writing-Centers-1295318

https://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/Salmon-Unit-1321181

https://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/Owl-Unit-2105260

https://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/Exploring-the-5-Senses-Halloween-Edition-2022120

Here is the giveaway! Don't forget to share with others! This giveaway ends on October 6th. 

Good luck everyone! 

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Sorry about the delay! It has been a hectic week, but I'd like to thank everyone who entered my giveaway! The winner was Cheryl C. Congratulations Cheryl you should be expecting an email from me shortly with your gift card! Thanks again for entering! 

Back to School Sale and $25 TPT Gift Card!

Teachers Pay Teachers have announced the date of the annual Back to School Sale! On August 1 and 2nd you will enjoy 20% off your TPT purchases and if you use the discount code B2S2017 you will get an additional percentage off of your purchase at checkout! This is the perfect time to stock up on your back to school essentials such as: 

Teacher Binder

Student Portfolios

Formative Assessment Strategies

Nutrition and Healthy Living Resource Package

Social and Emotional Learning Strategies

In celebration of the Annual Back to School Sale I am having a $25 TPT Gift Card giveaway! In order to enter all you need to do is follow The Third Grade Zoo's TPT Store, Facebook, or Pinterest or comment on this post with a Back to School Tip to share with others! 

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Good Luck everyone!