No Worksheet Wednesday

I am super excited to link up with Primary Chalkboard for the first No Worksheet Wednesday in March!!! 

I try as much as I can to limit worksheets with hands on activities, task cards, group projects, etc.  But I am not going to lie...the worksheet does make a visit to our room. 

Our day starts out pretty typical with our Daily 5 routine. We really do not have a lot of worksheet action going on during the first two hours. Here is my guided reading group practicing their vowel sound book by Reagan Tunstall. Love these!!!

We were  very fortunate to get a grant last year that allowed us to purchase 30 iPads. They are shared between myself and my teaching partner. Below is one of my cuties scanning a qr code to pull up book to listen to about Abe Lincoln and George Washington during the technology choice. They still love listening to stories especially nonfiction.

Raz Kids is a big hit in my room as well. I am amazed at how many kids have made improvements with their reading and comprehension. I love it because I can check to see what skills they are missing or need help with by looking at their comprehension quiz results.

 My work on writing group was doing a Happy Birthday note to our Super "G". (She is a grandma of one of my former students and a  retired teacher who volunteers twice a week in the classroom.)

 My work on words group was playing BANG with their spelling words. We put our own little twist on it. Actually, my students put their own little twist on it!! The weeks spelling words on printed out and laminated. I usually try to add a thematic graphic to make it a little more appealing. They kids love this. The cards a placed in the silver bucket shown below. The student draws a card and reads the word on the card. Here comes the twist...then they close their eyes and spell it out loud for the group. If they spell it correctly they get to keep it. If not, they put it at the bottom of the pile. When they draw a card that says BANG or You've been Seussed!!...that was this week's theme...then they must give their cards to the person on their left. I am amazed at how they get so into this activity. This week's words dealt with changing the y to an i and adding es. So when they drew their card today they actually gave the singular word for the plural word they drew.

During math I decided that on Wednesdays I am going to have my students start teaching the class on how they solve word problems. We did a sample together and then I picked 2 students to teach and work through a word problem with the class. While the student was at the document camera the rest of the kids had their white boards out. They were all so engaged and eager to share their knowledge with the "new" teacher. They were agreeing or disagreeing and supporting their answers. Let's just say I was one happy teacher!!

 During math today we floor sized made clocks! I got this idea from Reagan Tunstall. The kids were put in groups of 3. Once they made their clocks they quizzed each other on making different times on their giant sized clocks.

Come join us all at Primary Chalkboard to see what everyone else is doing for NO WORKSHEET WEDNESDAY!!