Five For Friday

Hallelujah! Another Friday has arrived. This Friday was necessary. 

Tonight, I am participating in a little Five for Friday action with Doodle Bugs. 

I went to our state's fair with my mom and dad last weekend. My parents live about 25 minutes away from the State Fair town, so it was an annual tradition growing up. Even now, there are certain traditions we must uphold each year. Riding the train (like in the picture above). Pronto pups. Pig races (which we barely missed out on this year...sad face). Butter sculpture. Gigantic fruits and vegetables. That's a little taste of a Kansas State Fair.

I tried to spruce up some walls before our big events this week: Grandparents Tea and Math & Reading Night. This is the activity we did with our fifth grade Panther Pals. It was a really great beginning of year activity. You can find it here.

We've started small group Reading rotations this week. I was nervous, but it's been a great week. I think this is going to work! Monday and Tuesday we practiced 3 rotations (Buddy Read, Work on Writing, and Read to Self). Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday we practiced 4 rotations (we added Listening). It really worked out the way I had it planned. Building stamina is key! Monday and Wednesday we practiced each center for 5 minutes before rotating. We did that twice each day. Tuesday and Thursday we practiced each center once for 10 minutes before rotating. Today (Friday) we practiced each center for 15 minutes before rotating. We've been doing our Word Work together each day at the end of our small group reading practice sessions.

Next week we'll add our fifth (and final) center, Word Work. I'm excited to see it all as it should be. I'm excited to get started meeting with my kids. I'm excited for us to be a well-oiled machine, especially because I will be gone several days in the near future.

One of my sweet families sent me these flowers this week. It was so thoughtful, especially for such a rough week. I hate ending on a sad note, but my grandpa passed away this week. It is sad, but it was not a huge surprise. His health had been declining. I hope that my grandmother is doing well with this. They were married for 32 years.

We'll celebrate his life in a little while on his birthday. 

Hope you have a great weekend,