Friday's Five Fabulous Finds

I have been on vacation this week and feeling refreshed.  Our snowmobile weekend was canceled due to lack of snow in northern New Hampshire, first time in 16 years!!!  I ended up doing my taxes and completing my daughter's FAFSA, worked on my TPT products and binge watched a few Netflix series.

I wanted to share a very special Valentine gift from a student.  She used the bones from her owl pellet and made this for me at home.  She wants to be a paleontologist when she grows up.  I think she is on the right track!

I had a special brunch with my two daughters.  I could not be prouder of my girls!  Emma is in her junior year of college and Hannah is a second year elementary music teacher.

Here are some Pinterest finds...

I love this!!

Make coordinates fun!

Great way to graph

Need to start collecting paper rolls for the end of the year STEM projects

Check out my Kung Fun Fractions post

Kung Fu Fractions

I came up with a new hook to kick off, or should I say "chop off", my fraction unit.  I bought a karate outfit which I later learned from one of my fifth graders is called a "gi".  I had my husband cut several boards for me into equivalent fractions: halves, quarters, eighths, sixths and thirds.  I created a PowerPoint and had "Everybody was Kung Fu Fighting" playing while I modeled my newly acquired karate skills.  

I love teaching like a PIRATE.  The kids get so excited and are 100% engaged!!! 

Note to self: Take more pictures!!!  

I passed out sets of fraction bars.  I had the kids "chop" their bars into equivalent fractions.  We looked at patterns of the numerators and denominators.  We added and subtracted with common denominators.  I have to spend a lot of time reviewing fraction vocabulary and basic concepts of fractions before I can teach my standards.

We spent a week working on many skills; examples of fractions, making equivalent fractions, simplifying fractions, finding Greatest Common Factors and Least Common Multiples, changing Improper to Mixed and Mixed to Improper Fractions.  I used pages from my "Fifth Grade Interactive Notebook."

Here is a link to my Fraction Notebook.  

You can also get it in my complete notebook bundle.

 Plastic eggs are out in the stores. 

Here is a TBT post on changing Improper and Mixed Fractions.

 We are now adding and subtracting fractions with unlike denominators.  I passed out slices of pizza(from a game) and had the kids create whole pizzas.  They had to find students with unlike denominators.  They had to make equivalent fractions to add them.   My students are creating their own pizzas.

Food Chain CHAINS

As part of my Food Chain and Web unit I had my kids complete a "Food Chain CHAIN."  They choose a biome and created a project describing the transfer of energy from the producer, to consumers and decomposers.  Some went above and beyond and created many food chains and webs.  Every project gets better and better this year!

Here is another project that my students will be making this week, "Stacking Food Chain Tubes." They will create a food chain of their choice.  

You can create your own projects or purchase them.  Both of these projects are available in my new science unit "Pass the Energy" available on TPT for $7.00.

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Here are some new resources that I used this year.

Great picture book to explain the transfer of energy

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Large charts that show food chains and webs of biomes.  

Love how they stand up on table.

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Follow that Food Chain is like the Choose Your Adventure series.  Students pick their own chain and read about the organisms.  Great resource for projects in my unit.

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We dissected owl pellets to explore food chains and webs.

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