October Fun

Can I just tell you how much I love October??  I'd say it was my favorite, but I also really love December.  We have had so much fun!  We ended our apple week at the end of September and jumped into reading Otis books.  If you haven't read these books, you must!  They are sooo cute!  It is about a tractor and his farm friends.  There are several books, but I love the original and Otis and the Scarecrow best.  Otis and the animals think the scarecrow is real, and they don't understand why he doesn't smile at them or talk to them.  We made a character map describing Otis, and then each created their own scarecrows. They turned out really cute! 

 I bought some straw at the Dollar tree for their hands, and they chose which head, hat, and outfit for the scarecrow.  We also have been talking about setting and characters, so they drew a picture of the setting and characters in the story. 

My class loves Otis, so definitely check it out! 

We moved into Pumpkin week which of course is always a favorite!  For one of the centers, I added this sensory bin.  I put oatmeal, leaves, and rocks with letters on them.  I wrote our sight words, color words, and the student's names on the pumpkins.  They could look for the letters and make words or write the words on the dry erase board.  Most chose to do both. 

I also wrote our sight words on a pumpkin, and they loved being able to write the words or make the words with magnetic letters. 

 This a game they love!!  All of the words we have learned so far go into the pumpkin.  There are also 3 with the word BOO!  They take turns pulling out a pumpkin and read the word.  If they pull out a BOO card, all of the cards go back in.  They LOVE this game and were doing really well praciticing our sight words! 

You could use this for number and letter recognition, sounds, math facts-  the options are endless!  Best of all - they are learning while having fun! 

 

 Later in the week, we decided to experiment with candy pumpkins.  We wondered and predicted what might happen when we put a pumpkin in oil, water, 7-up, vinegar, and milk.  Most of them ended up dissolving, but it was fun watching them change.  They were all pretty different, and I like this activity becuase it can be done in a day! 

 We also created shapes, towers, or anything they wanted with the pumpkins and toothpicks!  They loved doing this.  One made a set of dumbell weights.  :D  So cute! 

Others made shapes, and one even made a fidget spinner!  Pretty creative! 

We ended our week with lots of activities with small pumpkins.  Each table had their own pumpkin to measure with links and cubes.  They also counted the number of lines.  They drew what they looked like and described how they felt. 
Finally, we cut them open so everyone could reach in and pull out the seeds.  Lots of squeals with that!!  Their faces were priceless! 

Next week is Bat Week which is one of my favorite weeks of the year!!