One Class, Many Cultures - Freebie!

I've mentioned this project/bulletin board a few times, and now that this year's group has done it, presented it, and I've (almost) finished reading their reports, I'm going to tell you more about it!

We tweaked it this year, and I'm so happy with the results!  We tied it into our social studies curriculum by telling the kiddos (and putting it on the instructions sheet for the parents) that we will learn throughout the year how California is made up of immigrants and migrants from many places, so their first task as 4th grade social studies learners is to find out how their family got here and learn about the country/ies their families came from.  This tie-in wasn't as specific last year, and I'm really excited to be able to reference this project throughout the year!

Here are the parts:

1. Report - we give very detailed instructions about what should be in the report.  I modeled for students that if their family has come from many different places, they could start with something like "My family came from many countries, such as ___, ___, and ___.  I am going to focus on my ____, who came from _____."  So that the kiddos with many countries didn't feel overwhelmed.  Most of my students' parents moved here after they got married in another country, though, so they just had one country to write about.
2. Presentation - The students presented on their family history, one interesting fact they learned, and showed their Mini-Me.
3. Mini-Me - I give them each one of these cute little popsicle sticks.  Last year, I let them choose from the boy or girl ones ... which left me with about 25 girl sticks and 8 boy sticks.  One of my fabulous teammates suggested breaking off the skirts.  Yay for not having to buy more!  I broke off the skirts for all of the boys before handing them out and, then had any girls who wanted the skirts taken off raise their hands, and I quickly did theirs.

Click HERE to get them on Amazon
... so much cheaper than they were at the teacher supply store!

Most of the kiddos did fantastic on the presentation, though there were some who just read their report (totally not following directions)!  I did have to have a few re-write their reports for handwriting/neatness issues and a few whose parents clearly helped a bit too much, but overall the reports came out great (especially for the beginning of the year). 

This is such a great project because the kiddos love it, it gives me a great baseline of their writing (and how much their parents help) and presentation skills, and we get to know about each other better!  I'm working on planning some activities for them to compare and contrast their history or country with others.  We're definitely going to do a Venn diagram.  You could also do a lot of things with graphing and data as far as how many kiddos are from where (just look at all my kiddos whose families came from China!).  

It also makes a wonderful board that can be left up all year long!

I didn't do great at planning os the kids were spaced out.
 I'm thinking about putting some flags in the blank areas.

Now for the freebies!  

(Click on pictures to go to google docs!)

**Note: These documents are a collaboration between my grade level team and myself**

My bulletin board letters:

The letters are a bit crazy when you look at the document.  Just print, cut, (laminate), and put them in this order.  It will work, promise!  For those of you who don't want the California flag in there, the font is Oh Photo Shoot by Kevin and Amanda.  I just put it on outline (in the format font menu) and then put the flag image behind it.

Assignment Instructions:

Currently and Monday Made-It

Thank goodness for Labor Day weekend!  I got tons of work done and still took half a day completely off from anything school related (except, of course, blogs!).

As my kiddos excitedly pointed out to me on Friday, it is now September.  This is exciting for them because at the end of each month, any unused bathroom passes become raffle tickets.  With only eight days of school in August ... let's just say we have a very full raffle bin!

So, first up .... Currently!

Thanks Farley for hosting!

First off, I have to say that I LOVE this month's currently template.  I am all about bright colors right now.  Let's hope that lasts since my classroom is covered in them! :)

I absolutely adore my class this year!  With the exception of two (aren't there always), they are so well behaved and so excited about what we're doing!  I have quite a few space cadets (Student #1: "Is this social studies or math?" (holding up a worksheet full of addition problems).  Student #2: "Uhhh ... I think we did that one during social studies." No. We didn't. We did it during math).  I prefer space cadets to naughty kiddos, though.

Favorite Things:
1.  I got a Kindle this summer.  I am reading so much more now.  I used to read constantly.  Then college happened.  I was a Literature/Creative Writing major, and I stopped reading for fun.  Being able to instantly get new books on my Kindle is making me love reading again!
2.  Last year's plan binder was plain white (that is, except for the stains on it...).  This year's binder is pretty and that makes me happy every time I take it out!

3.  No, I don't have a new couch.  I just didn't appreciate it all summer like I do at the end of a day of teaching.  So it makes the list!

And now ... Monday Made It! (with freebies for you)

Daily 5 Board
So, I'm not quite done making these, but I created, printed, cut, laminated, and cut.  All that's left to do is arrange them in the pocket chart!  I'm going to post more later about how I am adapting Daily 5 to fit my classroom, but basically I'm doing Daily 4, calling it Reading Workshop, and giving some must-do and some may-do activities for each choice. Here are the labels for you!

Noun Sort
My first Word Work activity!  Students will sort the sentence cards into the four categories, then record the nouns on a recording sheet.  Lots of laminating and cutting here! Here are the sentences and recording sheet for you!

The sorting page.
Their recording sheet doesn't have the "not nouns" category,
 but there will be cards that go in there!

Card baggie is stapled to the back of the sorting chart.
Each set of cards is also a different color.
Crossing my fingers for no supplies lost!
They sort by the underlined words.

Writing Wall Name Tags
Lots of typing, printing, coloring in the parts where my printer was running out of ink, laminating, and cutting.  I think they are going to look great next to the black backgrounds for their writing!

California Regions Fact File
Most of the first chapter of our social studies textbook is on the four regions of California.  The textbook takes three lessons to do this and each lesson talks about all four regions.  By the end of it, I even have details about the regions mixed up!  This year, as we read those lessons, the kiddos are going to organize the info by region.  Here is the document, if you want to use it!  They need to be printed double sided and then folded into a booklet.  Note:  There is one page that I am doing some old fashioned copy-pasting, so it's blank now!  You can put your own map of California there!  Font from Kevin and Amanda!

The page on the right will have a map.

That's all for now!  Have a wonderful week!