Reading and Writing Love

Five quickies on this almost-to-the-end-of-school Friday. We get out in three weeks. Am I counting the days? Am I counting the minutes?? Thanks Doodle Bugs for the Five for Friday linky. I include a Funny Kid Friday below, too.

1. We wrapped up our Mo Willems unit today. Ya gotta know about Elephant and Piggie, Knuffle Bunny, and Pigeon books, right?? If you don't, go look them up RIGHT NOW. We own several copies of ALL twenty five E&P books (book lingo in my classroom). I save them for the end of the year, not only because they are a happy note to go out on, I mean funny even for adults, but because at this point ALL my kiddos can read them... well, read them after they've heard them, and read them with a partner. And they do love to read them. From the teacher perspective E&P are especially good for teaching dialogue, talk and thought bubbles, reading details in pictures, punctuation... so much. We've made Mo hats to celebrate his unit before, but only with Pigeon. This time all the characters prance across the front with a little directed drawing help.

Mo hats!

To show just how much we connect with Mo and his characters, I share what I found inside one little guy's hat.

Mo love

Cracked me up. I have about seventy Mo books altogether and they were worth every penny of investment. Most are available in paperback now, so they are a bit cheaper than when they first came out. Our school library is well stocked, too, as they fly off the shelves during our unit. Ya GOTTA do Mo if you don't already.

2. When the kiddos have the whole room to choose from at free choice and they choose this, you know something is going right, eh?

They LOVE the window seat!

3. Speaking of books and reading, I am going to be doing a book linky this summer so we can share the book love.

Teachers can share favorite kid books, teacher books, and books they read for pure pleasure. I've started my list already. It's going to run on Tuesdays for twelve weeks from June 6 thru August 22. Please spread the word and remember to stop back here when it starts in less than two weeks now. Keep your eye open for the book button!

4. I found these at Target this week.

Fun, cheap, and LOOK what you can do with them!

They make the CUTEST little first day of school gift for incoming students! I know it is early to be thinking about BACK to school, but you want to do this. I include a letter to students on how to use the wishing star that goes out to incoming families in their school start-up packet. I am especially proud of this idea because although you find great ideas all over the internet, the wishing star came out of my own little head. I happily share it because it brought me big kuddos with my new students and incoming families this past fall.

And people, my resource is FREE! You can read about how I use it by clicking on the family letter below.

Then grab the FREEBIE at my TPT store by clicking on the pack.

5.  We wrapped up a letter writing unit today... not letter, as in alphabet letter, but letter as in written communication. Letter writing for my class is a "bend in the road" mini-unit in writing workshop. In the past I have done this unit earlier in the year, but I found it to be a great end of year unit to do right now, too. The kiddos are getting just a bit nostalgic... if five year olds can get nostalgic... as it slowly sinks in that our year is coming to an end and they are not going to see all their friends over the summer as they do now. We spent the last three weeks writing to all sorts of people, but especially to each other.  The classroom mailbox has taken on new meaning.

For our celebration we played with our food, so to speak. I gave the kids licorice strings and they "wrote" the two most useful words in letter writing– Dear and Fondly. They loved it.

I really relied on my Let's Write to Someone letter writing resource, one of the few products in my TPT store. It helped me remember what I do in this unit, and the anchor charts, stationery and postcard are really helpful. You might check it out if you are looking for a way to refresh writing in your last weeks of school. You can find it by clicking below.

Along with this unit came a little Funny Kid Story I share in closing.

A favorite guest teacher was in our classroom during writing time this last week. Even though she knows our kids well she was rather taken aback when one of the littles asked, "What is the F word?"

She got quite a chuckle when she realized he was after the word Fondly!

Have a great last few weeks, OR congratulations on finishing another successful year of teaching, whatever your case may be.

Click on back to Five for Friday! Thanks, Kacey, for helping us find each other!! And I sure hope that Five for Friday will be back next Fall!!!

Thanks for stopping by!

Mo Willems Pigeon Hats- So Fun!

We love Mo Willems' Pigeon... who doesn't? There are lots of things you can do with that little bird full of big character. One of our favorites is making Pigeon hats.

Is that Pigeon on your hat?

It starts out as a guided drawing lesson. I fold paper into quarters and guide the kids to draw Pigeon four times. I ask them to draw Pigeon so that he fits the quarter sheet and fit on the hat. A lot of them draw him smaller, but that's okay– if he's smaller he still fits on the hat. I draw a big rectangle on the white board to represent where the pigeon parts go on their quarter sheet. We look at Mr. Willems's illustrations to try to capture some of Pigeon's expressions.

Then I ask the kids to evaluate their work and pick the pigeon they want on their hat. This time I had them choose two, as we were making hats to send to our penpals at a nearby school.

To make the hat I use a very ordinary, inexpensive paper plate, free of coating if I can find it, as they are easier to stick the pigeons to. Then I do the cutting– I come in from the edge and cut a circle just a bit bigger than the contoured circle in the middle of the plate.

Cut out a circle. Hold the plate facing down for easier cutting.

This is an adult task I'm afraid, but I got forty done while watching my one hour of weekly TV-- Call the Midwife. Tip: they cut better if you have the plate facing down while cutting. I use a piece of packing tape to splice the cut back together then old up the opposite edge to make a surface to glue Pigeon to.

Tape it closed with packing tape.

Fold up the edge opposite the tape to make a surface to glue Pigeon to.

Aren't they cute! You can see kids' individuality come out, even as they were all drawing the same character.

A flock of Pigeons!

I am especially fond of these little gems because although I've seen a lot of Mo Willems stuff, I haven't seen Pigeon hats quite like these, where the whole Pigeon is captured. It ties literacy and drawing together beautifully. The kids like drawing Pigeon so much, they started on a little Pigeon kick- Pigeons, Pigeons, everywhere! Wait till next week when we get to Elephant and Piggie!

Even works with pigtails!

Just as an aside, I do a Mo Willems author study at this point every year. The kidpeople know a lot of sight words now, and after we've read through the books once or twice, they all can read the books themselves. Nothing like hearing, "Again! Again!" when reading great books to kids :)

A sad note on this otherwise happy post, which I shared with my favorite ECE educator extraordinaire Dr. Jean: This same day we had to do standardized, computerized testing! I could not get back to the room fast enough to do something really fun and child appropriate! We can't control the testing, but we can use our powers for good to counter the evil-- HA :)

Love Mo Willems!  Love the Pigeon!

The post Mo Willems' Pigeon Hats– So Fun! first appeared on kidpeoplelassroom.com