Adjectives, Contractions, and Dollar Deals, Oh My!

Nerd alert on the title of my post!

I just wanted to give everyone a quick school update for Market Yourself Monday!


I want to thank Ms. Durning of Second Grade is Splendid for this next idea!  I saw it on her blog and thought it was too cute.  I love that she borrowed this idea from another teacher and now it's being borrowed again!  Isn't that what teaching is all about?!  Anyway, my kids loved this activity and it was a great way to reinforce our knowledge of contractions.  "Apostrophe showers bring contraction flowers!" 

Earlier this week we read Mouse Island during our Eve Bunting "author study" for Read and Vote.  (Note: The illustrator of this book, Dominic Catalano, lives in Bexley, OH...a suburb of Columbus!  My kids thought this was so cool.  However, after checking his website it looks like he'll be moving to China soon...)
Anyway, we have been learning about adjectives lately and how they can make your writing sound more interesting and exciting and how they can help the reader to create mental images.  We read Mouse Island and then searched for adjectives on specific pages.  (I know it's probably not "legal" to copy the pages of a book but it was the easiest solution since I only have one copy of the book.)  The kids highlighted the adjective(s) and then found a sentence where they could add an adjective to "fluff up" the sentence.  We also made a large web of adjectives that describe our classroom.  Tonight I am going to fill some plastic easter eggs with various adjectives.  The kids will have to choose an egg and three adjectives and think of a noun to match those adjectives.  Does that make sense?  Ex: I choose 3 adjectives from my egg: furry, soft, cuddly.  I could match those adjectives with teddy bear.  After they think of a noun, they will write 3 sentences about their match!
Does anyone have any fun adjective activities to share?

Does anyone else love buying books for your classroom?!  I get so excited when the package arrives!  The other day when I got to school, I had a package waiting for me from Scholastic!  I bought a bunch of books during their "Dollar Days" special (is it dollar days or dollar deals?).   I'm still trying to build my classroom library so I bought some holiday books, season books, vocabulary readers (my kids love these for NF text conventions!) and a few randoms....

 I got 4 science vocabulary readers....

• Tree Homes
• Cave Homes
• Powerful Polar Bears
• Remarkable Reindeer

 I also bought a bunch of holiday books...

• The Day it Rained Hearts by Felicia Bond
• The Best Thing About Valentines by Eleanor Hudson
• If You'll Be My Valentine by Cynthia Rylant
• Martin's Dream by Jane Kurtz
• Young Martin Luther King, Jr. (First-Start Biography)
• My First Kwanzaa by Karen Katz
• On the First Night of Chanukah by Cecily Kaiser
• Jingle Bells by Iza Trapani
• Corduroy's Christmas Surprise 
• The Best Halloween Hunt Ever by John Speirs
• The Legend of Spookley the Square Pumpkin by Joe Troiano
• The Littlest Pumpkin by R.A. Herman
• Halloween Mice by Bethany Roberts

 A few seasonal books....

• Picking Apples and Pumpkins (Clifford)
• Autumn is for Apples by Michelle Knudsen
• The Little Snowflake by Steve Metzger
• Flip and Flop by Dawn Apperley (penguins)

I also got a few randoms just for fun....

• I Lost My Tooth by Hans Wilhelm (Noodles)
• First Day Jitters by Julie Danneberg

Now I'm in the mood to search for some "book lots" on eBay .....this could be trouble! :)