Author: smartchickteacher

This is a really fun project to do every year. Just go to http://www.monsterexchange.org to sign up, it is FREE! You will get paired with another school. Students must create a monster, draw and color it, and then write detailed directions so that someone else can recreate it. It is so challenging and fun!

Try it yourself:

Monster Name(s):Bubble Gum Man

Author(s):Katelyn

1. Using pencil, draw a large circle that it 6 inches tall and 5 3/4 inches across.
2. Go one inch up from the bottom and draw a crescent moon here that it on its side. This should create a smile. It should be one inch tall. it is 1 1/4 inch from the right side and 1 1/4 inch from the left side.
3. Now draw a straight line that connects the two points of the mouth.
4. One inch from the top of the mouth, draw a large backward lowercase c.
5. The c should be 1/2 inch long. Go 1/2 inch up. Now draw a large oval here. This oval should be 4 1/2 cm tall. It will be 2 1/2 cm across.
6. 1/8 of an inch over draw another small oval.
7. This oval should be 3/16 inches across and 4/16 inches tall. Now draw a large pupil in the biggest eye. Now draw a 1/16 by 1/16 inch pupil in the small eye.
8. Color both pupils black with a crayon. Now draw a straight rectangle over the eyes. It should be 4/16 inches by 1 3/16 inches.
9. Color this rectangle in brown with a crayon. The crayon’s name is sepia.
10. Now draw a line across the middle of the mouth. It won’t be cut in half and will be going side to side. The line will be 2 inches long.
11. Color the mouth light blue with a crayon named sky blue.
12. Draw a large black top hat that is four inches long. It is black with a red stripe. The top should be 5 cm long. Cut the bottom half of the hat in half and color this stripe red. It will be the top half of the rectangle. Now Color what’s left of the hat black.
13. Now draw three octopus tentacles on the bottom of the head. Each should be 2 inches long.
14. One should be in the middle and each one 1 inch apart.
15. Color the tentacles green with a crayon named yellow green.
16. Color the face with a pink crayon.

Students created these based on different species of butterflies and moths.  They needed to write clues that got more specific as they went.  It was a challenge to decide what information would be best to use on the cards.  They had a sheet to use in order to make a guess for each of the cards.  They had a great time trying to figure them all out!

We are eagerly expecting an author visit from Grace Lin, the author of the Newbery honor book, Where the Mountain Meets the Moon.  It is a great book!  We just created  really cool goldfish reports that look like a chinese takeout container.  Did you know there are 20 different kinds of goldfish?  We cannot wait to meet her!  I will post pics of the projects and her visit soon!

My students have really enjoyed building class wordles by hand on large sheets of bulletin board paper. We did our first one based on a book we are currently reading as a class, “The Alchemyst”, by Michael Scott. I wrote the title in the center of the paper and the students add the names of items, places, characters, etc. in various sizes, fonts, directions. I will post a picture when we are done! It is coming along nicely!

http://www.wordle.net

You can build a wordle on-line at the link above…

We just dissected fresh shrimp as part of a science unit on invertebrates! The students loved doing this dissection and the materials were so simple and inexpensive! I bought fresh large shrimp at an Asian Market (they have huge ones) and then we needed scissors and paper plates. Check out the links to a step-by-step powerpoint on the dissection as well as a lab packet!

http://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/Shrimp-Dissection-Lab
http://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/Shrimp-Dissection-PowerPoint-Presentation

Try it! Your class will love this activity!

Every year, the students in my class participate in the Invention Convention. Each student invents something and puts together a display board with the information. The kids had a blast and learned a lot about design process and the steps to inventing an item. We even made business cards and conducted on-line patent searches. Everything was done at school with the exception of building the prototype! If you have not tried a project like this, you may want to try it! It is well worth the class time!

We dissected cow and sheep eyes in class. The kids were amazed the pupil is actually a hole! We had a few eyes come with eyebrows… They took the pictures with our classroom camera…

We figured out how much area a roll of toilet paper has in math. The students loved the activity! We also did some other calcuations! Who knew toilet paper was so educational????

We made Egg Contraptions as a prelude to our Invention Convention projects. It was so much fun! Our school custodian launched them from the roof for us! We had 15 out of 20 eggs survive the DROP! Students were banned from using plastic bag parachutes, but other than that could use any materials they wanted!

We just finished making our monsters and directions for the Monster Exchange project.  It is totally FREE for anyone to join.  You will get paired up with a classroom from another state and they will have to draw your monsters based on written directions and you will have to draw their monsters.  It is so much fun and the kids learn a lot about writing directions.

www.monsterexchange.org