Neglect...

Hi...

This has been the week from hell. I have finished my grad school work (!) but now am preparing for the end of the first half of the year, so planning has been piling up! Likewise, so have my blog posts...

So here it goes...

My 5 for Five Update:

1. Have breakfast for free - by this, I mean either make breakfast at home, or eat breakfast at work (we also get breakfast for free). In other words: stop buying breakfast at Dunkin Donuts!  -- I nailed this one :)
2. Study 2 nights this week for my Verbal Behavior final on Thursday. - This is my last final of the semester, so I need to end strong!  - Okay, so technically, I didn't meet this goal. However, the ultimate goal was to ace my exam, which I did, so I would say it was a success.
3. Create and upload at least 2 products on my Teachers Pay Teachers page. - I have started approximately 27,948 products - all of them remaining unfinished (I guess that's the Gemini in me). -- Success! Check out my products here, or see my uploads below :)
4. Start at least one of my home-made Christmas gifts  - I have a lot of gifts I will be making this year, and would like to get a start on them now so I'm not losing my mind the week of Christmas! -No...I can't even pretend to have done this one.
5. Post about my drama unit - I have been slacking on my educational posts, and would like to post about my upcoming drama unit I am starting this week. - Another bust. But in my defense...I didn't finish my drama unit, and I wanted to  make sure that I gave you a nice, coherent post!

So I did...ok. More than last week. Due to my very, very delayed post, I will not be posting a new 5 for Five this week. I'll save it for Monday.

How did the rest of you do?

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12/12/12 Update:

12/12/12 was a blast! My kiddos were so excited for the once-in-a-lifetime date (like, 12 in a life time, but whatever), that I had to do something to commemorate. 

I created a 12/12/12 math packet (last minute), and gave it to the kids for morning work. They were also able to work on it throughout the day, during leisure, or quiet academic times. Each transition was framed as a challenge, in which students attempted to complete their class transition in under 12 seconds (they did it!), as well as completing their dismissal routine in 12 minutes (from 12-12:12). At 12:11:48, we began counting down (from 12, naturally) until it was 12:12 on 12/12/12! It was very exciting, we all hollered and cheered, and then we ate munchkins (NOT 12)

Even though the date has past, therefore my freebie is no longer of any significance, I am showing it to you here. It may be worth checking out to print for a math packet, and just ignore the 12/12/12 theme :)

How did you celebrate 12/12/12?

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My Quickie Drama Update:

I haven't forgotten about this post. I just want to make sure it encompasses everything I want it to. The unit will not be complete until Dec 19th (When we perform our class' adaptation of Chicken Little, called, Henny Lenny. However, I don't think I can wait that long... so I won't. I'll give you a sneak peak on some of the activities and lessons we are doing within our drama unit :)

In addition to practicing our lines and rehearsing our play, I am teaching my class about literary elements of drama and plays. Today's lesson was about intonation, and the kids LOVED it!

Before we defined intonation, I gave some examples and had the kids describe what I was doing. I said the sentence "what are you doing" three different ways: a simple question, angry, and disgusted. The kids got a kick out of this, and described all the different things I did with my voice and body, and identified some emotions I might have been thinking. Then, I introduced the term "intonation" and defined it with further examples.

We discussed how punctuation tells how to say a sentence and adds meaning and emotion to a sentence or quote. We did the above example together.

Then, it was their turn. I created a game called intonation charades. These cards were given to each student and they were to read the card and do the action on the card, choosing the correct intonation  to fit the context. The other students then guessed who the speaker was talking to. (My example was I was saying "hello" to the President of the United States - I accepted any answer in which the listeners thought I was talking to a stranger or someone I was meeting for the first time.) Fun was had by all!

Here are my intonation cards. Because I don't know how to embed documents from Google Docs into a blog post, I had to upload it onto my TpT page as a freebie to offer it to you. Any help would be highly appreciated for future posts!

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And finally...new products on my TpT page!

One of my goals for the week last week, based on my 5 for Five, was to upload at least 2 new products. Well I reached my goal, and then some. Here are the newest additions to my TpT store :)

FREEBIE

So I gotta be honest...I don't know if all of these were posted within that last week, but I haven't posted about these yet, so I just want to get them out there :) Let me know what you think and please, please, please, provide feedback :)

Happy Friday (tomorrow)

Cheers!

R