I Need My Monster!

The time is almost nigh upon the witching hour. The fogbank prowls closer to the front door. No need to worry about that whispering; it's just an old friend. Come to sit beside you and tell you a story.

Do I have you in a frightful mood? Well, I have a creepy little packet to share with you.

I put this together last year to get my students to have more in depth discussions about books and to put all their talking skills to GOOD use!

There are five spooky tales to with your class, or to break them into five small groups to discuss one at a time.

 

 

 

We practice a lot of conversational skills such as eyes on the speaker, sitting still, and responding to what is said. I have an anchor chart about Conversational Starters. It helps students form their responses and pay closer attention to what the other children are saying. Something I find they don't often do.

 

The poster includes things such as:

 

I like what you said about ______________

 

I think your idea is interesting, but ______________

 

I agree with _____________

 

That's a good point. Have you thought ______________

 

 

It also helps set a spooky mood when you turn off the lights and tell the stories by flashlight!

Snow Globe Writing

I was wondering if anyone was going to ask me what I meant a few posts back when I said I was taking pictures of my students as they came in all bundled up. I had a pretty sweet prize pack from my TpT store for those curious minds. But alas, no one took the bait.

I took those really great pictures of my students, printed and cut them out then had them design the interior of their snow globe to go along with their engaging writing piece. I bought some clear plastic plates at the grocery store and some Buffalo Glitter. It's not actually glitter, but more confetti. Still very aggravating as it got over everything. I put a spoonful of the shimmery stuff in the middle of their design and then hot glued the plate on top of it to create a snow globe.

You know I didn't come up with this on my own. Total JIVEY moment, of course!

Their story concepts ranged from giant flesh eating teddy bears that needed to be taken down with a chainsaw (no idea where they found one inside a snow globe, but okay), to the mysterious stranger giving them a snow globe and warning them not to shake it. Oops! All of them were creative and engaging stories to read, so I accomplished that message. We still need to work on those pesky capitals and understanding how to paragraph appropriately. I got them to indent! Wheee.

Here's a picture of my friend, Meghan's student results. I took mine down and sent them home before taking a picture.