The Cutest Thanksgiving Play That Ever Existed

 We had SO MUCH FUN practicing for our wonderful Thanksgiving "play" for Grandparent's Day! We used a Reader's Theater of Twas the Night Before Thanksgiving by Dav Pilkey. The kids fell in LOVE with this book and could probably still repeat it word for word without seeing their lines. I was so very proud of them because this is not an easy book. They practiced their little hearts out to put on the very best performance they could for their family and friends. I was able to catch a few pictures during their first performance (we did it twice for family members who were caught in the building traffic). I wish I could have filmed the whole thing, but we were busy y'all!

My little turkeys!

My farmer and narrator!

 We did it! Yay! Below is the full story for your pleasure!

Twas the Night Before Thanksgiving by Dav Pilkey

Let's Rewind a Bit!

 Whew! We have been busy, busy, BUSY y'all! We have covered SO much in the ELA classroom the past few weeks it has been a whirl wind!

First let's begin with retelling fiction stories. We practiced and practiced and practiced "walking back through" stories after we read them or listened to them. The kids loved our little activity of Follow the Yellow Brick Road to actually physically walk down the "road" and retell each important part of a fiction story.

I LOVED how they held each other accountable and really worked together to retell and not forget any major event of a story. 

Then we moved on to comparing the difference between fiction and nonfiction stories. We looked at the meat of the books and really read to determine WHY a book was fiction or nonfiction. 

One day the kids worked with a group or buddy and they had to sort their independent reading books into fiction and nonfiction piles. 

Later on in that week we used a library cart of books and some brave kiddos came up in front of the class, pulled a random book of the cart, and read the first page aloud to the class. Then they had to determine, after reading part of the book, if it was fiction or nonfiction! They were SO brave and proud of themselves! 

Then it was assessment time! The students had to cut and paste the images of each book on the library cart and determine if it was fiction or nonfiction. The cart was available for the kids to come up and read the books in case they weren't quite sure of the genre! 

Wow! They blew me away with their attention to detail in the books to determine the correct genre! 

We then moved onto alphabetical order to the first, second, and a little bit with the third letter. The students worked with a partner and arranged cards in the correct alphabetical order and jotted down their answers together. 

After a few days of practice together they were finally able to prove their learning to me with our handy dandy alphabets. The kids had a paper clip on each alphabet to move along down the alphabet to keep track of where they last ended in the alphabet. It was hard work, but they did a GREAT job!

Lastly, this week we dug deeper into nonfiction and explored the text features. We discussed the glossary, index, table of contents, captions, photographs, diagrams, labels, keywords, headings, maps, and charts! Whew! It was a very busy week trying to find all of these text features in our books. They LOVED doing this!

Families, thank you so much for allowing me to teach your hard working children every day! They are just such a joy! Everyone have a happy Thanksgiving! 

Here's a preview of our newsletter for when we are back! Be safe and enjoy your family time!