Pretend It's in the Lesson Plan

Do you ever have activities just jump into your brain? 

I'm not sure if it's inspiration or just my pregnancy brain but I've made some last minutes adjustments to my lesson plans lately. 

We had been working on inferences and deductions. It was the Friday before Easter. 

I had been reading some "What Am I" riddles to my reading comprehension group and one boy said, "These are fun! I want to make my own." 

*Spark*

Pulled out the construction paper… whipped up an example… let them try it out

I thought they turned out decent for spur of the moment. Next year I will have it actually planned and we'll spend a little more time on it. Enjoy!

(Close ups of a couple eggs and their clues coming soon… I forgot to take them and if I don't get this posted, it may not happen.)

Once a week we specify one of our homeroom blocks as geography. We've been spending a lot of time on learning the states. I have one puzzle of the whole US. I wanted the kids to have to place the states but didn't want to make paper puzzles. 

What do I do? 

I gave each student 2 puzzle pieces. (I have 27 students but a couple were absent so it worked out.)

They then had to put the puzzle together as a class, silently. They could only touch their own pieces, but they could suggest where someone should put their pieces by pointing. They also had to step out of the inner circle if they didn't have any pieces in their hands. This kept 1-2 student from taking over the whole activity. I also timed them. It ended up being a great class building activity. Everyone was involved, most of the students were pretty positive with each other. That is a huge plus as this has been a rough year with the way our students have been treating each other.

My future plans for this… acquire 3-4 more US puzzles and have races with smaller groups. 

If you have any suggestions, please let me know!