Fun with SNOW in your Classroom

Having a snow day in your classroom is a great way to bring outside experiences inside! Even if you live somewhere where you don't have snow, it is fun to pretend!

I don't know about where you live, but I have seen many people's posts about having snow days! I live in Phoenix, and it has been in the 70s! Now I do enjoy the warm weather, but at the same time I think that I would enjoy having a snow day every now and then. As a way to make up for the fact that we don't miss school for school days I have brought snow days to my classroom! In this post you will find five ideas of things that you can do in your classroom to enjoy a snow day! This post does contain an Amazon affiliate link.


Having a fun craft is a great way to show your students how they are all unique and different. I enjoy this project because I give the students the gloves, hat and arms, but then they can create the rest of their snowman. They are able to add their own faces, scarves, buttons and they all turn out so cute! I used leftover Christmas wrapping paper to hang the display, with a cute poem from Adventures in a First Grade Jungle in the middle!


Another awesome hallways display is a snowman glyph! I love these because they again are personalized to each student, but allow them to show their creativity! Then you can have the students graph the results as well so they can show that they know how to read a glyph also. You can grab it FREE from TPT here.


During math centers my students get to build a snowman by answering various questions to gather parts of the snowman. I hang the different task cards around the classroom so they are able to get up and move around. Moving around is one of my favorite parts of any station, so that way they are not constantly sitting in their seats, but get to get their wiggles out while they are working on things!


Tying writing into your snow day is a great way to practice a procedural writing! Students can explain how they build a snowman in four easy steps! They can personalize this by saying what they would do to make their snowman unique or what they would add to their snowman. You can grab this awesome writing foldable from The Creative Classroom

Having a snowball fight in the classroom with these awesome snowballs from Amazon would be a great way to have some fun and get exercise during your snow day. You could use these to play dodge ball and it wouldn't hurt your students. Another snowball fight I played during math class was having students write a math problem on paper. Then we crumbled up the paper and they threw them across the classroom. They then answered the questions on their recording sheet and it was another way to practice their math facts. You could do this with any task cards or math concepts that you are reviewing at the time.

What are some things that you would do in your classroom to celebrate a snow day?! I would love to hear what else you would do!


States of Matter Books & Videos

Teaching about the states of matter is one of my favorite science topics!  There are so many fabulous ways to teach about solids, liquids, and gases!  I love all the different experiments and it's a concept that children interact with everyday of their lives.  I wanted to share some of the videos and books I use to teach these in my classroom.
States of Matter books and videos to teach about solids, liquids, and gases in an elementary classroom.


States of Matter Books


When it comes to books, there are a ton of books that are great for instructional purposes.  But I always try to find books for my classroom library that will be interesting enough for students to pick up on their own and read about science topics.  So here are my top 3 picks! 

1. What is the World Made Of: All About Solids, Liquids and Gases


States of Matter books and videos to teach about solids, liquids, and gases in an elementary classroom.

This book gives everyday examples of each state and even includes some simple activities for your students to explore the 3 states of matter!


2. Wile E. Coyote Experiments with States of Matter


States of Matter books and videos to teach about solids, liquids, and gases in an elementary classroom.

Wile E. Coyote uses the states of matter to try and catch the Road Runner! 


3. The Solid Truth About State of Matter with Max Axiom, Super Scientist


States of Matter books and videos to teach about solids, liquids, and gases in an elementary classroom.

This books is in a graphic novel format and a huge hit with my students!


States of Matter Videos


1. States of Matter for Kids


States of Matter books and videos to teach about solids, liquids, and gases in an elementary classroom.

This is a great explainer video with a little humor!

2. What's Matter?

States of Matter books and videos to teach about solids, liquids, and gases in an elementary classroom.

I'm a big fan of the Crash Course YouTube channel!  They are created more recently and include little snippets of pop culture which definitely appeal to kids!

3. I Wonder...Solid, Liquid, or Gas


States of Matter books and videos to teach about solids, liquids, and gases in an elementary classroom.

This video is set up as a game show and a great way to review the concepts you've taught!  I like showing this video when we are review for our test!

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Science Fair Projects Made Simple

Hello darlings!  Amy here from That Teaching Spark. Sometime in your life you or someone you loved has had to complete a.... wait for it.... Science Fair Project.  Gasp!  It can be the bane of your existence or it can be a joyful experience.  Can you even imagine?  LOL!


In all seriousness, I LOVE science, so teaching the Scientific Method and doing a class Science Fair Project is actually fun for me! No eye rolling please!  Talking parents down off a ledge and responding to parent whining and excuses... not so fun!  I get it.  I tell my students, "It's not hard.  It's just a lot of work!"  Especially when you wait until the week before it is due to even think of a topic.

In my school, all of third grade is required to complete a Science Fair Project.  To be proactive and to minimize the risk of parents wanting to gauge my eyes out, I created a Science Fair Journal that walks students through the process and gives them helpful reminders of the things I've been teaching them for weeks!! We also complete an entire Science Fair Project TOGETHER as a class and complete the journal TOGETHER.  This way I have modeled exactly what is expected and students already have experience with the process.


Question

For the past two years I decided to research about popcorn.  Food + kids = ENGAGEMENT!  Last year our question was, "Which brand of popcorn will pop the most kernels?"  This year we did pretty much the same thing but instead of brands, we research types.  We were trying to see if it made a difference if the popcorn was super buttery or if it was plain with just salt. Our question was, "Which type of popcorn will pop the most kernels, sea salt, butter, or extra butter?"

Background and Hypothesis

For this experiment we had to use the same brand to keep all the variables the same except the popcorn type.  After researching at www.popcorn.org/Facts-Fun/What-Makes-Popcorn-Pop we created our Hypothesis.  "IF we microwave sea salt, butter, and extra butter popcorn for two minutes and thirty seconds, THEN the extra butter popcorn will pop the most kernels."



Materials 

The pictures I am showing are from last year's experiment with the different brands of popcorn, so don't let that confuse you.  The materials you will need are simple and depend of the experiment you choose.

Testing the brands:
(make sure the bags have the same amount-grams)
You will need a total of 3 bags for each brand for a total of 3 trials

microwave
Pop Secret Butter 34 grams
Jolly Time Butter 34 grams
Orville Redenbocher Butter 34 grams
paper towels

Testing the type:
 (make sure the bags have the same amount-grams)
You will need 3 bags for each type for  a total of 3 trials

microwave
Pop Secret Sea Salt 34 grams
Pop Secret Butter 34 grams
Pop Secret Extra Butter 34 grams
paper towels

Procedure

This was a very easy experiment because you basically just pop all the bags for 2:30 minutes each.  I divided my students into 3 large groups to act as Trial 1, Trial 2, and Trial 3 and laid paper towels on the table.  The students dumped one bag at a time onto the paper towels and counted all the unpopped kernels.  The logic here is that if all the bags have the same amount inside, then they should have just about the same amount of kernels.  If you want to get super technical, I'm sure there is a slight difference with every bag and you could count the popped and unpopped kernels and develop a ratio, but for our simple third grade experiment, we are sticking with just counting the unpopped kernels.

Students recorded their results for each bag and then we shared the results of each Trial as a class to record in our Science Fair Journal.




Results- Data/Analysis-Conclusion

After we recorded the results for the 3 trials, I showed them how to create a graph with a graph key so we could fit all 3 trials on one bar graph.  We summarized our results into paragraph form and then we wrote our conclusion.  In the conclusion it is important for students to state if their hypothesis was supported or rejected.  It is also very important for them to know that their hypothesis DOES NOT need to be correct.  Some kiddos think if their hypothesis was rejected that they did the experiment wrong.  The whole purpose of the experiment is to see what will really happen.  If you are wrong that is ok!  You should never do an experiment when you are 100% sure of the results.  What would be the point?  You learn nothing.  



I hope these ideas were helpful to you and you are one or two steps further away from the ledge!!  Science can be fun!

You can grab the blank journal we used here.  


Happy Sciencing!