Tag: Kindness Month

Blogmas Days 5 and 6 (PLUS Hot Chocolate Craft!)

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Blogmas Day 5 – Tree Skirt

This is a hard one for me. I know some families have a tree skirt that they may have used forever and it has sentimental value….not our family. We would usually buy a tree skirt every few years from Target, but they’d always be the cheapest one they had. My mom always said that it’s better to focus more attention decorating the tree itself than buying something expensive to go underneath. We also would have a ton of presents for friends and family under our tree, so we never really could see the tree skirt.

When I moved out into my own place, I wanted to buy a nicer looking skirt for my tree because I wanted it to have a full and finished look. I got a pretty white and red one from Hobby Lobby last year and have it again this year.

Blogmas Day 6 – Anti Wish List

This one is hard for me!! I usually don’t even have a wishlist for myself on Christmas. I’m a lame person who prefers giving gifts rather than receiving them. I am appreciative over anything I get. Being a teacher, I get a lot of amazing gifts but I also get a lot of gifts that I don’t really have any use for. I am grateful for anything and everything I get. Because of that, I don’t really have an anti wishlist.

Want to participate in Blogmas 2019? Check out the following guidelines!

Last year you might have followed along with the 12 Days that I did with some of the gals listed above and we had such a good time that we decided to celebrate again together this year! So without further ado here are the guidelines for my 12 Days of Christmas.

  1. use the image provided in each post, so that way anyone who might jump in later can see what the plan is for the month.
  2. for sure link back to me, Abbey@ThreeCatsandaGirl, so that way I can celebrate your Christmas with you and maybe get some ideas of how to create festive enjoyment!
  3. spread Christmas cheer in the way you know best!

 

School Fun – Warming our Hearts

In school yesterday we did one of my favorite projects of the year that I wanted to share. It is one of my favorites that we do during the holiday season. The project I got off of Teachers Pay Teachers a few years ago from Counselor Keri‘s shop for $2.00. It was totally worth it! We start the activity with a mindfulness activity that gets them thinking about what makes them happy. They pretend they’re holding a cup of hot chocolate and think about the warmth they feel. We talk about how that warmth is like how our hearts feel when we’re happy. After the activity, I hand out 4 paper marshmallows and ask them to write something that makes them happy on each one. They then cut them out and put them on a hot chocolate (paper) mug they already have colored. They always turn out so cute and sweet.

 

 

For more day to day action and activities, go follow my class’s Instagram @lifeoftherookieteacher!!

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Blogmas Day 4 – Opening Presents

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Blogmas Day 4 – Opening Presents

This is one of my favorite topics! As much as I’d love to say, “I don’t care about opening presents,” that would be a total lie. I love opening presents! There’s something so sweet and exciting opening a gift that contains a surprise just for me. Who doesn’t love that? I will be honest and say, however I LOVE watching others open gifts that I have purchased for them. I love buying and wrapping gifts for my friends and family and I love watching them open them.

In my family Christmas Eve is spent with my parents and sister. This is the day we open all of the gifts we have gotten each other. When we were little, my sister and I opened all of our gifts first because of the little patience we had. As we grew older, we started to enjoy taking turns with our parents. We now take turns from oldest to youngest opening gifts. My dad always starts, followed by my mom, then myself, and finally my sister. I love watching the three of them open their gifts.

I’m not going to lie, I think pretty highly of myself when it comes to gift giving. Ha, I take my sweet old time picking out the perfect present for everyone in my life. My favorite resource is Etsy, AKA the BEST personalized gift giving site to exist. There’s something so fun for me watching them open the gifts I spent so much time picking out.

On Christmas day we follow a similar pattern. We celebrate Christmas with my mom’s side of the family. We take turns (from oldest to youngest) opening gifts. It is always a family joke that my youngest cousin has to go last because, even at the age of 20, she constantly wants to open all of her gifts first and hates to wait. In recent years, with everyone getting older, we have started a new tradition where instead of buying gifts for everyone individually, we buy one gift at a certain price cap, wrap it up, and then play the dice game together. It’s a new twist on our family tradition.

This year I am so excited to watch all of my friends and family open all of the gifts I have gotten for them. They are all sitting underneath my tree waiting to be opened.

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Want to participate in Blogmas 2019? Check out the following guidelines!

Last year you might have followed along with the 12 Days that I did with some of the gals listed above and we had such a good time that we decided to celebrate again together this year! So without further ado here are the guidelines for my 12 Days of Christmas.

  1. use the image provided in each post, so that way anyone who might jump in later can see what the plan is for the month.

  2. for sure link back to me, Abbey@ThreeCatsandaGirl, so that way I can celebrate your Christmas with you and maybe get some ideas of how to create festive enjoyment!

  3. spread Christmas cheer in the way you know best!

Blogmas Day 1 – Wintery Breakfast (PLUS Kindness Month has Begun!)

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Last December was the kick off to my blogging life. Within a few days of joining the blogging community I stumbled across an amazing idea known as Blogmas, or the 12 Days of Christmas Posts. I was fortunate enough to connect with the founder of this idea and joined her, along with other bloggers, writing about different Christmas topics to get in the holiday mood. I copied and pasted the rules to the bottom of this post if you want to join in with the fun! Speaking as someone who LOVES and is OBSESSED with Christmas, this is a super fun thing to do!

Day 1 – Wintery Breakfast

When I think about December (or anything in the winter) and breakfast together the first thing that comes to my mind is a nice large hot cinnamon roll! Growing up, my mom was a teacher, so over Christmas break from school she would always be home with us. During those 8-12 days of break, my sister and I woke up every morning to the smell of cinnamon rolls in the oven.

My mom is not the best cook/chef so these were just your run of the mill Pillsbury rolls but they always added something special to our wintery mornings when we were home on break.

Christmas morning was always extra special because with our cinnamon rolls, our mom would also provide us with peppermint hot chocolate with a candy cane on the side of the mug. This was usually our Saturday night treat in the winter, but on Christmas morning we got to add it to our breakfast.

My mouth is watering just thinking about those cinnamon rolls and hot chocolate. When I think of a wintery breakfast, that is immediately where my mind goes.

 

Want to participate in Blogmas 2019? Check out the following guidelines!

Last year you might have followed along with the 12 Days that I did with some of the gals listed above and we had such a good time that we decided to celebrate again together this year! So without further ado here are the guidelines for my 12 Days of Christmas.

  1. use the image provided in each post, so that way anyone who might jump in later can see what the plan is for the month.

  2. for sure link back to me, Abbey@ThreeCatsandaGirl, so that way I can celebrate your Christmas with you and maybe get some ideas of how to create festive enjoyment!

  3. spread Christmas cheer in the way you know best!

 

Kindness Month Begins

Last December I shared with all of my teacher friends my projects and activities I like to do in December. I love to have the theme of kindness during the month of December because it’s always good to teach kiddos about being kind and generous but it’s also the time of the year when they start to act up. Having daily kindness activities keep them in check with who they are and their behaviors.

On Friday morning we did one of my absolute FAVORITE projects of the year! We made our kindness light bulbs to hang on my whiteboard.

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Each light bulb has the sentence starter “I can light up the world with kindness by…” and then they share their ideas on what they can do. I LOVE doing this activity and so do the kids. It brightens up everyone’s day and their ideas are so adorable and sweet.

 

 

For more day to day action and activities, go follow my teacher instagram page @lifeoftherookieteacher!

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Parent Gifts

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As the break gets closer and closer the one thing I ALWAYS forget about is making parent gifts with the kiddos. The other thing I forget about is how long it takes to make them (and my lack of patience during the whole process!)

Last year, my team told me about making snowman mason jars (a project they found on Pinterest.) It was a very cute idea but it involved paint, crafty supplies, and a glue gun. 3 things that make for a long day and a BIG mess! I decided this year I was going to keep it as simple as possible.

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I had them make a class collaboration list on everything they are thankful for that their parents do for them. We took that list and they each wrote a letter to their parents saying how much they loved them and what they are thankful for when it comes to their families.

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Most of my kiddos took this pretty seriously. We talked about how the most meaningful thing you can give to another person comes from the heart and there are very few things more from the heart than your words. We took the letters and mounted them on construction paper to create a thick card.

As we let the letters dry we made very simple and easy ornaments using craft foam. I traced out yellow lights and blue mittens that they could pick to cut out. They then got to decorate them and put their school picture on it with the year. (They are super simple and pretty cheap but I’m a new teacher with hardly any money so this was the best I could do!)

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This was all we got done today. I overestimated our abilities to get it all done and wrapped in one solid day.

Tomorrow I plan to have them hole punch the top of their ornaments to add a string at the top. We will then take their letters and fold them into cards. Last week I bought some Christmas photo booth props from Target and took pictures of each of them in front of a tree with their props. (They look so cute!)

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I ordered them to have them put on the cover of their cards. After that we have the whole wrapping process, which I’m going to keep as simple as possible because my patience level is slowly declining. We’ll just put the ornament in the card and make a paper envelope to put the card in. Simple. Easy. DONE.

What are some ideas for parent’s gifts you make?

ONLY 4 MORE DAYS!! I just have to keep telling myself that. I. CAN. DO THIS.

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December 1st = Day 1 of Kindness Month

Posted in Education, UncategorizedTagged , , , 2 Comments

Happy December 1st! I am so thrilled that my favorite month is finally here! In my classroom I like to focus on the idea of teaching random acts of kindness. This is the time of year we hear about giving to others in need. To me, that also means doing anything you can for another person. I use each day to talk about how we can help others through something as simple as giving them a smile. There are a few activities that I like to do throughout the month that helps get my students in the mood. (Thank you TPT for having my back and giving me these FANTASTIC ideas!)

The first thing I like to do comes from  Kile’s Classroom. This is the “Random Acts of Kindness Chain.” (Click on the link to be directed to his store.) This is essentially a countdown chain that shows how many more school days are left until Christmas Break. When you take off a chain, it shares an example of a random act of kindness the kids could easily accomplish in one day. It gives ideas like, “write a note to a teacher in the past who you want to thank,” or “give someone a compliment about their personality.” It is AMAZING!!! We do it every morning during our morning meeting. One student gets the chance to take off the day’s link and read the act. From the moment the kindness act is read, my students get incredibly motivated to start right away. My class last year did not get along most days and we did so many team bonding activities and games to make them closer. It wasn’t until we did this, starting December 1st, that they put aside their differences and got along better than they had the whole year. The best thing about this activity is that it is FREE and it only takes 2 minutes of the day to complete.Screen Shot 2018-12-01 at 3.37.00 PM

The next activity that I love to do comes from Tails of Teaching. This activity is called the Top 2 Class Kindness Activity.

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This activity is something I do once a week, for the 3 weeks we have until break. On Monday morning, each student is assigned another student in the room to fill out a kindness note. They write the student’s name followed by their 2 most favorite things about them. I made it an anonymous activity, so the student didn’t know who had them and no one knows who they have. It is sweet to see the comments they can come up with about their peers. When we did this activity, I noticed my students with very little self esteem, start to speak up more in the room and reach out to other students who they may have been afraid to speak to beforehand. It builds incredible new relationships that last for the remaining of the year.

Last but not least is my favorite activity that I use as a decoration for my classroom. It is called the Gift of Kindness from Jodi Southard’s Shop on TPT. Students each get a light bulb that prompts their writing with the phrase, “I can light up the world with kindness by…” Each student fills it out with their own answer and then, when they’re all cut out and completed, I use string to make them look like actual Christmas lights and put them up around the room. It is such a simple and quick activity that helps put the room in the Christmas (and kindness) spirit!

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I LOVE this time of year and want to use it to share with my students the true meaning of Christmas (or the holiday season). These 3 activities are so easy and teach so many lessons in such a short amount of time.