The M O S T Fun Way to Introduce Your Class ELF!

As I'm sitting on the couch watching Christmas movies on the Hallmark channel, I'm thinking about Christmas in the classroom and how much fun we had discovering our elf this year!

Let me just tell you all about it...

We had been practicing our inferencing skills the past week and the bright idea came to me, what would be better than introducing our class elf than through a mystery box inferencing lesson of course!?

First thing I did was find my mystery box and put our elf inside with his letter from the North Pole.

Then I created 4 clues to describe our elf to use for the mystery box activity.

I played this up BIG y'all.

I was explaining the activity and looking at the clues (with this puzzled look on my face) and revealed to them that these were NOT the clues I had made for this activity! Someone must have came in and wrote new clues over the weekend...they flipped! 

So on we went.....each student got a recording sheet and 1 clue. They recorded their clue and then walked around to find and record the 3 remaining clues their peers had.

Once they collected and recorded all 4 clues, they traveled back to their desk to put together the clues and visit their schema. They recorded their inference at the bottom of their paper.

Let me just tell you how excited they were once they read all their clues and "thought" it was an elf!!!!

We shared our inferences with each other and the time had come for me to reveal the mystery!

We rationalized through why they thought it was an elf and why it couldn't be other things they may have thought.

And there he sits, inside our mystery box. 

I can not imagine introducing our class elf any other way than this in the future.

In fact, I was so excited I made it into a download just for you!

Now you can introduce your class elf through the mystery box or just practice inferring.

I've included 5 different sets of clues for the following mystery items:

 elf, candy cane, stocking, ornament and Santa hat

You can find it available now in my Tpt store or by clicking on the product picture above.

Christmas with STEM

So there's been quite a few days that have passed since my last post.

This year has been unusually different than the past 6 that I've been in the classroom.

Like I S T I L L don't seem to have it altogether AND it's DECEMBER!

#idontgetit

But anyways, since it's the Christmas season, I wanted to share with you a fun activity we did during the last week before Christmas break last year...because we all know it's survival of the fittest!

My kids L O V E activities that show off their creativity and imagination! 

I found a few ideas and came up with a few more that involve STEM activities that are Christmas (or holiday) centered. . 

The product includes directions for 4 STEM activities and the items you will need to put together the activities. 

Challenge #1 and 2:

Solo Cup Christmas Tree

Santa's Parachute 

Challenges #3 and 4:

Gingerbread bridge

Pipe Cleaner Trees

These 4 activities will keep your little engineers engaged during the month of December. 

In fact, I save mine until the very last day of school before the break and they work their little tails off (who would have thought)!

STEM challenges included are:
Build a Christmas Tree out of cups
Make a parachute for Santa
Build a bridge for the Gingerbread Man to cross
Build a Christmas Tree out of Pipe Cleaners

Each activity comes with pictures, directions, station cards and a list of supplies.

Set up is easy. So download this pack, grab your supplies and get started!

Find it in my TpT store HERE or by clicking the picture above!