Fun with Fairy Tales

November has flown by! I feel like it was just Halloween and now I'm getting set for Thanksgiving break. This month we worked on story elements, comparing and contrasting and opinions with a unit on fairy tales. My students really enjoyed reading fractured fairy tales and then writing their own versions. For a couple of my students, even a couple of my high kids,  this was very difficult to do. They could not think of a fairy tale being different than the original version and it made me see how much more we need to work on thinking creatively. 
We did a couple of projects with our unit where the kids also worked on  their writing. Last week we did, "If I Had a Magic Wand..." I really saw each students personality come through in this project. Some made wishes straight from a story we had read and some really thought about what they already like and what they would want. 

This month I also spent some time working on how to write letters. It's not a first grade standard but it helped with my students' conventions and seeing a purpose for writing. We wrote a couple of letters as a class to staff members and then we also wrote individual letters for Veterans Day. My kids really enjoyed this unit and I saw tons of growth in their conventions in just a week. 

We only have school Monday and Tuesday so I'm reviewing a ton and doing some Thanksgiving stuff. After the break I'm starting on habitats and plan on doing deserts first. It's the habitat my kids are most familiar with and it'll help them learn the vocabulary and concepts.