Thursday, January 17, 2013

It's Mitten Weather in Manitoba!

January, with its cold winds and freezing temperatures, always seems like the perfect time of year to focus on a multi-discliplinary mittens unit. Here are some of the activities that we enjoy working on in mathematics and ELA!

YouTube resources:
The Mitten read aloud

Jan Brett and her illustrations

Mathematics
SMART Notebook files: Mitten Sorting and Graphing Activity
To begin this activity, all students bring their mittens and gloves to the circle. We discuss the various attributes of our mittens and gloves, such as style, materials, etc. We sort our mittens and gloves using two large hula hoops as a Venn diagram. At first, the teacher gives the sorting rule, with students given the opportunity to generate their own sorting rules later on. The teacher or students can also sort the mittens and play "guess my sorting rule". To extend this activity and infuse technology, each child's mittens can be photographed, uploaded to the computer, and used in a SMART Notebook sorting activity. The "set picture transparency" feature is very useful in eliminating the backgrounds surrounding the mittens so no overlapping takes place during sorting.
 
ELA
The Mitten Story Map
Available at First Grade a la Carte

Mitten Writing: My mitten was so big a _________ could fit in it!

A variety of mitten activities in PDF format from Pinterest

And we love singing this mitten song while we play this "Farmer in the Dell" game--the first animal goes in the middle and gets to choose the next animal. The rest of the students make a circle, walking and singing around the animals in the centre. At the end of the song, once the mouse is in the circle, the student who is the bear gives a great sneeze and we all fall down!

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