SGA Election Day

 

Today at school was election day for the SGA!  My scholars were eager to vote.  My teammate said to me yesterday he was going to make "I voted" stickers for the scholars, which reminded me....I use to do a whole voting experience with my first graders!  I went and printed out the voter registration cards that I made way back when.  

Note:  I did add a Zip Code section on their printed copies.

I had some photos of them.  They could choose between the photo I had of them or drawing their own picture.

They worked on those yesterday.

Today when they came in, they saw me dressed like this:

Yes, I am THAT crazy teacher. 
(In case you haven't figured it out yet!)

We do restorative justice peace circles on Friday.  I decided that I was going to incorporate the elections into our peace circle.  

Book available on Amazon.

I then asked the scholars:

1.  What is it important to have a student government?

2.  What makes a great leader?

Then it was time to walk through the hall with all of the candidate's posters.  I created the sample ballots for them to use in the hallway.  I told the scholars how I received a sample ballot for our election.  I filled it out and brought it with me when I voted.  They were going to do the same thing.

Note:  The candidates were introduced in a whole school assembly the other day.  Going back to look at the posters was a great reminder for them.  

I am super lucky to have wonderful co-teacher and paraeducator support in my classroom.  They took my scholars through the hallway, pointed out each section, went over those candidates, and gave the scholars time to fill out their ballot.  

Meanwhile, back in the classroom, the other paraeducator and I set up the classroom to make it look like a voting location!

You can take a quick video tour here!

The line was out the door and down the hall! 

As the scholars came in, they handed me their vote registration card and told me their name.  They also told me their address OR birthday.  I looked at their picture on the back and put a star on their card.  I had tape on the floor just like a real polling place!

Mrs. Schnapp escorted the scholars to their booth and confirmed with them when they were done.  

The scholars went to Ms. Dove for an "I voted" sticker.  

Ms. Shadid did double duty - making the sure line of voters in the hallway wasn't out of control, and then collecting the sample ballots afterwards!  (Actually triple duty - all of these photos are hers!)

It was a great day!  The scholars had a wonderful time!

Thank you to Mr. Mason for the labels - and sparking the memory of what I did with my first graders!

Thank you to Mrs. Schnapp, Ms. Shadid, and Ms. Dove for going along with my crazy ideas and helping out!  I could not have done this without your support!

Thank you Ms. Shadid for taking pictures!

Thank you Ms. Henry and Ms. McNeal for making my evening! :-)

If I forgot to include you in my thank you section - my apologies!

Have a good night and a wonderful weekend!

Mario Day!

 

Over the summer, our admin came up with a "Level Up" theme for this school year.  Taking things to the next level with our teaching and the expectations we have for our scholars.  I took that theme and ran with it for my scholars.  For this year's Rock Your School Day, I decided I wanted to do a Mario Day with my fourth graders.  I got my team on board.  I started to tell others about it and they encouraged me to go to admin about making it a school wide Mario Day!  Admin was all for it!

I gathered and created resources to share with staff.

• Restorative justice circle (Peace Circle)
• Math task cards
• Super Mario Informational Nonfiction Digital Breakout

I of course ALSO had to get a costume!  

My principal announced to the scholars the week before we were going to have Mario Day and it was all the scholars could talk about!  Let me tell you, this was the BEST DAY EVER!!!!

Classroom Decorations:

I decorated my classroom (with help from my co-worker and two parents)!  Here's a video tour.

I covered my door with Mario wrapping paper.  It took the whole roll!

The tablecloth I purchased here.  On the table are tissue boxes that I covered with yellow question marks.  Inside of each box was a math question from the task cards I linked above.

I purchased this photo booth and I did not purposely hang it so Slapshot's face was looking through Mario!  (Slapshot is the Washington Capital's mascot.)  I didn't even realize it until one of my scholars pointed it out!!

I had these hanging all around the room.  Here, they are in my little window by the door.

My scholars are OBSESSED with stickers this year!  So of course I HAD to get Mario stickers for the day!  Honestly, there are enough stickers I could probably give them to every scholar in the school and STILL have enough left over!

Two other things I bought:

Tablecloths in several different colors / patterns

Table top decorations

Staff Pictures:

I think the staff had as much fun dressing up as the scholars did!  All pictures posted with permission:

My twin! :-)

Peace Circle:

The icebreaker during our peace circle was to work in small groups and create their own gameboard.  This was so much fun!  It took a long time and they didn't want to stop.  We are going to finish this next week.  Here are some pictures of them working together.  They made dice and game pieces.

He matched the tablecloth!  He said it was his finish line!

Math Task Cards:

I split the class up into five groups.  They had to work together to complete the math problems.  There were 24 problems.  After each problem, they came to me to check it.  After I checked it, they received a Mario sticker.  Then they could get the next problem.  Every five questions they received a gold coin.   

The scholars got so into the math activity, that we were late to our special because we lost track of time!!  

I was so impressed with how everyone worked together.  They were all smiles!  It was the best day ever!

Thank you to those who helped me decorate!

Thank you to everyone who shared ideas!

Thank you to GYTO for Rock Your School Day!

Thank you to everyone who participated!

Thank you to admin for liking my outside the box / crazy ideas!

Take care!
~Stacey~