End of Year Countdown - Shout Out

Summer started a week ago and I'm now starting to feel like a human again.  :)  Today I wanted to share what helped me fill the last 2 weeks of school - you know, when life was crazy.  

The Core Coaches has this incredible resource that I've used the last couple of years.  

10 Days until Summer

When I picked this up a few years ago, I was more thinking for easy sub plans or random theme days for Fridays to spice things up a bit.  This year it was completely used for the end of school.  I wasn't able to do all of them, but we did tackle a lot of the theme days.  Each day comes with a math review and ELA activities, and then some STEM, research, art, fun stuff, etc as well.  

To make this work with my hybrid classroom, I printed off the papers I needed and added them into file folders, then wrote the "to do" list on the outside so I could keep my plan in order, as I was adding in other links and activities as well.  During the actual lessons I took a quick picture to add to our TEAM conversation, and then put the paper under my document camera for my in class kids.  TEAMS was acting glitchy, so I was trying not to screen share for a long time. 

For the most part I did use it as is - highly recommend the articles and activities.  It's a complete unit. There are digital links as well, and those helped to find links for online read alouds, etc.  The kids just used copy paper to work on the activities, we did them whole class.  It kept them engaged over the last weeks of school. 

The days we did tackle: 

Aeronautics Day - tied in perfectly with our Science Design Parachute Challenge. We also made reflection 3D Hot Air Balloons about our dreams for the future, and had a Paper Airplane challenge.

National Parks Day - the kids loved to research. I added in a virtual field trip to Yellowstone, and I did take the kids outside to do the Mentos and Diet Coke. I had joined our class TEAM conversation on my phone so kids at home could participate, and my colleague dealt with my phone when I was dealing with the soda and candy. 

Weather Day - I added in some youtube links with Natural Disasters and the reminders how we can help others that have experienced them.

Summer Safety Day - Oh, the kids were also so good at brainstorming "rules" for their younger siblings of things to remember and why... The articles included were awesome. 

Summer Holidays - This was a fun one. I added in an Art Hub for Kids drawing. We used youtube links for each of the holidays as well.  

Reflection Day - This I used over a span of 2 days as I added in our ABC's of 5th grade, our Class Memory Jar, and Yearbook.  

Like I said, I highly recommend this.  Even if you don't know when you will use it - it really is a complete day worth of material, and you don't have to print tons of papers if you do things full class. To prep for each day, I simply got the specific file folder with hard copies and had added the links to my email drafts so it was an easy access. 

Hope this helps,