Five for Friday {on Saturday}

I'm linking up again with Doodle Bugs Teaching for this week's Five for Friday. Transitioning from break back to school has been so tiring! I'm jealous of all of you who had a workday to ease the process! 

Here we go...

My fiance, Joe, and I are FIVE days down in our first Whole30! Whole30 is a strict food program that helps you reset your body and heal from all the bad stuff we put into it on a daily basis. It's pretty much a stricter version of a Paleo diet. To find out more, visit the Whole30 website. 

It's been hard to go almost one week without Diet Pepsi, but other than that I feel better and I'm definitely eating better! 

My third graders have significant decoding problems, so we began studying different syllable types this week. We reviewed counting syllables and I introduced both open and closed syllables. They practiced counting syllables by looking through their story for the week, writing down words they found, and sorting them by the number of syllables. This was a super easy activity that they loved. They had choice on what words to use and they were reviewing their story for the week. WIN-WIN! 

*The sorting printable was a freebie from Mrs. Dryden on TpT 

I'm hoping this will help them decode multi-syllabic words as they are reading in class and independently. As we get further into the study, expect a blog post about everything we've done! What are some activities you've done when teaching syllables?

With my second graders, we are working on short vowels and it's starting to click! They are reading CVC words with short a, i, and o! This is a huge improvement from the beginning of the school year and it makes my teacher heart so happy! As a supplement to the stories and activities the book series I'm using provides, I'm making a packet of activities for each short vowel. I just posted my packet for Short A and all of the activities have been so helpful for my kiddos. The Short E pack is coming very, very soon!

It includes printables, an assessment, and hands-on matching and sorting activities. Here's a more in depth description of what's included:

Now that it's the new year, it means it's time to start planning for spring break! Joe and I are headed Gatlinburg, TN for the very first time. I know this has absolutely nothing to do with what happened during my week, but I've got to start planning! If you've every been to Gatlinburg, what are some must-dos in the area? 

Tomorrow is the first ever #tptchat on Twitter! It starts at 8pm EST and is a virtual chat with TpT sellers who are on Twitter. Anyone can join! If you've never participated in a Twitter chat before, you need to! They are a wonderful opportunity to collaborate with other educators around the country, and sometimes the world. 

Have a wonderful rest of your weekend!