27 February 2011

Armadillo’s Orange

If you use the Scott Foresman Reading Street Series, this book will probably be familiar to you!
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It’s a cute story of a little armadillo who uses an orange to find his way back to his burrow.  When the orange rolls away, he doesn’t know how he will find his way back to his home.  What he never realized is that there were landmarks all around him to help him find his way home. 
I’m very particular about the Tier 2 vocabulary words I teach the children this year – my final research project for my master’s degree is about vocabulary acquisition, development, and teaching.  I love when I teach a word like landmark and the children continue to use the word!
We paid particular attention to the sequence of the story and made an adorable story map:
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We read some other books that had armadillo’s in them as well and compared/contrasted the setting and characters in each story.
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We read some non-fiction books about armadillo’s and made an armadillo tree map.
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We also did a directed drawing of an armadillo using directions from Jan Brett’s website.
I think they turned out super cute!
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I know we did some math problem solving with this unit too – but I forgot to take pictures! It’s been a few weeks since we did this book, so I forgot!  I’ll try to remember this week to snap some and add them to the post!
Don’t forget to check out the post below for all of the great organizational ideas from all of our bloggy friends! I’ll slowly make my way through them! Link up if you have a great idea!

8 comments:

  1. My school uses Scotts Foresman and I lOOOOVE this activity- the administration is pretty strict on us following the scope and sequence of the manual (which I hate b/c they have winter books in fall?) But I will definitely keep this in mind for next year! I love to hear other activities to go along with the books! Thank you for sharing! =)

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    1. OMG! I just came across your blog and read this entry. I feel your pain sister. Don't you just hate teaching about winter things when it's warm and there are still leaves on the trees. Who ever designed this book sequence could have thought it out a LOT better.

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  2. Kathleen - I can't get the Armadillo orange documents to download for me?!?!? Says page is not available. . . know what the problem could be?!?!

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  3. We use this curriculum too! I have already done the story this year but would love to use this next year! I cannot get the documents to open either:(
    Jenea
    www.seedsofnoledge.blogspot.com

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  4. You come up with the CUTEST ideas! Can I be in your classroom?
    -Rachelle
    whattheteacherwants.blogspot.com

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  5. Okay! I redid how they are uploaded - hopefully they will work now. My husband, the computer scientist that he is, is trying to figure out why they won't download in an older version of IE -- let me know if you still have questions!

    Rachelle -- yes! Come anytime - we would have fun together!

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  6. Kathleen

    Can you please send me a copy of your Armadillo Orange activity? I don't see the link to download your activity. We are talking about animals and would love to use this activity as part of my LA.

    Thanks!
    Mireya
    yayaagu@aol.com

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