Elf Antics: Last Day!

This post is a quite a bit late, sorry!

The last day before our holiday break we found Dash hanging out on top of our white board where he could see the whole room:

On every desk he left a little treat! We could tell it was him that left it, because there was glitter sprinkled everywhere as well. 

 We were a little pressed for time due to the holiday sing a long that morning, but we managed to fill out our last day of our Elf Journal:

After the sing a long, we completed the entire journal by filling in some of our favorite memories from our time with Dash. We looked back through all the journal entries and laughed remembering all the silly things Dash did in our room.

Everyone was a little sad to know that Dash would not be back again, but we had so much excitement on Friday with our holiday party it helped cheer everyone up.

I hope everyone has had a wonderful holiday break. I am looking forward to seeing everyone's sweet smiling faces on Tuesday! :)

A New Suit For Santa

*I realized I forgot to actually post this a few weeks ago. Sorry!

The other day we worked on our special project from Mrs. Claus: designing a new suit for Santa. I shared some of the ideas the other day but I wanted to give you an update to show you the second part of the project.

After we created our new suit designs, each student wrote a letter to Mrs. Claus explaining why she should pick their suit design. They did such a good job using their words to explain their ideas!

Here are a couple great examples:

Elf Antics: Day 13

This morning we found Dash with a present for us!

In his letter, he told us that last night he let Santa know we would be watching the Polar Express so he sent us something special that we couldn't open until after the movie. Everyone was so excited about the present and couldn't wait to open it!

After the movie, we sat down to open the gift from Santa. Inside, we found 22 bells from Santa's sleigh!

I have to say, these kids just melted my heart with their excitement over this. As we opened it, I picked up one bell and rang it for them. They all started cheering and yelling, "we can hear it! we believe!" everyone was very happy to hear that I also could hear it ring.

I feel so blessed to be able to spend each day with each of your children. They have such sweet hearts and make me smile every day. It has been such a joy to celebrate this holiday season with them. It really is true that the holiday spirit is held in the hearts of children.

Elf Antics: Day 12

It looks like Dash made a new friend last night.  Look at these two "monkeying around"

In his letter to us, he mentioned that last night he ran into the desk fairy! He was so excited and wanted to follow her around everywhere.

If you look closely you can see some glitter sprinkled over the Desk Fairy's card and prize. Dash told us in his letter that since he didn't have anything else to give, he decided to make our desks pretty and leave glitter anywhere the desk fairy went.

It's getting close!

Elf Antics: Day 11

This morning we almost had a bit of an elf mishap! When we walked into the room we found Dash hanging from a paper chain he had made close to the ceiling:

However, within minutes of being in the room, some of the links from his chain started breaking apart! My friends were freaking out a bit wondering what would happen if the links holding up Dash were to break! Luckily, everyone agreed that as long as I was VERY careful not to touch him (or else he will lose his magic), I could go back through and add some staples to help it stay together.

One of my super smart friends commented that she knew why Dash used tape to put the links together: "it's because at the North Pole they wrap all the presents with tape! He must have thought that was the best thing to use and not realized that when you have tape and glitter it doesn't stick very well".  Such smart thinking!

And of course we noticed one more link was removed from Dash's countdown chain. We're getting close!

Elf Antics: Day 10

This morning we found Dash next to some snowflakes made of q-tips. Everyone figured out what those were very quickly, but no one was sure what exactly he was holding.

In his letter, Dash told us that he had so much fun playing in the snow at the North Pole over the weekend he wanted to bring some of it back to us. What he brought, was magic snow! He told us all we had to do was add water to the powder and watch the magic happen.

When we had some time later, we gathered around the carpet to try it out.  We were AMAZED to see the magic snow puff up when we added water. Everyone got a chance to touch the magic snow and we all agreed it was even cold just like the real stuff. The best part is, it doesn't melt! How very exciting!

And of course some of my friends noticed Dash had not forgotten to remove the links for each day of the weekend. 

Elf Antics: Day 9

Yesterday morning when we came in the room we didn't find Dash doing anything too crazy:

Upon further inspection, we realized that he had left not one but two letters for us. One was the daily letter from him, and the other was from Mrs. Claus!

Oh my goodness were we excited about our special project to help Santa! One student commented that, "we have to do this right away. If Santa finds out what happens he might put Mrs. Claus on the naughty list!"  another responded, "yeah, and if that happens he might lose his jolly spirit and then he wouldn't want to have a Christmas at all".

As you can see, we took our project very seriously!  We put aside our morning plans and set right to work on our new assignment. First we brainstormed some ideas as a class to get their creative juices flowing. They came up with SUCH original ideas. For example, one student suggested that Santa's new suit could have a robotic arm. That way he could maneuver his arm down the chimney to drop off the presents and save time by not having to go all the way down himself.  Another student suggested that he have a magic camera belt. When he pushes the button on his belt a spy camera appears in the children's rooms and a big screen projects in the living room. This way Santa can see if the children are nestled all snug in their beds or not.

A fun thing about this project was it brought out a lot of connections to movies. Last week during indoor recess we watched Prep and Landing. A lot of students made connections to that and took some of the high tech ideas the elves had and incorporated them in their suits. Other students made connections to the movie The Santa Claus and incorporated some of those ideas into their work.

Since Mrs. Claus didn't need our finished products until next week, we took our time creating our design yesterday. Next week we are going to finish up our work by writing her a letter explaining the different parts of our suits and telling her why she should pick each one.

These designs seriously turned out FABULOUSLY! Here is just one of the awesome examples:

For those that don't read "first grader", this new suit for Santa has:
-j et packs on the back (to help him fly)
- a command shirt (so he can be in contact with the North Pole at all times)
- a hypnotizing wand (to put kids and animals under a spell to get them back to sleep if they wake up)
- a noise meter (sucks in all the noise Santa makes so even if he is loud, no one can hear a thing)
- a naughty and nice list phone (so he can easily see who is on which list and it won't take up space)
- cookie pants (the pants pocket works as a cookie dispenser in case he gets hungry).

LOVE it! So creative! I can't wait to see the writing the kids do with these next week. This is one of my favorite projects of the year.

Elf Antics: Day 8

Yesterday morning we were quite surprised where we found Dash upon walking into the room:

There were squeals of delight when everyone realized he had made his own swing high above our classroom. He is such a silly elf. I could hear students wondering aloud how he got up there, and hoping that he is careful so he doesn't fall down. Such sweet hearts those kids have!

Everyone was also delighted to see that Dash had not forgotten to remove a link from his countdown chain.

Only 12 more days!

We are really going to miss him when he has to go back to the North Pole next week to get ready to help Santa with Christmas.

Elf Antics: Day 7

Today we found Dash perched on the ledge of the whiteboard. Next to him he had a tiny paper chain counting down the days until Christmas.

All of my friends could not believe he was able to make a chain that small! They carefully counted his rings and found out there were only 13 more days until Christmas. Very exciting!

Elf Antics: Day 6

Look where we found Dash today!

In the letter he left us he told us that when he got back from the North Pole last night he was so tired that he needed a place to rest. He had no idea we had an elf bed in our classroom and was quite excited to find it. He let everyone know that even though it looked like he was resting, he would be keeping an eye on us all day!

Elf Antics: Day 5

Sorry I didn't get around to posting this last night!

Yesterday when we came in the room we found Dash having a grand old time in the treasure box. 

It was funny to see the kids' reactions! Some of them felt that it was cute and we should let him take a prize. Others, however, felt that he was being very naughty and trying to steal from us. haha

You never know what Dash will be up to next!

Elf Antics: Day 4

Everyone got quite a laugh when they saw Dash this morning!

What a mess! In his letter to us, he explained that he couldn't resist playing with the band-aids because he had never seen band- aids made for giants. Apparently in the North Pole they only have elf sized band-aids! Who knew? haha

Later at recess one of the kids spotted a lone band-aid stuck to the sidewalk and wondered aloud if maybe Dash had left it there. I'm not sure about that one, but I definitely wouldn't be picking band-aids up off the sidewalk either way haha.

Elf Antics: Day 3

This morning when we came in we didn't see Dash at first. Upon a closer inspection of the room we found him camped out by our book boxes on a little table. It appears he had some fun coloring Christmas pictures last night and left a bit of a mess with the crayons!

We talked about what he was doing and everyone agreed that he must have borrowed the crayons from me, but the pictures must have come from the North Pole. One of the students wondered aloud if he could bring us some fun coloring pictures like these ... guess we'll have to wait and see!