Preparing for the 100th Day! Freebie!

I took the day off today to go to an appointment and to see my daughter in the city spelling bee. She got out on the word "necessary", because she added an extra c. So we've been teasing her all night - it's amazing how many times you can work "necessary" into a conversation. Before you think I'm a meanie for teasing her, it's the best way to deal with loss for her - if we make it funny she gets over it quicker than if we treated her tenderly.

I stopped at my classroom at dismissal to check out how my sub was - it seems she did a great job, so I will have to make sure to put her on our request list! It is amazing how hard it is to come by good subs! We've had subs in our school this year who have told kids that they were stupid for missing words in the school spelling bee, one told a 2nd grader to "shut his big mouth" for talking in the breakfast line, and of course, the infamous sub who didn't read the kindergarten bus list and allowed a non-bus student to get on the bus which resulted in a 2 hour search for the child before he turned up safe and sound at a local daycare!

Of course I had to clean up my room a little and then I decided to prepare some of our things for our 100th day on Friday! I found some blackline drawings and used my Elmo to blow them up on my Smartboard so I could trace them onto butcher paper. I will be putting my kiddos in groups of 4-5 to cut out and glue 100 gumballs in a gumball machine, 100 pepperonis on a pizza, 100 spots on a dalmatian and 100 fish in a fish bowl! Unfortunately we're out of lamination again, so I have to cross my fingers that my creations survive the process in good enough condition to hang up around the school!

Here are some of the other activities I have planned : putting together 100 piece puzzles (bought them at the Dollar Store tonight!), writing 100 word stories, reading 100 books and doing 100 second math drills! I'm always open to new ideas, so if you have a great 100th Day activity, please comment below!

I decided not to have my kiddos do a 100th Day homework project, because unfortunately only about 1/4 would even participate :( We have a big problem with our parental involvement at our school. Remember the sight word packets I made up (this post)? I made up 15 packets, thinking optimistically. Out of 300+ students, only 4 parents showed up! Granted it was held at 8am when most working parents are busy getting ready to go to work, but we also have a large population of unemployed/stay-at-home parents and they didn't attend either. I have voiced concerns in the past that our daytime events exclude our working parents, but I was told that they can just "ask their boss to let them come in 1/2 hour late". Hmm, reality check folks! In this economic climate, is a mother of 4 who is the sole income earner in the family going to potentially jeopardize her job by asking for time off for school functions or is she going to save that time off for when the kids are sick?

Anyways, here are some of the books I purchased for our 100th Day - I will be reading these all week, and I chose a variety of reading levels, because I have kiddos still reading at a kindergarten level, while others are reading at a 5th grade level!


I also made a quick "make a word" page for using the letters in "one hundred days" as well as a graphing packet based on the question "Would you eat 100?" Please leave me a comment if you use it, I love to know if my creations are helpful! I know the preview looks wonky, but I promise that the actual file is fine - I'm not sure why it always looks messed up, if anyone knows how to fix previews like that please let me know!

100th day