First and foremost... what I want you to take away from this are some ideas to get your kids excited about learning however YOU want to make that happen with what you have! You don't need all the things I'm going to write about! Just making a small change in your classroom can make all the difference for your kids!
The day before the final day of the quarter I planned a fun day of review for my teammates! We just finished reading 'Charlie and the Chocolate Factory' by Roald Dahl and I knew I just had to do a Wonka's Factory transformation!
DECOR
My school provides us with free butcher paper! (Trust me, I do not take this for granted as I know not all schools offer this!) This paper was 99% of my decor! I used different colors to create stripes by just stapling them to the wall, and used a different color for the 'table cloths' for each table team. I created the giant Wonka bar out of paper too by tracing the logo from my projector, cutting it out and gluing it to the brown sheet. Simple! I had a left over helium tank and added some balloons... but it looks just as great without them!
MATERIALS
Since I was Willy Wonka, I wanted my team to be my Oompa Loompa workers! I borrowed the white glasses from our student council just for fun! I got free to-go boxes from Pei-Wei (they were working to earn candy throughout the day, and kept it all in that box to enjoy during the movie the next day). Finally, I asked parents to donate bags of individually wrapped candy and toothpicks.
GO ALL OUT... (for FREE!)
I think what made this particular transformation even more magical than any I've done before is that I truly committed to playing the character of Willy Wonka. I'm talkin'... adapting his quirky mannerisms, using an accent the ENTIRE day, and even asking my students what their names were as if I had never met them before! Miss Salcido was not teaching that day. Willy Wonka was.
I even told my students the day before that there was going to be a substitute. I love my class so much... they played right along and really enjoyed it! The final cherry on top of it all was the music I had playing when they walked in as well as during different activities throughout the day. Here's the playlist I used:
ACTIVITIES
*Throughout the entire day I awarded my teammates pieces of candy to add to their box for various things (winning the competition, showing positive character traits, cleaning up the quickest...etc.)
TEAM BUILDING
- I had my Oompa-Loompas in groups of four. They each had to come up with a creative candy-related team name and earn points for great behavior all day. They each had to decide on who their 'Candy Captain' was. The Candy Captain was in charge of keeping the team on task!
- In their candy squads, they had 20 minutes to build a tower using only toothpicks and gumdrops. They also had to complete this IN SILENCE for an added challenge! Points were give to the tallest, and the most creative looking structure!
- Our final team building activity for the day was to create a commercial! Here were the requirements:
MATH
WARM UP: I had 7 envelopes taped to the wall for each team. Each envelope had 2 state testing review questions for each Oompa-Loompa to work on. I am a firm believer in "no-turns, no-outs"...each teammate had the same two questions to answer on their own. All students had to answer the question with work shown and get checked by me before grabbing the next envelope. IMPORTANT: I have trained my students and modeled explicit expectations when helping a teammate. They know not to flat-out tell them the answer just to 'hurry them up'. The first 3 teams earned 3, 2, and 1 point and candy.
REVIEW LESSON: I had 3 math centers planned for that day. 1: Zearn.org 2: Candy-related word problems on task cards 3: Teacher group. In teacher group, we use red vines to model different angles, line segments...etc. After modeling, they had to write down the specific properties of that angle/line. I also reviewed multiplying and adding fractions with M&Ms. (Each student received a mini-bag of M&Ms)
READING:
I used a non-fiction text about lollipops from teacherspayteachers.com. We first read the article together, then my students annotated and we discussed our annotations. After, we identified the text structure and provided evidence for it. Finally, my teammates answered the comprehension questions that came with the passage. I cut up the questions and placed them in envelopes, just like I did with math!
WRITING:
My kids had a BLAST using the names of different candy bars in their creative writing piece! After they finished, we identified different parts of speech within their stories by underlining verbs, circling adjectives, boxing nouns...etc. Below are the candy bar names I displayed for them to incorporate into their writing.
There you have it! A fun-filled day of learning and team building. To see more of my ideas, follow along my teaching journey on Instagram: @Teachwithsparkle
