Past projects 7
Building Brain Power
Funded Apr 3, 2023My students enjoy creating with Legos. I am amazed at their creativity and ingenuity. They enjoyed creating cities, trains, and buildings when we did our community unit. We talked about stability. Structures and make strong foundations. My class went on for a walk around their community. We paid close attention to arches and columns and shapes in buildings. My students drew sketches of some of the buildings in their neighborhood. My students then created and put together their buildings by using Legos.
My students were so excited to see the new Legos. I explained to them how we were going on a walk and looking at different buildings in our neighborhood. That project was fascinating, and their creations were outstanding.
I have created a Lego station in our classroom, and my students are always excited to spend time with me. My students build and create unique structures. This year, my students are so interested in dinosaurs and robots. I am planning a unit on dinosaurs for Spring. I will introduce different features of their favorite dinosaurs, such as T-rex. Thank you for your generosity. My students love their Lego blocks!
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With gratitude,
Mrs. Olivas
This classroom project was brought to life by PNC Grow Up Great®.Calming Area
Funded Jan 4, 2023The calming corner is an area in my room where students take a minute or two to connect with their big emotions. My students visit this area several times during the day. Here my students slow down or quietly look at books about feelings. I also include our classroom favorites such as Brown bear, brown bear, The very hungry caterpillar, and Rainbow fish.
We have soft-feeling dolls that students cuddle with and read to. Sometimes students whisper to these soft dolls how they are feeling. I also include paper and various writing tools as I encourage students to draw and show their feelings. The small wooden bench/student lap desk is perfect for this.
The sensory items calm students experiencing big emotions such as anger. The Calm Down is an excellent asset to my classroom. All of my students utilized everything included in the donation, such as the soft pillows, dolls, sensory manipulatives, and books.”
With gratitude,
Mrs. Olivas
Learning in the 21st Century
Funded May 7, 2019Thank You for your kind Donations. Now our classroom has two ipads and students can go to academic apps. These apps help them with basic concepts as tracing letters and numbers, Letter recognition and sounds, vocabulary building, and math concepts just to name a few of the so many academic apps my students are now able to use.
Now that we have a second Ipad my students don't have to wait their 15 minutes sessions for hours at during week. I have been able increase sessions to 25 minutes and therefore have more time to reinforce basic concepts using academic apps.
My students are also using reading apps as EPix in this app my students can select books and have them read to them. This is very helpful as sometimes I am not able to do read to individual students. Having this app helps my student have another model to hear vocabulary and enjoy stories.”
With gratitude,
Mrs. Olivas
This classroom project was brought to life by Verizon and 2 other donors.Socio-Emotional Development By Playing With Cuddlies
Funded Mar 6, 2019Young learners love books with vivid illustrations and great stories that they can connect to such as Pete the Cat. There is always a little lesson about how to cope with big emotions. Pete the Cat tells the students to take a deep breath and look at the sunny side of things; to keep going and not give up.
My students like interactive Read Alouds. We read a story several times I ask comprehension questions. We look for details in the illustrations and look for sight words. Students get so familiar with the stories that we choral read our favorite parts of the story.
I have several students that enjoy new books. They can't wait for me to put the book in the classroom library to revisit and look at the illustrations closely again. New books are great!!”
With gratitude,
Mrs. Olivas
This classroom project was brought to life by Conboy Foundation and 2 other donors.Magnetic Tiles: Building Colorful Structures
Funded Feb 16, 2019My students absolutely love to build and create different structures with the colorful magnetic tiles. We had a six week Building Study. My students learn what make structures strong and how to problem solve as they work together in groups of two or three students. You can hear then negotiate and share their ideas. It's an amazing addition to our classroom!
My students' eyes were wide open to see all the magnet tiles and they couldn't wait to start building and creating wonderful structures with them.
Few of our next steps are to look at great structures around the world i.e., the great wall of China, or Big Ben and try to create our own version of these great structures. Another step is to plan our structures by designing them first on paper as blue prints. We are just so excited with our Tiles!!”
With gratitude,
Mrs. Olivas
This classroom project was brought to life by Conboy Foundation and one other donor.Plenty of Dry Erase Markers for Basic Skills Practice
Funded Jan 30, 2012Thank you for the dry eraser markers. We have use them every day for language arts, math, science, etc. We practice our high frequency words. Our math basics have become fun and exciting. We play games like show me how many is 13 for example. Students use ten frames drawn by them and count ten and three more.In science, we draw life cycles of different insects. We enjoy working with our dry eraser markers. Students are aware that we save paper by using the whiteboards and markers. THis way we are helping our planet by on saving paper usage.”
With gratitude,
Mrs. Olivas
This classroom project was brought to life by Wasserman Foundation and 12 other donors.Lets Make Science Fun for Everyone!
Funded Jan 27, 2012In behalf of my students, I want to thank you for our science centers and the hand magnifying glasses. We have made great use of them. We have the tools to make science time fun and meaningful.Our favorite is the hand held magnifying glasses, my students have been able to observe and draw and write their science findings. Our science centers have become a great reinforcement tool to review and practice our grade level science standards.
The interactive science lessons have been fantastic and again great reinforcement tools to make science fun!”
With gratitude,
Mrs. Olivas
This classroom project was brought to life by Wasserman Foundation and 27 other donors.