Five For Friday-Graduation Edition

Aloha Friday!! My favorite day of the week!!

Mahalo to Graphics From The Pond for this cute graphic :)

Well it was our last week of school and it was a whirlwind of craziness.  What made this year different was that my oldest daughter graduated from the 6th grade.


She has been with me at school since she started in preschool at 3 years old.  If you have followed my blog you know that this girl is her own person and marches to the beat of her own drum.  If you met her she wouldn't say much, but if you had any sort animal or story about how you helped an animal she would become your best friend:)

Her 6th grade teachers really go all out and they had a dance along with their graduation ceremony this week.


This girl lives in t-shirts and shorts and wanted to wear jeans to the dance.  Since her teachers told her she had to dress up she settled for a skirt. I thought she looked perfect.


She was front row and right center at the ceremony which was perfect for me.  You have to understand this girl wants no attention at all!!  All the girls in her class gave tear filled speeches of how much they would miss the school.  Her teachers were great and had her read a story that she had written in class.




I think everyone was thrilled that she was a comic relief after all the tears.



Her teachers and principals presenting their leis and certificates.


Leis are then given from family and friends.


Pictures with the principal


Her fun and wonderful teacher


The fun starts when all the kids give each other leis of candy, flowers and any other goodies that can be worn around your neck!


The graduation was over  at 10:00 and I still had my kids in my class to pass out goodies to!  At noon I said goodbye to my class, cleaned up a bit and quickly headed to the beach for a 6th grade party put on by the parents.  It was a gorgeous day and I may or may not have napped most of the afternoon.


We left around sunset just as a bit of rain was sneaking over the mountains.


We arrived home at around 8 pm after a long, but fun filled day.  My girls were exhausted and went to bed on their own!

After a long and busy week it was nice to be home and just kick back and relax.



So happy to be on summer break for 2 months!!  How was your week?  Go link up!







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Educents Sale Weekend

Aloha friends!  It's a long weekend and I am going to by busy, busy, busy!  Time for BBQ's and some fun in the sun.

Just a quick announcement for you Educents fans out there!  They are having a sale this weekend.  My readers will get 10% off on all their items and when you use this code you will also get free shipping!


They have some great deals already, so head on over and check some major savings!!

Just click on the picture above and don't forget the promo code surfin10free!



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End Of The Year Writing

Aloha friends!  It's here...the end of the year.  6 days and counting.  This week marks the end of our last full week of school.  With all of our May Day festivities I didn't quite get a chance to finish our assessments.

I went through the great 2nd Grade Blog Hop last week and got so many great ideas!  I wanted my students to write something they would enjoy and put their best effort into.  I really loved Mrs. Olson's Lucky Little Learners "Words Of Wisdom Freebie".   Such a fun idea!  However for my assessment I wanted a more complete writing sample so I made this.


I made it double sided and told my students they would be writing a letter to next years second graders telling them all about second grade.  I told them to include what they would learn, what the teacher likes and doesn't like and anything they enjoyed.

I could not believe how hard the kids worked on these.  Every student wrote quite a bit.  Several students needed another sheet of paper!

These first two are so funny because right before the lesson I confiscated a toy from a student who is constantly bringing in toys to play with!  My drawer is full of his items. He will be happy on the last day of school when he gets to go home with a bag full of toys!




I guess I have been a drill sergeant lately!


I am so proud of this students writing.  His spelling has improved tremendously.  He wanted to stay in at recess to finish this letter!




This little guy did not like writing because he said he could never think of anything to write.  When he did write his stories were fantastic!  He filled up both sides of this paper.


This student struggles so much with writing.  Her language and grammar are often difficult to understand.  I had to laugh at how mean I am when you don't "lisen".  It reminds me of this meme.


Everyone is a little squirrely with vacation right around the corner.  I am doing my best to stay calm and sweet, but somedays it can be tough!

I really loved all the letters they wrote and was amazed at their spelling and neat handwriting.  I think they want to impress the first graders more than me!

I plan to make a copy and place their originals in with their report cards.

I made this template editable for you to be able to use it in your class.  Just open it up in Powerpoint and click on the text.  The font I used is KG What The Teacher Wants.

Click {HERE} to download from Google Docs.

Is your class getting a little antsy?  I would love to hear how you are keeping calm these last few days.




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A Memorable May Day

Aloha my friends!  I hope you hopped through my last post and got some amazing ideas for the end of the year!  I am still trying to decide which writing activity to use with my students this coming week.

If you have followed my blog for awhile them you may be familiar with our May Day program. Schools all over Hawaii celebrate May Day with song and dance to represent our unique cultures.  Our school takes it up a notch and we really go all out every year.  It is kind of a big deal at our school.

I admit I have a love/hate relationship with May Day.  It's so much work and preparation for weeks in advance, but I love the outcome!

It is held outside on our field. Teachers, parents and community members set it all up.  The flowers, plants and decorations are all donated by the community.


This is the stage for the Royal Court.  In a traditional May Day the court has a King and Queen, princes and princesses to represent the Hawaiian Islands.


The program begins with our principal welcoming everyone.


The conch shell blows to signal the arrival of the Royal Court.


The 6th graders each have a part in the court.  Each color represents an island. This is the island princess and prince of Kaho'olawe.







These are the king's guards getting ready for the arrival of the King and Queen.


The ladies in waiting.


The arrival of the King and Queen.


The parents of the King and Queen arrive to adorn them with flower leis.



The crown that the Queen is wearing is made of flowers!


Once the court is seated the performances begin.


Kindergarten and preschool did a Globetrotter routine. Very cute!


The first grade did a Tahitian dance and it was just beautiful and adorable.  I may have had tears in my eyes at the cuteness of it!


Aren't they just precious?!


Third grade performed a dance from Ghana.


The first graders took us on a trip to Samoa.




Fourth grade girls performed a Carnival dance from Brazil.


The boys then took the stage and showed us their Capoeira skills.


Here are my talented second graders.  They were super cute and their performance was top notch!


Once all the grades have performed the princesses perform a hula,


 as well as the princes.


The finale is the Queen and all of her ladies in waiting performing the final hula.


I forgot to mention that the teachers perform too! We did a disco routine to a medley of songs since this year marks the 40th anniversary of the opening of our school.  I don't have a picture, but there is a video floating around on Facebook that I will post on my page.

You can see just by the pictures that this is a huge school event that unites our community and makes the parents, kids and staff proud of our school.


Our Mardi Gras routine was so cute and the kids loved it.  I loved their costumes! But let me tell you, sewing costumes and rehearsing for the last few weeks with my second graders has kept me very busy!!

Now that May Day is done I am on auto-pilot for the rest of the year.  I am not running off any copies of anything!  

We are working on some fun plays this week.  We will be reading and maybe performing (depending on time) Spiderella,  The Three Little Elephants and Pinnochio.



These have been perfect to get my class engaged and reading.  I have two boys that are so into their parts.  They have been asking to read it every day!  I will definitely be filming them when they are ready!

I hope your end of the year activities are wrapping up nicely and that you don't have too many days left! Mahalo for stopping by!




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