KEURIG

For the last year, I have been selling some of the units that I have made for my classroom on TPT, http://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Store/Just-A-Second (or click the picture below)

While I haven't made a lot of money compared to others, the extra money has been a nice treat!  I wanted to do something special with the money.  I have a Mr. Coffee brand Keurig machine at home that I love, so I had been thinking about buying one for my classroom.  Being as frugal as I am, I had no intention of buying an actual Keurig brand machine.  However, this one turned out to be a great deal!  Normally $99.99, Kohl's had it on sale for $79.99, then a 30% off coupon, and a coupon for free shipping = $55! 

This model came in a lot of colors!  I had a hard time deciding but finally chose this one.  Why?  It matches my new phone cover.  I know, I know, not the best reason, but I like it!

I tried it out at home.  I had to make sure it worked before taking it to school tomorrow!  Mmmm!

Thanks TPT!  Now I need to make some more units for my classroom to add to my TPT store- who knows what fun thing I will buy for my classroom next!

SCIENCE EXPERIMENTS

This week my students experienced the best of Science (hands-on experiments), and the worst of Science (district assessment).  Overall though, it was a fun week!

We started with Sink or Float.  I know (from personal experience), that 3rd graders have already experimented with Sink or Float in previous grades.  So, while we didn't spend a lot of time on it, I used this time around to work on creating a hypothesis as a group.  It was fun to walk around and listen to the groups discuss whether they thought something would sink or float, and why they thought that, before they even tried it.

 One group asked if they could put everything in at once, after their experiment was over.  Why not!

We also searched for Buried Treasure this week!  It was a fun take on the usual "Magnetic or Non-Magnetic" Experiment they did in previous grades.  I buried four magnetic and four non-magnetic items in sand, and the students had to use their magnets to discover them, group them, and record their data.  I enjoyed listening to their conversations as I walked around.  Very interesting!

Both experiments went really well! The only thing I would change for next year is to have some mats or trays.  Using paper towels under the experiments didn't work because they didn't stay in place.  Having trays to work on would eliminate most of the mess left behind.