This is the image I always get when I think of Valentine's! I know that Valentine's day is over but I was just on my sweet friend Marie's blog, The Hands on Teacher in First , reading what she did last week and thought, Hey! That's not such a bad idea! I'm going to do that, too! Please read her page to find some cuuuuttteeeee stuff and ideas on there to pin and save for next year! So last week was all about the L.O.V.E! We read the story and I sang the book to my class! I swear they were enchanted! We talked about how in the story the man was trying to send his beloved a letter. So the kids in their writing center wrote letters. We talked and reviewed the parts of a friendly letter: The writing center was to write a friendly letter. I gave them some pretty paper and some envelopes and some chose to write a letter to me and my sweet intern: Totally melts my heart!! Then they made these cute mail trucks to put their valentines in! One of my room moms is a retired teacher (I lub her a lot!! She is great!!) showed this and made it for me and I think it's a keeper! It was super easy to make! So pin away! We also worked on my homophones center! They loved putting the mail in the mailboxes! And of course the par-tay on Friday! Another sweet blogger friend, Katie from Teacher to the Core has got some pretty smart tips for keeping my next Valentine's Day par-tay sane! We do not write names on the cards-- just sign who they are from-- which is a great tip she gives along with others! You can read about it here! This month also is Dental health month! I saw something similar to this on Pinterest a while ago (if you are the orginator of this idea, please let me know so I can give full credit) but I decided to make a Guess the Smile board outside my classroom! My sweet mom again (DO you see why I lub her???) took their pictures (I asked her to hold a small paper with their names that I just cut off after they printed) with their smiles and then numbered them on the back according to their mailbox number (or however you want to label it that will help you stay sane!) and assigned a number to the photo. I *tried* to make it more interactive by placing some answer sheets so that kids can write who they think is who on the line. Click on the pic to download this for your class! The kids in the hallways have had fun trying to see who is who! Hope you could find and use some ideas for next year! It was fun but exhausting! Check back later for a SHOWDOWN-- place value style!!