Gingerbread Palooza: Day 1

It was a normal Monday morning in my first grade classroom.  Kids arrived in the dark, the air was so cold it made the insides of your nose stick together and everyone was in good spirits coming off of a 4-day break.

Everything was going smoothly...until it happened.  It was story time & snack and as I opened my snack cupboard it hit me.  

Books, cookies and a letter fell out of the cupboard and HIT ME!  Dazed and confused I looked back up at the cupboard and saw them..the Gingerbread Friends.  4 cute little cookie people who successfully sent us a message: they were here to stay and have some fun with us!

And so begins Gingerbread Palooza 2013!

To celebrate the start of this fun event, here's a FREEBIE!  It's a pack of 2 gingerbread poems to use with your students during Guided Reading...which is exactly what I'll be doing tomorrow.

Starting tomorrow my students are going to journal each day about what the Gingerbread Friends have been up to during the night.   Sometimes they are nice and sometimes they are naughty...but they are always FUN!

P.S.  Don't forget about the TPT SALE..today is the last day!

Cyber Monday SALE and Gingerbread Palooza

It's on like Donkey Kong...the Cyber Monday SALE over at TPT that is, and I'm on the bandwagon too!

I'm soooooo excited because today my classroom is going to be invaded by the Gingerbread Friends.

These 4 will be up to good and no good for the next 3 weeks.  Every morning my students will arrive to find out what they've been up to during the night!  We'll photograph and write about each day.  Students will have their own little gingerbread journal and we'll make a class book.  This is the first time I've done this and I'm flying by the seat of my pants (ideas are taking over my brain) and I'll collect everything and put together a nice packet during winter vacation so if YOU want in on the FUN, you'll have everything you need for a January filled with Gingerbread and mischief!

This weekend I researched all the different kinds of Gingerbread Man books out there.  I have some in our own classroom library, I'm getting some from the public library and I ordered some online.  I'm especially interested in parodies or fractured fairy tale type books.  Here's a beginning list, but all the books I find will be compiled and included in the packet I create.

So excited to share this one since we live in Alaska and
Barbara Lavallee is the illustrator!
I sat next to her at a church function last year!

Almost forgot!  I have a new Readers' Theater script to go with this fun mischievous month: