100th Day, 2015!

Well, we've been waiting and waiting for this special day for a few weeks!  It finally arrived this week! The 100th day of first grade!  We spent most of our day the 100 way!  I've included lots of photos so that you could see your child in action!  Here goes!

Each child was asked to bring in 100 pieces of a dry 'trail mix' type snack!  We mixed everything together in a big bowl and divided it up at snack time!  The kids LOVED it!

The RED group enjoys their 100 snack! Lilly, Ariyah, Kendrick (hidden by Ariyah), Claire,
Maddie, Kaylee, Samuel and Paige.

The PURPLE group enjoying their snack!  Cameron, Hunter, Sierra and Kairi

The BLUE group enjoying their snack!  Lydia, Justin, Jessica, Jordan,
Noel, Makayla and Gavin.

The GREEN group enjoying their snack.  Hannah, Mason, Teagen, Annabel and Levi.

Our calendar routine was extra special today!  We have added a stick to our 1's jar each day we were in school.  When we got to each 10th day, we bundled them up and put a rubber band around them and moved each '10' to our tens jar.  On Thursday, we made our 10th bundle, so we took all 10 bundles of ten and made a large group of 100!  We moved this bundle to our 100s jar!   In addition, we've been adding a penny to a chart each day we are in school.  We trade coins when we can and count the money.  On Thursday, after trading all the coins, we finally traded everything for a DOLLAR COIN/PAPER DOLLAR!  We also tally each day and circle each time we reach 10 tally marks.  Now we can see that ten 10's makes 100!   It's big stuff everyone!   Now comes the part when they finally realize that writing the number 'one hundred one' is not written 1001!

Later in the morning, we divided up and the kids participated in three 100 day activities!  They rotated to each activity, but having fewer doing them at a time made it manageable.  One activity was to make a '100' hat and decorate it!   Another independent activity was to draw a picture of themselves at 100 years old for a class book.  They also drew pictures of what they thought cars, homes and school would look like 100 years from now!

Maddie, Kaylee Kendrick and Claire work on hats or papers.

Hunter, Sierra and Mason are busy working independently.

Noel, Makayla, Paige, Sam, Justin and Jessica work on their activities.

Gavin, Lilly, Teagen, Jordan, Levi, Lydia and Justin are working hard and Mrs. G helps put hats together!

Cameron, Noel and Sam work on their activities.

The children were also asked to bring in 100 small items they could weigh.  First, they used a balance scale and tiles to figure out the weight of their items (against the tiles).  They counted how many tiles it took to balance their items.  Next, they took their items and counted them out into groups of 10 until they were all gone!  They realized that ten groups of 10 equals 100 in all!  They recorded their work and took home their results.

Jordan, Teagen, Lydia, Hannah, Ariyah and Gavin use balance scales to weigh their items.

Noel, Claire, Levi, Jessica, Cameron, Justin, Sam and Paige work on their weight.

Of course we heard a few stories with a 100 theme as well!  After lunch and Music class, we partnered up and worked on 100 piece puzzles!  Phew, that was either FUN or FRUSTRATING for them!  There was very little gray area here.  A few kids were excited about it and wanted to pull out their puzzles at home.  Others spent more time walking over to me, complaining that they had missing pieces or their puzzle was too hard than making a good attempt at the puzzle!  This is one skill that every first grader needs to improve!  (I even sent an email specifically about the importance of puzzles to every parent in the class).  Please turn off those video game systems, iPads and computers and pull out your puzzles!

Jordan and Sierra

Maddie and Teagen

Gavin and Paige

Hannah, Mrs. G and Mason

Ariyah and Kaylee

Jessica and Kairi

Annabel and Levi

Samuel and Hunter

Cameron and Lilly

Justin and Lydia

Noel and Makayla

Claire and Kendrick

One very important event of the day was to award a certificate to one student in the class!  Justin is the ONLY person who has been in school every single minute of our 100 days of first grade!  He has never been absent, late or left early!  That is amazing accomplishment and we are so proud of him!

Congratulations Justin!  You have been in school every minute
of our 100 days of first grade!

The final activity of the day was something new this year.  After 24 years of celebrating 100th day, I needed something new to try out!   I bought packages of 100 dixie cups and gave each group of 4-5 kids one set.  Their job was to work together to create a sculpture of some kind!  I told them I would take each group's picture for the blog when they used every cup to create something 'cool'!  It was so much fun to watch them work together!  There was some frustration when sculptures fell down, and great teamwork to rebuild!  Some groups had to rebuild 2-3 times, and unfortunately, one group bumped their sculpture for the 3rd time as they tried to get set up for their picture.

Noel, Levi, Annabel, Paige and Makayla

Kendrick, Jessica, Claire and Kaylee

Jordan, Maddie, Teagen, Sierra and Hunter

And finally... what would a special day be without the 'funny one'?????

Hopefully your child came home excited about their 100th day of school!   It was something we looked forward to for a long time and it made a long, cold week more bearable for sure!  Have a great weekend and remember to pull out your puzzles at home!