Simple Mother's Day Gift & SpEd Giveaway!

Mother's Day is Sunday!!! My class made these today! They may seem a little silly, but I love how they turned out....and of course they're silly, they're made with silly straws, silly! :)

Here are the items you'll need...plus a hot glue gun, not pictured. I was able to purchase everything at Walmart believe it or not!

 The rest is pretty self-explanatory! I used 2 1/2 inch pots and they were only 77 cents each.

Just glue the foam ball inside the pot, insert the straw in the center, glue in moss, and decorate! Be sure to get the foam flowers that are sticky. This requires no gluing for your students and makes for a clean, mess-free craft and no drying time! 

We also made these little seed packets that I had printed from TpT last year! Each one is filled with a pack of flower seeds also purchased from Walmart. This printable is from "Teachings a Hoot." I don't have the direct link to this product, but {here} is the link to her blog. 

So that's Mother's Day this year in my classroom! I think the most favorite Mother's Day gifts my class have ever done are what we made last year....cookbooks and ceramic potholders! You can check that post out {here}. But since I have the same students each year, I have to always change it up! 

And did I forget to say HAPPY TEACHER APPRECIATION WEEK TO YOU?!!!

These four items you see are just a smidget of what is in this care package that my team over at #weteachsped have put together for one lucky special education teacher!

OVER $100 worth of must-haves!!
And you can enter right HERE!
Hurry....only 23 hours left!
a Rafflecopter giveaway

Five For Friday!

We've had an exciting week in the Bender Bunch Classroom and I'm happy to share it with you for "Five For Friday."

We set up a nail salon on Monday! The girls had a blast learning to paint nails, and the boys were a little jealous!!

Tuesday was SILLY PUTTY!

We started our lettuce this week and it is growing beautifully!!!!

I got these COOL CUBES that I'm in love with!

We ended the week today with a picnic in the park!!!

My students made their own sandwiches and packed their own lunches.

And guess who's on Instagram now!!!.......Me!

You can follow me {here}. 

Thanks for stopping by to see our week!

 Head over to Doodle Bugs Teaching to read more Five for Friday posts or link up your own!

Wordless Wednesday!!!

Our week (thus far) in pictures!!!

Amazing Day with Science, Gardening, & Leprechauns

I am so excited!!! What a great day it has been! First off, I finished my NV Alternate Testing up........I can breathe! I don't know if any of you administer the alternate assessments with your students, or what the alternate assessments are like in other states.....but in NV we have to record and videotape them, not to mention deal with a bazillion materials. Here are some of the materials I had to have just for the Science assessment:

a real apple, plastic apple
a real orange, plastic orange
a real table, a toy table
a toy horse
a real flower, silk flower
a hat
a toy boat
3 water bottles--one full, one empty, one 1/2 full
a cup full of paper clips
a cup full of rocks
a cup full of cotton balls
two small boxes--one empty, one with small gadgets

And they don't send any of these materials....we have to gather them ourselves. Needless to say, I'M DONE and oh what a relief it is!!!

The other exciting news that I'm SUPER excited about is that one of my Autistic students got approved today for in-home therapy sessions....40 hours a month....paid for by the district!!!! Yeah! That's right! An outside agency partnered with The Lovaas Center and Autism Partnership will be going into the home and providing this child with social/behavioral/communication therapy intervention. 

I am so excited to be able to obtain this amazing opportunity for her as her parents have not been able to afford additional therapy. This is probably one of my biggest educational accomplishments I've achieved during my teaching career! Thrilled beyond words! You just gotta dig down deep and find those resources! 

So yes, it's been an AMAZING DAY!!!!!

We also started our rocky candy today that will be ready to eat for St. Patrick's Day! If you've made it before, then you know it takes about 4-5 days to make. 

Super easy though, just a waiting process! This makes it all the more fun for the kids though, as they get to watch the process and see the changes taking place each day!

We also did a little spring planting today! 

If you were a reader of my blog last year around this time, then you may remember the cute little garden we had right outside our classroom door last year!

This year I moved classrooms and had to give up my garden bed.   :( So sad....it was so perfect and probably the only downfall of the new classroom! There is no place for a garden bed near my new room, which is why you see us above planting in containers this year. Oh well, we will have our garden regardless....and it's portable! The kids just love it so much and it really brightens up the school!

Well if you're still planning your St. Patty's Day and want a visit from a Leprechaun, check out my newly posted Leprechaun Kit!

 Just like the "Elf on a Shelf" tradition, but with a Leprechaun! Includes everything you'll need for a fun-filled day of Leprechaun mischief. Check it out {here}.


Until next time..............

7 BLOGS, 7 PRIZES, 7 WINNERS

If you saw my earlier post, you know that my class was planting a flower & vegetable garden this week. We did it! It turned out great! The kids had such a good time. They are already taking ownership and mothering their flowers each morning. Even if they didn't have their names by their flowers, I think they'd still know "THEIR" flowers. It was interesting to find how many students had never planted a seed or a flower......which we do live out west where you seldom see a garden. I think we take for granted that our kids know how to do these things. I grew up gardening in North Carolina. My own children were born out west and I hate saying it, but they have never truly experienced gardening like I did in my childhood. My children and I have always planted flowers, herbs, and do 5-gallon bucket gardening, but it's not the same! 

Here are the pics of our lovely new garden!

On the left side are our radishes and lettuce. Fingers crossed.....I just hope they all survive. My thumb is not looking very green! 

And now for the best news of all......................

GIVEAWAY!
I have reached 93 followers and am soooooo excited to be hosting my first giveaway! I cannot even believe it! To thank you all, I have been working on a fabulous giveaway with the help of 6 other awesome fellow bloggers!! 

Giveaways from:

Camp We Wanna Learn Alot
More Than Math by Mo
Learning with Mrs. Leeby
Carolina Teacher
Live, Laugh, I Love Kindergarten
The Very Busy First Graders
The Bender Bunch

I need 7 more followers (what's up with the 7's) to get this party started!!! So what are you waiting for???? After you follow, be sure to come back and enter! My goal is to post this giveaway by Friday!