Teacher Spring Open House Ideas

WOWZA! Did you all survive our super cold and snowy January and February?? Have you finally started to thaw out?? I definitely have. All of these cold days have made me appreciate 20-30 degree days! Isn’t that crazy?! I consider 20-30 degree days to be “warm” as I wear my lighter winter coat and thinner socks. Now that it is March, I can not stop thinking that we are steps closer to that warmer weather and close to spring.

What does spring look like in an elementary classroom? Well, spring looks brighter and cleaner. No more boots and snow apparel lining the hallways. Blinds are open, letting the sunshine in and illuminating the room. Students are smiling as they are running out to recess; not worrying about being too cold and happy that they are able to play all over the fields and playground. As spring is approaching, I am setting my mind to all these happy things and thinking about our Spring Open House.

In fifth grade, we have been working on projects that will be displayed during Open House. Students have been busily writing, crafting, experimenting, and exploring! My students’ work will be displayed either on their desks or my Portable Display Tower from Screenflex. Here is what you will be able to see at our Open House:

Writing

What I love to do during Open House is showing the growth of my students! I want parents and families to see how much their child has grown since the beginning of the year. One of the ways I like to do this is through their writing. I have had my students keep a monthly journal. Each day, there is a different writing prompt where I allow students around 10 minutes to answer. I use this resource: https://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/Writing-Calendar-for-the-Year-2018-2019-2898482

This resource is awesome as it provides you a generic writing calendar for the year with predetermined prompts and a template for you to fill in your own ideas. I love this teacher’s creativity!! I have had students glue the calendar in composite notebooks. Then, they write the date of the journal entry and answer the prompt below. I will have students place their composite notebooks on their desks so their parents can read through and see how much they have grown as a writer since the beginning of the year.

On the Portable Display Tower, I’ll be displaying our “Selfie Writing”…specifically students’ writing on what they would do if they found a pot of gold. I purchased this awesome resource where students can answer a seasonal writing prompt and add a selfie to their writing. On the selfie, they can add different filters or emojis to decorate their face. (https://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/Themed-Selfie-Writing-Pages-Digital-and-Print-3534832)

To think about St. Patrick’s Day, students wrote about what they would do if they found a pot of gold. They wrote a three-paragraph story about how they found the gold and two things they would do with their gold. Students had a blast creating their stories and transforming themselves into leprechaun 🙂 Here is me as a leprechaun:

We printed out their stories and pictures. Their writing will be displayed on one side of the display tower!

Science

On another side of the display tower will be some of our science work. We have focused on life science for the past couple of weeks! Students know all about ecosystems and the many different groups that make up an ecosystem. To summarize all this information, students created puzzle pieces that illustrate abiotic and biotic parts of an ecosystem, herbivores, omnivores, carnivores, and decomposers. Each puzzle piece has illustrations of at least six examples of the group. The puzzle pieces will connect together to form a bigger puzzle that will be displayed on the tower.

Reading

My class has been researching and reading about different “superstars” throughout history. Each student was able to choose someone–alive or dead–that they wanted to further research. Some “superstars” in my classroom are Amelia Earhart, Dolly Parton, Alexander Hamilton, Lebron James, and Elvis Presley. For the past couple of weeks, students have been reading books about their “superstars” and taking notes. Then, they took all of their research and are in the process of creating a magazine. The magazine has to include at least one page written in each of the five different nonfiction text structures–compare/contrast, description, cause/effect, problem/solution, and chronological/sequence. For Open House, these magazines will be displayed on their desks 🙂 My class has been really creative with their pages so far. I am excited to see the final products in our class!

Artwork

To help us all be in the “Spring Mindset” and inspire a growth mindset, we will be doing some of these crafts in class prior to Open House! We will be focusing on “Change Your Words, Change Your Mindset”. All of these spring crafts will offer a chance for students to reflect on the word choices and phrases they are using in the classroom. In our classroom, we inspire each other to have a growth mindset, where we are good with making mistakes and accepting challenging situations. We push each other to be the best that we can be 🙂

Students will be making these “3D Tulips”! On the stems of the tulips, they will write phrases that “help them grow” in their learning. Students might write phrases like “mistakes help me grow stronger”, “I’m on the right track”, or “I will learn how to do this”. These tulips will be displayed on the remaining sides of the portable display tower!

Around the room, I’ll have students make these flowers.

I’ll challenge students to find ways that they can incorporate growth mindset into these flowers. Maybe they might write encouraging messages in the middle of the flowers or goals they have for themselves on the petals. For these crafts, there is no right or wrong answer. I want students to be able to express themselves and positive thoughts 🙂

I CAN NOT believe that I am already planning for the Spring Open House. It seems like just yesterday it was the first day of school. This year has flown by!! I would like to thank Screenflex for offering the opportunity for me to reflect on my teaching in these blog posts AND for my students to reflect on their hard work on the display boards and tackable walls! Happy Spring Everyone 🙂 (now if Mother Nature would just accept the fact that we are ready for warmth…)