Dia de los Muertos & Inferencing

I cannot believe it's November! So many things going on this month: my husband is growing a mustache for Movember (it's a serious thing in the fire department, y'all, so I'm going along with it), Mocking Jay Part 2 comes out (OHMYGOSHOHMYGOSH) and most importantly: THANKSGIVING BREEEEAAAK!

November also means Dia de los Muertos, one of my favorite holidays to teach my students about. This year we started our Day of the Dead learning with (drum roll please) INFERENCING! Have you caught on that we're working on inferencing BIG TIME in my classroom??

Y'all. I had the best dad in the whole world. I know a lot of people think that about their dad, so you can understand where I'm coming from. He was SO kind, wise, funny, UNIQUE and my number one fan. And I miss him LIKE CRAZY. He passed away last year and not a day goes by I don't think about him. I wanted to share his memory with my students, so for this Dia de los Muertos, I made an altar honoring my sweet daddy.

I included pictures of my dad and his brothers as children (wearing cowboy hats), a few pictures of my family at our family ranch from my childhood (my dad was holding a cowboy hat in one and a baby longhorn in the other) and a recent photo of the whole fam.

My food offering included Oreos, M&Ms, and all the leftover chocolate Halloween candy I could find in my house!

I decorated the altar with battery operated candles, sugar skulls, mini paper picadors and yellow daisies. The finished product made me so happy. I enjoyed creating this tribute to my dad and only cried twice!

I took the altar to school on Monday and let my students know they'd be making inferences about my dad's life based on what I included on the alter. I gave my students a graphic organizer that had them write down three observations from which they would draw one inference. We focused on the photos and the food.

For the photos, I asked them to write down who they saw in the photographs (family), the setting (outside, on a farm, by a barn), and the other items they saw (horses, cowboy hats, fence, cow).
Can you guess what their inference was? They inferred my dad was a COWBOY! And gosh, they were right! My dad raised Texas Longhorns. He had a passion for the business and had a beautiful herd. Check out his hard work on his website, AssadTexasLonghorns.com!

For the food, I asked my students to write down three different types of food they saw. Answers included Oreos, M&Ms, Almond Joy's, Whoppers, and Reeses. The students inferred my dad liked CHOCOLATE!!! And boy did he! I shared how my pops would always sneak a tiny corner out of the cake at family get togethers because he just couldn't wait until we cut the dessert! He definitely could have been the poster child for choco-holics!

Guys - my students were SO into this lesson and when I told them it was in honor of my dad, they had so many sweet questions and connections. I was so impressed with their maturity and respect for my memories and feelings. Have I mentioned how awesome my class is??

Do you celebrate Day of the Dead in your classroom? I'd love to hear about your activities! Comment below! 

INFERRING... Oy Vey!

Sooooo.

Inferences. 

My sweet 4th graders are really having a hard time wrapping their head around inferences. 

And I felt my self turing into an inferencing GRUMP. "What can you INFER, guys?? LOOK FOR CLUES!!" 

I knew there needed to be a change....  

Every morning, our school has us write a Morning Message to our kiddos. As they walk in, they grab their breakfast (we eat breakfast in our rooms... so weird, I know) and check out what's on the board. Not going to lie, my first thought when I heard we have to put up a Morning Message was, "Seriously??? One more thing to do??" but I have realized I LOVE morning messages. And by golly, if there's a day I forget to write one my kiddos ask for it!! So I decided to combine inferencing with our morning message. 

I defined an inference, gave the kiddos a scenario, had a bag of evidence and was ready to watch my kids ROCK OUT INFERENCING!! (Side note: Not pictured is the sentence stem, "I can infer that your BFF is _________ because ___________ .)

I just knew the dirty kleenexes, the Mucus relief medicine (we discussed what mucus was) and the Vitamin C (and the fact that they knew I was sick -they had all been asking me if I was ok the day before when they heard my sick voice - they are ANGELS, y'all) was going to lead to light bulbs in their sweet little brains and inferencing would be a problem of the past!!

My plan halfway worked. The kids were SO STOKED to check out the inferencing bag. I heard their excited whispers as they wrote down their inference. I heard angels singing from the heavens. I picked up their sticky notes and began reading......... and the angels stopped singing. 

"I can infer that your BFF is nice because she's your friend"

"I can infer that your BFF is funny because she tells jokes"

WHAT. 

Y'all, out of 23 kids, 3 inferred that my friend was sick. I was so bummed. Another inferencing FAIL! 

I went home to my hubby and retold the story. He told me my inference bag contained too much of an inference. HUH. He told me my evidence needed to be WAAAY more obvious. At first I hesitated because UH HELLO, what does he know - he's not a teacher AND it's not like the kid's state test at the end of the year would contain an obvious inference... But I tried it anyway. 

I totally forgot to take a pic, but I grabbed everything orange, black and halloween themed that I could find and put it into a gallon size bag (pumpkin cookie cutters, halloween pencils, a ghost with an orange and black outfit, a black and orange halloween bag). The next day we tried again. The board read, "Yesterday I decorated my house for an upcoming holiday. Make an inference about what holiday I decorated for. STEM: I can infer you decorated for ______ because _______." Kids read it, giggled at the bag, wrote on their sticky note and BOOM! 21/23 made a correct inference. HALLOWEEN! A few kids still weren't getting it but I was making progress! 

Now, EVERY THURSDAY is "Think about it Thursday" and I give my kiddos a scenario that requires them to make an inference. This Thursday I put a receipt and some change in a bag. MY LITTLE BOOS MADE FANTASTIC INFERENCES!

"I can infer that you went to the store because there's a recet (receipt)."

"I can infer that you went grocery shopping because there's a recit (receipt) and money."

23/23 had it, y'all!! WOOOOOT! And now I know we need to work on spelling receipt!! 

I hope you love this idea! Do you think it could be something you use in your classroom? Do you already use something like this in your classroom? Do you have ideas for what else I can include in my bags? Help a teacher out! I'm running low on ideas.... 

I also want to encourage you to do a Morning Message for your kiddos!! They other day we were working on poetry and my message was something like "Sometimes poems have a rhyming pattern. Give me example of rhyming words." It was a TOTALLY last minute message but I was able to see that 3 kids in my class don't know what rhyming words are. It's SUCH an easy way to pinpoint gaps in your kiddos learning!! 

HAPPY TEACHING, PEEPS! 

xo