From Egg-sitting to Chick-sitting!

Check out what Little Joe Chickapig was up to in our classroom...

Yep! Thats's right LJC was doing a little egg-sitting for some of the hens back at the Chickapig farm & asked us for a little help. Of course we said yes & quickly discovered that egg-sitting is a lot of work. We had to check the eggs often to be sure that they were safe and warm. We also had to carefully turn them...just like the mama hen does. (Shhh, don’t tell them but they are also getting a little extra practice telling time!) We used our "EGG-SITTING LOG BOOK"  to keep track of all of this.

{This Log Book is part of my "What's Hatchin' Chick?" unit.}

First, all of the students made a warm and safe nest to keep their egg in. Many also chose to cover it with a little blanket (since they were a little too big to sit on the egg to keep it warm! lol) Awww, they're so stinkin' cute!






Check out some of these cute names... Little Bob, Rozee, Little Jo, Chi Chi...

We stopped about every hour to do an "egg check" (I tried to stop on the hour since my students were just learning to tell time to the hour.) The wrote down the time, turned the egg and check to be sure it was warm and safe.

At the end of the school day, my students decided that they wanted to put the eggs back under Chickapig. When I asked them if they wanted to take their eggs home with them they said, “No we want Chickapig to keep them warm so they hatch!”  Hmmm... ??? 

Fast forward to the next morning... WOW! Little Joe Chickapig is one awesome egg-sitter chick-sitter! We found 6 adorable little fluffy chicks & a note. Omiword! these kiddos were beyond excited! A few things that I heard that morn... "Chickapig you did it!" "Thank you for keeping the eggs warm all night!" "He followed his heart!" "I guess he took the rest of the eggs back to the farm."
One of my favorite questions that morning came from a sweet little girl who raises chickens at home... "So Miss B, do you think these are baby chickapigs or just plain old chickens?" lol

Baby chickapig or baby chicken...we really didn't care but after noticing that they had beaks instead of snouts, we figured out they were chicks and... We LOVE them! <3



Be sure to check out my "What's Hatchin' Chick" unit for the Egg-Sitting Log Book that we used in this post plus oodles of other activities to go along with your hatching unit.

Thank you so much Little Joe Chickapig for hanging out in our classroom and inspiring all kinds of learning fun!
{Pssst! ...if you haven't picked up this awesome book yet, head to Target now!}

Also, be sure to check out the Chickapig Facebook page!


Thanks so much for following our hatching & Chickapig adventures. Now it's time for me to head to the kitchen to come up with a fun little treat for my students...

{Be sure to check back to see pics of the cutest little treats ever!}

What Hatches? {FREEBIE}

Happy Spring y'all! I don't know about you guys BUT I am so ready to kiss winter goodbye! My kiddos are absolutely the best but... they have been a little stir crazy lately because of all of the indoor recesses that we have had. {By the way, I am still mad at that groundhog! He was WRONG! LOL} Anyway the reason for my post today is to let you know that I've posted a little sentence writing FREEBIE for y'all to celebrate the beginning of springtime! Woohoo!! Just hop on over to my little TpT shop & download! Check it out...

Be sure to check out some of my other products like "What's Hatchin' Chick?" or "Big Chickens Writing Craftivity"! Please be sure to leave me feedback after your free download.

 Hope you love it-Happy Spring!

We've HaTcHeD!!!

We've hatched y'all! And woo wee, were these kiddos excited! Our hatch actually started 2 days before we were expecting and by the time it was all said and done, we had 13 out of 14 eggs hatch. Not too bad! Some years almost all of the eggs hatch during the night, but not this time! Oh no! Only one chick had hatched by the time the kids arrived in the classroom in the morning and we spent the rest of the day watching 12 more lil chickies work their way into the world. Watching the kids' faces as the chicks worked {for sometimes hours} to break out of those shells, was priceless!

Well it's time to get my own lil "chickies" to bed-Monday morning will be here before we know it. And I just heard that Monday's forecast includes a lil sleet & snow! Aughhhh! Hasn't anyone told winter that spring is here!?!? Gotta love that Missouri weather! :)

What's Hatchin' Chick?

OMIword! The excitement that a few eggs in an incubator can create in the classroom!!! I like to keep my firsties in suspense....What could possibly hatch from eggs? I just love the responses...lizards, eagles, alligators, chickens, dinosaurs....{hmmm...might have to work on that one a lil bit! lol} While we are busy learning all about many different oviparous creatures, we also are taking on the duties of "Mama Chicken" {aka: egg-sitting}. Egg-sitting?? Yep! Each kiddo gets his/her own egg to care for, along with an egg care log. They just love this and it also reinforces telling time!

 

If you would like to check out more math & literacy activities, click the pic below!

 

....as I was typing this post, I got a text from another teacher that was just checking on the eggs....I think we might be "gettin' our hatch on" tomorrow!!! Woo hoo! I will keep you posted!

 

 

An EGG-citing Day in First Grade!

I kinda thought that I might find 1 or 2 fluffy chicks in the incubator this morning since there were a couple of eggs with small cracks last night when I left school. Well, check out what I found.....

Can y'all believe that we had 9 cute lil fluffy chicks hatch during the night!?! Needless to say, my firsties were just a little unsettled WILD today! After seeing that sooo many of our eggs hatched during the night, I was kinda worried that the hatching was over & the kiddos weren't going to see any of them actually break out of the eggshells. But after I moved these 9 fluffies to another box, I discovered small cracks on 3 more eggs. Over the next couple hours, well...to say the least, we were a bit distracted.....Check out what we watched...

I always worry that the chicks aren't going to live! You have to agree, they just look yucky right after they hatch! All that flopping around just looks to sad...BUT it doesn't take long for those feathers to start to fluff up and they start peeping & hopping all around! Well, if you've been counting, we now have 12 out of 13 eggs that have hatched. Just one lonely egg left unhatched in our incubator tonight...

Poor lil thing....no cracks or anything. :(  Will morning bring us up to a 100% hatch???

What's Hatchin' in First Grade?

Hope everyone had a great Easter weekend! I'm trying to enjoy the last few hours of our "spring break" {which is actually 3 days...but at this point in the school year, I really appreciate a few days off!}Tomorrow our class will be welcoming some new visitors....1 dozen bright shiny eggs! Our incubator is all ready and the kiddos are soooo anxious to see what hatches. {Ssshhhh....don't tell them that we will be hatching chicks! I've pretended that I'm really not sure what kind of eggs they will be sending us this year....I want them to think about all of the different animals that hatch from eggs. And...OH MY! does it have some of them thinking! I've heard, "Lizards! Snakes!" and yes, even "Dinosaurs!" Dinosaurs?!? Hmmm....we might have to talk about that a little more! :) 

We are going to be starting our day off by filling the first few pages of our Egg-Hatching Observation Journal. Then each morning I will give my firsties a chance to observe any changes in the incubator & complete another journal page. This journal is part of my "What's Hatchin' Chick?" unit. This is one of my favorite units of the entire year! The kiddos really get into all of the activities.....soooo much excitement in the classroom! If you would like to check it out, just head on over to my lil shop at Teachers Pay Teachers or Teachers Notebook
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And...being the FREEBIE lover that I am, I want to share one of our fun little centers that my firsties will be working at this week. Just click the pic to grab a copy!

I will keep you posted on our hatch status! Are you hatching eggs in your classroom? Would love to hear from you! Happy Spring!!!

THEY HAVE ARRIVED!

The eggs have arrived! Check it out...12 little babies! My firsties were soooo excited this morning when they saw them! Of course we got started right away on our little egg-hatching journals. We predicted how many eggs we think will hatch & drew a picture of our prediction. We will be writing in our journals each day until the "big hatch."

This lil reproducible book is in my "What's Hatchin' Chick?" unit. Click HERE or on the pic below to check it out.

I really REALLY love all of the fun chicken books that are out there. One of our favorites is "Big Chickens" by Leslie Helakoski. This book is such a HOOT!

After reading about these crazy clucks, we brainstormed what we thought it meant to be a "big chicken." Tomorrow we will be writing about things that turn us into "big chickens"-I can't wait to see what the kiddos write! Of course, I can't resist the opportunity for a little craftivity! Check out these super-cute "Big Chickens"...

The pattern for these cuties & the writing prompts are in my "Big Chicken Writing Craftivity" unit. Click on the pic to see more. 

I'm really excited to have just two more days left til the weekend! WOO HOO! I'll keep you posted on the hatchin'!