It was SPOOPY (not spooky!) WEEK in Tracie Gerardi’s Language Arts class, filled with activities that appealed to all students without being too “celebratory” of Halloween (some students do not observe.) Each activity utilized and taught important skills and allowed scholars to be creative! And of course, Tracie wore a different shirt and matching mask every day!

And the activities!!!

Monday- we read “Creepy Carrots” and practiced summarizing and retelling! Older students created “Batty Vo-Cat-Bulary” wordfalls.

Tuesday- school was closed because of the heavy rains and flooded roads, so the boys got to choose two books and we read them together on Zoom!

Wednesday- we read “There Was An Old Lady Who Swallowed a Bat” and “…Ghost,” then used story mats for recalling and sequencing! Older students created character analysis pumpkins by carving or painting symbols that represented characters from their novels.

Thursday- I left motivational notes and small gifts for my 8th grade homeroom, then the lower division read Christopher Pumpkin! We talked about how it was important to cherish our unique qualities and always be ourselves, then made our own Christopher Pumpkins. Older students had to decide what the characters in their novels would dress up as for Halloween and draw/write about it.

Each student in every class was given a fun pen and special note, then had to work in teams to solve puzzles, riddles, secret codes, and mazes in order to rescue their teacher (me!) from zombies, ghosts, and witches! These escape rooms are always so engaging and my students love them!

My lower division also learned and practiced using commas and quotation marks with candy corn!