End of the Year Gift for My Kiddos

Not that I'm counting down or anything, but I have 10 teaching days left with my wonderful second graders. I mean that sincerely. This has been a terrific teaching year. I switched grade levels and kept many of the kids I had from first grade. Part of me was thinking it was going to be a long, difficult year because I had many of the same students. In reality, it has been a pleasure. I have completely enjoyed watching their progression this school year. I remember their first day of first grade and many of them weren't even reading. Now at the end of second grade, I have a smile from ear to ear because of how hard they have worked and how much growth they have shown. I wanted to do something special for this group of kids to culminate our last two years together. I came across this amazing idea from Jessica at The Polka Dotted Teacher a few weeks ago. I made these wonderful word clouds about each student.

I gave each student the following form with the name of each student in our class. I asked them to think of just one word to describe each student in our class. We have spent a tremendous amount of time learning how to use the dictionary and thesaurus this year. So I wanted the kids to use those skills to come up with some meaningful words about one another. The words could only be positive and they could only use the same word twice on their sheet. It was really wonderful to see the words they chose for one another. Some of the funniest words were the ones they chose for themselves.

This was the first time I have ever made a word cloud. I used Tagul.com and found it really easy to use. I can't wait to give them to my students next week and see the smiles on their faces.