Milk- I mean "Math and Cookies"...

Since we've moved to Indy, I have been cooking a lot more. Some of it has to do with saving money- some of it has to do with eating healthier. I typically utilize the stove-top and Crock-Pot. However, on Friday night, I had this sudden urge to bake...

I made German Chocolate cookies with milk chocolate chips:

I followed the cookie recipe my Grandma Helen gave me just before we moved. The first time she told me about this, I couldn't believe it---THERE IS NOOO WAY A RECIPE COULD BE THAT SIMPLE- COULD IT?!? It is so easy and so delicious, I thought I'd share with you:

Ingredients:

1 box of your favorite cake mix

2 eggs

1/2 cup vegetable oil

*Add in whatever other goodies you want...nuts, chocolate chips, raisins, coconut....etc.

Pre-heat oven to 350. Mix all ingredients, roll into balls, place on greased cookie sheet, bake for 10-12 minutes and voila!

I plan on making yellow cake cookies with butterscotch chips next time...if you try this recipe, let me know how you like it, okay?

This past Thursday, we held our 2nd English as a Second Language Parent Night! The theme was "Fun with Math" for grades 1-5. My teaching partner Alissa and I, along with our two bilingual instructional assistants have been working for weeks in preparation for the event!

We were fortunate to be able to recruit several of our staff members to help serve dinner to the families and help proctor the math activities presented in the workshop.

We had over 140 people in attendance- AWESOME TURN-OUT!!!! WOOOO-HOOOOO!!!!These family nights are by far the BEST part of my job! I love interacting with parents and being able to share information/activities that can bridge the home to school connection.Here are the presenters....yours truly and my beautiful partner, Alissa.

I took a Power Point I had made for one of the workshops Michele and I did back in CA, and changed it to reflect Indiana Content Standards. Alissa and I selected 3 Math games that could easily be transferred from addition to multiplication (since we had a wide variety of student ages) and had our IAs translate the directions in Spanish. We modeled the games on the "Elmo" (3-dimensional projector) for all the families to see...After each game was taught and modeled, we had the families practice with their child(ren) and had our staff walk around and assist as needed...

The first game we presented utilized adding/multiplying using a deck of cards. I found this awesome playing card template on-line, so we were able to print and laminate a deck of playing cards for every student.
The second game was played using dice. Students had to add/multiply the results of the dice roll and tally to 10 to keep track of the person who received the greatest sum/product.

The last game taught regrouping. I got this game from Michele Capriotti when I taught at Bear Valley. It is called, "Go for the Red." We laminated colored construction paper squares in 3 colors. Each color represented a different value- 1's, 10's and 100. You roll the die and receive the corresponding number of squares...you trade in your 1's for a 10 and your 10's for 100...the first person to get 100 is the winner!

We are going to try to have one more parent night before the end of the school year. We have been very successful in establishing a positive rapport with our ESL families. I love teaching...and the most rewarding part of my job is knowing I have done something positive in the life of a child.

Here is a picture of me and Maria V. one of our Instructional Assistants. She is so sweet.Here I am with 2 of my favorite co-workers- my partner Alissa and Amanda (1st grade teacher).
Oh and our dining room table arrived...YAY!!!

I have been so excited about this room, because it is the only room in the house that I get free reign over. I love our house, but every room is very "uni-sex" and earth-tone in color palette. I love love love that the dining room has some femininity...

I love our oil paintings and am so glad we have some furniture to accompany them. We got those two Tuscan paintings at Wicke's Furniture in Moreno Valley just before they went bankrupt. They were a steal...80 percent off the original price!Since our furniture is so dark, I tried to incorporate color from the paintings into our glassware and table runner. I think eventually I would like to get some colorful window draperies as well. Those Tiffany style stained-glass candle holders were a Christmas present from my Grandma Genie and I absolutely love them! I am so glad I have a room to display them in! We still have more to go, but Ryan and I are pleased with the progress we have made on our home. It feels so good to not have empty rooms everywhere we walk- especially since we have to spend so much time indoors...

Ryan was telling me last week how much he missed...yes missed the snow (we had 2 weeks without it...). Well his wish came true...it's baaaccccckkkkk!!!!

I know someone else who is happy about the white stuff....


Until next time...xo