Funfetti For Fabulous Writers!

I made this cute Funfetti Cake for my beautiful class! They did so so well with their writing samples (assessment) today! The poor things had been used to writing recounts their whole schooling lives and had suddenly been required to write narratives! 

We only had about three weeks to practice the basics of a piece of narrative writing. I drilled in the structure into them everyday: Intro, Problem, Action, Solution. They were so sick of it, but it worked! 

For the test they were given a prompt in the form of a photo, and had to create a narrative story based around that photo. Our assessment photo was title 'The Bush', which was basically two kids walking into the forest. 

Reading their stories was probably the highlight of the year! They were so creative, clever and oh so beautiful! When I have a chance I will attach a few pieces of writing.

I am so happy, and so proud. Go Room Fourteen! :)

Making Play Dough!

I know what you are thinking... Play dough? Is that what you use for your cakes?

Relax! This blog post has nothing to do with baking, but more to do with my teaching!

Ahh, those were the days when having a play dough cake at school on your birthday was just bliss! You even got to blow out candles and everything! If I was teaching younger kids I would leap at the opportunity to make a play dough cakes for my students. I don't think my 10 year olds would be very impressed!

Sadly, this play dough is not for a kindy/classroom birthday party. Instead it is for something way more exciting: Fractions! Fractions/Ratios/Proportions is always a tough area for kids, so I am really needing ways to engage kids and make the knowledge stick! Basically, kids will manipulate the play dough to create fractions and so forth! I hope this does the trick (fingers crossed).

Here is a link to the nz maths lesson plans that I will use the dough for :)

The recipe I used is super easy and it was great as you don't have to cook it or anything. Just chuck your ingredients in a bowl dry to wet, then mix and kneed till it is nice and firm!

Play Dough in Action

Play dough recipe:

Ingredients
2 cups flour
1/2 cup salt
2 tablespoons cooking oil
2 tablespoons cream of tartar
2 cups boiling water
1 teaspoon food colouring

Methods:
1. Mix all dry ingredients.

2. Add oil and boiling water with food colouring.

3. First mix in the bowl, then kneed on a floured surface until nice and firm. (If the dough is too stick, just add more flour).

This dough should keep for a while if you keep it in a ziplock bag in an airtight containter.

If you want to make your dough a little more exciting you can add glitter or scented oils!

Happy creating!

Kimberley :)