Welcoming the New Year!

We survived our first day back and had a great time welcoming 2012!  Here are a few pictures from our celebration:

I greeted my students at the front door (wearing my blinking New Year's hat, of course!) and they had to walk through the sparkly garland and hanging decorations in the doorway. 

This is not the best picture. You can't see all the sparkles. :(

Everyone had their own hat on their desk along with their New Year's morning work.  The students LOVED getting their classmates' initials for morning work! :)

Next, we had some in depth discussions about the holiday and the idea of "starting fresh" in the new year.  We also learned what "resolutions" are and made our own personal and school goals.

Everyone enjoyed creating their "Resolution People".  

(I think this idea came from a mix of Pinterest inspired things!)

Aren't they cute?

We seemed to have an Xtramath-related resolution theme going on today.....everyone wants to make it to the next level!  I also had one cutie that made a personal goal to go work out at the gym 4 times a week so that he can be reeeeaaaallllllly strong.  :)

Please ignore the one on the bottom row with the floppy head......

We continued our New Year's celebration in literacy and math stations too.

Here are my kids working hard to make a list of words that can be made with the letters in "Happy New Year."

Oh, and they LOVED Rockin Teacher Materials' Math Mystery: Case of the Scrambled New Years Snowman!  {All of her Math Mysteries are awesome!}

We finished our day by playing "New Year's Roll and Cover" in partner groups.

You can grab this latest freebie from yesterday's post here.

You can find links to most all of the other activities I used today in a previous post.  Click here.

We had a wonderful time today but I am exhausted!

How did you celebrate the New Year?