All Of Me - John Legend & Lindsey Stirling I LOVE LOVE This song.

How many times do I have to tell you
Even when you're crying you're beautiful too

The world is beating you down, I'm around through every mood

You're my downfall, you're my muse

My worst distraction, my rhythm and blues

I can't stop singing, it's ringing, in my head for you

[Bridge:]

My head's under water

But I'm breathing fine

You're crazy and I'm out of my mind

[Chorus:]

'Cause all of me

Loves all of you

Love your curves and all your edges

All your perfect imperfections

Give your all to me

I'll give my all to you

You're my end and my beginning

Even when I lose I'm winning

'Cause I give you all of me

And you give me all of you, oh

Give me all of you

Cards on the table, we're both showing hearts

Risking it all, though it's hard

How many times has a song evoked such an emotion inside of you that you not only can't get it out of your head, but it carries you through the bad parts of your week? I love this song by John Legend.  It was introduced to me at the 2014 Grammy's this year. A year filled with shock value songs and a gay men and women's wedding ceremony. Among all the creative hullabaloo was just a simple and beautiful love song, sung with passion and piano to the one he loved sitting in the front row spotlighted. It was such a tender moment. You could hear a pin drop. I loved it.  John Legend, a smart kid who started high school at age 12 and graduated 4 years later and went on to Penn State. He formed many choral singing groups that he was the musical director of. He is superbly talented. His lyrics ring so close to my heart. I think he's a musical genius. I wish he'd come to Salt Lake City. Thanks John Legend for the beauty you add to my world. You make my day. 

Olympic Torch Art made from a Cone and Tinfoil

I wanted to teach the kids a few things about the Olympics in Sochi, Russia happening this week. I always love watching the opening ceremonies and the pride I feel in our country represented by hundreds of cool athletes from all around the U.S.A.

 We made Olympic Torches for art this past week, and I had them write about the Olympics.

Our classroom bulletin board of the Sochi, Russia Winter Olympic Games turned out pretty.

Tacky and the Winter Games is a book I sent away for on Amazon to read the kids too. HERE is a link.  Tacky is one of my all-time-favorite book characters. He is so funny and odd but always saves the day

I looked on Pinterest and around the internet and found a few fun ideas for things we could do. I have always loved watching the figure skaters in the Olympics. Who doesn't remember Tanya Harding and Nancy Kerrigan and the hoopla of THAT winter olympics?

Here is the Sochi set of Winter Olympic Pictograms. I used these to put kids' face pictures on the "heads" as they choose their favorite Olympic Winter Sports. Check out HERE at this Flicker site for more pictures.

Sochi Winter Olympics depicted on our bulletin board. 

I can't believe the  Salt Lake City Winter Games were  back in 2002!  The students chose their favorite of the 15 events and I put their pictures on top as a headshot. Super fun!

Then I had them decorate a white piece of 5 x 5 paper in red, white and blue and we glued their skier or skater or bobsledder on top of it with their face cut out and glued on top of the athlete icon. Then I backed them with red or blue and attached them to the board. These turned out super CUTE! 

We also did a class graph of favorite Winter Olympic Events and I think figure skating and snowboarding were winners. 

 Here are the Pictograms. I used the Salt Lake City Pictograms from the Utah Education UEN Website for my headshots HERE.  I just liked the black background better and also because it listed the name of the sport. 
I made up some SOCHI 2014 banners with the Olympic Rings too and we looked up what each color of the rings stands for. Then I had a mom helper glue their face to their favorite or most admired winter sport. 

So I had the kids also do a graph choosing their favorite of the Winter Olympic Sports. Boy did we have a lot of ski and snowboard lovers in our class! (I don't think anybody even KNOWS what a bobsled is! :D) HERE are some cute graphics I used to create our Class Olympics Graph. It was free on TPT. Some backround information and stationery is HERE from TPT. I forgot to take a picture.

Olympic Torches out of paper cones covered in tinfoil. The flames are orange, red and yellow tissue paper squares. 

Then we chose our sport and wrote why we'd love to be in the Olympics. We brainstormed how exciting it would be to wear the Red, White and Blue, go to the opening ceremonies wearing the U.S. Team Uniform and hat, (although this year's hat is kinda weird looking in my view) and live amongst the top athletes in all of the world, even if only for a few weeks or days. I hope they will all be safe in Sochi 2014. That's always a concern these days, sadly, isn't it? The best bunch of activities that I found for FREE was HERE at First Grade WOW. Thanks so MUCH! There was everything from Math to Nouns and Verbs and Wordsearches. She matched some activities to the cute Tacky the Penguin Book (My favorite Children's Book of all Time).

Their"Olympic" essays were a lot of fun to read. Some cute word wall vocabulary cards can be found HERE at TPT.  My favorite stationery I found was HERE at TPT.  It was soooo cute! 

Winter Olympics Writing and  Olympic Torch Art.....

I found a cute Olympic Bingo game that was super colorful but I wanted Winter sports only. It is HERE at learning treasures. I'm going to keep looking.  A cute wordsearch I found HERE at Sports Girls Play. And a very cute Olympic Torch outline is quality-kids-crafts. I did a variation on it in my class so check them out below. Another cute BINGO game with WINTER sports only is HERE at Classroom Jr.

Here is another bulletin board we did just outside our doors. Underneath are the 15 events I had copied many years ago during the Salt Lake City Winter Olympics in 2002. I just pulled out my file again. Good memories! I got to go SEE that opening ceremony. It was magnificent! 

I wanted the students to experience Russian Culture a little bit too. So we will make some Russian Nesting Dolls out of paper next week and write poems about the Russian Olympics. I brought in the dolls I bought in Armenia many years ago when I traveled to Russia. HERE at activity village are the printable and free download of the Russian Nesting Dolls blackline. They turn out really cute! I've done them in the past when we had a rotation for Christmas Around the World and I presented Russia. Russian Nesting Dolls I have at home from my trip to Russia a few years back.  I also showed them some travel brochure picture posters I made up of Russia with some of their cultural icons like the Onion Domed buildings, Their government leaders (Putin) and who their Santa Claus is! (Father Frost). And I will read them some of the stories of "Babushka" by Patricia Polacco because she depicts the Russian culture in her stories. Here are a few of her famous books. I hope we bring home lots of gold this week at the Winter Olympics! Go Team U.S.A.