Predicting Fun...with a groundhog???

Okay so I was teaching predicting to my students last week.  And one thing lead to another and the next thing I know we have groundhogs done for the bulletin board.  Let me explain how it went.

I wanted to work on predicting with my students, so for fun I read them the story The Little Cold Lady Who Swallowed Some Snow.  Now if you are a follower of my blog, you know I LOVE these books.  So I passed out index cards and had them number their cards 1-8.  Then I showed them the cover of the book and read the first thing the lady ate.  The students had to predict what would be the next thing she ate.  We continued doing this throughout the entire story. 

The students kinda figured out what her final object would be, but they had to predict what she ate next.  It was so much fun!  When we got to the end of the book, they drew a picture of the final item she ate.  Then we talked about predicting.  We talked about how the ideas at the beginning were a lot more random and once they started figuring things out, their predictions became closer.  It was amazing watching their little light bulbs going off about narrowing down...so proud...

Okay so then what???  We started talking about how predicting is a part of everyday life.  Like predicting who will win a game, the groundhog, etc.  So I had them take a groundhog outline I made and make a prediction about if the groundhog will see his shadow or not.  They had to start their writing out with "I predict the groundhog will/will not see his shadow.  I predict this because---"  They turned out SO cute!

Here is my groundhog outline.

Here is the finished bulletin board.  They had to put detail into their groundhog, too...

just to give it some oomph!  I don't know if you can see it, but there are lots of scarfs.  I have some coming out of his hole, some with hair bows, and a couple are wearing tuxedos!

Who would have thought that a little lesson on predicting a picture book could turn into such an excellent life lesson?!  Next week we will be predicting the Super Bowl and they will have to give reasons to support their predictions, just like their groundhogs!