Tried It Tuesday

Ok, so I have to start off this post with a funny.  So with all of the snow we've had here, my hubby has gone on a cleaning/organizing binge!  As I was taking pictures of all of my crafts from our snow days, he come out of the office (in desperate need of organizing) and says, "I should have taken before and after pictures of the office for my Tuesday Made It!"  Ha Ha!  We had to over the linky days after that!  Too funny.  At least he listens a little bit!

Now on today's Tried It Tuesday link up with Holly over at Fourth Grade Flipper!

I have two "tried its" to share with you today! One is from home and the other is from school!

First, my home "tried it"

Freezer Paper Stencils!

My tried it with my stockings is using freezer paper as a stencil for painting.  I wrote about my new stockings that I was making in my Monday Made It post.  Yesterday, they weren't finished, because I was having issues with my Cricut.  I changed computers and viola! It worked!  I use Cricut Craft Room to design my monograms and fit 4 nutcrackers on one page.  

Then I cut the freezer paper with the Cricut.  I cut the freezer paper with an exacto knife and then ironed on each piece to my 3 stockings.  I will say that the paper had a much harder time sticking to the burlap than the plain black fabric. 

I bought white glittery fabric paint to use for this part of the project.  As I was painting the stockings, I realized that the fabric paint was actually white, but just glittery!  It looked good on the black fabric, but I was worried about it showing up on the burlap.  So I went back over the monograms with white acrylic paint and that was a good choice!  

We went out to run some errands and when we came back the paint had dried and I pulled the stencils off the stockings and this what I was left with!  The nutcrackers are kind of transparent, but when the light catches the glitter, they are so pretty!

I am absolutely in love with them!  I can't remember the last time I put this much effort into a project! I need to find a new project to use with freezer paper!  I wonder if you can use it on canvas???

Next, my school "tried it"

Genius Hour

With my 21st Century Classroom grant,  I attended a week long training last summer.  You can read more about that {here}.  One of the things we talked about was Genius Hour.  If you'd like to learn more about Genius Hour you can go {here}.  Basically Genius Hour is a time for students to research and explore topics that they are interested in.  They get to pick what they research and how they present their new information.  I introduced this idea to my students and they were so excited!  We had quite the discussion about appropriate and inappropriate topics.  I told them that if it wasn't going to help them learn and become more educated, then it wasn't a good topic.  

I did have some challenges with this first time of Genius Hour.  The kids asked if they would work in groups and I told them yes, if everyone wanted to research and learn about the same thing.  I had some students who wanted to work together but couldn't agree about what to learn about.  I had to explain that just because you are friends doesn't mean that working together is a good idea.  I also had some students who couldn't figure out what they wanted to learn about!  At the same time, I had some students who were already working on a power point while they were researching.  We used Penzu and word to take notes while we were researching.  Here are all of my little researchers!

At the end of the class, I wanted my students to be accountable for the work they did in class, so I had them respond to two questions in TodaysMeet - What topic are you researching? What did you learn about your topic today?  These are some of their responses.  

What new things have you tried this week?  Don't forget to go check out all of the other awesome "tried its"!