Leprechaun on the Loose

I can't help myself, I just had to do the sneaky leprechaun thing and my kids are buying into it hook, line and sinker. The first day that I tried it, another teacher did it for me while we were in the library, so right away, my kids realized that I had absolutely nothing to do with these antics! After that first day, that was it, they were sold. Yesterday, I caught one of my kids smelling the table in the hallway and then telling me that she could actually smell the leprechaun. I can't imagine what a leprechaun would smell like. According to her, he smells like green jelly beans. Sounds about right. The greatest thing about this whole experience is to see those amazing little imaginations at work. They have surpassed my expectations. They spend all their time thinking about the leprechaun and just caught up in all that he is. I LOVE it! Today, he actually had the nerve to walk across their work. IMAGINE!

My kids finally decided to leave him some lucky charms with a note to tell him not to be so tricky. In case you were wondering, the leprechaun picked out all the lucky charms ate them and just left the rest on the floor. Then he walked right on top of the container they were in. 

Doing this has really brought out my naughty side. I get to make all kinds of mess and never have to clean any of it up. The kids consider it their responsibility to pick up after the leprechaun. Who knew? Maybe I should just start my year with a leprechaun and I'd never have to tidy my classroom again.

Believe or not, we've actually had a bit of time to do some writing. I really like this story - Jamie O'Rourke and the Big Potato. It's a great story for a retell, or just a simple response, which is what we did. You can check out a few of the responses below, including the one the leprechaun walked on.

Here is just a quick labelling activity we did. This and the response sheets above are both from my St. Patrick's Writing Unit, you can check it out here.

So that's it for my bag of tricks. I'm gonna wrap the leprechaun stuff up tomorrow. I'd love to hear about any tricks your leprechaun's been up to...