RUN RUN!

'Twas the last day before break and all through the school not a child was breaking any single rule...

...that is, until our Gingerbread Man escaped the oven!

We baked him and decorated him and stuck him in the oven. While we read our final Gingerbread Man story of our unit, he escaped! 

Video done by our AMAZING literacy coach Leah O'Donnell.

Yes, we are crazy. 

Yes, we did let the kids chase our Assistant Principal in a gingerbread man costume. 

The kiddos had worked hard all week comparing and contrasting Gingerbread Man/Boy/Girl/Pirate/Cowboy stories, learning in their theme-based centers, and generally behaving the week before school let out. So we planned a fun little morning for them. 

We don't have a big holiday party and have a number of students who don't celebrate, so the Gingerbread Man is a fun anchor that we can use for literacy, math, and team-work concepts. 

Anyways.... after our week of Gingerbread stuff, we culminated by joining all 4 Kindergartens into one class to walk through the steps of making a real gingerbread boy cookie (we will use this to into "How To" writing in January). 

Everyone got to decorate our little cookie by putting 1 M&M on him. 

Then we stuck him in the school oven. 

While we read Gingerbread Man Loose in the School, our AP, dressed as the Gingerbread Man created a little chase for us. 

We even had to run outside!

The chase led us back to her office, where our very wonderful AP presented us with our previously-cooked cookie. She was such a doll for playing along with us!

The kids were a little stunned how it had all happened. There was so much chatter about what could have happened and how, so we just let them reconstruct the events as everyone tasted our cookie. 

Everyone was so worn out from all the excitement! After lunch we had a small relaxing celebration of the Gingerbread Man in our own classrooms and dismissed for break. 

Scholastic had The Gingerbread Boy Loose in the School for $1 so all my kiddos got a copy of that to take with them. 

I also use the Gingerbread Man unit from Katie Mense at Little Kinder Warriors.

What GB Man activities am I missing out on? How do you do the GB Man?