Five for Friday: Fraturday Style

I'm linking up with Doodle Bugs Teaching for Five for Friday (or Fraturday in my case).

Saying Good-bye to Summer!

 

Last weekend, we were able to get out for one more camping, hiking, and dirt biking adventure. I can't believe that October and fall are already here.

 

Miley had a blast! She wishes we went camping and hiking every weekend.

I Found Some Word Work Inspiration

 

I found these amazing dice at the Dollar Tree. I love the sight word dice and had to stop myself from going overboard and buying one set for every kiddo. I settled for 2 of each of the sight word dice sets and 1 of the math sets. When I got home, I was inspired to make Roll and Write mats to go with the dice. Then I thought, why not make a word work set for others to use?!

Bam! Roll and Write Sight Word Addition is Born!

 

Here is an example of a station put together. I love that Roll and Write is so low maintenance. Click here to get yourself a copy.

Roll and Write: Color Word Freebie

 

After I made the Roll and Write Sight Word Addition, I was inspired to make a Roll and Write Color Word Freebie. Click here to get yourself a copy. :)

Speaking of Color Words

 

The time has come for me to switch my sensory table to a more fall theme but I wanted to show you what our current table looked like before I switched it out.

I used shredded black butcher paper for the filling and then added/buried colored items. The kiddos have to use the thongs to pick out the items in the paper and put them in the appropriate bucket. The wonderful cards and color labels came from Marsha McGuire and her Back to School Math Stations. I love all of her kindergarten math and literacy station ideas.

Teaching Ways to Say You're Sorry

 

My little ducks got in a little trouble for not being kind at recess yesterday, so when got back to class, we had to have a discussion about playground rules. I love having my kiddos write letters of apology. It helps teach them responsibility but also encourages them to vocalize their actions and discuss the appropriate behavior.

Plus look at these names! We are getting better at the writing our names with a capital letter and lowercase letters.

Enjoy the rest of your fantastic fall weekend and be sure to stop by and visit all of the wonderful bloggers linking up with Doodle Bugs Teaching.



Take Learning Outside: Sidewalk Chalk

The beginning of the school year is always tough on kiddos and teachers. We have to start getting up earlier and the day feels so long. Here are some easy and fun ideas that I am going to work into the first couple weeks of school to continue learning but add some movement and teambuilding into the day. Click on the pictures to go to the original links. :)

Write and Read: What an easy way to practice sight words, spelling, letters, math facts. I love it! I'm picturing kiddos drawing out words or letters out of a bag, reading the word/letter,  and then writing it on the sidewalk. Their partner then has to read all of the words/letters on the sidewalk before it is his or her turn.

 

Spelling Hop: How fun! Write all of the letters of the alphabet on the sidewalk and kiddos have to hop to each letter to spell the word. This would help with spelling, letter recognition, and alphabetical order.

 

Roll a Number: Drawing a number line on the sidewalk will help kids with their number identification and counting skills. This would also be fun with a giant dice. Have one person roll for the kiddos playing. You could also have a dice that has addition and subtraction symbols on it. The possibilities are endless!

 

What's my Number: Here's number identification in another way. Hop and say the number. This would be a great activity for kiddos who have trouble with reversals i.e. 14 and 41.

 

Solve It: Call out a math problem and have kiddos solve it on the sidewalk. Then, your class can talk a "Gallery Walk" and see how everyone reached the answer.

 

Here is also a link to 30 Sidewalk Chalk Games to play with kiddos. What sidewalk chalk activities do you do with your kiddos?

 

Priscilla

Five for Friday

I am linking up again with Doodle Bugs Teaching for Five for Friday. I was worried there wasn't going to be any linky over the summer and I am so glad Doodle Bugs is keeping this going. Yay!

1. Some Beach.....Somewhere
I am still going through beach withdrawals. I shouldn't complain because I did get a week at the beach but I still want more.

 

What are your summer plans this summer?

 

2. Fly Swatters
I found these great retractable flyswatters at the Dollar Store and all I could think about was Swat a Letter, Swat a Word, Swat a Color. I love that you can change the size of the retractor so that students can use them at their tables without hitting one another. (Not saying that won't happen anyway; one can dream though.)

3. Eric Carle
I have all of my supplies ready and once this wind dies down, I am going to get started painting my animals/characters for my Eric Carle inspired kindergarten room.

I have made lots of Eric Carle inspired art projects over the years. We always start by making "pretty paper" as Eric Carle puts it. He uses tissue paper but I have found that regular white copy paper works really well and is more durable. I am going to try and make giant animals using white butcher paper. My other supplies consist of lots of Eric Carle books, tempera paint in lots of colors, and foam brushes. Here is a link to a  slide show on how Eric Carle creates his art.

4. New Books
I have been going crazy on eBay and at the thrift store buying books. I amazed at the great deals that are out there. Also, I find that if I get books at great deals, I don't tear up as much when covers get bent and pages get ripped. Here is a couple of my most recent finds.

I bought this lot of Eric Carle books off of eBay for $18.00 including shipping.

I love going to the thrift store. The one here will put kid's books in bags and sell of the whole bag for cheap. This lot cost me $4.95. I couldn't believe. That's a great deal for the Seuss. I have to contain myself and not go too crazy but boy is it hard!

5. Sight Words
I have posted another sight word unit on Teachers Pay Teachers. I have really loved using all of these sight words pages in my classroom and they go so well with Word Work for the Daily 5.

 I also noticed that my students are better at writing complete sentences and using the words correctly. I loved reading their sentences. Kiddos are just too funny. Here are a couple of examples.

I love that this one is about Hide and Seek. Adam is the little boy's big brother.

I want more chocolate too!

Yay for remembering double consonants before adding the ending -ing!

I love the detail in this picture!



I hope you have a fabulous weekend! Go and enjoy some sunshine!

Priscilla

Sight Words!

Well... I've been doing a lot of thinking about sight words. I've been thinking about how hard they are for kids to learn, how hard it is to make practice time meaningful, and realizing that sight words are so key for the success of our beginning readers. Phonics is fabulous! Reading strategies make the world go round! But without sight words, kids still struggle with reading.

With that said, I have decided to dedicate a week to sight words. Some of these will be my own ideas and others will be amazing ideas I have found through the methods of "Beg, Borrow, and Steal."

This is my Preprimer Sight Word Practice Unit that I create to give students additional work on sight words daily. We go over the word together, spell the word, act out the word, and use the word in sentences with a partner before I even have the students work on the word independently. My kiddos have to complete the daily word before heading to their Daily 5 rotation.



Here are some additional tips on how I use the pages with my kiddos.

I tried to copy a page and put it in paint, it looks a little grainy and is lopsided. Oops! If you click on the tips picture, you can see all of the text boxes. :) Anyone have a better way to convert word documents to pictures without using the snipping tool?!

Happy Monday,

Priscilla

Five for Friday

I"m so happy to be linked up with Doodle Bugs Teaching for Five for Friday. Don't mind that it is a little past Friday. :)

 

1. 100 Days of School
This is a little belated but I wanted to brag show you my kiddos fabulous projects. They had to come to school with a collection of 100 things. They could arrange the 100 collection any way they wanted. I was amazed with the creativity!

Here is the view of my back counter. During the 100th Day, first and second grade went to every classroom and took a look at all of the projects. The kids loved it and it was so much fun to see all of the great ideas.

This is a llama made out of 100 bottle caps.



This is a comic man made out of 100 marshmallows.

100 eyeballs! I loved the way they carved out the number 100.

Cars! All of the Cars stickers are attached to 100 pennies.

I just love these caterpillars!



2. Snow Baby...Snow
Denver finally got some snow on Tuesday evening. All I could think was snow, snow, SNOW! I really never thought I would miss it so much. Now don't get me wrong, I secretly prayed for a Snow Day, didn't happen, but I was okay with just getting snow.

One issue that is hard with snow is how the kiddos react.When the first flake falls, it's like a barrel of monkeys is released into the classroom. Well, I have the saying, "That if you can't beat them, join them." When it snows, we sing one of the two songs; sometimes both.  The songs seem to value the kids excitement and it is a great way to have fun with the snowfall.

This one my class wrote in the style of Five Little Pumpkins. My kids just loved our Halloween songs and couldn't get past wanting to sing them in November and December and January so I said let's make a winter version. :)

3. First Unit
I have started creating my first sight word packet. I found that I wanted more of a challenging sight word practice for my kiddos who really needed explicit sight word instruction, sounds, and sentence writing. Here is a sneak peek of just a few of the pages. The whole set has the entire word list for the Preprimer Dolch words. Just about 40 words. I'm pretty excited.

 I have started using some of the pages with two of my groups and I am seeing some great things. They are getting more comfortable with the sight words, their sounds, and they are able to tell me vowels and consonants. I'm so proud of them.

4. Dr. Seuss
I can't wait to get done with American Symbols so my class can start learning about the wonderful world of Dr. Seuss. I found this picture from a couple of Halloweens ago and it put me in a Seussical mood. :)

5. 47 Cent Jeans!
No, you did not read that title wrong. I went to Old Navy and was scanning the clearance rack when I found a pair of Tall Old Navy jeans in my size. It was like the clouds parted. They fit great and gasp, I could where heels with them. I thought $15.00 dollars was a steal and when I went to cashier, she announced that the jeans were actually ringing in at 47 CENTS! Best shopping day ever!

Priscilla