Dr. Seuss/Elmer Classroom Library Labels

I created a few more classroom library labels for Dr. Suess and Elmer.  Home someone can use them.


*I had to take this down for the weekend, hopefully will be back up Monday*

Sarah

3D Shapes Sorting and Venn Diagram

We are about to start a new math unit on 3D Shapes.  We focus on relating them to everyday objects and also on exploring whether they roll, stack or slide.  Last year, I created a 3D Shapes sorting and Venn Diagram activity and I thought I would post it here in case anyone else could use it.  Click on the picture below to download.

Hope everyone is having a great weekend!

Sarah

More Walking through the Jungle

What a crazy week!  We had snow days Monday and Tuesday.  Finally back to school on Wednesday and Thursday, then we are off today due to mid-winter break!  Tough to squeeze in what I had planned for the week!  We did manage to read "Walking Through the Jungle" and "So Say The Monkeys" and do the jungle rhyming and beginning sounds activities that I posted earlier.  We also squeezed in some President's Day things which I will post later.

Here are a few more activities for "Walking Through the Jungle" that I plan to do next week:

Here is a nonsense/real word sort,  Click on the picture to download.

Our word family next week is -ox.  So I created an ot/ox word sort.  Click on the picture below to download.

Hope someone can use them!  I'm off to the museum with my boys today!  Love getting to be an all day mom!

Sarah

Walking Through the Jungle

I have been sick as a dog all weekend.  Yes, all the sickness in the classroom and in my own family finally overcame me.   Luckily, I already had a  doctor's appt made for today!  Then we had an ice storm hit last night, so school is canceled.  Its really pretty and we haven't lost power yet, plus it gives me one more day to recover.

So I didn't get much done this weekend, but I did make a few things for our big book this week, "Walking through the Jungle" by Stella Blackstone and Debbie Harter.

 This is a really cute story about a little girl that is using her imagination and visiting different animals in their habitats.  This would be a good story to read if you were doing a unit on animal habitats.  The jungle portion of it is only the first few pages.


The first item I made is a sight word game.  The first two pages of words are from our Reading Series, Harcourt Trophies.  I think I will have my WMU student use this game and use the first two pages with the below and on grade level kiddos.  The second two pages are words from the Dolch lists that our series doesn't cover.  These will be for the above grade level kids.  You can click on the picture below to download the document.  Thanks to Babbling Abby for teaching me how to do this!

Next, I have a beginning sounds activity and a rhyming activity.  These will be used in a small group with my below grade level students.
Click on the picture below for the rhyming activity

 

And here is the beginning sound activity. This activity goes specifically with the story, so it is not strictly jungle themed.

Some of the other books we will be reading are:

 

Hopefully, my own little monkeys will let me make some other things today!

Sarah

Stylish...Me??

Thank you Dana from Love 2 Learn and Share for my very first blog award!  Thank you Dana!

 Here are the rules for receiving this award:

1. Thank and link back to the person who awarded you this award
2. Share 7 things about yourself
3. Award 15 recently discovered great bloggers
4. Contact these bloggers and tell them about the award

Seven things about me:
1.  My favorite colors are red and purple
2.  I love carbs! :)
3.  I have two boys Andrew who is 6 and Colton who is 3
4.  I have taught for 13 years, 11 in kindergarten, 1 in 1st, and 1 in a K-3 multi-age
5.  My hobbies are knitting and scrapbooking and of course reading!
6.  We have 2 cats and a guinea pig
7.  The most embarrassing thing I have ever done in my class is wear the same shoes but in two different colors.  I have actually done this twice.  I need to stop buying the same shoes in different colors!


15 great bloggers who are getting this award next:

Growing Kinders
Learning and Laughing in Kindergarten
Mrs. Wills Kindergarten
Seeds of Knowledge for Future Generations
ABC and 123 Learning
Babbling Abby
First Grade Fabulous Fish
First Grade Learning Stars
First Grade Teaching
Always First Grade
Frogs, Bees, and Under the Seas
Heidi Songs
Ms. M's Blog
The Inspired Apple
Really Roper

Happy 100th Day!

Today we celebrated the 100th day of school with lots of fun activities!

After calendar, I always ask students the question of the day.  This gives them a chance to share their ideas and favorites about a lot of different topics.  Then I write one student's answer on the board and we use it to review things like high frequency words, letter identification, capital letters, and end marks.  Our question today was: "If you had 100.00, what would you buy?"  Here is one response.

We read a couple of books today.  Miss Bindergarten is always a favorite.

Usually, I don't give topics for the writing center, but since today was a special day, they had a topic.  Before we broke into centers, we brainstormed a list of ideas for our writing.

Of course we counted to 100 by 1's, 5's, and 10's!  We also did a math sheet of counting by 10's.

Last, we made 100th day headbands.  The clip art is old Carson Dellosa clip art that I have had forever.  We listened to a children's music channel on Pandora while we worked. They loved that and I need to do it more often. 

Hope everyone had a happy 100th day!!

Sarah

Even More Valentine's Day Fun!

So first of all I have to show you the ring one of my students gave me as a present:

So when I said it was beautiful and I loved it, he said, "Well don't wear it too long, it will make your finger green!"  Lol.  He is a sweetie, but I need to check with his parents and make sure it was okay for him to give it to me :)


Here are some of the other centers and activities we have had this week for Valentine's Day:

I ordered these buttons from Oriental Trading Company a long time ago.  They are perfect for Valentine's Day because of the colors.  There are so many things that you can do with them, counting sets, patterning, sorting..etc..

We created a category on the bookshelf for our Valentine's Day books.

This is a sorting activity that I think I got from the making learning fun Yahoo group.  Its if yours, let me know and I will give you credit.

This has been the "hot ticket" center this week.  Its a color word stamping from Making Learning Fun.  I've never seen kids get their winter gear off and get in the room so fast as they are to do this right now. :)

This is a letter matching game from Childcare Land.  I think it was originally a flip book, but I turned it into a matching game.

Last for math, we did an estimation activity with candy conversation hearts.  I was surprised at the number of kids who did not want to eat them!

Hope everyone had a happy Valentine's Day!!

Sarah

Red Panda Extravaganza!

Today was the big day!  We finally celebrated adopting the red panda cub from the Binder Park Zoo!

 Here are some of the activities that we did:


About a week ago, we voted for which baby animal we wanted to adopt from the zoo.  Here is the graph.

We are berries and bamboo (pretzel rods), just like red pandas!

We made red panda masks.  I got these from the Red Panda Network.

Next, we located on our big classroom map what part of the world that red pandas live in.  I gave the students a map of Asia to color and they put a picture of a red panda on the part of the map where red pandas live.

We also played a roll and color a red panda game.

We also did a red panda themed short vowel "o" family sort during reading centers.

Download the Red Panda Short "O" Family Sort Here


Have a great Friday!

More Red Panda Activities

Thursday is the day we celebrate adopting our red panda  from the Binder Park Zoo.  I created red panda rool and color  activity that we are going to do at the party.

Download the Red Panda Color and Roll Here 

I also created some more literacy activities:

Here is a sight word game that will be played my my pre intern from WMU this week.  There are two sets of words.  The first two pages are words that are from our Harcourt Brace Trophies reading program.  The second two pages are for the kids who work above grade level.  I took these from the Dolch word lists and are words not covered in our program at the kindergarten level.

Download the Red Panda Themed Sight Word Game Here

Can't wait to post the party pics on Thursday!!

Sarah

Publish Post

We Are Adopting a Red Panda!

Every year instead of a valentine's day party (Valentine's Day parties will be held in wraparound), our kindergarten classes adopt an animal from the Binder Park Zoo!  The students voted on Tuesday and selected one of the baby red pandas to adopt this year!  You could also use these activities for the Chinese New Year since the red panda is indigenous to China or for a zoo theme.

Today was a snow day and my hubby was home too!  Fifth 3rd declared an emergency and he did not have to report.  So I worked off and on researching the red panda and creating some literacy materials for us to use next week.  On Thursday, we will have an adoption party to celebrate adopting the red panda.

I found one book at the Kalamazoo Public Library and put it on hold, hopefully it comes in soon.

I also created some literacy activities.  Hope you enjoy!

The first is red panda word cards.  I put these in my letter/word work center and have the kids make the words with magnetic letters or other letter manipulative.  We also go over these words for vocabulary.  They have words for where red pandas live, what they eat, and who their predators are.

Downlaod the Red Panda Word Cards Here

Also for the letter/word work center I made an uppercase/lowercase letter match

Download the Red Panda Uppercase/Lowercase Match Here

The beginning sounds match will be used in a small group with my parapro for those students who did not benchmark in this area on DIBELS.  They may also make their way into the letter/word work center.

Download the Red Panda Beginning Sound Match Here

Last but not least, I made a red panda making words activity.  I was inspired to do this by the cute ones sent through the making learning fun yahoo group and some of the other bloggers I follow.

Download the Red Panda Making Words Sheet Here

They have already called another snow day for tomorrow, but my husband will not be home, so I doubt I will get as much done.

Sarah

More Valentine's Day

Today I put away all the winter/snow themed books and activities and got out my box of February books and activities.  These include Groundhog's Day, President's Day, and Valentine's Day book and activities.  Here are some of the books we will hopefully read before Valentine's Day:

 

I have a lot of these "bugs" books and the kids love them.  I usually have to read it more than once.

 This one is always a favorite because the kids see the show on PBS kids.  They also think that the possibility that Arthur might get kissed is "gross" and like the ending of chocolate kisses.

This is one of my favorite's to read because it has a good moral message. 

A cute and simple story when you have few extra minutes.

I like to read this one before we do activities with candy hearts.

Starfall has a cute making a sentence game.  We will be doing this in the computer lab coming up.

The link is http://www.starfall.com/n/holiday/valentine/load.htm?f&n=main

I also created a Valentine Color A Rhyme for either my para pro or my pre-intern to do

Download the Valentine Color A Rhyme Here