That's Nonsense!!! :)

This week we are starting our insect unit!  The kiddo's always love learning about these little creatures and little do they know that they will have live ladybugs to watch!!  I was hoping they would have come last week but ther is still no sign of them....sigh...  Maybe they will come tomorrow. :)

I will be practicing Nonsense Word Fluency this week in preparation for our last Dibels Benchmark.  Here is the activity I will be using.  

Enjoy!

Click HERE to get your own copy!!

Don't get SQUISHED!!! :)

A little Vowel Sound Sorting

Today I brought out the Flower Power Vowel Sort again for some extra practice.  My kids are really good at telling me ALL the sounds in a word, but when it come to isolating a specific sound, this is not so easy for them - so I thought a little practice on hearing the middle sound would be great!!  I used this in my small groups this week and it has worked out great!  Since we have done this before, they were familiar with how to play.

Here are the leaf pieces - I printed them on the back of some scrapbook paper/cardstock so they would have a cute design on the back.  :)

I literally opened the bag, laid out the materials and they took off.  This left me with some time so do some much needed conferencing!! :) I conferenced with one or two students and when I returned to the group to check on them they were ready for the response piece for this activity.  We did not complete the response sheet the first time I introduced this activity, so this was new for them.

Sorry for the bad picture... :)  I had my main lights off and just had lamp light in the room - I do this alot... it's a wonder my eyes aren't worse then they already are!! :)

I did this response sheet a few different ways to differentiate for my groups.  For my highest group, I told them that I wanted 4 words in each box and that they could use 1 of my pictures they sorted - the rest they had to come up with on their own - and then I had them pick a word from each box and use it in a sentence.  For my middle group, I gave them basically the same directions except they could use 2 of my words and they had to come up with 2 of their own (no sentences).  And for my lowest group - I only required 2 PICTURES in each box - one could be mine but 1 had to be their own - this was a little difficult for some, but others surprised me!! :)

I sometimes forget to go back and revisit some of the activities we have done in the past.  When I do bring something old back out, it is amazing to see how excited they get.  It is also fun to see their confidence go up and to see them be successful!!

Rhyme Time

Here is a new Rhyming Game I added to my store at Teachers Pay Teachers!  I told you I had to do more with this adorable clipart!! :)

Click below to go to my store.

Birds of a Feather...

Flower Power

At this point in our Kindergarten year, we have learned most of the vowel sounds.  Last week some of my children were having a really hard time discriminating the different sounds that they make.  This is where the inspiration for my new addition to my TpT Store came from. 

Enjoy!!  

Click on the picture below to find your own Flower Power!!!

I absolutely fell in love with this clipart when I saw it!  I will be using it for more fun!!

Valentine Literacy Games

So here is attempt number 2 at posting something on Teachers Pay Teachers!  It has some games that I like to play during small group time and eventually let them play on their own.  It has been up there for a while but I just keep forgetting to let y'all know!! :)

Just for my blog readers...

Here is one of the games that is included in the pack.

Broken Hearts

You can find the entire pack HERE.  :)

Enjoy!!

 

Happy!!! :)

So some of you may have noticed the new button at the bottom of this blog... it is my other obsession... Polka Dots(I know... big surprise!! :) ) and Personalizing EVERYTHING!!!! Who doesn't like a few colorful dots and your name on anything you can put it on right???? I create a lot of my products with teachers in mind!!  :)  Well, it was a little hobby that has turned into a big business and I LOVE it!  A fellow blogger, Kristen Walsky at First Grade Teaching found my Porter's Polka Dots Boutique and she so sweetly asked if we could do a giveaway on her site.    If you haven't already, head on over to her BLOG and enter to win the giveaway!!  It's super easy!!!  Thanks Kristen!!!  

Oh and follower too if you haven't already!  She has some fantastic teaching ideas!!  

Now, on to other things - like what has been going on in our polka dot classroom this week.  Well, we have been playing catch up! We had sooo many fun things to do before we got our for Christmas that we didn't get it all done...so what do you do???  You turn Christmas Reindeer activities into Winter Reindeer activities!! :)  Just go with me on this...the kiddos did!!  :)  They had a blast!!  I used Deanna Jump's Reindeer Unit and did a little adaptation!! :)

 The kids had a great time rereading Deanna's Reindeer Book and looking at real reindeer on the internet.  Completing these All About Reindeer books was quite a task but after the first couple of pages they caught on and were able to put the words in order by using the sentence rules we have been talking about.... and talking about... and talking about!  :)  Sometimes I feel like a tape recorder... :)  My favorite part was seeing how good their reindeer drawings were.  Some of them were really cute!!

So I turned the glyph (minus the lights and ornaments on the antlers)  into just a cute art project to accompany the cute books!  

Busy Busy Busy!  I love to see this!  :)

Proud!! 

We also did our own reports about reindeer and I will post those at the beginning of next week... if we don't have a snow day.  Expecting a lot of snow in Atlanta on Sunday night.  Secretly wishing for one... or two... :)

Have a good weekend!

Hoo Loves You Word Family Sort

I have been inspired by many of my fellow bloggers who have created some super cute activities!  Here is my first attempt at creating an activity to share with my parents and fellow teachers and using google docs - so I hope all works out!! :)   Before we left for break my kids were having a really hard time discriminating between the /t/ and /p/ ending sounds.  They were doing a lot of guessing instead of using their decoding skills.  I have included some pages that you can plug in and use your own word families. :)  

Parents: This is a great activity to reinforce skills we have been learning and practicing in class!! 

I forgot to add the response sheet so you can get it here!

Games

Last year I found this really great site for Center Activities!  Pocketful of Centers has a lot of really cute and engaging activities for our young learners!!  Here are a few of them in action!!

Matching color word to color

Apple Tree Number Match

Apple Tree Number Match in action... :)

I also use a lot of resources from the Florida Reading Research Center.  Check them out if you have not already.  Here is one of our favorite activities....Beginning Sound Wheel Match(I also have a capital/lowercase wheel).  I wrote the answers on the back of the wheels so they are self check too! :)

How Tall are You?

I found some pictures!!  We used our Gingerbread Men to measure how tall we are!  They had a great time.  We took turns standing in front of our gingerbread men and counted the gingerbread men.  We graphed our results and then showed our work on a response sheet.  They had a great time and most were able to show their work.  :)

Daily Five

The Daily Five has saved my life!!!  I love love love it!  I love how easy it makes my planning, I love how much the children are learning and I love how independent it has made hem.  Here are some pics I snapped during the last few weeks (that did make it off my phone before it drowned) of my children hard at work!!

Read to self

Read to self...notice he is using his finger to track!  Woo hoo!  It's the little things isn't it??!!  :)

Andrew always sits in this same place. :)

Read to self in the library.

Joel Working on Writing!  We are finally writing sentences!!!   Yeah!!!

Word Work with Wikki Sticks

A Kindergarten Thanksgiving

Wow!  Thanksgiving krept up on me so fast!!  This week has been crazy busy, but it is one of my favorite weeks of the kindergarten year.  Preparing for the annual Kindergarten Thanksgiving Feast is always an exciting time for our students.

We worked very hard all week preparing our costumes.  The children had a great time making their headbands, pouches and shirts.  I put a plain white t-shirt on their School Supply List back at the beginning of the school year so we would have them for this special day.  I took the shirts home and dyed and frayed the edges.  Then during the week my para helped the kids stamp their own shirts.  This was the first time I used actual t-shirts and I think they turned out so cute!  I usually use the brown paper bag, but this way really wasn't any more trouble then the bags.  I think we will stick with the t-shirts from now on!! 

Each class was responsible for bringing something to the feast to share with the entire Kindergarten.  The only requirement is that is has to be something (or something close) that was actually brought to the first Thanksgiving.  Our contribution this year was butter.  I love to make butter with my kinders because they love seeing the whipping cream turn into the butter right before their eyes.  It tastes yummy too!!

Here is a shot of what was brought to our feast this year:
Popcorn, dried berries, bread/butter, jerky and pumpkin cookies.

Before we head to our feast we have a Thanksgiving Parade through the entire school to show off our adorable Pilgrims and Indian costumes.  The big kids show their respect by waving and clapping as we go by.  It is so much fun.  We eventually make it into the cafeteria where our feast is usually held.  We have wonderful parents and para-pro's that prepare the plates so they are ready to hand out when we arrive. We share our food together and the children have a great time sitting with their friends talking about this fun experience!!

 

During the week we did some other really fun activities.   I purchased Deanna Jump's Thanksgiving Unit and we had a ball with it.  I will post some more photos later this week. 

One activity that I do have a picture of right now is a Turkey Word Family Activity.  The kids had a great time writing and reading their favorite word families!!  I had to differentiate this activity to meet the needs of my students but by doing this all of my children were successful at their particular task. I got this cute turkey idea/activity from a very kind teacher whose blog I came across recently.  

Thank you Mrs. Carroll at The First Grade Parade!  

Happy Thanksgiving!!