Back to School

It's that time of the year again, Back to School!  I have been working hard these past two weeks in order to prepare for the new school year.  It's sad but I actually started prepping at the end of last year, by printing out our Group A and Group B signs.  I'm sure our school does back to school a little bit different, especially with kindergarten.  The first three days of school, we have 45minute blocks to meet the students and the parents and during this time we get to go over our rules and do and assessment on the students.  Then, we break the class up into 2 groups - Group A and Group B.  Half the class comes to school for 1/2 day (Group A) and then the next day the other group of kids come for 1/2 day (Group B).  That following Monday Group A would come for a full day and Tuesday Group B would come for a full day and then that Wednesday all the students would arrive.  So, it's a great way to ease the students into kindergarten.   More pictures are to come later on!

Welcome notes for parents!

I got these great trays from Lakeshore this year, and it helped me organize all my Group A and Group B papers for the parent conferences!

This year, I decided to ask parents if they were willing to help me prep projects for crafts we complete this year.  

I know this looks chaotic but I wanted to display some of the love that I have received over the years on my filing cabinets.  

This year, I decided to paint my desk and I think it looks awesome!  It was a puke green color before and I couldn't be more pleased :0

Reading Buddies along with stories for students to read!

Puzzles I bought from Ross for $4.99 and they are awesome learning tools!

Here is my morning station, otherwise know as calendar time.  I also bought these awesome magnetic ten frame frames for counting in the morning.  

I used sheet protectors to the dimensions of the shape and color cards and well as the rhyming words and everyday we review a color and shape and that cards just slide right into the sheet protector.  We do go over the rhyming words, I will ask students to give me other words that rhyme with "box and "fox"!  I also have a close up of the magnetic 10 frame, so easy to use!

Here is my behavior management plan, I moved it this year so that students would be able to move their clips on their own.  

I made thse signs last year and they just sat on my whiteboard :(  I am reinstating them again this year and hopefully will get put to good use.

Number Writing 0-20

I've started working on next years pacing and when we teach numbers in the beginning of the year.  I've found a lot of the worksheets that I've used in the past were probably photocopied a 1,000 times and looked just awful.  So, I decided to make some new pages for the kiddies.  You can find them here on my TpT store, they are on sale right now!

 Numbers 0-20 on each page to help students learn to write their numbers.  

 Four lines of tracing the number, with dots to help guide them.  

The fifth line has the dots for guidance and the sixth line, students must write the numbers on their own.

Guest Readers

The other day, we were lucky enough to have guest readers join us in the classroom and read to the students.  Our special readers were Tameka Johnson from the Seattle Storm and Lawrence Wright who is an international pro basketball player!  Tameka wrote the story "Temeka's Choice" and also wrote Decisions, Decisions, Decisions" with Quency Phillips.  They were also kind enough to donate a set of their books to the class!

PlayDoh Containers

I found this post on Pinterest last year from Chickbug and thought it was the cutest idea, and I've been dying to recreate my own version of these containers.  It wasn't until my Mother's Day project failed that I had to resort to PlayDoh and remember about this craft.

I'm you have dried out PlayDoh somewhere in your closet or craft corner and with a few pieces of scrapbook paper you could make your own monster containers.

After creating the strips, I laminated them to ensure that they would hold up to five year olds handling them.  

I'm using the monster containers to store my letters for when we use them during a small group or a Language Arts center.  

Helping Hands

I was on Pinterest the other day, and I came across a post from the blog Little Minds at Work where Tara had cut out hands to help her students master the skill of addition.  I thought that this was absolutely adorable and quite beneficial, so I decided to embark on making my own set of hands during Spring Break.  

So, I first found a template of hands to print out.  I used file folders to print on because I wanted the hands to be a sturdy as possible.  Also, I had to reverse the image so the hand outline that I would cut on would be on the backside.  Then, I had my work out out for me - 48 hands to first cut out, then laminate and then cut out the lamination, whew!!!

I had to try out a few in the beginning of this process to see how the end result would look like.  One, extra step I took was to put velcro on each of the fingers so that the students would be able to accurately count each finger.  This was quite a task, especially because the velcro was so difficult to take off the packaging :(.  After each finger was securely placed on the paper, I hot glued the palm of each hand to secure them.  

Now, I also decided to make addition and subtraction cards to use the Helping Hands with!  Here is an example of the fingers being used to add 1+2.  

It's hard to see the fingers due to the shine from the lamination.  Below is an angled view and a back view to see how I put velcro on each finger.  Please note that this project was very time consuming and I had to buy the colored paper, so I put out some of my own money.  

The final project of all my Helping Hands completed!  I'm very excited for the students to use them to reinforce addition as well as our subtraction unit coming up next month.  

Read Across America

While looking through Pinterest, I saw some super cute posts from First Grade Fever, where they had done a writing regarding Thing 1 and Thing 2 coming to your house and what would the student do!  I had a hard time coming up with the template, but after lots of research, I finally came up with a way to make Thing 1!  After lunch, we read The Cat in the Hat and did this art project afterwards.  I then asked the students what they would do it Thing 1 and Thing 2 came to their house, some responses were just too funny!

"I would tie them up!"

"I would want them to go away!"

Non Sense Words

Here is one of my newer centers that I just created.  My students needed help reading and decoding reading real words and non sense words.  So, I had the idea to use scrabble tiles, I don;t know why but I'm in love with the end result.  I bought the tiles through Amazon, 200 tiles for about $20.  I also, got this container from our Christmas party and I thought what a perfect container for this center.

Now, I know this doesn't look like much right now, but this is how easy the center folds up.  I struggled for a few days on how to display real words versus non sense words. and I figured red and green made the most sense.  I used my Cricut to make the perfect circle and then cut it in half, and traced the half circle onto the colored paper, trimmed the edge and viola!

I used my Cricut to make the perfect circle and then cut it in half, and traced the half circle onto the colored paper, trimmed the edge and viola!

Now comes the fun part!  I sorted the letters and came up with the real words first.  Then, I took all the extra letters and put those together by gluing them with Elmers Glue.  Next, I added a coat of Modge Podge to solidify the tiles.  I wish I hadn't done this because the tiles became sticky and I had one big blob of tiles.  I had clear coating spray paint from a prior project, so I sprayed the tiles down which heloed take away the stickiness!   

Now, when we play this center I lay out all the pieces face down and students and pick up a piece.  After reading the word, they have to determine whether it's a real word or a silly word and put it on the correct side.  Now, if students need help reading the piece they picked, I asked if anyone else can help and if they are struggling because we haven't learned the letter or they can't blend the word, then I intervene and help them out!  I give this center two thumbs way, way up!!!