Finally...Classroom Reveal!

Hello world! I'm still here! I apologize for completely ignoring my little blog for the past couple of months. This post has been sitting unfinished on my computer for weeks. I have been so busy that I've barely had time to eat or sleep! I guess that's what happens when you take 4 grad classes while teaching full time, conducting your action research, and starting up a new school! But I can't lie, I LOVE being back in kindergarten! I really did miss it. Although it's late, I do still want to share my new classroom with all of you! The room is huge, which is awesome, but it's been a struggle to try to make it feel cozy. It's still a work in progress. I included links to all the products I used at the bottom of the post. Enjoy the tour!

Writing Center 

Classroom Library

Meeting Area

                                Student Portraits                                       Rainbow Names
                         (Inspired by Deanna Jump!)                        (Also from Deanna Jump!)

 

                                 Reading Area                                          Student Tables

Student Tables & Meeting Area

 

Small Group Tables

Math Center

 Reading Area & Cubbies

Looking towards back of room

Birthday Balloons

FREEBIE from Once Upon a First Grade Adventure

 Computer Center

Word Wall

Student Mailboxes

Behavior Chart & Dismissal Chart

Here are links to all the products I used:

Common Core I Can Posters

Chevron Daily Schedule Cards

Chevron Calendar Pack

Chevron Classroom Rules

Chevron Banners

Chevron Classroom Library Labels

Word Wall Cards

 Chevron Clip Chart

Chevron Number Posters

Chevron Borders

Chevron Bundle

 And here are a few of the activities we did WAY back in September!

Chicka Chicka Boom Boom Trees!

I used my Silhouette Cameo to cut all those leaves and coconuts! Since my husband got it for me, I have been using it like crazy for every little thing! I actually drew and scanned in the leaves and the Cameo cut them for me! Best gift I've ever gotten! :)

No David Behavior Sort                            The Kissing Hand

I hope you enjoyed the tour! Up next... Fall fun and festivities!

Classroom Sneak Peek!

I AM SO EXCITED! After waiting all summer, I finally got into my classroom yesterday! I have been so jealous of all the beautiful classroom photos I've been checking out on Pinterest and my favorite blogs, so I am full of inspiration and ready to go! My husband and I spent the whole day yesterday moving furniture and setting up bulletin boards. We're still waiting on most of the furniture to be delivered, so I am not even close to finished! Here are some of my current projects and links to where I purchased the materials!

READ blocks - Michaels $1.50 each

Huge clothespins - Michaels $1.50 each

"Write" banner - from my store on TPT

Colorful photo frames - Michaels $9.99 (buy one get one!)

Poster Quote Freebies - Technology Rocks

Lantern Lights - Amazon

Chevron Borders - Really Good Stuff

And finally, I saw the idea for this on Pinterest ages ago and always wanted to make my own! I found this bottle at the dollar store and it was perfect for the job! I can't wait to shake some "brain sprinkles" all over my kiddies next month :)

Much more to come! I am also working on a post with lots of reading and writing workshop setup ideas and freebies!!!!

Milestone Freebie & Read Aloud

Hi guys! I'm so excited to be celebrating another TpT milestone this month! I can't believe I've made it this far..and it's all thanks to my awesome followers! To thank you all, I'm giving away my chevron classroom rules for FREE for the next week! You can download them HERE. You can read about this month's milestone achievements on the TpT blog HERE.

I know it's been a while since I've posted, and I'm sorry for neglecting you all! If you haven't already read about it on Facebook, I'm attending the Teachers College reading and writing institutes for the first half of this month. I'm having an amazing time and learning SO many new things about reading and writing workshop. I have tons of learning to share with you all but for now I just HAD to share this book we read yesterday! Have any of you used it with your kids? I am in love with this book! I literally RAN to the book sale and bought it today!

For those who haven't read it before...Ralph is a student who has a BIG problem in writing workshop. He can't think of a story! Everyone else seems to have stories, but he just can't find one! In the end, he finds his own story and gains his confidence as a writer!

What a perfect story for the early days of writing workshop. I can think of so many ways to use this one book! Here are just a few ideas...
-Teach kids what writers do when they get stuck
-Demonstrate that all writers get writers' block...even YOU!
-Teach kids different ways to generate ideas for writing
-Teach kids how to orally tell a story to their partner to plan out their writing
-Ralph has to get out of his seat to think...teach kids to choose their own special writing spots around the classroom
-Create a chart of strategies and resources for kids to use when they get stuck
-Teach them how to peer edit and ask questions about each others' writing
-Can you think of any others? Share your ideas in the comments :)

I'm having an amazing time here at TC, but I can't wait to be finished so I can get into my classroom in a couple weeks! As soon as I get to work in my room, I'll be posting pictures and back to school ideas! 

Finally, here's some inspiration from Kate Roberts' keynote today: Despite all the current pressures and standards, we can still teach with LOVE, humor, and compassion. Above all, we must keep children at the center of all things! And one more tidbit from Lester Laminack: "Remember that we are not raising scores, but children!" <3

Alphabet Game Freebie!

Hey everyone! Just a quick note tonight...I just made my first ever fan freebie on Facebook! Head over to my page to check out my "I Have...Who Has?" ABC Game. This is a great game to play with your whole class early in the year to practice the alphabet. All you have to do is like my Facebook page to get it for free!

Enjoy! I'll be back soon with more goodies and back to school ideas!

Classroom Library & Lesson Plans

Hi friends! Okay, so I know I should be enjoying summer vacation, but I am so excited to get into my classroom to start organizing! Waiting another month will be agonizing for me, so I figured I'd get a head start working on whatever I can from home. Today I started working on my classroom library organization. I printed out my book basket labels and I also made matching stickers for the books, which will make it so much easier for the kids to keep everything organized! I'm thrilled with how these turned out!

 

If you like these, you can pick them up in my TpT store!

We also had our first PD day a couple weeks ago and it was so exciting to meet the other teachers I'll be working with! Since we're a small new school, there will only be four of us next year. We had a great time ordering furniture and materials, looking at curriculum, and planning out our daily schedule! Since I got my daily schedule, I was able to begin updating my lesson plan format. This is just a quick sample I made up and it will be more detailed once I get all the curriculum materials. I will post a complete version at some point when I've got the whole year planned out! If you're interested, you can download the template HERE. 

We have our next meeting in about a week, so I'm looking forward to doing some more planning and learning more details about my new school! I'll keep you all updated :)

EXCITING NEWS AND SALE!

I got a job!!! So the news is out and I'm throwing a SALE this weekend to celebrate! After a year off, I'm heading back to kindergarten! The principal of a brand new school contacted me through my blog and, long story short, I got the position! I'm thrilled to have the opportunity to be part of the founding team of this awesome new school! Everything in my store is 20% off now through Sunday in celebration!!!!!! Can you tell I'm excited?! 

Math Centers Task Cards

I hope you're all enjoying your summer so far (those of you who are already out)! I'm sure some of you remember the Math Centers Task Cards I said I was making...like two years ago! Haha. Well, I have FINALLY had the time to finish them and I'm SO excited about this set! I haven't been able to find anything else like this on TpT! I included over 330 hands-on tasks and I know kids will have so much fun with these! There are so many things to do and they're activities that can be repeated throughout the year so you don't need to change out stations and themes every week! Plus, I included the related Common Core Math Standard on each card to make organization and planning easier. I'm also making a coordinating set of printable games and recording sheets to make prep even easier!

I hope you love them! More fun stuff coming up and I have some big news coming soon so check back in the next week to hear the EXCITING NEWS!!!!! :D

Goal Setting Checklist FREEBIE!

Hey guys! I just wanted to share a quick little post and freebie with you. A colleague recently shared this idea with me about students setting and tracking their own goals. I thought this was a fantastic idea and wondered why I hadn't thought of it myself. This is such a great way to empower students and hold them accountable for their own learning. I have had my kids use graphs to chart their own progress in reading, but I haven't actually had students come up with their own goals they want to accomplish.

There are lots of great ideas on the internet, which I've posted on my Pinterest board.
But there aren't too many products that are simple enough to use with kindergarteners. So, I was inspired to create a quick little freebie for those of us in the younger grades! I thought this would be a nice simple visual way to make goal setting a less daunting task for kindergarteners.

One way to use this would be to give each student a goal checklist weekly or monthly. Have students choose 3 goals from the picture sheet, then cut and paste their goals onto their goal sheet. At the end of the week or month have students check off whether they accomplished the goal or still need to work on it. Then they will choose new goals for the next month. You could have students tape their goal sheet to their desk or keep it in a folder. The important thing is that they are revisiting it frequently to monitor their goals and keep track of their accomplishments. You can also keep these for parent conferences or send them home to keep parents informed of their child's progress.

I'd love to hear more ideas for goals I can add to the chart. Please comment if there's something you'd like me to add. Click one of the images below for your FREEBIE

Also, if you're into the idea of having students set goals, check out this awesome student data binder from Mrs. Knight, which allows students to set goals and track their own progress! I love this!

That's all for now! Thanks for visiting :)

Growing a Kinder-Garden: Plants Unit {Freebies!}

This was one of my favorite science units that I did with my kids last year. Many of the activities you see here are part of my Freebie Plants Unit. The unit includes fun activities, templates, songs, crafts, book ideas, and a sample outline of lessons. Some of the activities and templates are not included in the unit because they were borrowed from other blogs. I've included links to those activities below if you'd like to use them.

We started our unit by reading the story of Peter Rabbit. Then we received an urgent letter from "Mr. McGregor" asking us to help him with his garden. This idea came from Mrs. Lee's Kindergarten. We decided we would have to learn more about plants so we can write back to him and help him. Then we created a schema chart of our prior knowledge. This cute chart was inspired by The First Grade Parade. 

Next, we learned about the plant lifecycle. We read some books and watched a Brainpop video. Then we learned a song about the lifecycle, which we acted out with body motions.

We also learned about what plants need to live and grow. We read "Once there was a Seed" and we sang the song "What Do Plants Need?" I found this cute little song a while back but I can't remember where it came from. If you're the author please let me know so I can credit you for it. Finally, we made these cute flap books. The front of the book was inspired by Mrs. Lee as well. 

Next we learned about the parts of a plant. We started with this video on Brainpop about the parts of a plant. Then we learned the plant parts dance called "Flower, Leaves, Stem and Roots" (similar to Head, Shoulders, Knees and Toes). Finally, we made a poster and students made their own plant parts diagrams.

Finally, we were ready to plant our own garden! The kids enjoyed watering and measuring their plants every day and recording observations in their plant journals. We also went on a field trip to the botanical gardens and nature center as part of this unit. At the end of the unit, we decorated flower pots and brought our plants home as a Mother's Day gift!

I hope you have lots of fun learning about plants and enjoy the freebies!

ABC's and...Embedded Picture Mnemonics!?

Hey everyone! I know you're probably thinking "embedded picture what?" Don't worry, we'll get to that in a second. So I was recently reading some articles for one of my classes and it got me excited because it confirmed something I was already doing with my kids - don't you love when that happens? For each letter of the alphabet, I always have my class create a craft out of the letter. Apparently there's a name for this...well I'm sure you've figured it out by now. Embedded picture mnemonics simply means we form a picture representing the letter-sound out of the letter itself. Research shows that embedded picture mnemonics help children learn letter-sound relationships more quickly than other methods. Fun, simple, AND scientifically proven! So when the principal walks in and asks why you're doing arts and crafts, you've got research to back you up! Hah!! You can download the articles HERE and HERE.

I don't have pictures of all of them, but here are some examples. And of course you can find many other ideas if you search the internet.

A for alligator, B for bumblebee, C for cat, D for dinosaur, G for gum (this one isn't really an embedded mnemonic), I for iguana, N for nest, O for octopus, P for penguin, Q for queen, R for rabbit, T for tiger, and V for vase of violets. 

My class also sings this song every day during morning meeting. I made a chart to go along with it and we use body movements to match each letter sound. The kids love it! I'm thinking I need to update my chart using these embedded mnemonics!

Thanks for stopping by! Have a great week!