Cool Website

A Website I Love to use in my class is Sundance Pub Literactive  Sundance Literactive Readers feature fun online stories that develop key skills for young readers.  There are 50 titles that are organized into 5 carefully leveled  sets (A-E) that gradually increase in difficulty.  Watch pre-k, kindergarten, and first grader children's confidence soar as they follow along with the animated storybooks.  The also show students our to stretch out the words and tells them what the word is if they do not know it.

I found this really cool website Storyline Online It has books that are read aloud to students and shows the pictures of the book.  The books they have available to watch are:

A Bad Case of Stripes
Enemy Pie
Knots on a Counting Rope
The Night I Followed The Dog
Private I.Guana
Sebastian's Roller Skates
Stellaluna
To Be a Drum
Brave Irene
Guji  Guji
Me and My Cat
No Mirrors in My Nana's House
The Rainbow Fish
Somebody Loves You, Mr. Hatch
Thanks you, Mr. Falker
White Socks Only
Dad, Are You The Tooth Fairy?
Harry The Dirty Dog
My Rotten Readheaded Older Brother
The Polar Express
Romeaw & Drooliet
Sophie's Masterpiece
When Pigasso Met Mootisse
Wilfrid Gordon Mcdonald Partridge

Freebie!!!!

Ok, now that I have your attention :-) I know that a lot of the blogs that I follow have used Dreamlike Magic Designs for their blog design. You should head over to her blog. She gives away the cutest paper packs and even some clip art. She added a cute Christmas paper pack to her FREEBIES!! Make sure you follow her...you don't want to miss any of her FREEBIES!!

Smart-board activity (The Little Old Lady Who Swallowed a Bat)

This is a notebook file for smart-boards. This smart-board activity goes along with the book "There Was an Old Lady Who Swallowed a Bat." In this activity students can move the objects and have the lady swallow them into her stomach. This help in retelling the story! Students will have to also sort objects by if they were swallowed or not swallowed. The next slide also has were the students move the objects that were swallowed to match their beginning letter. Students use picture to sequence the story. Students will be able to create a circle map on one of the characters. It also incorporates math by counting how many were swallowed by looking at a graph and having them write the number while determining more or less. Check it out on my teacher pay teachers account.


The Little Old Lady Who Swallowed a Bat Smart-board activity

preview:

Printing on Sticky Notes :)

WOW!!!! I just found on Ladybug's Teacher Files a video and template on how to print on sticky notes.  I am so amazed by this and I can't wait to start using this in my classroom! What a great idea to use in reader response notebooks.  Here is her video below and also the template downloads.

Here is her Blog post about it for more information: Ladybug's teacher Files- printing on sticky notes 

Happy Thursday!

Hi friends!  I am trying to be one of those people that post all the time but I just can't.  I feel I have been overly busy lately with school, meetings every day after school, wedding planning, and outside of school life.  I can't wait till things calm down.  Wait, I forgot I'm a teacher! It never will!  Today, I just want to share some great ideas and things I have found.  Right now in kindergarten we are learning to write our numbers in math.  I found this great lesson idea to use with the CD "Totally Math" by Dr. Jean.  I have the CD but never thought to use it!  Use the song "Chant and Write" to help kids practice writing numbers.  All of the students will have a wipe-off board and dry erase marker.  Play one number in the song at a time and model how to write the numbers as they sing the song.  Then the students practice writing the numbers on the board while they sing the song.  After they made it from 0-5, ask the students questions  and have them point to specific numbers.  For example, point to number 5, point to the number that is between 3 and 5, point to the numbers that are larger than 3, point to the number that is less than 1, etc. This will keep your students engaged while practicing.


I also LOVE the website www.fontspace.com!!!  The fonts that you can download for free are amazing! I have been sharing them will all my teammates at school.  The newsletters that are sent home weekly are looking wonderful from all the cool fonts!

I would also like to share this wonderful article by Ron Clark!  It is so true!!! Click on the link below to read article.

What Teachers Really Want To Tell Parents

Writing Folders

Here are my writing folders! Students have several pages in clear sleeves to help them in writing.

Take Home Folders

Here are my Take Home folders.  Every child takes this folder to and from school.  This is the way we communicate with parents everyday! Inside the prongs I put clear sleeves that are all labeled.  

The labels are:

*Pocket: Return back to school

*Parent/teacher communication: For any notes, transportation changes, absent notes, etc

*Newsletter

*Show and Tell

*Lunch Menu

*Monthly Calendar 

*Class Schedule

*Handbook

*Homework Folder

*Pocket: Keep at Home 

First Week

Wow, the first week has been challenging and wonderful at the same thing.  I forgot what kindergarten was like at the beginning of the year.  Overall, I think that this year is going to be another amazing year with all my little kids.  :)  I am glad I have a long weekend to rest and get started on some more wedding planning.  If anybody knows anyone that is selling the TALL glass cylinders for the reception tables, please let me know :) or any decorations.  My colors are going to be black, white, and hot pink. 

Teacher Organizer Binder!

I LOVE this binder so much!!! A Huge shout goes out to Mrs. Pollard at Tales of a Teacherista! She made this binder for herself.  {Check out her blog here} She was sweet enough to email me the documents to print out and also customized the cover and spine for me. AMAZING!! If you haven't looked at her stuff on her blog, then you should! Everything is high quality!


Here are some pictures of this binder made by Mrs. Pollard at Tales of a Teacherista!

DonorsChoose

Happy Monday,


Last year, I decided to try and get the phonic alphabet tubs funded for my classroom.  I worked all year emailing, facebook, etc to get this project funded on Donorchoose.org.  Unfortunately, it expired before it was fully funded.  I am trying again to get this project funded.  There is only 162 dollars to go till it is funded.  I would greatly appreciate if you could help out!  Kindergartners need concrete experience with objects and manipulatives to explore letter sounds and make connections to the alphabet. Learning the alphabet and the letter sounds is critical because it is the first step in learning how to read! THANK YOU!!!! Click on the link below and it will take you to the giving page and give you more details!! 

All I Ever Needed to Know, I Learned in Kindergarten!

Book Labels

I decided to create book labels for my reading center in zebra print since I was doing the jungle theme this year.  I also needed a new system in organization.  I have my reading center sorted by non-fiction and fiction.  The book labels has pictures to determine the category.  On the label is a dot with a number in it.  This indicated what books go in what basket.  On the back of all the books are a colored dot with a number.  The students can put books back easily by matching the label on the basket to the label on the back of the book.  Makes life much easier as a teacher because at the end of each day we don't have to sort through books and put them back into the proper places.

Book Labels

Classroom Labels

Here are some classroom labels that I use in my room to keep everything organized.  :) I got them from Kelly's Kindergarten. <-- click to check out all her freebies.

Classroom Labels

Look what I found! Absence note

As I was looking through different blogs the other day.  I found the CUTE absence notes from a creative classroom.  These forms will work great for my classroom.  You can send copies home with the parents the first week of school or even in the take home folders to fill out when their child was absent from school.  I think it is a great idea because it is so hard to get all the information that the office wants.  This way the parents will know exactly what they need to included the first time.


Absence Note

Caddy Organizer!

Last year, I was trying to find a way to organize crayons, pencils, glue, etc on the tables so the students could share.  Another teacher Susan and I decided on using toilet paper rolls and putting them inside the caddies to keep crayon colors organized.  They worked great until half way through the year they started to fall out.  This year Susan and I decided to go to Lowes and buy some piping and cut it to fit inside caddy. I believe this year the caddies are going to be more STURDY!! Here is a picture after finishing.  Will take a picture and upload it of the pencils, crayons, scissors, and glue inside later! :)

Jungle Theme Classroom

Happy Friday! Today I decided to start blogging and sharing ideas with all the lovely teachers out there.  I have been slaving in my classroom the past week and can I say "I am tired." This year I decided to go with the safari/jungle theme.  It has taken me all summer to put all those ideas into action.  I have uploaded a glimpse of what I have done so far.  I am still working on the finishing touches!

This is the Reading Center

As you walk into classroom, I have a display wall with bamboo & jungle leaf paper across the entire wall.

Home Center: Made a window to give it a home like feel

 Computer Center, group table, and part of the word wall

 Curtains were made to match theme and behavior chart on file cabinet was made to match.

 Writing Center: Bought animal print baskets to hold all the writing materials.

 Side view of the classroom

 Made chair covers in different animal prints and carpets to match

 Science Center with animal chairs

 Better View of some of the Word Wall

 Chair Covers and Reading baskets in animal print

 Group Time, Listening Center, and Blocks are in baskets on shelf. (ignore the board! Not finished because it will be taken down to install smartboard)

That is the start of my Safari/Jungle theme room.  I will post more pictures later when completely done.