Time away to create teaching a different way!

Wow!  It seems like forever that I have written anything on here, but the time has been very rewarding.  I spent a lot of time reworking my centers and learning areas after attending a workshop on differentiating my learning centers.  The presenter, the wonderful Margo Southall, was hilarious, insightful and in my book a genius!  She has some wonderful ideas for making comprehension a part of your Daily Five choices using some very cool printables and creatables.  There will more to come on that project as the year winds down and I try out a few things that I think I want to do for next year's class.  I have a group of kiddos that just don't seem to be progressing with the rest of the class and I am trying some new things to help motivate and get them movin'.

I have also been busy creating lots of new freebies and adding to my TPT store.  Here are samples and links to all the fun new things I have created and will be using with my class for the next few weeks. 

This is a printable to use with your Daily Five working with words if you want your kids to have spelling practice. Click here to download a copy.

This is a poster with pocket chart cards that I am using for fluency practice with my kiddos.  The poem is one that has been around a long time and is adorable!  Click here to download a copy.

Click here if you would like a copy of the shopping list I added to my Work on Writing-Real World Text area.  It is a printable that will give you three shopping lists per page for kids to use to write a shopping list.  I added several cookbooks along with it, and my class is so excited about the area now!

Click here if you would like a copy of the printable I use with my classroom magazines.   I never seem to be able to fit in all of my weekly readers that my school pays for, so I found a new use for them.  I put them in my Work on Writing area, but they would work in the Listen to Reading area also.  I made a shortcut on one of my computer desktops to the online version (which will read to the kids if they choose that button) and as they read they fill out the fact poster. 

This is a copy of my reading log that my students use during Read to Self or Read to Someone...they also can add books they have heard in Listen to Reading.  I added a book response to it after going to my last training...although that idea is still a work in progress.  Click here if you would like a copy.

I also added a rainbow writing paper to my Working with Words area.  The kids just seemed to do better with a specified piece of paper to rainbow write on...so here it is!

Last, but not least, I made a printable to use with all those million of alphabet beads I have.  I created a word building station for Working with Words and added all the beads...some chenille stems (pipe cleaners)...and this printable...VOILA!  Word Building Station.  Click here if you want a copy!

I have several other projects in the works...so check back every so often to see what I've added!

Winter!

We have been doing everything winter around here!  The kids and I thought since mother nature couldn't provide the real deal, we would celebrate snow in our own way.  We have been reading and practicing two new winter poems in our fluency mini-lessons.  The kids started giggling when we first read the snowball poem.  It took a few of the kids a second to figure out why a snowball would pee the bed...but we all got there pretty quickly and enjoyed a good laugh.  There is a cute poster for Shel Silverstein's Snowball poem at Teeny Tiny Teacher's Blog.  You can download it from her here.  She has some great printables to go along with it!

I made a poster for the Chubby Little Snowman poem.  You can grab a copy of it from my TPT store here.

I hope everyone is having a good middle of the week...it's all downhill to the weekend!

From Christmas Comes Winter-Manipulatives That Is!

I hope everyone had a wonderful holiday.  Mine is soon to be over...we go back to school on Wednesday, but...good news!  I was so excited to get a message that I have my first follower!  Thank you! I hope you are the first of many to come! 

After creating my lesson plans this week I started to plan for my centers.  I have to admit I think my brain is still on vacation, because I couldn't think of one thing that I thought my kids would just be over the moon about, so what did I do?  I went shopping!  That's right! I loaded the whole family up and went to Wal-Mart...nothing like a little grocery shopping to stimulate the creative juices!  As soon as we entered the building, the boys (husband included) ran to the toy section to check out the newest Legos that Santa hadn't been able to fit in his sack.  I however went to see what was left of the clearance holiday stuff.  Boy did I hit the jackpot!  Most of their holiday items were 50% off.  I found some snowmen ornaments that I will use in my Working With Words center after adding letters to their bellies.  I think I will do a Words in Words pocket chart activity using the words New Year...maybe I'll add Happy, if there's not enough letters to make at least 10 words.

This inspired me to make a new version of our BAM! game.  I'm going to call it "Oh Snow!".  I have painted craft sticks white and put a sight word on each one.  I wrote "Oh, Snow!" on just a few.  For the activity, students can pull a stick out of the container and try to read the word.  If they read the word correctly, they get to keep it.  If they pull out the "Oh, Snow!" stick they have to put all their sticks back.

I made thegame storage out of an empty sugar free drink mix container.  I peeled off the shrink-wrap ad used a permanent marker to draw in the face.  I took an old snowman sock and pushed the toe up inside of itself and glued it to the edge of the lid.  I made it into a hat by tying a piece of yarn around the open end of the sock to make the bobble at the top.  I used left over pieces of foam stickers from the kits below to decorate the container.

Another great find were foam ornament sets that I will save for my class to make next year.  They didn't have a price on them, so I went to scan them and whoa baby...they were 75% off!  Can we say awesome!  I soon found out that all their Christmas craft kits were 75% off. 

I found these packages of 36 snowflakes for $1.24 per package. 

I am going to put a piece of packing tape in the middle of each so I can make a re-usable word sort using our Treasures spelling rule each week in January.

Why packing tape?  You can write on it with a permanent marker, then when you want to erase it, just use a white board marker to scribble over it, then wipe off!

I also found these foam stickers for the same price...$1.24.  I bought some Christmas and some winter.  The winter ones came with mini-snowmen that I will use with these big snowman ornament crafts for matching activities...again, using packing tape to make them changeable each week to match our focus each week.  They came with little hats too.  I haven't figured out what to use them for yet, but I'm sure I'll find a way.

This week we will be matching nouns written on the small snowmen to the big snowmen labeled person, place, thing, plural, and singular.  Next week we will be matching verbs to their tense-        present, past or future.

Last but not least, I found a super-awesome new crown to wear during small groups.  During the beginning of the year I wear a crown and talk about letter land and queen I who always gets her way...so when I wear my crown I can't be interrupted.  Great visual for the kids during small group time.  I know I look a little crazy, but my son was taking the picture while laughing which of course made me laugh...and then I couldn't stop.  Anywho!  Have a great week back!