Classroom labels and a new twist on writing!

This week has been both busy and productive. As I was perusing Pinterest earlier in the week I stumbled upon the most amazing and inspiring writing center. After I saw it, I just had to do something similar in my classroom.

Check this out!

If you want to see this teacher's entire classroom, feel free to hop on over to Seusstastic Classroom Inspiration: New Classroom Reveal

So after I discovered she had the entire writing center (thats right, posters, printables and labels galore) available on TPT I bought it and got busy making my own writing center.
Here is the link to her TPT store The Ultimate Writing Station
Oh ya, and did I mention that for the next HOUR there is a HUGE TPT sale going on??
Her unit which is usually $12 is on sale for $8 so grab it now to steal this AMAZING deal!

So here is what I came up with after I bought this unit and I have to say I'm pretty happy with how it turned out :)

So I have to admit I absolutely adored everything in this unit, except I thought the labels were a little dark for the color scheme/theme in my classroom.
Once again I did a quick search on Pinterest and found some really cute clipart bunting.
After I discovered Erin Bradley Designs, I found the perfect clipart to go with my theme.
 Spring Bunting Clipart
All I can say is "oh boy am I in T-R-O-U-B-L-E"
Now that I've discovered how cute her clipart is, I will have a hard time not buying all of it!
If you want to purchase my labels, you can grab them HERE at my TPT store.

After all of this label inspiration (I loved how organized Mel D at Seusstastic was!) I felt inspired to label some other things in my room.

Here is what I created:

I have to admit, I cannot get enough of this bunting! 

It's a little hard to see, but I also picked up these templates from Erin Bradley Designs

And to complete my organization kick, I thought it was about time I added some colorful labels to my math manipulatives.

I found this free download curtesy of Judy Lau

Math Manipulatives

That about wraps things up, feel free to check out my store and see my unit that's on sale!

Go To The Sale

Have a great weekend :)

100th Day of School!!

So we did it! We made it to the 100th day and boy was it packed with activities! (our hundredth day was actually last Thursday, but there has been an incredible amount of stuff going on and I couldn't manage to post until now)

Leading up to the 100th day we brought in 100 little things to add to our classroom collection.

I found a fabulous unit by Sheila Melton that I used for morning work all week leading up to our 100th day celebration.
You can purchase it from TPT 100th Day of School Celebration (70 page unit)!

Here are some samples of student work that turned out really cute!

This worksheet had them draw the following:

 1. What they would look like when they are 100 years old

2. Their favorite memory from the past 100 days of school 

 3. What they would buy with $100 

4. They could eat 100...

They thought this 'I Spy' worksheet was so fun!

As promised Zero the Hero came and brought them a snack that was round (resembling a zero)

Every year, I have him bring mini bagels and cream cheese (it is a fun way to wrap up our counting by ten's unit)

*I plan to post more on Zero the Hero another day

Then on the 100th day we made 100 posters.

Here is the list of all the things each poster needed

1. Write 10 numbers

2. Write your name 10 times

3. Write 10 friends names

4. Write 10 words

5. Glue 10 shapes

6. 10 stamps

7. 10 sequins

8. 10 stickers

9. 10 paint dots

10. 10 thumbprints

Here is my sample poster I used to give my students an exampleAnd here is how the kids posters turned out (well at least one of them anyways)

Pretty cute don't ya think?

In the afternoon, we made 100th day snack mix. As I'm sure you can see, we had 10 different snacks and the kids used these tens frames to separate the snacks into 10 groups of 10 totaling 100.

I was able to download these fantastic 100 day tens frames HERE

To finish up our day, we did 100 exercises (Wow! I was not expecting that to be so exhausting :)

Well, thats about it for now folks. Hope you enjoyed my little post. 

Happy Monday!

It's Valentines Day Hip Hip Hooray!!

Wow, can I just say-what a complete whirlwind of a day! I always love class party days but I always feel really exhausted at the end of them. Its the beauty of kindergarten, such anticipation leading up to great events, but then sheer exhaustion sets in and I am ready for a beer and a bubble bath by 4:30pm.

So here is a little peek into our week leading up to Valentines, and of course all the fun stuff we did to celebrate all the LOVE that was in the air.

 We made Monster boxes! Aren't they just the CUTEST things you have ever seen? I thought so :)

 Of course I had to make one first so the kids would have an example. They thought it was hilarious!

Here are a couple of centers we enjoyed working with this week:

You can grab this download for free HERE

(Don't you just love that the girl frog has a big bow? So precious!!)

We read the story Froggy's First Kiss, which my kiddos thought was so funny.  Then we did a great follow up activity. My first graders had to read sentences (about the book) and decide what kind of punctuation mark to put at the end. The worksheet below has three sections for students to write a telling sentence, asking sentence and an excited sentence.

This super cute unit was a free download compliments of Cara Carroll at The First Grade Parade

Here is another fun center my students had a blast with!

I found these hearts at Dollar Tree and thought they would make a great valentines literacy activity. 

I wrote capitol letters on the front of the hearts and lowercase on the back. Then I had my kindergarteners match them together.

My firsties used these hearts to make CVC words. 

And for an extension assignment, we made challenge words (words that start with digraphs)

On Thursday, we learned about the 5 love languages (words of encouragement, quality time, physical touch, acts of service and gift giving) and the ways we give and receive love. After we talked about them, I had each of the kids identify what their love language is and then glue it on a heart with their name on it.

If you want to learn more about the 5 love languages check it out 

HERE

We displayed them in the hallway so everyone can see :)

And here is a fun little Pinterest find, I decided to use this year for my kiddos. It's hard to see, but the valentine's say "Happy Valentine's Day Love Bug," 

I liked the idea of giving my students a valentine that wasn't full of sugar.

Grab a free copy of these valentines HERE

And of course, Valentines wouldn't be complete without a fun little gift for my coworkers

 Last but not least, this posting wouldn't be complete without including a little personal touch.

I had a hard time thinking of something I could get my hubby since all the traditional valentines gifts are bent towards pleasing women (flowers, chocolate etc.) So of course, I had to hop on Pinterest and see what ideas were swirling around. 

Here's what I came up with:

I confess I took the pic after he started devouring the Frittos (they're his favorite, so he couldn't wait to eat them)

If you like the tag, you can download it HERE

So after the craziness of a fun filled week, I headed home and was greeted by a very sweet surprise

Tulips, Proseco and a Spanish love poem. Oh that's right, did I mention my husband is a Spanish teacher. 

His Spanish fluency always comes in handy when he wants to be romantic.

I'm a sucker for it every...single…time! :)

And so everyone, I must wish you adieu. I hope you all have a fabulous President's Day weekend!

Away We Go…A Peek into Our Travels Around the World!

We just recently started a new unit that is near and dear to my heart- Traveling Around the World.
I love to travel, see new places, try new foods and meet new friends. The promise of an adventure always sparks excitement and wonder in me and it is something I would love to impart to my students.

This is the third time I have taught this unit, and boy oh boy does it get better (and easier) each time I tackle it!

This time around, I decided to create some handouts/worksheets that would help the unit go smoothly and also teach my students to synthesize information and pull out the important facts from what we learn.

One of the key elements to making this unit engaging is to have guest speakers from different countries come into our class and share. I encourage families to share with us about their heritage and countries of origin. We are very fortunate to have such a diverse student population, so there are usually quite a few families who have relatives that live in other countries.  Each time we travel, our focus countries change depending on where the students and their families come from.

This year I created a handout for all our guest speakers to help them organize the information they would share.  It also offered ideas of things they could bring in which include: food, games, pictures, money and books. Here is what it looks like:

The other elements I created to help the students feel like they were really "traveling" were suitcases and tickets.

The students get to decorate and glue a "stamp" on their suitcase for every continent we travel to, and they love it!

I found this Delta ticket template online. I printed them out and laminated them so we could use them for each plane ride we take.

The biggest and best part of the unit is the in-class airplane.

 I arranged the students chairs in rows "inside" the airplane. When its time for our plane trip, I have the class line up outside the classroom and I disperse the tickets. Then I lead them in and escort them to their seats on the plane.

When its time for our flight, we always kick things off with a little fun and informative video about safety :)

The first time I played this, my kids were completely mesmerized and totally engrossed! I have to admit I was a little swept up by the music as well! : )

After our safety video, I usually show a short presentation about the country we are studying by using a combination of web resources.

Some of my favorite places to find information are:

National Geographic Kids

Time For Kids-Around The World

After our "trip", we take time to review and record the information we just learned. Here are some samples of my students work summarizing what we have learned so far...

We started our trip by exploring the continent of North America. We kicked off our unit by having one of my student's parents come into our class and talk about Mexico (one of my student's dad is from Mexico). His mom made Mayan hot chocolate and sweet bread that she shared with our class. The students were fascinated by all the interesting facts. They especially liked learning about the snake pyramid.

 We spent a little time learning about our own country and reviewing our national symbols and historic landmarks.

 This student drew a picture of the Golden Gate Bridge, since it is something well known you will find in America.

 Next we traveled to the continent of South America. We only had time to visit one country so we focused on the biggest one-Brazil. We had a blast learning all about Brazilian culture and traditions. 

It just so happened my kids were super students last week and filled the marble jar so we got to celebrate by watching the movie Rio. It was a great way to wrap up our trip to Brazil.

This week we traveled to Europe. One of my students parents are from England. His mom came into our class and shared all about her country. She even made some tea and homemade scones for us to sample. The students thoroughly enjoyed having "tea time" at the end of the day.

If you wanna grab a travel journal and start your own adventure, feel free to download it 

HERE

We learned that there are two different flags, one for England and one for the United Kingdom.

Tomorrow we are traveling to Italy and on Friday we will be learning about Scotland from a special guest. It will be quite the production.  

Stay tuned to hear about the rest of our adventures.

Happy Travels!

Kindergarten Open House

This weekend my school had a kindergarten open house for incoming kindergarteners and their parents.  We offered an informational session for the parents while the kiddos were preoccupied reading, doing crafts and eating cupcakes. It was a great way for the kids to feel excited about starting school and the parents to learn a little more about our kindergarten program. 

Since this was the first time I was in charge of planning the event I thought I would hop on over to Teachers Pay Teachers for a little inspiration. I wanted to find a cute powerpoint template that I could use as well as something fun for the visitors to take with them when they left.

Here are some ideas I found that helped the event go off without a hitch!

If you like this powerpoint template, click HERE to download your own!

 I shared a little about our school and kindergarten program. Here are just a few of the talking points.

Some tasty treats and fun favors to help the visitors feel appreciated and excited about kindergarten next year.

If you like these tags, feel free to download them. I'd like to give a BIG THANK YOU to Peace Love and Learning! You can check out their blog and grab the free resource HERE

The popcorn tags were a free download courtesy of Crayons in the City. You can download their tags for free HERE

I also thought it would be helpful to give each family a folder which included a packet of handouts to help guide them through the enrollment process. The handouts also offered tips to help prepare their kids for kindergarten. 

I found these wonderful handouts from Simply Kinder Grab your packet HERE

The free packet includes: a list of tasks to work on before starting school, a list of what we learn of kindergarten, flashcards to help them learn their letters, numbers and shapes.

I also included a kindergarten readiness checklist and an article about

 the importance of play. 

Now the last thing I want to share with you is a picture of our cute bulletin board. I felt like we needed to spruce things up for winter and after pursuing TPT I found a wonderful idea.

Here it is:

My students had so much fun making their snow people and writing recommendations of books they loved. 

If you like this bulletin board idea, you can purchase it on TPT HERE

Thanks so much for stopping by. Oh and I wanted to wish you all a Happy Belated Groundhogs Day!