Great Giveaway!

This is such a cool giveaway! You should click on the image to go check it out. Thank you Simply Kinder!

After Christmas Sale!

Click the image to visit my teachers pay teachers store!

Snowmen at Christmas!!!

Today after reading Snowmen at Christmas, we created scenes for what our snowman would do on Christmas night. Then I let students add a mixture of Elmer's glue and shaving cream to make a puffy snowman and snow. It is really cool how it sets up all puffy and soft. The kids loved it!

Holiday Giveaway!!!

 

 JD's Rockin' Readers is having a fantastic giveaway just in time for Christmas!!! It ends at 11:59 today. Click the image to check out this great blog for more details!

Cyber Monday and Bonus Tuesday

Click the banner to check it out and don't forget to use the code at checkout!

Spooktacular Sale!!!

I love getting to see all of my students dressed up. They get so excited! I will be spending the day as Goldilicious! To celebrate I am having a sale! Check out my store and find all the items at 20% OFF! Click the image below to find a list of stores on sale! Thanks to JD's Rockin' Readers for hosting!

If you love GIlbert books, you will love this pack! Get it Halloween day for $.96!!! Click the image to go to my store and check it out!

I've Been Boo-ed!

 

I have been boo-ed by Diving into Learning! Check out this great blog to find great ideas, freebies, pinterest boards to follow, arts and crafts!

If you've been booed, copy and paste the above pic and these "rules" into your post.

 1.  Give a shout out to the blogger who booed you and link back to their site!

2. Share 3-5 October activities, books, products (yours or someone else),or freebie(s) that you love!

3.  Share the Boo love with 5 bloggers- make sure you check this link to make sure you don't boo someone again:

 http://toristeachertips.blogspot.com/2012/10/ive-been-booed-fun-october-linky.html

And don't forget to tell them that they have been BOOED!

4.  Link up {here} so that others can find you and read about your October ideas!  And while you are there... check out the other great blogs!

This is an activity pack based on the Gilbert book, Trick or Treat, Smell my Feet, by Diane de Groat. Gilbert books make fun holiday read alouds and teach great lessons. 

The Biggest Pumpkin Ever is a great book to use for prediction!

The Little Old Lady Who Was Not Afraid of Anything by Linda Williams-After seeing a great idea from I Can Teach My Child, I had my sister create a computer version of her wonderful idea. You can check out her post for ideas on comprehension, but I also like to use this book for teaching onomatopoeia. Click the image below to go to the google doc.

I have boo-ed...

The Teaching Queen

Mama Goose's Kindergarten

First Grade Delight

Mrs. Lirette's Learning Detectives

Learning in Spain

100 Follower Giveaway

I am so excited to be participating in this great giveaway! Over $200 worth of product has been donated. Check it out for yourself by clicking the image. The winners will be announced October 28th.

A Bad Case of Stripes

Not only do I love David Shannon, I love my David Shannon nails! Also, this is a fun anchor chart we made. David is perfect for verbs since he is always so active! Each student came up with a verb to add.

 To celebrate David Shannon and our love for A Bad Case of Stripes, we had a rainbow themed day. Here is a picture of our snack!

Nouns with Proper Pete and common cat!!!

This week we were studying proper and common nouns. I decided to make these page toppers. I plan to keep the pages and just take the list off to make a new one with my students next year. If you don't want to draw you could find images that would work. (That was the easier and quicker idea of my neighbor teacher. I should have ran the idea by her before I drew my own. :)) We read a Pete the Cat book as a fun intro. At first, I gave the students the proper and common and had them discuss and decide which was which. Then I started giving them one and having them decide on what the other could be. I also underlined where I used capitals for the proper nouns. They did great with it and I was able to clarify misunderstanding along the way. They were really engaged!

A Pocket Full of Kisses Nails!!!

Here are my nails to match A Pocket Full of Kisses for my Audrey Penn Author Study!!! I am having fun with my new inspiration for my nails. I am working on David Shannon now and I can't wait to show what I have picked for my nails then. Do you have anything you like to do like this to go with your theme?

Favorite Freebie Linky Party!!!

Click the image to go to the linky party main blog!

This is my favorite freebie because it can be used by so many teachers and in a variety of grades. Also, these sheets allow me to get a clear picture of how stations are going for my students. With these sheets I know that they are practicing skills that are common core aligned and benefit them. The variety means that you can change each semester or quarterly to mix it up or you can stick with the same format all year. Once I have taught them, they are in a booklet and I don't have any other work with those for the semester!

The story behind it is fairly simple. My first year of teaching I struggled with students not getting a lot accomplished during stations time. I had those who were quiet and off task, but a few would be interrupting others. I needed accountability for all of my stations. Many of my stations change weekly and they have booklets made up for those, but I wanted to put together a variety pack of the stations that could be consistent and offer them for free. I spent time coming up with what I wanted students to do that I felt they would have time for and I created the literacy stations freebie pack.

To use it you just pick which sheet you want to use for that station, teach it and print it into booklets or individual pages to leave out.

Visual Aids for the Literacy Stations Freebie Pack!

I have created visual aids to go with the literacy station freebie pack. These sheets are also free. They use pictures from the story of how Cinderella got to the ball to help students remember how to fill out the sheets. I will laminate the one that I am using at that station and leave it there so that students can use it as a resource.

Stephanie's Purple Painted Nails

In honor of my Kevin Henkes author study, I have painted my nails purple just like Lilly's purse. Call me crazy, but I am going to do my nails to go along with my author study for the whole year! I am excited. I always feel like I am lacking inspiration when I go in. Now I have found my inspiration...books! Thank you to the wonderful Ashley Farris at The Parlor Salon in Lebanon, MO for not thinking I'm too nuts and just going with it! I would love to hear your ideas. I will be doing Audrey Penn, David Shannon, Cynthia Rylant, Jan Brett, Robert Munsch, Audrey Wood, Dr. Seuss, Mem Fox, and possibly Patricia Polacco. 

 

Kevin Henkes author study

In order to keep the system clutter free for the sale, I won't be uploading this unit until Monday so I will discount it myself on Tuesday to 28%off! Also, it will be 20% off all of August.

Stations and Room Ready to Go!

This is my set up for magnet station on the front of my desk. You can see the student book hanging there, but of course it isn't usually. Also, my cute stations signs that I have for all my stations. I will be adding the signs and 2x4 labels to my freebies page soon. The the little palm tree and treasure box go with my pirate theme. I have put my list of what they can do when they finish. The sheet that the mixed up letter are on is card stock with a magnet on the back. To make the pieces I printed, laminated, added a magnetic strip to the back of parts with letters and then cut them apart. Since the words are different colors, I just have a binder with an envelope that I store each set in and sort them onto the mat when it is time for that set. As you can see the students know what words they are looking for because their sheet tells them. They have to decide what word each is, sort it out, and write it down in the same box on their paper.

I use an easy set up for stations assignment. In my example there are only two post-it note students, but of course normally there is a partnership next to every index card. I have students do two stations a day with their partner and then everyone does the same thing for the last station time. (word work, read alone, read with a partner, writing, or spelling) On my station board, the student pictures stay in the same place but the last stations card gets taken off, all of them moved down (the bottom one to the top of the one to it's right) and then the one I took off goes to the top of the first column. I usually train one student to do this. Each stations card has two stations on it. The partners go to the top one first and the bottom second. They understand and can do this quickly. 

Like I mentioned before, I use the same stations signs and labels. Here they are throughout the room. They are either where that station takes place or by where the stations booklets are kept if they do not have or always have parts. You can get a free Literacy stations pack with stamping station, big book station, listening station, fiction station and non-fiction station papers at my TPT store.You can also purchase the Magnet station, Word Work Station, Sentence to Story Writing Station and Writing Station. Word Work and Magnet are available for the entire year. The writing stations are available at bundle pricing for August to December with January to May in the works. Mimio station will be available soon. I use a follow the directions pocket chart book for August to December, but will offer a January through May. I have a poetry station that I have made up of other peoples things, but there are a lot of great Poetry station resources on TPT.

Just a few more things I want to share! :)  We have an island theme in our school this year and my room is a pirate/island theme so for open house I got this picture props and will have someone there to take pictures of students and siblings. I also got each student a foam frame and foam island or pirate pieces to put on it for their picture. I will send one student picture home and any of siblings, but I will take another and make it their stations picture. 

The last thing I want to share is my behavior area this year. I (with the artistic ability of my sister) have made a treasure map. The jewels are for each student and are on a green magnet around the edge. Then the students can move up or down the map. They will move down a color at a time inner green, yellow, orange, red. They can also move up to blue and purple. Students are free to move back up for good behavior. I want it to be positive. Each of the colored map lines are magnetic.

Purple=Outstanding!!!

Blue=Great!

Green=Ready to Learn

Yellow=Think about it

Orange=teacher's choice (based on consequences that fit and are geared toward improving not punishing)

Red=Parent Contact and possible Office referral

Students will color in their behavior calendar the color they are on at the end of the day unless I need to make notes.