March's reading month / Beans & jelly beans

Happy Spring everyone. On the first day of spring my school wore yellow. We are doing March is reading month events. Some of the examples are; bring your favorite book, read a shirt, read a hat, read a pin, share a poem and read and munch day. Along with secret readers that come in and read a book to the class. Do you do anything special for March’s reading month? I love all the jelly bean activities for Easter but I just don’t trust some of my students not to eat them at the centers. I came up with another way to play them without the jelly beans.

I took beans and colored them to match plastic eggs.

I made sure that the eggs have different amounts of beans in each egg. Check out the pictures for my final product of bean / jelly bean counts.

This way they can open the eggs and add or subtract the two numbers. I have added a recording addition and subtraction sheet to my tpt for free. I just ask that you friend me on my blog or on tpt.

St. Patrick's Day necklaces

St. Patrick’s Day is almost here! I am not Irish but I love making cute and fun crafts. I am making St.Patrick’s Day necklaces with my students. It’s so easy and they are so cute! I dye noodles green; this website has great directions on how to dye noodles http://www.craftycrafty.tv/2008/08/how_to_dye_pasta_for_crafting.html the picture is what they turn out like after you dye them.

Then I just use my die cut machine and make tons of clovers. If you don’t have a die cut machine at your school you could have the students cut clovers themselves from a pattern. I then cut string and tie it thick at one side and put tape side ways so nothing falls off one end. After threading it all on the string you have a nice green St. Patrick’s day necklace. Here is a picture of the final product modeled by my wonderful husband and cute dog Pepper.

Pinterest

O how I have a love hate relationship with Pinterest. I love how many great ideas I find on there for everything. I hate how I can be on it for hours and I don’t work on anything else but that. So I have made a Pinerest for my teacher blog. I guess that it’s ok when I spend forever on Pinterest because it is all for the good of teaching and the blog. Check me out at

Dr.Jean, Valentine's Day, 100th day

Several weeks ago I went and saw Dr.Jean with my fellow kindergarten partner-in-crime at my school. We love Dr. Jean and tried to sign up for the conference even before they had all the information out about it. She is a rock star. I can remember back to my student teaching days learning the Tooty Ta song. She makes you fall in love with teaching younger children all over again! She has such a passion and fun spirit that shines through. I am working on a great project that I got the idea from her, and plan on posting it for free here. I even got a picture with her.

Then came Valentine's day, what a crazy day that is with all the candy and valentine cards. Parties are so much work! To my students’ smiles and their parents’ excitement it makes it all worth it to make it a special day. A little shout out to my wonderful husband who sent me flowers and planned a great night. The next day, Feb. 15th, was the 100th day of school. All morning I thought about how I wanted to make a grand entrance at my door for the students. I have a very long drive to work, so all the way that is all I could think. Below is what I came up with. I left it up all day long for the students to crawl through. It is just two hula hoops duct taped together and then to the wall.

Writing Lessons

What do you use for writing lessons? My school does not have something school wide for writing and is looking for ideas. I use “Talking, Drawing, Writing: Lessons for Our Youngest Writers” by Martha Horn and Mary Ellen Giacobbe and think that it is wonderful!

My former school district purchased the book for us. Leave a comment about your writing lessons and what you use. Thanks for the help.

Free printable math game 1 - 30

I found this cute game from growingkinders for free at her blog. Let me show you how I used this cute game that she created. I took all the numbers and copied them on card stock and glued them down on a folder. I made 3 different folders, putting the numbers in different order. Then I took the cards with frames and made those into cards. I added so that I had ten frames for up to 30. The students play this game by pulling out the ten frame cards. The student that pulls the card out has to count and show the group how many and what number they need to cover up their folder. Everyone puts a cotton ball down on that number. I don’t trust some of my students not to eat marshmallows. Hope you enjoy!

Labeling

In writers workshop my students were having trouble with labeling their pictures after drawing it. I gave them all post - it notes to label things around the classroom and stick it to the item. They thought they were big stuff labeling the room.

Chair covers

I am back! I have been making so many new things for my classroom this year I have not had time for my blog. I have been working on a lot to share and I am excited to come back to the blog world. Plus you guys just have so many good things that I have been so busy checking every other blog, who wants to update their own? The winner of the chair covers is Kelly from http://busyinkindergarten.blogspot.com/. Congrats Kelly! Thank you for being so patient. Thank you for allcanlearn at http://www.etsy.com/people/allcanlearn?ref=ls_profile for providing the chair covers.