Insects & Timelines

Beware insects!! My class and I will be delving into our insect unit for the next 2 weeks. We will go on a bug hunt and capture some bugs. We will study them, and then let them free again. I am linking up with Deedee Will's Peek at my Week Linky. There are many freebies (not my own) that a variety of teacher bloggers have created that I have linked to in my lesson plans. Just click on my lesson plan pics to download my plans and find those fabulous freebies.

 

 

Click here to see other visual plans.

 

I am also linking up with Collaboration Cuties for their Social Studies Mentor Texts Linky. Last week, I worked on timelines with my kindergartners. We used these books that I had bought through Scholastic Book Clubs as a set.

 

 

 

 In math, we were working on our calendar unit. So our timeline social studies standard worked well during our math time. They were already familiar with number lines. Here are some samples of their Morning, Noon, and Evening timelines.

 

 

 

Click here to check out other Social Studies mentor texts.

 

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Animal Groups

I am linking up with Collaboration Cuties for their Science book linky.

 

 

 

 

For the past weeks, my class and I have been learning about different animal groups. A few years  back, I ordered through Scholastic, some great Science Vocabulary Readers, to introduce animal groups to my kinderkids. I read one of these before delving into a particular animal group. My kinderkids wrote one fact and drew 2 examples in their Animal Groups book.

 

These are kept at the science center so students can use them for sorting activities or for reading.

 

Here is an example of the bird page.

Here is an example of a fish page.

 

Here are some animal pictures found in magazines
that were cut and laminated for the science center.

 

Here are the directions at the science center.

 

In small groups, we used an AIMS activity to sort animals by what group they belong to. It was not that exact lesson, but something similiar, as I have older versions of AIMS. I love using AIMS activities for math & science.

 





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Product Swap

I am off to my first gender reveal party. I will be wearing pink! So I have to post a little early and link up later! (All linked up now! Pink it is!) It time for another product swap!! I love trading products to try out in my classroom. I was paired with Nicki Thigpen from Mrs. Thigpen's Kindergarten. She graciously gave me two of her products: Syllable Sense and Spiders Math & Literacy Unit.



 

 

It has been quite some time since I talked about syllables with my students. I wondered if they still were familiar with them, since it was before winter break when we last reviewed them. Syllable Sense is a great packet for introducing, practicing, and reviewing syllables. There are many pictures for 1, 2, 3, and 4 syllable words. It also includes recording sheets with pictures. Due to my school being limited on copies, I decided that my kinderkids were capable in drawing and writing at least 2 examples in each column (1-4). I put this activity at a literacy center for my students to practice with their group.

 

 

Click above to see Syllable Sense! at TPT.

 

Nicki's Spiders- Math and Literacy Activities included many wonderful activities that would work beautifully with my nursery rhymes or spiders unit. She included a spider brace map, spider tree map, spider craft, spider web color word pocket chart and recording sheets, the Itsy Bitsy Spider poem, BME sheet, rhyming cards, spider numeral and tally mark cards, and spider webs with spiders to match for number sense. I chose 3 activities this week to include in my lessons.

 

I used the Rhyming Activity to review rhyming words with small groups.

After finding a match, we recorded the rhyming pair on whiteboards.

I used the spider numbers and tally marks to use for a Kagan Quiz-Quiz-Trade activity. My kinderkids paired up to quiz each other about what their numbers were. Then they traded cards and put their hands up to find a new partner.

I worked with small groups to review composing and decomposing numbers 11-19.
We used the spiders and counting mats to help with this math skill.

Afterwards, I wrote __=10+4 on the whiteboard and they had to tell me the numeral.

 

Click above to see Spiders at TPT.

Check out and see what others are trying out in their classrooms!

 

Nicki Thigpen is reviewing my Wild About Watermelon unit. It was my first unit that I created for TPT about a year ago! I used Microsoft Word mostly to create it. Since then, I have learned to use powerpoint to create my units with. It is so much easier! I updated this unit and added a long vowel activity to it. My Wild About Watermelon unit is on sale at my TPT store now until tomorrow night, Sunday, April 21st. If you would like a chance to win it, I am going to choose one individual who comments to this post about how many school days you have left until summer. (I have 34!)  Please leave an email address, so I can reach you! :0) This giveaway is now over. Thanks to the 2 ladies who participated- I emailed you my unit!

 



 





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Five For Friday & Froggie Freebie

We had so much fun learning about frogs, turtles, and ducks this week. It has been a delightful week!

 

1. We made these frogs from Kim Adsit's Frogs & Butterflies pack. They came out so cute! I was proud because 18/19 of my students did this activity independently!! They have come a long way since the beginning of kindergarten. I am proud of all my 19 students. This activity involved fixing up mixed-up sentences and putting them back in order. Afterwards, they had to glue the matching pictures to go with the words.

 

 

The next day we made more frogs! I shared with my students this book:

 

 

This story is a sweet story of a frog who want to fly. His parents tell him flying is a bird thing, and he should find a frog thing to do. After this story, we discussed what our thing was. My students wrote and made a frog to go with their writing. I've used this frog template to go along with other writings. It's a freebie for you if you would like. Just click on any of the student samples to go to my TPT store to get the templates for free.

 

 

Click picture for freebie.



Click picture for freebie.

 

2. My Sing & Spell package from HeidiSongs arrived on Wednesday!! I was able to purchase these through a small grant through my school's PTA. :0) My class loves to sing and dance while learning their sight words. There are free samples on youtube and her website to try a couple out in your own classroom.

 

Click picture to go to HeidiSongs.

 

3. This week has been especially brighter knowing that a couple of coworkers who I have worked with are considering of requesting me as their upcoming kindergartner's teacher. Not sure if it will all go through, but it certainly makes one feel good about oneself.

 

4. I finally read Mossy to my students! I even got a little teary eyed during the story. My kinderkids got into the story. One little guy cracked me up... because at the end there is a picture of baby turtles. He wondered if the Mossy and Spot (two turtles) would kiss, and then at the end, he giggled, "I guess they did kiss!"

 

 

Afterwards, we watched Jan Brett's video of drawing Mossy so we could draw our own box turtles.

 

 

 

 

In the afternoon, I read Turtle Splash. It is a great book to review take away one with my kinderkids. They enjoyed working with their partners as we reviewed writing subtraction sentences.

 

 

 





 

5. Little heartwarmer!! My coworker and I were talking in our closet, and to my surprise, I saw this caterpillar crossing the floor in front of the closet. The little artist is her kindergarten son. Such a sweet message for his mom (my coworker). It warmed my heart and brightened my morning.

 

 

 

Check out other Five for Fridays by clicking above.

 

 

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