Positional Words with Pete the Cat: The Wheels on the Bus

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My muses and I have been working on this for a month now, creating at home and trying these in the classroom.  Hopefully you can squish this in before you jump into fall themed activities.  

But you will need the Pete the Cat: The Wheels on the Bus book before you begin!!

 Back to the beginning...

First, I simply read book to my class so they could enjoy it.  We watched the accompanying video available on Teacher Tube:

Pete the Cat Wheels on the Bus

 (Others are available on YouTube, if you can access those from your school server.)

Next, I used the illustrations in the book to discuss positional words.  

Click on the image below to download the list of questions I used.

Then we made this anchor chart of the terms!

******I explained that the bus is turned so that we were looking at its side and therefore the front and back area would look a little differently.************

After this I gave students a copy of a Pete and bus to color.  We brought these to the carpet work with them demonstrating each positional term. 

Pete Manipulatives

Bus Manipulatives

Then we followed up on a different day with this cut and paste activity.

Cut and Paste Positional Pete

Finally, I gave students a reader using these terms as a culminating activity. 

 

It was perfect!! We are studying the word "is" and students could find it and highlight it in yellow.

Pete's Bus

I hope you can use and enjoy these. I am sharing because I was not able to find any positional word materials that were appropriate for the beginning of school.

Shapes Week

Okay, it was more like weeks, but that is because my colleague and I like to spread things out over time, so we are revisiting concepts at regular and repeated intervals.  But a shapes week sounds fun!!
Each time a plane shape was introduced, we read a Lakeshore big book and created a little project to go with it. My class also had fun creating shapes with craft sticks.

The hexagon proved to be very challenging!

Students had to think about the different amounts of sticks required to make a square different from a rectangle.

I loved this activity!

These were the big books we used to introduce our featured shape of the day.

Our projects...

This shape was filled in with tissue paper rectangles.

 Click here if you want a rectangle worksheet for a project.

Click the image to go to Kidzone for a Itsy Bitsy book.

I had a late meeting the night before this project so the students ended up tearing paper to fill in the triangle.

Click here if you want a triangle worksheet for a project.

Click the image to go to Kidzone for a Itsy Bitsy book.

This is one of my favorite projects!  Students searched magazines for blue colored pages to fill in the circle. 

Click here if you want a circle worksheet for a project.

Click the image to go to Kidzone for a Itsy Bitsy book.

This was my square from last school year.  It is colored in the center and outlined in yarn. 

       Click here if you want a square worksheet for this project.

                           

This year I ran out of copies so we have an alternate version where students glued craft sticks into a square and colored the inside.

Click the image to go to Kidzone for a Itsy Bitsy book.

The hexagon project was a challenge to come up with my colleague wanted to have students use small hexagons to fill in one large hexagon.  But, the smaller hexagons did not fit in well when she tried them inside.  I also knew my students would struggle with cutting out small hexagon shapes correctly.   Instead, I had students watercolor this page.   

Here is a copy of the project worksheet.

Here is a copy of a plain hexagon worksheet if desired.

We had no book for hexagon, however I did find this video.

Some Chicka Chicka Boom Boom Activities

One of these activities is for now and the other is for later in the year.  

 NOW...

Chicka Numbers for a Headband

 FOR LATER...

This creation was inspired by my class from last school year.  After we completed our study of the alphabet, we needed to move on to decoding.  Still, my class continued to beg to revisit Chicka Chicka Boom Boom.  I like use my student's input in lessons and learning, but again, we needed to move on. So over the summer, I  began to make this so in the future students could have the best of both worlds.

Click the get a free copy on my TN store.

I made this video to go with this as well.

I made it using the Knowmia App. 

I hope you found something useful today.

Mm is for Monster

The first week of kindergarten is done!  It was an exhausting first day, but by day two there was an extremely significant improvement!! Students remembered the routines that were shared from the first day.  Most remembered what to do when they heard the verbal commands.

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The first letter that I like to teach is the letter Mm.  I like to use monsters to reinforce the concept. I enjoy this big book for shared reading.

                              

Today we had a little fun with watercolors for our "Mm is for monster" activity.  These pictures were printed on card stock.

Here are the Mm is for monster pictures if you would like to try this with your class.

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Don't forget about the big TPT sale!

 TPT 

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I was really excited that I was able to welcome my students without breaking the bank! All I needed was construction paper and some cute pencils. 

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This year we are using more activity based homework instead of worksheets.  We are asking parents to work with their children on specific skills. This is our shapes study page. Click on the image  if you would like a copy.

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Pete the Cat Template for Rhyming Craftivity

We'll get back to Pete in a minute, but first I want to let you know about these events over at Teacher's Notebook. First, head over to read my teaching tip article...

Click to go the Teaching Tip page!

Back to Pete...

I know I am a bit slow creating something for Pete. Everyone posted items for him last year!

I am going to try to get a ahead of the game! I just visited the Harper Collins Children's website and discovered that many more adventures for Pete are on the way! I can't wait to see what I can do with these...

This book seems like it will be perfect for the beginning of the school year.

My activity is based on the first book, Pete the Cat: I Love My White Shoes!

I thought I would create an activity that would review colors and introduce rhyming together.  Also, I wanted it to be something that I could hang up to decorate the room.  

My class last year loved Pete!  Many purchased the "I can read" versions of his stories to read by the end of the year.  I hope this project creates a new generation of Pete lovers that are motivated to read! Click the image to get your copy!

Rhyming Bridge Thinking Map Freebie

I have created another couple of Educreations lessons.  These are rhyming lessons to use with my rhyming bridge map.

 The second Educreations lesson is here if you would like to use it.

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This bridge map has been a work in progress for a while.  The first time it did not line up at all.  After several tries, I believe I have remedied this problem. Unfortunately, there was no place for the "RF" (relating factor) in the revised version. Perhaps students can write these on the back or it can written as a heading for a wall display.

Bridge Thinking Map Template

(print a copy, cut apart on the dotted lines, glue the two pieces together to create one long bridge map.)

Rhyming Pictures

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If you're like me and unable to attend any fancy conferences this summer, don't fret!  I have been getting professional development free from the comfort of my couch by using the following resources from Whole brain Teaching.

 Check it out because I think it could be helpful to you!

                                                                                                               

Syllables with Mr. Syllabot Freebie

Here is a short video demonstrating how to teach syllables using my Mr. Syllabot resources available at my TPT or TN stores. 


Here is a Syllabot Freebie to try.
Click the images to download each of the two parts.

Full project includes templates for the student Mr. Syllabot, 4 pages of sorting cards, large size sample cards to create Mr. Syllabot anchor chart.