Trick or Treat Blog Hop

Welcome!  I hope you are enjoying the hop, getting great tips and picking up fabulous freebies!

My tip for you is to start using Number Talks in your classroom, if you aren't already!

This short video will give you an introduction to the procedure if you aren't familiar with it.

Here's a little trick. Turn this into a craftivity. I gave each student six pumpkin cut outs and let them glue them in any arrangement.  Then I asked them how they saw the number 6.  We outlined the parts with yellow yarn.  Finally, we filled in the number bond.

My freebie for you are booklets that you can use with your number talks! There are various options to pick and choose from. I hope you find these as useful as I have! Grab these now! They are only available during the hop!

The hop is over. These books will be on sale soon!

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Five for Friday

1

This double bubble map was created using interactive writing. I love these two books.

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2

After reading aloud a version of the Three Little Pigs, students set to work on building one of the three houses.

The house made of bricks....

made with these mosaic gems and modeling clay.

The house of straw was made with straws and modeling clay.

The house of sticks was  made with modeling clay and craft sticks. (I had to help this group.  They could not agree on what to do.)

When it was time to test, each student had to write their prediction on this worksheet. If you'd like, you can grab a copy here.

These are our results...

3

The TK students decorated each pig's house. 

4

I am ready for red ribbon week! The door is done!

5

Humpty Dumpty Activities

We have spent several weeks working on the nursery rhyme Humpty Dumpty.  Here are some of the activities we did.

1) Our Humpty Dumpty egg experiment...

Here they recorded what happened.

Here is a copy if you'd like.

Recording Sheet

2)Humpty Dumpty Craft  

3)Assemble the poem

I placed a copy of the nursery rhyme out to make this activity easier. If you would like to make it harder, take the copy away.

Each child got a word or two from the rhyme.

They had to build the nursery rhyme in the pocket chart.  This means they had to use their literacy skills to figure out what word they had and when to bring it up.  Some tracked the poem and some used phonics to help them figure out their word.

4) An alternate ending 

Here we talked about altering the ending to Humpty Dumpty's story.  We brainstormed what he could fall on to keep from breaking. I charted the ideas and students had to choose from the list. They had a sentence starter to write the new ending and were asked to illustrate their work.

We had a lot of fun with Humpty Dumpty!

Interactive Alphabet Notebook (Made with Free Resources)

I have always wanted to try using interactive notebooks with my kindergartners. However, I was a bit skeptical. I was not certain that younger students would be able to handle this activity.  Luckily, I was able to find some free resources, so I could try this before making any major purchases.  If you want to try this yourself, continue reading.  All the links are shared below.

To begin with, I grabbed some thin composition books available through my supply order.  

Next, I downloaded Paige Bessick's Interactive Notebook Letter Sound Practice sheets from TpT. (Here)     Update:  This was a free resource, but is now listed for $2.00.

I also downloaded the notebook cover which was created by Keri Brown. (Here)


Finally, I created some additional pieces.  I created a set of  alphabet pictures for under each flap and a handwriting practice portion.  (Here)

I am thrilled with the results!  Students are doing a terrific job putting the pieces together. This has become one of my favorite activities!

Hints: 

If you noticed from the photos, I have cut out several parts for the children.  All they needed to do was glue them on.  This has made things go very smoothly.

Keep it interactive.  Have students review and discuss previous pages with one another before they add a new part.

Enjoy!

What We've Been Up To...

Here is what is on the walls these days...

I love the book Chicka Chicka Boom Boom. Here are some of the activities we did with the book.

Here the students are working on their lapbooks. The activities are to reinforce shape concepts.

This is available in my TpT store.