Welcome back!

Wow! Has it really been almost a month since I posted last?! Shame on me!! 

I was a super busy bee over the break. My first week I volunteered in a friend's classroom since I was out earlier than her. She was my second grade teacher AND my master teacher for student teaching block 2 (which I co-taught 2nd grade with her.) She is one of my biggest supporters and mentors and I just LOVE being able to be in her classroom and seeing how she does different things. Such a learning experience! 

The second week was crazy. Doctors did open heart surgery on my 82 year old grandpa and the whole family was very scared and nervous. He made it through surgery with flying colors and is on his way to a full recovery. (YAY!) After that I host a small Christmas party with  my side of the family on Christmas Eve, then went to Hubby's parents on Christmas day for a big party over there. The following Saturday Hubby was rushed to the ER (by moi) at 5:30 in the morning for kidney stones! I went to the ER the following Tuesday because I got bit breaking up a dog fight (I'm perfectly fine.)  After that it was prep time for our traditional New Years Eve party...and when we finally recovered from that, I was in charge of a last minute (like 2 days to throw everything together) engagement party on this past Saturday! 

I am so glad the holidays are over...no more excitement for me. Thank you very much!

Anyway, today was the first day back with munchkins and we had so much fun!! I introduced the kids to the idea that water comes in different forms. We're going to be spending the next two weeks learning about water as a liquid, water as a solid, and water as a gas. To help the kids understand the concept of water as a solid I brought up the idea of ice (most kids are familiar with ice and that it melt into water) and asked them where they see ice outside. Many kids say that they saw ice in their cups when mom or dad gave them a drink, but a few of them said that they remember it hailing a little while ago and that hail looked like little pieces of ice. This led us into a discussion about hail, sleet, snow and icicles. I told the kids we were going to do an experiment later in the week and they were super excited about it. 

We're going to make a snow man (out of shaved ice from a snow-cone maker my co-worker is letting me borrow) and we're going to see what happens when we leave him out in our classroom vs. what happens when we leave him outside. Now today it was almost 90...I'm hoping it'll be colder outside for this experiment but c'est la vie and I'll work with what I have. Next week I'll toss a bunch of water onto a hot electric griddle or skillet and show them that when water gets really really hot it evaporates and turns into steam. Ta-Da! Introduction into the gas form of water! The whole thing is going to be a lot of fun. 

Anyway, I've kind of focused on snowmen and snowflakes for our "topic" of the week so for math we had to sequence the parts of snowman from biggest to littlest! Aren't they stinking adorable!?

The kids had to draw eyes, a mouth, and arms on their snowmen. 

Some of them got a little...creative with their buttons. 

And some you can't even see!!

Our letter of the week is Mm, and we are REALLY working on identifying beginning sound. So, as a whole group I let the kids come up with ideas of what words started with m. I think they did really well...once I really explained the concept!

Now, don't get me wrong, I still had A TON of responses that were incorrect, but by the end of the lesson/discussion time they were getting the hang of it! I'm really hoping this helps solidify our beginning sound identification. 

OH! Victory moment!! I sent out progress reports the Friday before break, along with a target work packet, and I had one little girl that couldn't identify a single letter (upper or lower case) and could only tell me the sound that x made. I reassessed her today...SHE KNOWS 11 SOUNDS!!! I just about cried when I counted up her stars! (They get stars next to the letter when they master the sounds.) I was very proud of her and all the practice and work she had done over break.

 Look at this beauty that I got for Christmas!!! My sister-in-law bought this baby for me for Christmas and I could not wait to try it out!! Fully loaded it holds 22 regular sized papers, and I only have 19 kids so it's perfect! 

I cannot wait to show you more of what I have planned for the rest of the month! It's going to be an amazing adventure. 

I hope you've enjoyed this first blog post of the new year, and always remember:

Every moment can be a learning moment!

Sincerely from TK,

Nichole

Ho Ho Ho! A classroom full of fun!

Wow, has it really been over a week since I posted last?! I'm so sorry!! 

Well, to catch you up on all the fun things we've been doing and are doing this week! We have been having so much fun doing all the different parts of my gingerbread unit. The kids have been working on our sight words, and our gingerbread ten frames. They love helping the gingerbread man across the river by following the special number. We are having a blast. 

our Gingerbread writing

We have also done a bunch of winter/Christmas crafts. The first one we did was a thumbprint reindeer ornament for our moms and dads. The kids got an ornament and a tray with brown paint. We all went step by step dipping our thumb in the paint and placing it on the ornament. My recommendation, HAVE VOLUNTEERS! I did this by myself and ended up having to wipe the paint off half of them and redo them with the kids because they were blurry, or too close together. If you REALLY want to keep a secret for the moms and dads and don't want them helping, then I would recommend dedicating a good 30 minutes (I did mine during universal access time) and call the kids over one at a time or maybe in groups no bigger than 3 or 4. Something small that you can handle and keep the kids following the directions so they turn out properly. 

I used paint pens from Michael's to draw on the nose, eyes and antlers. I felt extra crafty and drew on holly because I had the colors and the time. Here is how they came out. 

We also did a directed a art lesson, much like our turkeys, where we made reindeer using our hand prints as antlers!! They came out super cute! I forgot to snap extra pictures of the kids' reindeer, so you only have my lovely teacher sample to see for an example of the final product. Again...YOU WILL NEED VOLUNTEERS! Have your volunteers trace all the kids' hands on the light brown and then do the art lesson bit by bit. If you don't have volunteers or want to keep this as a surprise, take time during independent time and trace the kids hands one by one...OR you could use a hand cut out and just trace that instead of the kids' actual hands. It is completely up to you. 

Here is what they look like completed (at least my teacher sample.)

Another craft we did (that worked with fine motor skills) was our paper plate Christmas tree. This was a 2 day craft that took some prep work from the teacher. I had the kids paint their plate green and then after it dried I cut them into thirds and glued them into the tree shape. I placed them under books to be pressed flat while they dried. On day two I gave the kids their plate tree and some pom poms. They needed to glue the pom poms to create a decorated Christmas tree. I think they turned out adorable. Don't you?

The last craft we've done (so far) is a hand print reindeer. I painted both of their hands brown and placed them down one at a time. Some of the kids didn't let me place their hand and they ended up right on top of each other rather than next to each other to create the head and the body. The kids glued a red pom pom down for the nose and then the fuzzy pom poms for the collar.  I took a sharpie and drew on the eyes and the mouth. These are hanging above our desks and the kids love them! (The parents can't wait to take these home either.)

I have two more crafts (at least) planned but they are simple foam crafts from Michael's. These crafts help the kids work on their fine motor (the peeling of the paper off the backs of small pieces.) These are fine motor activities...that's my story and I'm sticking to it! Once I do these crafts I'll get pictures of them too. 

Ahh so many fun things crammed into 2 weeks. My count down has already started! 4 days left!

I hope everyone is having a great holiday season!

Always remember, every moment can be a learning moment!

Sincerely from TK,

Nichole

Not your normal blog post!

Well hello there!! I am full into Christmas mode at school! We're doing reindeer and gingerbread in my class. I cannot wait to show you some of amazing crafts that the kids are doing. It's going to be amazing. 

Anywho, I'm here to remind everyone that TPT is having its annual cyber sale!! Go shop till you drop and enter the code TPTCYBER at checkout and receive 10% off instantly! To go along with the amazing discounts, I am having a sale as well! 10% off everything in  my store. Exciting!

I am also here to promote some good friends and fellow bloggers! My friend Kristen from Easy Teaching Tools has released an UH-MA-ZING writing product for Christmas!! It contains 27 pages of amazing writing prompts and pages for little writers to write their hearts out! Check it out!!

She is a fantabulous blogger and if you want to see what she's doing in the classroom as well as what is going on with her creative and fun products go follow her on her blog here! She really is amazing!

If you're looking for some fun math activities that go along with all the holiday fun, check out Jamie Huerta's (from Laughloveteachlearn.blogspot.com) Common Core Holiday Math Pack for First Grade! This pack is 30 pages of student-friendly math sheets that get your student's brain a tingling! 

This pack contains concepts like: Number Bonds (Numbers 1-15), Word Problems (solve using number bonds & pictures), Creating number sentences using number bonds, Fact families, Solve it making a ten, Doubles plus one facts, Find the missing addend (cut & paste), Is it true? Is it false? Prove it!, and Find the missing number (addition & subtraction)! 

Swing by to pick up your copy before the sale runs out!! Follow Jamie on her blog here!

So, I'm off to go prep for more fun Christmas activities for tomorrow's festivities (OooooO! I rhymed!) and I hope everyone had an amazing break!

And never forget! Every moment can be a learning moment.

Sincerely from TK,
Nichole

I'm so thankful for all my kiddos!

Good morning! I hope everyone has had a great week so far, whether you were off this week or still have to work another day.

My kiddos did a lot of fun crafts last week getting ready for Thanksgiving! We had so much fun!  We talked about all the things we are thankful for (I am thankful for my family, my job, and all my super smart kiddos in class...just to name a few) and then turned or discussion into our very first free write! We made foam turkeys  (from Michael's)...

We did a super fun directed art lesson. This lesson was SO time consuming. I budgeted for a half hour but it took us closer to 45 minutes. The kids loved it though, and I can use it as a measurable assessment for following directions and fine motor skills (double score!) which is always a plus.  Their turkeys came out super cute and I'm super excited for more lessons like this.

The last turkey activity we did was our tie-dye turkeys! The kids got a coffee filter and markers. They got to color their filter how ever they wanted. When they had it just prefect they brought it to me and I misted it with water to make the colors bleed together. After they dried the kids got their turkey body and glued it to the middle of their filter.

Some turkeys have a lot more color than others but I still think they came out beautifully! Don't you?

Well I hope you have a great rest of the week and I want you to know I'm thankful for each one of you and all that you do in the world!

Have a happy Thanksgiving and remember, every moment can be a learning moment.

Sincerely from TK,

Nichole

I'm on break! (Well...sort of.)

So I officially am on break! Yesterday I stayed EXTRA late to prep everything (and I do mean EVERYTHING)  for the next two weeks. I thought I got it all done, but alas...I did not. I am going to go back to school Monday and stay for a couple hours. I bought some new baskets and made some labels to organize my classroom and *drum roll* MY CLASSROOM LIBRARY!! 

So far my kiddos have been putting books back willy nilly, and often times they're not in the correct area or even on the correct shelf. That all stops! I bought a basket for each "theme" I'm doing and I will color code the books. Each book will receive a sticker that corresponds to the correct basket. I am so, so, SO excited!

I am also really excited to announce that I am having a sale on my TPT account! Everything in my store is 20% off for the next week! 

I have a HUGE gingerbread unit that I'm doing for the two weeks of December. I am also working on my units for January and February. So far I've got a bundle on arctic animals, the water cycle, and  the weather. They're no where near done but I'm already excited to get them out for people to use. I'm also looking for some guidance. I know my kinder team has put in a request for some specifics in a bundle I am making for them and my TK team has asked me to create our progress report forms, but if there is anyone out there who needs something or has a specific request, please feel free to let me know! 

Any who, our Thanksgiving themed crafts post will be up Monday and I'll be posting some of the Christmas/Gingerbread crafts we will be doing a little later as well. 

Thank you for stopping by and don't forget to stop by my {store} and take a look. 20% off sale for a very limited time!

I hope everyone has a good week next week, whether you work or not. 

Always remember, every moment can be a learning moment!

Sincerely from TK,

Nichole