How About Them Apples?!?!

So here in South Florida it does NOT feel like the weather is changing from summer to autumn. Seriously! Every day I feel like my friends and I try and convince one another that we felt a change in the weather, and that there is a crispness in the air...we clearly are DELUSIONAL! It is definitely no where near boot weather here, or even t-shirt weather for that matter! We are still rockin' the shorts, tanks and a/c to the max! Although we don't really experience fall here, I love to celebrate and decorate for the season! Everything I bake has some form of apple or pumpkin in it, including my morning coffee.

In class this week, we will be doing lots of activities with apples. I made these fun apple pom poms to use as table names. I will be hanging the apples from the ceilings and then use the apple names red delicious, gala, golden delicious and granny smith apples as table names!

We will be having an apple taste test this week. This is when students will be sampling apple jacks, apple crisp, caramel apples and apple cider. We actually bake the apple crisp in class. The kids LOVE in class cooking! The recipe is found in this unit.

A website that I use to help me get parents involved in aiding in sending in supplies needed for classroom activities is Sign Up Genius. If you haven't tried it out before, you should! It is free, and requires little effort! Plus the best part is that parents will not send in multiple of the same item! In the past I have ended up with 5 of something I only needed 1 of, and none of something I needed 2 of! Using this website has saved me so much time and effort in my planning! I hope it helps you too!

After our apple sampling we will be using our five senses to tell all about apples. The students will help to complete this apple repeated text.

As part of our apple study we will be learning about Johnny Appleseed. We will check out some of my favorite Johnny Appleseed books...

we will be watching this Johnny Appleseed YouTube video...

then we will be making this Johnny Appleseed craftivity!

Our literacy and math centers are all about Fall too!

Just the other day we completed this  interactive math emergent reader. The kids had a blast! We used beans as the leaves on the trees. This week we will be doing a similar activity but with apples instead.

If you are learning about apples this week, be sure to check out this apple pack! Happy Apple Week!!

Once Upon a Time In Science Land

Once upon a time it was my second year of teaching. It was the month of May and it was time for science. I was giving my students directions so that we could transition from math to science. That's when it happened. One of my students blurted out, "What is science?". My mouth dropped open. IT WAS MAY! What do you mean what is science? I have been teaching you science since August, and I thought I was doing a good job too! (Obviously I was mistaken!!!!) This was an ah-hah moment. We had done experiments, we had used science tools and yes we had even created a science fair project. Yes, I had taught science lessons all year long, but I had never taught my students what science actually is.  Ever since that year, I have worked hard to teach my students what science is and how to be a scientist. Teaching science has become one of my favorite things to teach, ESPECIALLY at the beginning of the school year. I teach my little ones that they are scientists, and this unit pretty much prepares my students to be scientists for the rest of the year. 

To start off I use lots of books to teach about what science is, how they are scientists every day and the scientific process. These are some of my favorites. 

I teach about the different kinds of scientists, which gets them VERY interested in science and helps them understand that they are scientists! 

We also think about how we are scientists every day.

After we understand what a scientist is and what a scientist does, we start to explore science tools. I teach the students how to use each science tool the correct way. This helps eliminate future problems such as..."Please stop using the ruler as a weapon." and "No, a dropper is not for putting water in your friends' ears." or my personal favorite "No, science tweezers are not for plucking your eyebrows." (not speaking from experience or anything!) After teaching how to use each tool I set up super simple stations to actually get our hands on the tools and to use them. Some of the stations get MESSY...like really MESSY, and well if you know me you know that me and messes don't go well together, BUT if you saw my kids using science talk and getting into it...it is worth all of the mess!

 

 

Now we are ready to dive in and really start learning about the scientific process. Of course, we HAVE to make a craftivity before the unit is over!!! After this unit every student understands what science is and even better they tell me about how they were scientists daily. When it rains they tell me how they were a meteorologist and when we are at recess they tell me about how they are entomologists or botanists...it definitely makes my heart sparkle! 

Need help with your science instruction? Here are some science resources that you may find helpful.

      

                   

      

 

And we all lived happily ever after in Science Land! ;)

Kindergarten Is Like a Box of Chocolates

Remember Forest? LOVE Forest! The other day this saying popped in my head...

Well really it was more like...

but said in my best Forest Gump voice of course!

Really this saying popped in my head because I was about to have a pity party for myself/boo hoo a bit thinking about what I "got" (if I am being honest). I stopped myself real quick...good thing I love a box of chocolates. I don't actually like to eat the chocolates, I just think it is a fun game to see what's inside each little chocolate! What a great way to look at your students...no matter the obstacles or the challenges that each one brings with them, its my job to find out the great treasure that they have just waiting to come out from within them! So that's what I have been doing...one little "chocolate" at a time! ;)

That being said, we have been working LOTS on our alphabet letter recognition and letter sounds in my classroom. We have been creating, sorting, writing, singing, dancing and anything else you can think of to learn our letters! Folks we are almost there! :) If you are having some of the same struggles with your little "chocolates" here are some of our favorite resources to use in our classroom! 

{YouTube Videos}

{Center Activities}

Kindergarten really is like a box of chocolates...and that's the best part! :) Happy Wednesday!

Printing On Post-Its

I wanted to share something that is one of my favorite things with you. If you are OCD like me and HATE handwriting on things, than this is the post for you!

Last year I saw on Pinterest {Come pin with me!} that you could print on post-its, and I did it last school year...but this school year my obsession has gone to a whole new level! I started off printing on post-its, but now I print on ANYTHING that I can figure out how to print on and NOT write on!!! {Like all those cute little tags at Michael's!!}

Here are some pictures of how I use it in my classroom and life!

Name labels at Meet the Teacher

Labels for my Wish List at Academic Focus Night!

Gift tags for presents!

If you want to print on post-its click on the picture below to get your FREE templates! I hope you become as crazy obsessed as I am! 

 

Beginning of the Year Recap!

As always the first few weeks of school have been a whirlwind! I wanted to share some pictures of some of our favorite activities!

On our first day of school we read the Kissing Hand and did this Chester craftivity! I love how they all turned out!

Since I am a pennant loving gal {if you don't believe me check out my room decor}, of course I had to have my students help decorate our classroom with this class pennant and fun pencil keepsake.

Some of my other favorite activities that I do at the beginning of the year come from this unit. One of my favorite includes marshmallows! If you are looking for great ideas, this product is a MUST!

Surprisingly my students this year are AMAZING at cutting! Wow! I am beyond impressed. What we have had to work on is letter formation and handwriting. I work on handwriting during my letter sound focus time. I have really enjoyed using Alphabet Directed Drawing by From the Pond. I focus on one letter a day, and review the already learned letters daily. To start the lesson, the whole class does a hands on letter sound activity which could include a sorting activity, bean bags, fly swatters, bowling, etc. After this short little lesson and review, we practice writing the new letter. After I see the students are forming the letter correctly, we complete the directed drawing and think of other words that start with the letter that we have been working on that day! I love how excited my kids get when they realize by following the picture cues and directions they created a really cool illustration! Even though we have been doing it every day for a few weeks now, it still surprises them every time! :) The best part is that during writing workshop I see my students trying to  remember some of the directed drawings we have done, and they are using them in their illustrations! LOVE IT!

Due to all of the testing that is required at the beginning of the year, we jumped right into math and reading centers. This year's bunch of students were really quick learners of how to have appropriate behavior in centers and how to work independently. I am so grateful! These are some of the centers they were working in the past few weeks!

I have been using The Moffat Girls No Prep pack for all kinds of things! It is jam packed with goodies! I use this for math extension activities and ELA practice. 

In preparation for Academic Focus Night, we have completed our Kindergarten Goal Books for August. I know that keeping portfolios on each student is quite the task, but for me and my students seeing their growth in such a simple way is AWESOME! I love sharing it with parents at the end of the year. The hardwork is worth it!

Making my students feel like our classroom is their second home is so important to me, and having them feel like their peers are their second family is even MORE important! I think that learning each others names is the first step to making a classroom family. So in the past few weeks we have done several activities with our names and also have done a study all about being friends, what makes our family special and the most important all about ME! 

If you are interested in any of the activities shown just CLICK the picture below!

        

           

       

I hope your year is off to a great start!