Thursday, January 31, 2013

How I Use Ordering Cards

Tomorrow is Friday!!  I have been counting down the days until this Friday for quite some time.  It is the day I get to go on a Women's Retreat with a group of friends from church.  I am long overdue for some girl time! So excited!
I have finished my February Ordering Card Set!  You may be asking, "What are ordering cards?"  For me they are cards that the students put in order.  This past summer my husband helped me install a thin steel rod in my room.  I then put little plastic chain links on the rod (26 of them so the alphabet would fit!).  Now my students can hang up little cards in the right order!  I used to put magnets on the back of the cards but that seemed to get bulky to store.  Now my cards lay flat and storage is so easy...plus taking the time to place the magnets on the back became time consuming too.  Now just a quick hole punch and they are ready to use!
Here is what the rod looks like:


It hangs above my listening center table.  When students finish listening to a story they can spend some time ordering cards.
This is how the cards fit on.
This is a close up of the rod and the cards.  The orange thing is just a foam stringing bead that I placed on the end so that the rod wouldn't come off.


Now that you know what Ordering Cards are...you can head over to my store at TeachersPayTeachers and pick up my February set!  It includes four different types of cards!
Valentine Lower case letter ordering

Coin patterning

Click here to get the set!
You can also download the Valentine Lowercase Letter Ordering cards here for free!
Now I better head off to bed, since tomorrow night will have more chatting than snoozing!



Wednesday, January 30, 2013

Dental Health unit...with a freebie!

Wow!  It has been a busy week!  Yesterday we celebrated Kansas' 152nd Birthday and then today my class celebrated the 100th day of school!  Two days in a row of fun activities that keep us from our normal routine...I am exhausted!  Tomorrow we start learning about Groundhog Day!  If you haven't picked up my Groundhog Freebie you can download it here.
Next week we learn about caring for our teeth!  I am excited to have my Dental Health unit complete!  It has some fun games and I always love it when kiddos are having so much fun that they don't even realize they are learning too!  Take a look at some of the activities in the unit:
A pocket chart activity of putting together sentences.  There is also a recording sheet to fill in the color words.


A fun activity of making letters using toothbrushes and smiles!  I can hardly wait to see my class doing this activity!  There is also a recording sheet to write down all the words that they made!


This is the recording sheet to the spin and tally game!  My kiddos are still struggling with making those tally marks!
To purchase the unit click on any of the pictures.

One of my favorite books to read during our study on dental health is Robert Munsch's Andrew's Loose Tooth.  I love having the kiddos make up their own funny way to get a tooth pulled out! 






Andrew's Loose Tooth


I have made a freebie of the writing page I use in my class.  If you would like to grab the freebie click  the picture below!
Enjoy!  If you download it please leave positive feedback at my store!  I would love to hear what ideas your class came up with!






Sunday, January 27, 2013

Let the Blogging Begin!

I am so excited to be entering the blogging world!  I have been a blog stalker for quite a while now and have decided to start blogging about my own journey!  As the mother of two young boys it isn't like I need something else to do.  The laundry piles are endless and the dust is piling up, but I have decided to start blogging about my love of teaching kindergarten. I am eager to start sharing my thoughts and ideas with other kindergarten teachers.  I recently started my own store on teacherspayteachers.com and am so excited to share my ideas that way.  I hope that this blog will allow me to share more thoughts and give me a place to reflect on my lessons.  Thanks for joining the journey with me!  Below is the latest freebie I have posted to my store. Check it out!  If you download it please leave positive feedback!   
                                                      Click here:  Sentence Scramble

I hope to add a complete Sentence Scramble Packet in the near future!