How Will You Spend Your Summer Vacation?

Jennifer at Herding Kats in Kindergarten is hosting a linky party on summer vacation.

How will I spend my summer vacation? Well, right now I don't think mine is going to sound too exciting. There are no vacations to exotic places or anything as my husband recently became employed again. I am, however, moving back to my hometown of Buffalo, NY after the school year ends. So the beginning of my vacation will involve throwing things out, selling things, packing, loading, and driving a Budget truck from South Florida to Buffalo over the span of a weekend. The rest of the summer will probably be filled with interviews for teaching positions (I hope!) and possibly working as my sister's aide in summer school. Thankfully, I get summer pay so if I don't end up working atleast I'll be able to work on TpT things, blog, and lay out by the pool.

I also owe Jessica at Mrs. Stanford's Class a HUGE thank you for her blog post on how to include your blog link when commenting!!!! Thank you Jessica! :)

Check out her blog post if you don't know how to do this! She's also having an awesome giveaway!

I'm off to get ready for bed before an hour of Seinfeld. I need a good laugh after the season finale of Glee, a rainy day dismissal at school, and the looooooongest day ever.

Cindy

Seahorses & a Freebie!

I started my mini-unit on seahorses with my kindergartners today. First of all, I was thrilled to walk into the book fair and find this book...

For only $3.99, you can't go wrong! I snatched it up right away. This book is full of great seahorse facts and has bright colorful pictures. Before we started reading part of the book, we talked about our schema. I put everything on sticky notes and stuck it to this chart. We moved a few things to "Our New Learning" after reading and added some additional facts.

These little cuties are from Deanna Jump's "Ocean" unit. My students really enjoyed this project!

Here is a freebie from my Seahorses unit! It's a text to self connections sheet that you can use with Mister Seahorse by Eric Carle. Click the picture below to get it! Please leave me a comment if you use it. I really enjoy reading comments and getting feedback. :)

I hope your Monday was well. I had a surprise observation by my principal. Thankfully, it went well!

Cindy

Nonfiction Book Reports, Seahorses & a Freebie

This is a nonfiction book report that I assigned to my second graders a few months ago. They had to read a nonfiction book, make a poster, and include the author and/or

 illustrator and five facts. They also had to present this to the class. Here are some of the posters that were turned in.

Now onto the freebie! Click the link to download the handout that I typed up to tell my students and their parents all about the book report. I hope you can use it!

I'd also like to share with you this little 20 page mini-unit on seahorses. Click the picture to see it in my TpT store!

Hope your Monday is a happy one!

Cindy

A House for Hermit Crab & Some Ocean Stations

Today we read....

After reading this great book, we completed this little jewel from Jennifer over at First Grade Blue Skies. Click the picture to go to her blog and get this great freebie!

Here are a few examples of my kindergartners' houses for Hermit Crab!

I also wanted to share some of the station activities that my students are working on. These are from my ocean unit. Click the picture to find it in my TPT store!

My kindergartners completed this book independently this afternoon. This is in my TPT store for $2.00. Click the picture to get it!

My first and second graders are working on making words using the letters in "THE OCEAN".

Here is the game that they are playing at another station. It goes with A House for Hermit Crab by Eric Carle.

 

 14 days of school left for me and a million things to do! How many days do you have left?

Cindy

Is This a House for Hermit Crab?

We are working on an ocean theme this week and will continue into next week. Today we had a shared reading of this book......

......then we made these adorable hermit crabs from Deeana at Golden Gang Kindergarten.

There is a freebie book to print from her blog to go inside as well. It's great for sequencing! Here are what some of the pages look like.

No, it's too heavy.

No, it's too deep.

Yes, this is just right.

I hope to be back tomorrow with some more ocean activities that we are working on! I'm off to concentrate on this season finale of Criminal Minds.

 Cindy

Mother's Day & a Freebie!

What a long day! Our school is in the midst of administering standardized tests for four days this week. Today was day #1. Since I have a kindergarten homeroom and K doesn't take this test, we spent a good part of the morning working on Mother's Day stuff. First, we completed the book that I created. Click the picture to get it in my TPT store. It's currently on sale for $1.20!

Next, we made envelopes from construction paper to hold all of our gifts. My friend and colleague, Lori from Teaching with Love and Laughter gave me this great idea. I took mine a step further and had the kids weave yarn in and out around the outside (minus the opening). This was really annoying fun!

You have to love the backwards "p's" and the spelling of "moth'rs" not to mention the fact that the second one was decorated upside down. Oy vay! Atleast they decorated them nicely!

Tomorrow we are making these:

I got this idea from a colleague last year. I made this with popsicle sticks last year, but decided to try pipe cleaners this year. Click the picture below to download the poem and labels!

Directions: Make 2 pots and glue around the inside edges to make a pocket for the flowers.

Sign your name and glue the poem on to the front of the pot.

Trace and cut out four flowers.

Glue the jobs labels onto the flowers.

Tape or glue the stems onto the flowers.

The flowerpot says:

Pick a flower

And I'll do

A very special

Job for you!

Love,

Happy Monday!

Cindy



TPT Sale & Mother's Day Freebie

I just wanted to let you all know that I am participating in the TPT Teacher Appreciation Sale from May 6th-8th. I am offering 20% in addition to the extra offered by TPT. Just enter the promo code: TAD12 at checkout to receive your additional discount! Happy shopping! :)

Here are some items from my store that may help you in the upcoming weeks! They will all be on sale.

Mother's Day emergent reader w/ scaffolded writing

Mother's Day Literacy Unit

Ocean Literacy Unit

Ocean Animals Emergent Reader w/ scaffolded writing

This is a Mother's Day freebie in my TPT store! I can't take credit for the idea, but please feel free to download it.

Cindy