Back to School! - And a couple of FREEBIES!

Hello out there! Wow, it feels like it has been AGES since my last post! So let's kick off the term with a look at what we have been up to in Prep C this week, and with a few FREEBIES!

Every morning in Prep, we start off with Circle Time, and I decided to kick the term off with a good dose of kindness!

We began the week by reading 'Have You Filled a Bucket Today?' by Carol McCloud. We created an anchor chart together using a FREEBIE from Scholastic and some bucket pictures I found online. You can download these by clicking the link below. We also talked about ways we were kind to people on the holidays and recorded them on a mind map on the board. We referred to this throughout the day.

Another day we read 'Pig the Pug' by Aaron Blabey and brainstormed all the ways we share in the classroom.

Finally on Friday we watched an online reading of the beautiful story 'Chrysanthemum' by Kevin Henkes and completed an adorable activity I found on Pinterest by 'Keepin' it Kool in Kinderland.' I showed the children a large red heart cut out of cardboard and explained that this was Chrysanthemum's heart - full and happy. Throughout the story we folded it over and over again each time the other mice hurt her feelings. At the end we unfolded it and talked about how even though she felt better and her heart was back in the right shape, we could still see the creases from where she was hurt. We stuck a poem in the centre and hung it up on the wall as a reminder to think before we speak. You can grab this FREEBIE and read more about Khrys' lesson by clicking the link below.

FREEBIE Link to Bucket Filler Anchor Chart - Scholastic 

FREEBIE Link to Heart Poem - Keepin' it Kool in Kinderland

Our sound of the week this week was the 'Long U' sound. As a class we built an anchor chart of the sound, completed a spelling sort and even made our own unicorns after reading a class favourite 'Thelma the Unicorn' by Aaron Blabey!

We made did puzzles, built words and completed a handwriting sheet in our rotations.

If you click on the image below you will find a document with some FREEBIES to teach this sound in your own classroom - including the template for the adorable unicorn craft! Just add some foil for the horn and hooves, and coloured paper strips for the mane and tail.

We reviewed our phonics skills with these super fun letter punch cards from Doodle Bugs Teaching, and Syllable Fluency and Fitness by Tickled Pink in Primary. $2 hole punches from Kmart and it was well worth the little mess they made!

For number sense in maths this term we are focusing on how to show numbers in different ways. On Wednesday we completed an 'All about the number... 8' activity on the whiteboard, then later in the week we worked on tally marks in particular. We worked together to play 'Puppy Pick and Match' and matched tally mark bones to puppies. This was such a favourite that I left them out for the kiddies to play with during free choice math groups. Afterwards, we played another Fluency and Fitness game from Tickled Pink in Primary for number sense using tally marks. We sat on the carpet and write each number we saw on whiteboards and at the end completed the fun fitness activities - and LOVED IT!

If you click on the image below I have also shared my 'Puppy Pick and Match' activity for you all!

Finally, we also kicked off our new Health unit this week. We will be learning all about being safe in different places and situations throughout the term. This week we started by reading 'Monkey Needs to Listen - A book about paying attention' by Sue Graves from the 'Behaviour Matters' collection.

(Can I just say - this collection of books is AMAZING!!! I purchased the set through Scholastic Book Club and I can tell you now, they were well worth the investment! This particular book I have read 4 or 5 times with this class alone and they still love to hear it. And a heads up, if you have the new TBS Book Club catalogue, you will find them in there. I highly recommend them. If you want to check out the other titles just search 'Behaviour Matters Books' in Google and you will find them.)

Anyway, back to our unit. Before our story we looked at our own classroom rules and discussed how we have rules for lots of reasons - getting along, working, playing and most importantly, for safety. After we read our story, we talked about how when Monkey made the choice not to listen, he put himself in danger and spoiled a very fun activity for all of his friends. We then completed a sort of safe and unsafe choices we can make in the classroom which I then turned into an anchor chart to display and refer to throughout the term. At the end of the lesson, the children drew a picture of themselves doing something safe in the classroom. This was a great way to start back at school after 2 weeks off to review our classroom rules, and recover WHY it is important that we follow them.

If you click on the image below, you will also find a document with this safe/unsafe choices sort for you to use in your own classroom.

Well it has been a long short first week back and I am now off to do some well-earned relaxing!

How was your week?

Guided Reading Goodies!

Hello again lovely teacher friends!

If you are anything like me, you are probably always on the look out for fun and engaging phonics and letter recognition games for your little cherubs at this time of year. Right now I am putting together my own collection of games to use with my guided reading groups - made up of my own creations as well as some fabulous FREEBIES I have hunted down over time. 

I have put together this post full of my own FREEBIES, as well as links to some great FREEBIES out there on the web. I hope you enjoy these...

These items are all FREEBIES I have made myself, which you can download by clicking on the images.

And here are some links to some fabulous products I have found very useful over my teaching time. Click on any of the images below to go to the host site.

(Hint: any links leading to 'the Reading Mama' have the download link RIGHT AT THE BOTTOM OF THE PAGE. Just keep scrolling and you will find it :)

I hope you find these bits and pieces as helpful as I have!

Five Little Speckled Frogs Math - with a HUGE FREEBIE!

Hello to all my fabulous teaching friends here in Oz! We are definitely over the hump of Term 1 now and only 9 days away from our Easter break (but hey, who's counting??). 

Last week I shared with you how my little Cubs are in need of a bit extra work on the basics this year. Over the last few weeks I have focused my teaching on learning to read, write, count and build numbers to 6 through the use of number rhymes and songs. This week we continued with the song 'Five Little Speckled Frogs' and I would love to share some resources with you which I found very useful with my little kiddies. 

You can click on the picture below to snag all the materials you will need to use Froggy Math in your classroom!

To give you an idea of how I use my focus rhyme with my kids, this is how my maths lessons go.

Number Sense Warm-Up

We start every maths lesson with a number sense warm-up - If you have been following my posts you would know by now that I just LOVE this part of my day! It is a chance to play with numbers. At the moment I am keeping to working mainly with numbers 1-6 and trying to match our theme for the week. I have always found that this time of day is when my Cubs are the most engaged! We don't all get a turn every day, but for most activities I try to give everyone a whiteboard or blocks to keep them involved in the game.

If you would like to read more about my warm-ups you can check out some posts by following the images below.

This week our warm-ups were all frog-themed. First we played a fishing game where 2 children came up and used my magnetic rods to fish for frogs (laminated pictures with paperclips attached), while the rest of the class counted to 20. The children then counted up their number of frogs and built it with sports marked in a chalk tens frame. We then had an opportunity to discuss who caught more or less, and recognise same numbers.

Next we played another variation of our fishing. This time our goal was to practise reading, writing and building our numbers. One child at a time hopped up, fished out a frog and read the number I stuck to the back. The Cubs then wrote the number on their whiteboards and built it with their cubes. I usually set up whiteboards or blocks in a semi-circle ready for our lesson. This helps to smooth the transition from lunch to starting our activity (and takes the stress out of having them not know where to sit). If we are not using any of these things I draw a semi-circle on the carpet in chalk as a guide.

Another day we played a combination of the two games and had two Cubs fish out a frog with a number on the back and build it in the 5 frames. This was a very quick game play and I managed to get through a fair few more kids.

Focus Lesson

After our warm-ups we move on to our lesson. I have mentioned before how my Cubs are very wriggly and cannot remain focused for very long. This is why my math focus lessons rarely go longer than 10 minutes at this stage. Below are some photos of our number lesson activities this week. We acted out the song with ourselves, blocks on our arms, and my story prompts. We ordered numbers to 5, counted and sequenced collections and build and counted frog collections using my big pond. (The pond is just made from A3 coloured cardboard - green grass, blue water and a couple brown rocks scattered). 

You can click on the picture below to grab your own copy of these materials PLUS a copy of the story to print and read to your own children.

This week we have also (finally) moved onto sorting by attributes. This was another math lesson. During the week I have two focus number lessons, and two focus lessons on another strand - sorting this term.

Buddy Follow-Up Games

For the last 10 minutes of our Maths session we play buddy games. I have snap bags of activities in buckets prepped and ready with everything my Cubs will need to make it easy quick and easy to start. This week we built froggy towers with cubes, played a dice game to build collections, and practised sorting shapes and counters. For this part of the day, I hand out the bags of materials to pairs (who I choose) and the Cubs find their own spot in the classroom and get to work. We are just getting started with buddy games so are still learning how to stay on task and work together.  

Again, if you would like a copy of these cute frog buddy games just click on the picture below!  

I know it is very short, but at the moment, that is how my Maths lessons look in Prep. As the year goes on we will slowly be able to extend our sessions, but at the moment it is more important to me to focus on the quality of learning, not the quantity of time spent.

I also just wanted to show you what we have been up to in learning our letters. This week we learned the letter d and made some very cute dotty dinosaurs. We practised handwriting the letter d and then write words starting with d on our whiteboards. Slowly, slowly, slowly we are getting there!

I hope this has given you some ideas for your own early years classroom. Don't forget to snag your own set of Five Little Speckled Frog Math by clicking on the picture below.

Remember, you can also find me on facebook and receive updates of new posts, freebies and activity ideas as soon as they are posted! Click on the image below to follow me ;)

Until next time my friends :)

Back to School - Prep C Style!

A big hello out there to all my fellow teachers, and congratulations to those Aussie teachers who have survived their first and second week back at school for 2016! Today I would love to share with you what the Cubs have been up to in Prep C!

Last Wednesday I finally got to meet my brand new cubs! I feel like this year I will be in for a good few challenges but I am looking forward to it. Besides, even if it is a tough term, if the days fly by as quickly as the last 8 days have, it will be Easter holidays in no time at all!

I started the term by snapping a photo of each of my little ones holding our 1st day of Prep C sign (and I couldn't resist snapping one of myself!)

The first few weeks of Prep are most certainly all about setting up expectations and building social skills. Over the last 2 weeks I took some time to sit down with my cubs and discuss classroom rules, and what they would look like in our classroom. I then went home and put our ideas together into some posters and we refer to them every morning during Circle Time. I also have a set posted up on the wall.

In our first week we read the book 'The Kissing Hand' which the Cubs really enjoyed. It was a bit of an effort to build our 'sitting on the carpet' expectation but we are making progress. After we read our story for the first time we talked about how Chester felt on his first day of school, and compared how we all felt on our first day. We drew faces on a piece of paper to make a chart and I then printed of pictures to create a display version. This is an activity we will do each week for our book of the week with a different theme.

We also started working on letter knowledge. Having started some mini checklists with my Cubs over the last week and a half we will definitely be doing everything we can to add in more time for letter recognition and sound knowledge!

So far we have started work on the letters b, m and s. These are a few activities we have been working on over the last few weeks. We have been building words with matching beginning letters with Wikki Stix, building letters with play dough, handwriting letters in our mini books, and working on letter matching and recognition.

The picture in the top left corner was of an activity we played in our Circle Time one day this week. As I stated a letter name, three of my Cubs threw beanbags into the matching hoop. The remainder of the activities here were done during Literacy Rotations. We circulated around the room whilst the Cubs worked and had them tell us the letters they were working on.

This week we moved onto reading 'The Rainbow Fish' - one of my all time favourite books! Again we build up our poster for out theme of sharing. We brainstormed all different things we can share with our friends (funnily enough the things kids seem to share most didn't make the list - head lice and bugs! haha!)

Later on in the week we worked together to create a display of rainbow fish in our room. I cut up coloured patty pans into thirds and we stuck them over a fish template which I printed onto white card. As they worked I wandered around and handed out one silver scale (aluminium patty pan cut up) to each child. They looked fabulous when they were all finished!

During our math block the last few weeks I introduced my Cubs to number sense warm ups, which worked a treat! I have thrown a few photos together below of all the different games we played. Some days we even wrapped up math rotations a little early and had a second game before lunch which nobody objected to. You may notice that I have used my animal number posters in every game so far! These are working posters and I use them in just about every math lesson! They are especially great fr practising number formation because I can hold one up in the air facing my kids and trace over the numbers with my finger. 

We had a go at Apple Picking where we raced to collect as many apples (scrunched up red paper) as we could to place them on our trees, counted them up and placed the matching numbers beside them (missed this shot!). We built collections of frogs in our pond. This was made from A3 card cut into a pond shape and stuck to green card. 

We went fishing for numbers twice! One day we used snap cubes to show the numbers pulled out in front of us, and on another day we wrote the number on our whiteboards. One day our doggy hid his bone under cones and we have to find it by guessing the number it was behind. Once we found the bone we had to write the number on our whiteboards.

On Friday we practised subitising to 3 by turning over cards and identifying how many animals we could see. We then had to find the numeral and write to on our whiteboards. After our warm up on the carpet, we then went to our desks and practised rainbow writing our numbers to 5 in coloured pencils - We need lots of work on number and letter formation!

  

Our Math rotations we full of back to school themed games (which will be swapped out at the end of next week). We build towers, matched number representations, counted collections and identified matching numerals, and built numbers in ten frames. We also tried out a few finger gym activities to build our little finger muscles.

This term in Prep we are learning about plants and animals. Over the term we will be looking at all different kids of Aussie animals and how they live in their habitats. So far we have begun by talking about our 5 senses, living and non-living things, plant parts, needs and how plants grow. We even made our own people and plants which look amazing in our room! As we learn about a new concept I add new displays to our Science Wall. All these displays I have made with adorable clip art from Krista Wallden.

Well that about covers the bulk of what we got up to in our first few weeks :)

How were your first weeks back?