Peek at my Week of Turkeys!

This is the beginning of many days within the month of November that we have half days, conferences, or NO SCHOOL!  BOO!  We are beginning our GLAD unit on Turkeys and I want to teach!  Yesterday, we did our Inquiry Chart and read our Big Book: Let's Talk Turkeys. Our BIG CONCEPT is: The most important thing about turkeys is they come from North America. We also did an input chart about the parts of a turkey.  They LOVE the word and action for snood!  That piece of skin that wraps around the turkey's beak.  Did you know that?  Ha!
My Kinders were INCREDIBLE with how they are making connections to what we've already learned about living things and GLAD strategies.  We are also continuing to use basic Sentence Frames/Accountable talk frames to foster their acquisition of academic language:

A turkey has_______________________________.

A part of the turkey is__________________________.

The _______________________ and _____________ are similar because________________.

The _______________________ and _____________ are different because_______________.

I've also posted new printables in my TPT store!  Be sure to check them out.

Check out the other blogs who have linked up!

Be Blessed,

Peek At My Week 10

Here we are at a brand new week.  We had great success last week studying spiders.  I stand AMAZED at how effective GLAD strategies are for helping my Kinders acquire academic language.  They have already grabbed onto the BIG CONCEPT: The Most Important Thing About Spiders is they eat pests!  That same vocabulary from chants is transferring to their writing and the ideas they generate when given a sentence frame such as:

The little spider is___________________.

The moment when one of my boys stated "eating pests" I was a BELIEVER!  I'm super excited to join many other teachers in our district who have been selected to attend more GLAD BOOT CAMPS to go deeper with these incredible strategies.

This chants will also set up success with our Sentence Patterning Chart, and later be used for writing.

Chants are a golden way to teach academic vocabulary in a non-threatening and fun way!  We have chanted for anyone who happens to pop into the classroom!

Each GLAD unit has a social skill that you are working on the entire 6-8 weeks. We are working on Being Respectful.  Anytime I see a child or a group being respectful and doing what we've determined, then I will add points to my various tables.

 Here is a sentence frame: if the child gave me a verb it was written on white using green.  If it was a prepositional phrase, it was written in orange to be linked to our sentence patterning chart we'd create the next day.

 Our Input Chart: Each Category is "color chunked: to aid comprehension.

Spiders Syllables from A Differentiated Kindergarten

This week we will finish our Sentence Patterning Chart and begin a Comparison Inquiry Chart for two Books:

Just wait till you see how GLAD Compares two books!  I was floored by this new strategy, since it's usually a Venn Diagram used for comparisons.  Nope!  Stay tuned.  

Come link up to other great bloggers at Mrs. Willis' Kindergarten

or click here: http://www.mrswillskindergarten.com/

Have a wonderful week!

Be Blessed!

Peek at My Week 7

This year is teaching me so much already.  Note to self: when doing a letter craftivity, be sure that all the children have their letters facing the right way...seems obvious right?  Ugh. Between all the other monitoring and and assessing I was doing a few escaped my sights until...they were beautifully glued. Well, tomorrow is a new day. Mistakes are great teachers!

My class will be introduced to Class Dojo this week.  I spent time entering my kiddos into the program and setting us up for success.  If you aren't familiar with Class Dojo be sure to follow this link to a great positive, behavior management system.  I know that my students will buy into it and am excited to share back with you about it!
They have tons of free resources and printables detailing how to make a smooth transition.  The great thing is, it will work with any grade level and you can use any Android device too!     Check it out!

This week we will be exploring Apples and the letter /Bb/.  My students needed some extra time to understand the routines and expectations of Kindergarten, so we are beginning our deeper study of letters now.  This has been a tremendous learning curve for a teacher of 15 years.  Most of the activities that I had re-planned were too difficult, thus I began with truly blank slates.  One may look at the situation and scream but I LOVE a challenge.  I feel privileged that I have been called and chosen to teach at Whittier Elementary.  It's an amazing opportunity to give these children a great jump start...to love learning.  Yes, I will be creating  A LOT of resources, but it will be worth it.  So, if you find yourself discouraged remember that we do a wonderful work.  We are their first taste of magic....hope...opportunity.  What an honor....wouldn't you agree?  Here's a peek at my upcoming week.  Be sure to link up with us at Deedee Wills' page, so you can join in on the fun!

or click here

Here are my Lesson Plans for this week.  If you'd like to download them, just click HERE.  I'd love to hear from you and see what you are all up to this week.  Feel free to leave your ideas and comments here, as well as check out my TPT store for new Printables and Freebies.

Be Blessed,

  

Peek at My Week 2

A big shout out to my new favorite girl, Tami over at Learning and Teaching with Preschoolers!  She has such great FREEBIES on her blog that totally helped me create my plans this week!  Yahoo!  I love people who share!

Feel free to download the plans HERE and check them out! 

Have a blessed week and be sure to hop over to Mrs. Wills' Kindergarten Link Up!

Weekly Lesson Plans

A big shout out to all of my friends who started school last week!  Whew! I find it funny that every year I seem to forget how exhausting the first week of Kindergarten is!  I created my visual lesson plans, but then went to a minute by minute with my cuties.  They are an energetic, enthusiastic little bunch that will definetly keep me on my toes this year.  Here's a peek at some of the activties we did last week.  As most of you know, the first few weeks...MONTHS are about reviewing the routines and procedures. It's well worth the effort though and will guarentee a much smoother year.  
I'll attach my plans so you all can see. To download the plans simply click here.

Don't forget to sign up for the Literacy Bundle Giveaway! Win all these AMAZING Printables for FREE!

 It ends Sept. 9th!

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5 Senses STEM Unit, FREEBIE and GIVEAWAY!

I'm super excited to begin our STEM Unit on the 5 Senses this next week!  STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics) is at the core of what I believe about good teaching.  The only thing I would add is an "a" for the arts.  But, being the musical/drama girl that I am, it will be added.  This is the first unit I will be using from those developed for the OSPI website.  Click HERE if you'd like to check them out.  I attended a workshop during the Starting Strong Conference on STEM and my district is opening three new STEM schools within the next 2 years, one will be right next door to my current building!  STEM is all about hands-on learning.  The activities are relevant, only guided by the student inquiry, allowing students to draw their own conclusions, get messy and learn about concepts.  Perfect for Kindergarten!!!   We are lucky that in the State of WA we have some great new guidelines for Full-Day Kindergarten, stating that learning must be developmentally appropriate and value play.  This is my goal as we embark on this unit.

Along with the OSPI unit, I have added some of my own resources, as well as, this great unit by Kathryn Warner from Kindergarten Kindergarten!  You can purchase it at her TPT store here. It's jammed packed with fantastic printables.

I will be doing CLOSE READS with the Heinmann Raintree SUPER SENSES Series.  Each Sense is detailed with realia photos for ELD/ELP Practices and bold new vocabulary.  All of their books are PERFECT for Kindergarten/First Grade!

Also, we will enjoy these other classic texts:

And if that's not enough information for you....

Here's my new Literacy Pack available today at my TPT Store!

Click here to take you there right away!

Just purchase, print, laminate and enjoy.

But that's not all!  You can download these awesome 5 Senses Posters FREE today!  Who doesn't like a FREEBIE? 

Click here and grab the link for your goodies!

Don't forget to follow this blog and find me on FACEBOOK to ensure you don't miss out on more ideas and resources!  I'd love to hear from you!

And here's the giveaway!  Enter to win this amazing Literacy Bundle full of some of my most popular printables! You can enter once a day!  Share, Comment, Tweet, LIKE, and Pin!  Good Luck!

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Visual Lesson Plans

Happy Monday!  
I'm super excited to be joining some of the most creative teachers I know through the Visual Lesson Plan Link-Up!  You still have five days left to join us on this journey.  Just click on the link below to take you to Dee Dee Wills' Kindergarten blog, find the blue button and add your blog.  She has also included a template and video tutorials to watch.  THANK YOU, Dee Dee!  Stay tuned to see my weekly lessons!  Be sure to also check out the other teachers' blogs who are participating!

Link Up

Be Blessed!

Back to School Trainings, GoodNight Moon and a FREEBIE

Hello All,
I've spent the last three days at this conference here in my home town of Kennewick, WA.  

I feel fortunate that I've been able to attend and it's only five minutes from my house.  It's afforded me a glimpse into the bigger picture of P-3 and an opportunity to mingle with some pretty fantastic educators and presenters.  I cannot wait to join my new district!  They are inventive and completely sold out for kids!  

I've also been getting ready for the new school year, as I'm sure all of you are, and reflecting on what is meaningful and developmentally appropriate for the new children who I will be entrusted with.  With so many ideas rolling around in my head, it's a wonder I ever get any sleep at all.

I'm super excited about my newest printables that are available at my TPT store.  

Who doesn't love the book GOODNIGHT MOON by Margaret Wise Brown?

A classic story of comfort and love.  If you do not own a copy for your classroom, you can purchase one by clicking on the link above.

I was thrilled to find adorable clip art by Little Red depicting the book, and went right to work creating a printable that will encourage your student's alphabetic knowledge, number sense, one to one correspondence, emergent reading skills, and shape recognition.  There are endless possibilities to use the centers and activities in multiple ways.  After all, primary teachers are the MOST creative people I know, right?

Hop on over to my store to grab a copy for back to school!  

There's No Place like Kindergarten

And, since there can never be enough FREEBIES, here is my gift to you!   This is a great Kindergarten Check-Up for the beginning of the year-just for you!!  Be encouraged.  We do tremendously meaningful and powerful work.  

Be Blessed,