Improve phonemic and phonological awareness skills with lesson plans for kindergarten and first grade. These daily, 10-minute lessons will lead to reading and writing success! Lesson Plans for Teaching Phonological Awareness Skills Phonological awareness skills are the foundation for reading and writing success. Students with phonological awareness understand that language is made up of words, rhymes, syllables, and sounds. Comparatively, phonemic awareness focuses on identifying, ... continue reading...
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Back to School Ideas: Sentence Building | Literacy Center for K-1
Check out these engaging back to school ideas to teach your students about sentences and their parts. This color-coded resource is perfect for K-1 literacy centers. Sentence Building Activity Writing a complete sentence can be a tricky task in kindergarten and first grade! This build a sentence activity is a great resource to add to your literacy centers. It provides students with support in developing complete sentences, making this activity one of my essential back to school ... continue reading...
Pirates, Free Literacy Center Downloads and Pete the Cat
This is how I manage my literacy centers. The pirates ship was made using styrofoam sheets and paint. You can buy the sheets at most craft stores. You draw your shape onto the sheet and then cut it out with a hot wand. Super easy! The little pirates are birthday party invitations that I bought at Target. Each child is placed in a group...pirates, anchors, pirates ships, jolly rogers or maps. So you can see that today the pirate ships will complete the activities at the abc center and then ... continue reading...
Where’s My Mummy? Fall Book Party
I'm linking up with Ashley from The Teacher's Treasure Chest to share one of my favorite Fall books. Where's My Mummy? by Carolyn Crimi is always a class favorite. Little Mummy doesn't want to go to bed so he begs his Mummy to play one more game of hide and shriek. The events that happen next will have your Littles shrieking with delight. The simplicity of this fun book makes it the perfect book for making predictions and asking and answering questions about key detail in a text. (Common ... continue reading...
Illustration Techniques: In Pictures and In Words
Welcome back to the second week of our book study which covers the 50 illustration techniques that demonstrate "Good Writing" I have to give a shout out to Deedee Wills for working so hard to get this book study up and running! Katie Wood Ray does suggest book titles, but merely as a way to introduce these illustration techniques. She recommends searching your current book collection and reading these books with a new eye... the eye of an illustrator/writer. Each illustration ... continue reading...
Constitution Day
Constitution Day is observed each year on September 17th. It is a federal observance to recognize the adoption of the Constitution and those who have become U.S. Citizens. The book, We the Kids by David Catrow is a great book to read to observe this holiday. The adorable illustrations in this book make it easy to teach your kids about the Preamble to the Constitution and what it means. The Constitution is a set of rules that Americans live by. We discussed why the Constitution is important ... continue reading...
Math Part 2: Math Workshop
Yesterday, I told you a little about mine and Deedee's new Math Workshop unit. We are so pleased with the feedback we've been getting on TPT. It makes us feel great to be able to help make the lives of teachers a little easier. :) Because let's face it... Teaching is rewarding but it isn't easy!!! If you read Deedee's blog post HERE you saw that she said she does Math all day long. Ditto! I try to incorporate Math and Reading skills into just about everything I do. Providing the ... continue reading...
Throwback Thursday! Mental Images with a Freebie
Happy 4th of July! I am linking up with my sweet friend, Cara's Throwback Thursday post. I posted this last year and I thought I would bring it back to the top. This is a great poem to read at the beginning of the year when you are teaching your littles that Great Readers create images in their mind when they are reading to help them understand what they are reading. Okay, admit it! You know this made you want to bite into a big juicy apple! :) This is such ... continue reading...
Insects Eric Carle style!
We read Eric Carle's series of insect books and then we made our own Eric Carle inspired insects. This is what we started with. The papers were made by painting with bubble wrap, sponges, circle paint brushes and those soft body wash thingies. (not the technical term...but shoot! I can't remember what they're called. You can buy them at the Dollar Tree and then come on a little rope. ) I LOVE how the kids know how to use squares, rectangles and their creativity ... continue reading...
Just how BIG is a walrus anyway?
How big is a walrus? We read that a walrus can grow to be up to 12 feet long and that his tusks can be 3 feet long. The kids weren't quite as impressed by this info. as I was so I decided that we should make a life size walrus so that they could see just how BIG that actually is. The walrus was so big that we had to hang him in the lunchroom. In the middle of the walrus is all of the information that we learned about walruses. As I was uploading the pictures I realized that on ... continue reading...
Turkey Trouble Freebie!
Turkey disguise glyph craft math and writing activity with a free file for your kindergarten and first grade classrooms. So perfect for Thanksgiving. We read the story, Turkey Trouble by Wendi Silvano and made Wanted signs for our turkeys. The students decided on a disguise and drew their turkey. Then, they had to decide what they would give as a reward. The students had to choose a reward that they could actually give. For example, 2,000 legos. OOPS! ... continue reading...
Book Study Part 1: In Pictures and in Words
Deedee Wills kicked off our book study and she did such a great job that I just want to add a few little snippits. By sharing some pictures of student writing from my classroom. One thing that really stood out to me in this book is the idea that it is OKAY to slow down and take our time. Writers don't have to jump right in and start writing "words" to create meaning. Each time they pick up a pencil or a crayon they are making meaning through their illustrations. I'm excited about really ... continue reading...
Farm and Apple Fun!
My husband would say that he's glad there's only one of me. But, I can't tell you how great it would be if I could clone myself during the first 9 weeks of school. I am sure you guys feel the same way! Once the first 9 weeks are over and the kids know all of the routines it is smooth sailing. I can't wait for the day that I don't hear little voices calling out, "Mrs. Jump" 100 times. I told my little sweeties that I was going to change my name and one of them said in a worried voice, "But ... continue reading...
How to Heal a Broken Wing! I LOVE BOOKS!!
I'm getting ready for Vegas but I wanted to do a quick post to tell you all about an AMAZING book I just recently read. Seriously, I love books so much! I'd rather spend my money on books than food or shoes or clothes or chocolate (Okay, that's going a little too far) but you get my drift. Here's my favorite book, How to Heal a Broken Wing. I purchased How to Heal a Broken Wing last year and my class loved the beautiful story about a little bird who is ... continue reading...
Insect planner
Hey Friends! I hope you are having a fabulous week. The good news is tomorrow is Friday! Can I get an amen? We are right in the middle of our insect unit. You can click on the mini-planner below to see how I plan it out. This mini insect planner includes the activities we do during our whole group reading/science instruction. For those of you who are waiting on the Common Core Essential Questions for First Grade, I promise I am almost finished. I am so sorry that it has taken me ... continue reading...