Vowel practice with a holiday theme FREEBIE!

I quickly wanted to share a vowel activity the I made for my kids to use to help them practice hearing vowel sounds.  Since we had been graphing math throws in our Everyday Math lesson, I thought it with be fun to graph vowel sounds using a spinner (I'm not a big fan of the paper dice you have to make).  Click on the picture below to download it for FREE!

The week before Christmas Centers

After today just one more week of school before the Holiday break!  Next weeks centers follow a fun Christmas theme.

Math Center:  Roll and Color with two dice.  We just did an Everyday Math lesson this week on graphing dice rolls with a pair of dice to practice joining numbers together.  This will be a fun way for my students to get more practice with it.

Writing Center: Making a List Write the Room by Deedee Wills.

Phonics Center: Christmas Tree vowel sorting.  

 

Art Center: Santa Color 100 Hundred Chart by Lil' Country Kindergarten.

I hope some of these activities will help you with your planning.

Centers For the Week-Holiday Theme

Art Center:  Window Ornament activity.  While browsing on Pinterest I found this fun activity from 1-2-3 Learn Curriculum

 You can get an ornament template HERE.  I used contact paper for the color paper pieces to stick to.  When they finish making them I plan to laminate them.

Math Center: Number ordering with Christmas Lights.  I printed off four houses and the Christmas lights and laminated them.  Students will place the lights along the roof to put numbers 10-20 in order.

Writing Center: Writing CVC Words.  Each reindeer card has been laminated and using wipe off crayons or markers my students will be practicing sounding out cvc words and writing them down on the cards.  Once I check them they will take a paper towel and wipe them clean for the next group to use.

 Phonics Center: Ho-Ho Ending  Sounds by Deanna Jump.  This will be great for my kids to use.  We have been practicing listening for ending sounds in our K Phonics program.

Centers for the upcoming week.

Art Center:  Angel ornament.  A friend of mine has been using this fun angel art in her classroom for years.  She can't remember where it came from.  If you've seen it before and know, please let me know. It can also be used with math or as a holiday project.  Get the template for free right HERE!

Phonics Center: Hearing Ending Sounds ( Write the room)  This goes great with our K phonics program by Fountas & Pinnell. 

 Write the Room

Math Center: We will be ending our study of the Gingerbread man books this week and this will be a fun math game for my little ones to play. 

Gingerbread Man Roll and Color/Cover by ABC123kindergarten

Writing Center: Sentence picture match.  My students have to read the pattern sentences and find the picture that matches.  It has a cute Christmas tree theme.

 

 Holiday Sentence-Picture Match

 

Centers for the upcoming week & a sale!!

Take a peek at what I have going on for my task centers this upcoming week and be sure to check out my sale at Teachers Pay Teachers on Monday!

Phonics Center:  Gingerbread man puzzle.  Match picture sounds to the correct lowercase letter.

Art Center: Christmas tree with rectangles.  Idea from Little Giraffes.

Math Center:  Gingerbread man button and number match.

Writing Center:  Gingerbread man crossword puzzle.

Gingerbread Man Freebie

With my gingerbread man study just around the corner, I've been busy going through all my activities and updating them.  A lot of what I've been using needs a digital update.  

I wanted to share a gingerbread man math activity that I will be using the week after Thanksgiving break.  You can grab it for free

HERE!!

Center Task

Here's a sneak peek at my center task for the upcoming week.

Phonics:

 

Squirrel’s Sounds (Free from Kelly's Kindergarten) - Working with beginning sound. Students will match pictures to pictures with the correct beginning sound to their game mat.

 

Art:

Pilgrim art from All Kids Network.  I always try to plan something that my kiddos can do on their own without a lot of teacher direction and this one will be great for them!

Math:

Turkey Math - Feather Match activity that I put together for students to count the dots on the feathers and then match them to the numbers on the turkey.  It goes along with our Everyday Math domino match and will be a great review and practice for them.  Check it out here!

Writing:

Scarecrow Write the Room is a great task for my kids to practice sounding out words and then writing down the sounds they here to make the word.   This works well with our Fountas and Pinnell K Phonics lesson on saying words slowly.  You can get it here!

Five Senses

I just finished putting together my Five Senses unit.  This unit will provide your students with a complete study all about their five senses and how these senses help them learn about their world. Through the use of books, hands-on activities and recordings of their findings, your students will learn that they use their eyes to see, their skin to touch, their noses to smell, their ears to hear, and their tongues to taste. 

 The unit kicks off with a hook lesson using popcorn to get your students using all of their five senses. The unit then follows a series of lesson on each of the senses. Some senses give you two lessons to choose from. Each lesson also includes student recording sheets.  The unit ends with a review of what they have studied and learn with a pocket chart sorting activity and a book for them to write/draw items for each of the senses.

Check it out here and let me know what you think!

Centers for the week!

Here's a peek at what I have planned for my kindergartners this week during our center time.

Math Center: Harvest Time from Kelly's Kindergarten:

To make this game, print all pages on cardstock. Leave the playing mats whole. Laminate or place in sheet protectors (optional). Cut the number cards apart. Laminate these cards if desired. To play, give each player a game mat (up to 6 players). Spread the number cards face down on the table in the middle. Players take turns choosing a number card. If they have a matching set on their mat, they place it in the correct space. If not, put it in the discard pile. Play continues until someone covers all the sets on the mat.

 Grab the mats here for free!

Grab the number cards here for free!

 

 

 

Writing Center: Label the Scarecrow Parts from 

In The Teachers’ Lounge

Phonics Center:  Turkey Feather Beginning Sound Sort.  Check it out here.

 

Art Center: Paper plate Scarecrow

You can find it here.

I hope some of these ideas help you 

in planning for your students!

 

 

Thanksgiving Symmetry

In our school we use the Everyday Math Curriculum.  Each morning my students complete a review of a math lesson through math tubs.  Everyday Math gives extension activities that make great math tub review.  Every now and then I find that it is helpful to create a math tub that aligns with lessons.  So I created a Thanksgiving Fold and Cut Symmetry activity.  Just show children how to fold paper in half and then cut through both layers of the paper, starting at the folded edge and cutting away from the fold.  Then open the paper to show symmetry. For an added bonus have them draw the rest of the picture.  Grab it here for free.

Center Task for the week & lot's of Freebies!!

Can you feel the excitement in the air?  With Halloween just around the corner I've noticed how loud my kiddos have been.  Plus we are expecting some of Hurricane Sandy's icky weather.  Our weather report has reported that Sandy's wind field will be so large, they anticipate a significant storm  here in Maine.  Oh Joy!  Hopefully it will go in time for Halloween.

So this week I've planned some Halloween and Fall themed centers.

My Math Center this week is a great freebie from Smedley's Smorgasbord of Kindergarten.  You can grab it here.

The Phonics Center is all about beginning sounds.  Check it out here.

My Math Center is a combination of math and art.  I love the 100 charts by Lil' Country Kindergarten
 

The Writing  Center task is another activity with beginning sound.  Using spooky Halloween theme.  Students pick a card say the picture, listen for the beginning sound and record it on the recording sheet.  You can grab it here free for until November first!!!

Crazy busy and a look at my Center Tasks

Wow, what a week!  I had a workshop session with Cathy Collins on Tuesday, a field trip to a KinderConcert and some field work to Harvest Hill Farm (Pumpkin Land) on Friday.  Then next week is conference time.  Phew!

Our school as adapted the Teacher's College Reader's Workshop model.  We have spent the past three years working on this model with the help of Cathy Collins.  She has been coming to our school and modeling reading lessons.  So many wonderful ideas.  She has a great book called Growing Readers.

Now  for a look at what I have planned for my center task this week.  This week is more of an October theme.

For my Math Center I found this great freebie from Kelly's Kindergarten in her October centers:

Spider Count

Print spider webs and have children use plastic spiders (Dollar Tree) to create matching sets.

Writing Center Task:

Another freebie Spider Roll ‘n’ Write from Love Luck and Laughter

grab it here

Phonic Center:

I created this Pumpkin Rhyming activity that my students can play as a memory game or just match them up.

 

Check it out here.

And lastly my Art Center 

A cutting practice activity from DLTK

Home to school reading folders

I’m very excited for my students to be bringing home reading folders.  Each child has a folder that holds a Ziploc baggie and a year long book log.  The bag will hold their high frequency train card rings and leveled reader.  As the school years goes along I will add reading strategies and  high frequency word games for students to practice at home.  Here are some examples of their reading folder.  I apologize for the quality of the photos.

A week of pumpkin center fun

I'm so excited to be able to share with you my center ideas for this week.  Over the years I have arranged my center time in many different ways.  Now I love how they flow and it allows for my kids to get the independence and extra practice on the skills I'm teaching.  My center time is right in the middle of the day.  The kids have just come back from lunch and have to go to an assigned center.  I've mention in an earlier post that I have four rotating centers (math, phonics, art & writing).  On the fifth day they have free play time.

Here is a look at what my four centers for the week are:

Math Center

Writing Center Activity

You can check them out here

Art Center Activity

Phonics Center

download for free here