Wednesday, October 31, 2012

Monday, October 29, 2012

A Turn to Learn - Terrific Teacher Site!

This site has some terrific teacher tools, such as REMINDER BRACELETS, and various computer how-to's. I've added this site to my sidebar.

Friday, October 26, 2012

Letter P Activities

Our activities for the letter P included:

* Made our own pretend PIZZAS with PAPER PLATES and construction paper ingredients. (Picture)


* Mixed red and white PAINT to make PINK, then painted our PIG picture.

* Looked at all the different styles of a PENNY. (I use a classroom Elmo and projector for close-up work.)

* The student whose name began with a P got to wear a namecard necklace with the P done in glitter glue.

* Had a PICKLE tasting PARTY.

* Took our lunches outside one day for a PICNIC (see picture).


* Compared a PEACH, PLUM, PEAR, PAPAYA, and PINEAPPLE. Had a taste testing. (See pictures. During center time, they asked if they could have what was left. That pineapple never had a chance. :)



* On another day, did the same with an Idaho, new, and sweet POTATO.

* Learned how to play Hot POTATO music game.

* Popcorn!

* We jumped our P every time we entered the room.

* Had a field trip to a PUMPKIN PATCH (at a local church - see picture).


* Took the measurement of our PUMPKIN with a piece of yarn, then checked to see how long it was using different types of units. (I did the same lesson last year, explained in more detail here.)

* We cut open our class PUMPKIN, and every child got to scoop out some "innerds" with their bare hands (and put on a paper plate to study, keep, and take home.) Some of their expressions when they put their hands inside were priceless!

* For Fun Fun Friday, we wore our PAJAMAS to school!

Monday, October 22, 2012

Science Stunts

These were originally meant to entertain guests at parties, but they're just as much fun to watch (and do) in the classroom!

Friday, October 19, 2012

Letter A Activities






Our activities for the Letter A last week included:


* Sang "The ANTS Go Marching", then made ANTS with our fingerprints in paint. (Picture #1)

* Brought APPLES to class and graphed them by color. Then we placed them in order from smallest to largest.

* Cut open the APPLES to see the stars. Ate one half, then did APPLE STAMPING with the other half in paint.

* Had APPLE SAUCE and APPLE JUICE for snack one day (It was amazing how many of my students had never had this drink.)

* Took pictures of ALLIGATORS and put them in AB sequencing order on a sentence strip. (Picture #2)

* Made APPLE MOSAICS with red (or green or yellow) construction paper by tearing and gluing finger-sized pieces to the picture. (Picture #3)

* Opened a box of ANIMAL CRACKERS and tried to identify the animals.

* A lot of my students have names that begin with A, so they got to wear a yarn necklace with their names written on a card, and the A emphasized in glitter glue.

* Jumped on and sounded out the letter A on the floor every time we entered the room.

Wednesday, October 17, 2012

Graphics From the Pond - Terrific Teacher Resource!

Put this in your favorites! This site has clipart and fonts - tons of free stuff that any teacher can use to create games and worksheets! I've already added this site to my list on the left of the blog.

Monday, October 15, 2012

Recycling Old Tires

I found these pics of what people had done with old automobile tires, to benefit children's and school playground, and I just had to share! They're ingenious!
 






Friday, October 12, 2012

Letter S Activities


1. Glued STICKS on the letter S.

2. Formed STICKS into other letters of the alphabet. (See picture.)

2. Painted a picture of the SUN with SOUP (tomato soup, to be exact!)
*Note: 1 can will suffice for approx. 10 students.



3. Collected items and labeled them as SOFT or hard.

4. Cleaned our desks with SOAP (aka SHAVING cream).

5. Compared rocks to STONES.

6. Using alphabet STAMPS, spelled out our names.

7. Had STRAW races (using straws to blow a pom pom down a "race track" on a table).

8. Wrote our letters, numbers, and names in SAND. (I put colored sand in some old pencil boxes.)

9. And on Friday, SLID around the room in our SOCKS, just for the fun of it!

Wednesday, October 10, 2012

"Let's Sing Hurray Today!" - A Cute and Short Alphabet Literacy Song

You can use this with every letter of the alphabet! Just change out the object words!

(Note: I'm not the author of this little ditty. It was shared by another teacher at a recent workshop.)
Let's Sing Hurray Today!
(Tune of “Farmer in the Dell”)
Let’s sing hurray for A,
Let’s sing hurray for A,
Let’s sing hurray for A today
Let’s sing hurray for A.
An apple starts with A,
Ants starts with A,
Let’s sing hurray for A today,
Let’s sing hurray for A.


Let’s sing hurray for B,
Let’s sing hurray for B,
Let’s sing hurray for B today
Let’s sing hurray for B.
A bat starts with B,
And ball starts with B,
Let’s sing hurray for B today,
Let’s sing hurray for B.

Monday, October 8, 2012

Music And October

Click here for the Table of Contents, and a Freebie Halloween Song.
You can buy it here for just 99 cents via PayPal.
Or here through Teachers Pay Teachers.

Friday, October 5, 2012

Letter F Activities

I was asked recently if I did any activities to go with the alphabet when we learned/reviewed letter names and sounds. I'll begin sharing those, beginning with the letter F.

1. They mixed red and yellow paint to discover the color orange. Then they colored a FLOWER with a FORK.

2.  Trace handprints on construction paper and cut out to make FALL LEAVES to hang from the ceiling. (Blogged earlier.)

3. Draw pictures of our FAMILY to make a class book.

4. Discovered which FRUITS (including a pumpkin) "Sank or FLOATED".

5. Cut out pictures of FOOD from magazines to FILL our paper plates. Note they had to find 1 meat, 2 vegetables, and the fourth was their choice. (Plates were divided into fourths with a marker.)

6. Finished the week with FUN FUN FRIDAY - we brought our FLIP FLOPS to school to wear in the class.

Monday, October 1, 2012

Jump Shout! Learning Our Letters


The group I have this year are a challenge. Most of them don't know their letter names, much less letter sounds, so I have to find ways to keep the letter front and center until they learn it. Constant repetition is the key, and so we do the Jump Shout!

I put duct tape on the floor in the shape of the letter. (This one is an F.) The letter is DIRECTLY INSIDE THE DOOR. To enter the room, they have to jump onto the letter and shout its name (or sound, depending on which one I tell them to say.) They love it! In fact, some sneak back into the line to do it again.

Considering we leave and re-enter the room an average of SIX times a day, that's a lot of repetition!