Back to School Sale

It's that time again...Teachers Pay Teachers is having a sale and so am I!  On August 18 and 19 TPT is offering a 10% off code PLUS I am having 20% off all products over $3.00.  That adds up to 28% off!  Don't forget to use the TPT Promo Code when you check out!

Here's a peek at some of the deals you'll find at my TPT Store:

That's all for now - I'm busy as a bee working in my classroom and I promise pictures will come soon!
Thanks for reading and please consider following my blog or TPT Store.

Spring Chicks!

I know the calendar says April but here in northern Michigan we're enjoying the only benefit of an OMG I CAN'T BELIEVE IT'S STILL SNOWING LET'S MOVE TO FLORIDA STOP SNOWING ALREADY STORM early spring snow/ice storm - a Snow Day!  But the winter weather hasn't stopped me from getting excited to embark on a sad lesson in the circle of life successful spring chick hatching in my classroom!  My friend Patti, who raises more animals than you can imagine with her daughters for 4H, just stopped by with her egg incubator and the fertilized eggs have been delivered to school so I should be all set.  But then I remembered our failure to hatch any live chicks from our eggs last year and thought I'd better get more prepared.

Hatching Chicks Survival Guide

I wanted an easy way to keep track of how many times I turned my eggs and the temperature guidelines for my incubator so I thought I'd make a simple chart I could post in my room.  But one thing led to another, and two hours later I had my Hatching Chicks Mini-Unit! I will definitely be using these posters and printables during the next few weeks, and maybe you can use them too!

Mini-Unit Includes:

• incubator recording poster (color and b & w)
• chicken life cycle poster
• chicken life cycle writing prompts with lines and without (color and b & w)
• A Hen Lays An Egg original song
• 6 page student booklet to read and color
• egg hatching paper chain countdown links with daily chick/embryo stage of development

Thanks for reading and please consider following our blog, TPT store and/or facebook page!

1000 Followers Celebration!!

Yes you read that right!  Of course, WE don't have 1,000 yet but Nicole from Mrs. Rios Teaches Second Grade does and that deserves a CELEBRATION!  She has invited fellow bloggers and TPTers to join her in partying, and we're so excited to be part of it!

We're offering "Winner's Choice" from Becky's store to the winner of Nicole's giveaway. That's right...you get to choose any product from the store.  Visit Becky Brand's  TPT store to see what your choices will be.  But that's not all!  Nicole's giveaway winner will get 107 products!  Woo Hoo - now that is a celebration!

Giveaway Starts April 6th!

Click the picture to join the party!!!  Of course you have to wait until April 6th at 7:00 a.m.!

Thanks for reading and please consider following our blog, TPT store and/or facebook page! 

Spring is Here - April Fool's!

It's snowing here on April 1st!  I guess spring is never coming taking it's own sweet time...I suppose that's what we get after a long winter with 10, yes 10 snow days!  Anyhow, it's spring break for me and since it's not very spring-like outside I thought I'd try to bring some spring inside with this fun "Hop into Spring" Making 10's freebie for you!  This is a great Common Core State Standards based activity to help students learn combinations of ten!

 How We Did It

We actually used this spring Making 10's game in my class the week before spring break in math choices (More about how math choices in an upcoming post) and it went great!  Here's how I organized the activity:

I printed out all 4 game boards along with the 4 Easter themed game boards (part of  Making 10's throughout the Year) and I put one of each inside a plastic page protector.  

 

Students used dry erase markers to find combinations of 10 by circling adjacent numbers.  Since I had a parent volunteer helper that day I asked students to play the game as a 1-player game while the parent helped, and now that they know the game it will go into the games rotation as a 2-player game.  The kids enjoyed the activity and little did they know, they got to practice many of the first grade Common Core State Standards including: CCSS 1.OA.B.3 (Properties of Addition), CCSS 1.OA.C.6 (Fluency of Facts within 10), and CCSS 1.OA.D.8 (Unknown Numbers).

 

A fun alternate version of game play to increase fact fluency would be to give each child in your class or group a game board, set a timer and see how many combinations they can find within a set amount of time. 

And Now for the Freebie!

Click here to go to the download, available on TPT

I  hope you get a chance to use this spring freebie with your class or maybe just looking at  the cute spring flowers will brighten up your day.  Thanks for reading and please consider following our blog and/or facebook page! 

Happy Easter and a Sale!

Happy Easter!  We started our spring break at the end of the school day yesterday, and since we're not going anywhere this year I thought I'd spend every waking moment on Pinterest obsessively check for more followers/TPT sales hold a 20% off sale at my TPT Store! All items which are regularly priced at $2.50 or above are on sale until April 1st!  Check out some of the items on sale below:

20% off items Math

20% off items - Language Arts

   

20% off items - Other

Of course there are many other products that are already priced at $2.00 or less also!  Thanks for reading and please consider following our blog and/or facebook page!  Oh, and before I get to carried away with my sale, I wish you all a Happy Easter!

Academic Vocabulary That Works

Our district has undertaken the daunting exciting process of teaching academic vocabulary words to all students in grades K - 12.  When we were first presented with this idea, many of us early elementary teachers thought, "No way will this work with (insert your early el grade level here)!"  However, even bossy know-it-all the best early elementary teachers can admit we were wrong.  Academic Vocabulary instruction has been going very well in our first grade classrooms and we discovered a way to make it even better!

The Academic Vocabulary Word Wall!

 

We decided to incorporate the (not new) idea of a spelling or high frequency word wall to our vocabulary words.  And because the most important thing is that our classrooms are cute and colorful functional and meaningful we created this poster set.  We took the reason for teaching academic vocabulary plus the inspiring brightness of The3amTeacher's zig zag background set and waa-laa!  Academic Vocabulary - Sparking a Brighter Mind and Spark of the Day.  It's one of the most beautiful useful bulletin boards in our rooms!  Having our words posted along with the journal page examples keeps the words fresh in our minds (ours and the students) making it easier to reflect and review forgotten previously learned terms through review games.

And now for the FREEBIE!

If you'd like to grab your own copy of our poster set, click here!

Thanks for reading and if you like what you've seen, follow us!