Five for Friday :: November 13

 Hey there!  Happy Friday!

Every Friday morning during calendar time in my classroom, my students and I sing "It's Friday, it's Friday, it's Friday, Friday, Friday....wooooh!".  I've been singing it all day long.  Hip, hip, hooray for Friday!

Here's what 's been going on lately in my classroom!

1. Kindergarten students digging through their Halloween candy buckets to bring you your very favorite treats must be one of the most pure acts of love possible.  My sweet Kindies have been flooding me with Twix bars ever since Halloween.  Love them so much.  I know how precious Halloween candy is to kids.  Their generous little hearts are so special!

(And I'm just going to pretend that I don't see the calorie count on that full-size candy bar!  Yikes!!  Cover your eyes!  Don't look!!!)

 2. Sometimes teachers just need permission to take things one day/hour/moment at a time.  This verse has been in the forefront of my mind this week.  I'm so thankful for TRUTH and precious, timely reminders.

3. Few things melt me more than Kindergarten friends immersed in books.  Looking, talking, learning together.  I had to capture this sweet moment from today.

4. 'Tis the season for turkeys!!  We started these "Thankful Turkeys" last week and finished them early this week.  Love.

5. And we made these directed drawing turkeys today!  They turned out too cute for words!

Wishing you a relaxing and wonderful weekend!!

Gratitude List FREEBIE

I love Thanksgiving.  I always feel warm and fuzzy inside all day long.  Anyone else like that???  I am so grateful for so many things.  God has blessed me far beyond what I deserve....and, especially on Thanksgiving, I just can't contain my overwhelming feelings of gratitude!

I so want to instill a sense of deep gratitude in my children.  We always do something special throughout the month of November, or during the week of Thanksgiving, to remain mindful of all that we have to be thankful for.  This year, I created a "Gratitude List" for each member of my family to fill out.  We'll share them on Thanksgiving morning.

 My daughter filled hers out over the weekend.

 All sound-spelling and Kindergarten-handwriting perfection.

 I LOVE that she wrote that something that makes her laugh is her brother.  She sure loves him to pieces!!

 She fancied it up a bit when she was finished.  Of course.

Maybe you're looking for something like this to use with your family too?  

CLICK HERE to grab it!

Five for Friday {November 14}

Hi there!  It's the weekend and that's a wonderful thing!  I'm cozied up under a blanket today because everything outside is snow-covered and all of a sudden Michigan is like a frozen tundra!

In related news....I survived the first days of snow with my Kindies.  This is no small feat, and I'm feeling extra successful this weekend.  Every time I got them all bundled and out for recess, it was a feeling of sweet victory!  Only infinity more recesses to go before winter is over.  We can do it!  Ha!

Here are my Five for Friday (Saturday) this week... 

1. I created this simple anchor chart a couple weeks ago to remind my students what I am looking for in each of their stories.  It simplifies the process for them a bit, and is easy for them to remember.  My students are at so many different levels, but this is something they ALL need to remember.

 2.  We drew dragons this week during Project 64.  They were all so cute.  So, so cute.

 

 

3. It snowed all night on Wednesday, so we woke up Thursday to a snow-covered ground.  Meaning that I had to make sure my kids had everything they needed for recess when I brought them to school on Thursday morning.  Adding that one extra thing to my morning completely threw me right off and I realized when I got to school that I had forgotten my shoes!  I had my big clunky boots, but I couldn't teach all day in those...my feet would have been soooo sweaty.  So, I used these socks from the office.  They had been donated by one of our staff members after her son outgrew them.  He is now in 4th grade.  Navy skinnies and faded navy little boy socks.  It's a good look.  

 

4.  We completed our Thankful Turkeys this week.  I always love these.  They are so sweet!

I love that this girl added bottom lashes to her turkey! :) 

 Melt me.

5. We're learning about MOTION in science.  My kids loved this investigation this week.  They had to make ping pong and golf balls move without touching them.  Such a blast!  

SNOW, SNOW, SNOW!!!  My kids played outside until dark on Thursday.  Fun in the snow!  

Just can't believe it's not even Thanksgiving yet... 

Hope you are enjoying your weekend!!

Thanksgiving Brain Boost {FREEBIE}

I am working hard on my second set of Brain Boost pages, but they aren't quite finished yet.  As I've used the first set with my class, I've made note of things I want to tweak on those too.  We're almost done with the first set and I just love that time with my students every Tuesday and Wednesday morning.  I made special Brain Boosts for Thanksgiving and we completed both of them together last week.  Since we don't officially cover Thanksgiving, it gave me a good chance to talk with my students about some of the basics.

I plan to put together a holiday/special events Brain Boost set eventually, but for now they are free for the taking.  Snatch them up if you think they'd work for your class!  

CLICK HERE to snag them!

Five for Friday {November 22}

Happy, happy Friday!!

One extra week of teaching before Thanksgiving means one less week after!  Not a bad trade-off.  It feels so great knowing that, when we come back after Thanksgiving, we'll only have three weeks before Christmas Break!  Crazy!  But, so FUN!

Anyway, I'm linking up with Doodlebugs for Five for Friday...seems like these posts are the only ones I can get around to lately!

1. I love me a good graphic organizer.  My reading group this week completed this bubble map after reading a story about a picnic.

2. I was feeling a bit overwhelmed by moving onto our second writing unit.  My kiddos are sweet as can be and learning so much, but I just didn't feel they were ready to be writing personal narrative books independently yet.  So, we began writing a book together, as a whole class, this week.  I chose a topic that we all have experienced, and we worked together all week.

Last week, our school held an event called "Donuts with Dudes".  Students brought their favorite "dude" for donuts before school in the morning.  We used the Story Hand from Deedee and Deanna's writing unit to plan out our story.

 

We completed one page each day, and will finish it up next week.  I am so glad that I've taken the time to do this as a class.  I'm hoping it will really help my kiddos know what to do when they get to writing their own.

 

My kids have gotten SO good at drawing very detailed pictures.

3. We've been working on "Thankful Journals" this week.  As a class, we've come up with something each day that we are all thankful for.  Yesterday, the student I selected said that he was thankful for school and everyone agreed!  I've really enjoyed doing this with my class this year.  It was a last-minute decision, but one that I plan to do for years to come.

 You can find this journal for free HERE.

 4. I was adding this week's words to my word wall today when I was reminded how much I love the tip that Kim Adsit gave at her conference that I attended in the Spring.  She said that she uses different colors for the words on her word wall.  It just serves as one more visual for students that might need it.  They can learn to distinguish the words by color for some added support.  My kids could learn that "a" is green, "am" is lavender, etc.

 

 I went through my word wall words over the summer and put them together in a document that separated them by color.  Click here to grab it if you'd like!  We follow the Scott Foresman Reading Street language arts curriculum, so it aligns to that.

5. A sweet note from one of my littles at the end of the day today.  The perfect way to start the weekend!

Two days of school next week!!  Enjoy your weekend!!