Choice Time favorites

My students this year have definite preferences during Choice Time.  We have 20-30 minutes of Choice Time each afternoon, and I've been surprised this year at how many of my students do the exact same thing every single day!  

Here are my students' current favorite activities:

1. PUZZLE TABLE
I have a handful of students every year who LOVE the puzzle table, and this year is no exception.  But this year, they all happen to be busy boys.  Some of my busiest bodies calm and focused at the puzzle table during Choice Time each day??  Yes, please!  I just love watching them use their minds to work together and solve puzzle after puzzle after puzzle.

I posted this pic on Facebook.  Click the image to head over to my page to weigh in!

2. STEP-BY-STEP DRAWING BOOK
This book is taken out and used every single day.  The pages are falling out and I really need to make a second copy!  I ordered the original book from Scholastic years ago, and just photocopied and bound it for my students to use.  They LOVE it.

Crayola Twistables are the best, yes???  Love love love them in my classroom.

 3. WORD WALL
My students are nuts about our word wall this year!  All of our word cards are magnetic and they love to take them off the wall, copy the words down, then put them back.  They know the rule of one card at a time.  Several students do this every day!!

They especially LOVE the name cards this year.  I had each child write their name on a card, then I traced the names with different color Sharpies.  My students love taking them down and making lists of their classmates.

You can read more about my word wall HERE.

I'd love to hear about Choice Time in your classroom!  If you have it, what activities do your students love?

Five for Friday {July 25}

It's time for Five for Friday!

My week was all sorts of summer fun....with a little bit of work tucked in.   

1. I make my own laundry soap.  I found a "recipe" a few years ago, and the whole concept intrigued me enough to try it.  I've been making my own ever since.  This is a double batch and will last me between 4 and 6 months.

I'll be talking more about it on Monday for Monday Made It.  Come back then if you'd like more info!

2.  This week I had THREE lazy beach/pool/relax with friends days.  AWESOME.  Two of them at friends' cottages and one of them at Lake Michigan.  Here are some pics from the first one.  This is how I spent Monday.  Summer fun with my kids is one of the best things in the world.

I EVEN worked up the courage to do THIS!  I am not much of a water lover.  I'd rather be on the beach than in the water, but this looked like too much fun.  And it was.  At one point, my son (the adventure-seeker) said "I can tell we're going sooooo fast.  Good job mom!".  Bless him.  We were going 14 MPH.  

I did pick up speed after getting comfortable. :) So much fun.

 3. A little bit of school work.  All in moderation in the summer!  Cutting out these adorable stitched stars for my door display this year!  Next step...add my little superstars' names and laminate them!

4. This is FREE in my TPT store.  I posted about it yesterday.  Go snag it if your word wall needs a fresh look!

5. So, you know how I'm on Facebook now???  Well, I'm still trying to figure it all out.  I've spent too much time this week trying to set up a Fan Freebie app on my page.  I *think* I've got it now (fingers crossed), although I haven't actually tried adding a freebie yet, so I guess time will tell!  Ha!  Hoping to get something added there next week....I'll let you know so that you can go get it!

Carrie and Danielle were both so patient and helpful and answered so many questions for me.  Thanks a million, girls!

I'm headed to Chicago for the weekend and can't wait!  See you back here next week, friends!

Word Wall FREEBIE

Hey hey friends!

It's nearing the end of July, and I can hardly believe it.  I CAN believe it, because summer goes by this quickly every year, but still.  Waaaahhhhh!

BUT....even though I love summer so much, I also love teaching so much.  I've been doing a teensy weensy bit of back to school prep to keep my teacher-brain happy!

If you follow me on Instagram, you know that I am freshening up my word wall this summer.  I actually love my word wall -- it's bright, cheery, and super functional -- but the letters had gotten really faded since I put it up two years ago, so it needed a re-do.  I'm not changing anything about it...I'm just re-making what I had before.  

When it works, it works!  

In case your word wall is in need of a fresh look too, I just uploaded this FREEBIE to my TPT store!

I love how student-friendly the lined letters are.  So clean and easy to read.  Go grab it!! 

I have more summer fun planned for today -- a play date at the beach!  Yes, please!! 

Happy Thursday!! 

Five for Friday {July 18}

Happy Friday!

It's been a while since I've checked in.  Summer and vacations and all things wonderful!  But I'm back today with a few things that I've been up to!

1. We spent five days with my bestie and her family in Wisconsin Dells.  We just love it there.  The kids LOVE the water parks and all the fun activities.  And time with our favorites that live too far away?  Yes, please.

 This picture just makes me smile!  BFFs.  We had so much fun.

And on the last day we walked out looking like this!  You know she's your BEST when you accidentally coordinate your outfits so well for good-bye photos!  Ha!  Love this girl!

 2. I was recently invited to join a Bunco group in my neighborhood that meets once a month.  I had no idea what Bunco was, but thought it would be a fun way to meet some new people.  We got together last week and it was my first-ever time playing.  As you can see, I didn't do so well!  Ha!  BUT....the person with the most losses wins a prize so LUCKY ME!  Hee hee.  It was mindless and fun, and it's always a good night when you can have girl time, snacks, and wine.  Looking forward to next month!  

3. I went into school for a morning this week.  My first time since the end of the school year!  It felt good to be there and get a few things done.  You know how it always goes that you get a few things done, but add a dozen more to your to-do list!

I did some laminating and printed a few things to cut out at home.  The circles designate my student tables and the triangles are for our "Table Captains".

4. The top of my to-do list right now is updating my word wall!  I don't plan to change it much.  It was just ready to be freshened up after getting faded by the sun for two years.  This is one of the things I brought home to work on.

5. I've also been working on this!  

I feel like I've learned SO much as I've read through this book this summer.

I've had ideas running through my mind for a few weeks now, so I've done some creating and have gotten everything organized into this binder that I can't wait to use for guided reading this coming year.  I promise to share them soon, once I finish it all!

Have a wonderful weekend!!

Word Wall tip {and a FREEBIE!}

I have a word wall posted in my classroom all year long, and I talk all year long with my students about how they can use it as a tool to help them while they write.  But, it is always around this point in the year when I really begin to notice my students using it during writing time, unprompted and without needing my direction to do so.

One of my littles, in particular, was really using the word wall to his advantage last week, and it made me think that this word wall tip might help some of your littles too.

My word wall has evolved so much over time.  I have a chalkboard in my classroom that went unused for so long.  I knew that it would be perfect for my word wall, but I didn't know exactly how to set it up until I visited my bestie Abby's classroom and saw how she had used tape to create boxes.  I used black electrical tape which is super easy to work with.  It's been up like this for almost two years, and has been awesome!

Then, I got the tip to use different colors for my words at Kim Adsit's "DI for the Little Guy" conference that I went to last Spring.  It was a tip that she mentioned really quickly, but it was such a great take-away for me that day.  I worked over the summer to divide my word wall words into separate pages so that I could copy them onto different colors.

 The idea is that, for those sweeties that need a little more of a visual, they can remember each word by it's color.  "Of" is green, "one" is yellow, etc.  Just one more layer of support in case your kids need it.  From my experience this year, this has been super helpful!  It's even so nice for me to use if my students ask me how to spell a word....I can point them to the word wall and remind them that "look" is the purple word in the Ll box or that "from" is the pink word in the Ff box.  You get the idea. :)

 I laminated the word sheets and cut out all the words at the beginning of the school year.  As we've covered each word in class, I've added magnets to them and put them up on the word wall.  I love the look of a full word wall!  We've done LOTS of learning this year!

After years of being dissatisfied with my word wall and not being able to figure out the way to make it work best for my students, I have just loved it this year.  And when I see my students choose writing spots close to the word wall so that they can use it while they work, it makes me feel all warm and fuzzy inside!!

I posted about it briefly back in November.  You can check out that post HERE.  

If you'd like the PDF file of the words I use (they mostly align to our Scott Foresman reading curriculum), click HERE to grab it from Google Drive!

I would love to hear how you make your word wall work for you and your students!!  Please share in the comments!

Happy Sunday!

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!!