Product Swap Snapshot {and an awesome GIVEAWAY!}

Hey hey!

I'm just in today to give you a little heads up on something that you're absolutely going to want to check out!  My friend Kimberly (we're only bloggy friends now, but we'll be IRL friends when we meet up this summer at the Color Run!!) just got a new blog design, and to celebrate, she's hosting a fun product swap for a few of us bloggers...and having an awesome giveaway too!

Head on over to her blog to enter the giveaway today!  And stop back on Monday because I'll be posting about the fantastic product I was able to review. 

This is the talented bunch of bloggers that I got to join for this product swap -- click their buttons to head over to their blogs! 

Hope you're having a great weekend!

Five for Friday {April 11}

Why is it that Spring Break week goes by SO MUCH FASTER than every other week of the school year??!?  Ha!  

I had a wonderful week off, with lots of family time.  It was just what I needed!!  I don't have too much school stuff to share this week, but I just love me a Five for Friday, so here goes!

1. We traveled to Wisconsin Dells for a few days to enjoy the indoor water parks.  We were anxious for a little getaway after the long winter.  The Dells are about a 5 1/2 hour drive from our house.  Two movies and some reading/playing time, and we're there!  The perfect distance to drive with our kids.

Rowan had fun with some Road Trip Bingo on the way. 

2. The weather was awesome!  The skies were blue!  The clouds were big and puffy and my whole family was happy the entire time.  Love!!

 3. The last time we were there, Trey was too short to do many of the bigger slides.  This time, he was JUST tall enough.  He was so adventurous!  And then he wanted me to be adventurous too....which isn't always in my nature, but what I won't do for this kid!  This is what he said my face looked like while we were riding "The Hurricane".  Ha!

 4. You know you're a teacher when your souvenir from vacation is a pack of Scentos markers.  Hee hee. :)  My students will be so excited!

5. A little bit of prep work today for next week.  But, now that I look at it, should it say "Buggy FOR Books" instead of "Buggy OVER Books"???  Oh my.

Anyway, I plan to pair this with some student book recommendations and Doodlebugs' Spring directed drawings.  Look for more on this fun new display next week!

Happy Friday, friends!!

Five for Friday {April 4}

Happy Friday, friends!  And Happy Spring Break (finally finally finally) to me!!  I love my kinder babies, but I was so ready for a week of relaxation and fun with my family!!  Of course I still wanted to link up with Doodlebugs, so here is my Five for Friday!

1.  We finished learning about letter-writing before break, and as a fun wrap-up each student chose a special someone to mail a letter to.  Here were our letters, all ready to go.  Of course, I blurred the address on the front envelope, but this was a really fun activity and very motivating for the kids!

They got to decorate the back side of their envelope before we put them in the mail.  Fun!

 2. We completed this cute bunny craftivity on Wednesday from A Cupcake for the Teacher.  When we get back from break, we only have one week before Easter.  I wanted to get these displayed before break.  They turned out so sweet!

3. I tell my class all year long that, if there is a book at home that they would like to read to the class, they are more than welcome to bring it in.  They must be able to read it completely independently in order to share it with the class.  This little guy was so adorable with his book on Wednesday.  He was also celebrating his birthday, so it was a fun thing to add to his day!

4. And then today is MY little guy's 7th birthday!  It was such a treat to spend our first day of Spring Break celebrating this awesome boy.  Our day started with homemade donuts and a candle on our family's celebration plate!  

5. One of the best things about blogging is the way this community of teachers works together to learn from each other and help each other.  I am grateful that I have the opportunity to join several other bloggers to help out Tori from Tori's Teacher Tips.  Please click the graphic to head over to the TPT site where you can check out the bundles that are for sale.  And CLICK HERE to read the story behind the fundraiser.

Have a wonderful weekend!!

Spring Colors book {FREEBIE}

A mid-week post!  Can you even believe it??!?  I have a few free minutes while my son is at his church choir practice and I wanted to share this book freebie with you!

My teaching partner and I have parent volunteers come every Thursday to pull kids for small group activities.  Last week, we were trying to decide what to have them do, and my partner had the idea of putting together a Spring-y class book for the first day of Spring.  Perfect!!  She came up with the cute wording for the book and I put the page together.

 They turned out really cute!!

 Oh, I am so READY to see green grass, trees, and flowers again!!!

I loved the ideas that some of my students came up with to match their color.

Here is a copy of the blank page.

Maybe it's something you can use too?

CLICK HERE to grab a copy of this page and the cover from Google Drive!

I like to laminate the pages of my class books, punch them, and bind them with metal rings.  I save all the pages to put in my students' memory books at the end of the year.

Please leave me a comment if you grab it!  I'd love to hear from you!

Happy Wednesday!  Temps are supposed to be OUT of the 20's here tomorrow -- I'm so, so excited for Spring!!! :)

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 {March 21}

Hi there!  Happy Friday!  All I keep hearing about in bloggy world is Spring Break, Spring Break, Spring Break.... I have two more weeks of teaching before Spring Break, and I am crossing my fingers that by the time it rolls around, the temperatures around here feel even a teensy weensy bit like Spring.  Maybe?  Please????  We still have 20's in the forecast for next week and I am just ready to be DONE with that craziness!

ANYWAY.... let's talk about some great things that happened in my classroom this week!

1. One of the kids' favorite things to do on St. Patrick's Day is always the Lucky Charms graph.  My class had lots of fun with this on Monday.  Fun AND delicious!

2. I love making this student reader with my students in March.  We focus so much on reading and books in March, and academic vocabulary is a huge push in my building.  This book checks both boxes and just fits perfectly this time of year.

(This student reader is part of my Three Cheers for Books pack.)

3. I introduced the rules of letter-writing this week as part of our current writing unit.  During one of the mini-lessons, I modeled writing a letter to a friend and used my first name when I signed the letter.  This little guy decided to write a letter to me and used my first name.  He also signed with a heart which is how I always sign my letters to my students.  Made me giggle!

4. Mystery Readers for the WIN!  We are LOVING our Mystery Readers.  The class cheers EVERY morning when they see a mystery reader on our daily schedule.  It's just so much fun.  I take a picture of every reader with their child and the books they read and put them up on the door.  The kids just LOVE having those pictures up in our classroom.  You'll have to use your imagination for what the whole door looks like because I didn't want to post all the photos here, but I have these two signs and lots of stars mixed in with all the photos.

5. Our seeds are starting to sprout and...SURPRISE!  The first seed to sprout is growing in the pebbles!!!

 And the second seed to sprout is growing in the sand!!

The seed in the soil is starting to break through the surface, but I just love the amazement from my students when they see that the seeds in the sand and pebbles actually DO grow!

I hope you've had a great week!!  Enjoy your weekend!

St. Patty's Day Fun

I spent a few hours at school today getting ready for next week, so I took a few photos of the St. Patty's Day fun that we've been having at school...and also some that my students will get to enjoy first thing Monday morning!

Each Friday, we meet with our 4th grade Reading Buddies.  Most weeks, the students read together, but this week they helped us with a St. Patrick's Day craftivity.  We had already done our LEPRECHAUN DIRECTED DRAWINGS in the morning, so my students knew all about leprechauns and pots of gold.  We used Corn Pops cereal as the gold to fill our pots and the Kindergarteners got to color their pots however they wanted.  

This little guy is a HUGE University of Michigan fan. :)

 The pot actually came from a Mailbox magazine many, many years ago, but you could use any that you can find.

 Then, I paired it with this fun writing prompt from Nicole's Straight Up Standards for March pack.  The Kindergarteners did the talking and the 4th graders did the writing.

 This little one cracked me up!  I do LOVE my smelly markers!!!!  Ha!

Aaannnddd.....I got everything set up for my students to discover that those pesky leprechauns DID invade our classroom even though we crossed our fingers and hoped that they wouldn't!  Tricky, tricky little trouble-makers!! (My kids go nuts for this every year.  It is seriously the craziest and most fun way to start the day!)

What fun things do you do in your classroom to celebrate St. Patrick's Day???