Freebies, Lapbooks, and Math Tubs..oh my!

Yay for getting my act together for two weeks in a row!!!  Also...a super yay/ holla that there are only 12 days of school left.  Which is exciting in and of itself, but that also meant my favorite day for our A-Z countdown: N for Nachos!!!! 

Another Five for Friday, which is seriously the perfect way to sum up the week.  Thank you Doodle Bugs Teaching! 
Here we go:

1. Finally set myself up with an Instagram.  I'm so excited, because I love my personal Instagram, and I know this one is going to make it hard to pry myself away from my phone!  Can't wait to hashtag all my firstie fun.  #hashtaggingiscool @FirstGradeWolves
2. We have been all about the lapbooks this week.  I found a picture on Pinterest of one for Thomas Edison.  It was for upper grades, but it only showed the front cover.  I decided to make one for my firsties that used content aligned with our district curriculum.  If you want any of the sheets from that lapbook, you can click on the picture below to download. 

 

Then we also made a lapbook for the book Mouse Soup.  We read a little bit each day, and we did a different activity after each lesson.  I used the I-Can summarize from the Guided Reading Flip Flap Books by Simply Skilled in Second.  I love all the flip-flap books in this packet...you should really pick it up.  I made the pocket full of predictions modeled after her pocket full of Author's Purpose, because I really wanted my kiddos who were about to do the higher level DRA soon to practice making quality predictions using the words might or maybe.  If you want a copy of the pocket full of predictions click on the picture below to download a copy. 

3. We are learning all about the suffixes er and est.  This amazing packet from The Teacher Wife is what I bought to use for this, and my students love it.  They especially like the spinner bingo game, and they actually cheered when I said I would keep it in centers next week.    Thank you, Lindsey!  You guys should all buy this thing.  Who doesn't love phonics games mixed with superheros!?1?

4. In DRA-LPAC prep-math assessment-desperation mode, I made this quick little worksheet for my kids to practice using their balances and using the weight vocabulary while I was busy testing.  They loved it!  You can click on the picture below to download a copy for yourself.  (Don't worry, I went back and added a border before uploading it to Google Drive once I was less frantic.)   :)

 

 5. In my last post, I talked about the fact that I have a *relatively* new student who is legally blind.  Which meant that all those cute match and record card games I had been using for math tubs from all of you fabulous bloggers just weren't going to work, unless or until I learned how to adapt them for her.  I found out right away that they had playing cards in Braille, and I got straight to work making some review math tubs that used nothing but a deck of cards, paper, and a few plastic bags to hold them all.  Also,  yay for the Dollar Tree with their 2 decks for a dollar!  There are six math tubs.  One is place value with two-digit number, word form, expanded notation, and a model.  There is a fact family tub, a counting on tub, a subtraction tub, a parts of a set tub, and a certain or impossible tub.  They are really easy to prep and use.  My kids really enjoyed using them for several weeks and my newest student got to be totally involved as well.  It was awesome!  Sadly, I was so frazzled that I forgot to take pictures of them in use.  :(   Ah well...there's always next time.  If you want to buy these math activities, they are for sale in my TpT shop.  You can click on the picture below to purchase.

 

 

 And an unofficial #6...my daughter and I got this movie from the redbox last night, and it was sooooo good.  If you haven't seen it, I highly recommend it.  Tons of laughs and a tearjerker too!

  

 

Have a wonderful weekend! 

 

Spring has Sprung...Pictures and a Craftivity!

So, today my students were using all of the plastic egg activities that I talked about in my last blog post, and they were all having so much fun.  Well, all of them except that one student who was busy trying to wipe off the marker from the egg.  I know you know who that is, cause you have a student just like it.  ;)  Anyway, I had to share a couple of pictures with you guys of the math tub activities.  The first two are how I store my math tubs each week (except they are not usually in Easter baskets of course), and then the other pictures are the tubs in action.

 

 

If you want to buy these activities from TpT store to use this week or the week after Easter, click here.  :)

This week we are also working on our Spring Chick Craftivity in my follow directions center.  Because we don't have time to spend during the day devoted to just doing a craft with the kiddos, then we incorporate them into the read and follow directions center.  One of our student expectations is that they are able to read and follow written directions with picture clues, so this fits right in.  Here is a picture of how I set that up in my classroom.

 

 

Last year, my teaching partner and I wrote up all of these activities, and now I have a cardboard box that was meant for borders that I store all the sentence strips in and a file folder crate with hanging files that I store the examples and hard copies in.  It is a beautiful thing having them done for every week of the year, let me tell you.  I have made two or three new ones this year, but for the most part, this is one center that I praise the Lord for that I don't have to think too hard about.  Whew!!!!  Plus the kids get to spend time coloring, cutting, gluing, creating, etc....all the stuff they need and love to do. 

The science and writing portions of the activity will be done in the writing center or during science or writing instruction time.  This packet comes with colored and black-and-white versions of a chicken's life cycle and an organizer to order them.  It comes with a planning page for writing about the three stages.  It has a half-sheet and a whole-sheet publishing page to write about the stages of the life cycle.  Then it has the templates for creating the Spring Chick to go with their writing.  This is perfect for Easter time or for spring time when most curriculums cover life science.  If you were doing it away from Easter time, they could just make the shells of the egg white or brown.   I just have them make it more festive in honor of the holiday.  :)  Click on the preview below to purchase your copy of this craftivity in my TpT store, and please comment if you have any questions or feedback.  Enjoy!

Math and Literacy with a Basket of Eggs.....Plus a Freebie!

I just love when I can use one thing a million different ways.  I made Reagan's fabulous Phon-eggs and it got me to thinking...what else can I do with plastic eggs.  I typically have four math tubs a week, and the kids catch up or do free centers on Friday.  I also have various amounts of literacy centers each week.  My goal was to make four math and four literacy activities, and I did it!  Success!  One of the activities is available below as a freebie, but you can get all eight centers here in my TpT store.  Plus if you buy it today or tomorrow, you can get it for half-price.  Score!  The math tubs include: "Eggspanded" Notation (matching the number and the expanded notation written on the top and bottom halves of the eggs), "Eggsact" Change (counting coins inside the egg), "Eggstraordinary" Math Facts (matching addition facts written on eggs), and Time to "Hatch" (reading the analog clocks inside the eggs).  The literacy centers include: "Eggstra, Eggstra!" Read all About It! (writing prompts inside eggs with writing paper), "Eggcellent" Compound Words (matching base words written on the tops and bottoms of the eggs to make compound words), Nouns and Verbs Are so "Eggciting" (reading the words inside the eggs and recording as either a noun or a verb), "Scrambled" Word Wall Words which is described in detail below, as it is available for a freebie.  All of the activities have cover pages and recording sheets.

I already have some easter baskets that I got at the good ol' Dollar Tree, and I bought a bunch of the cheap colorful eggs from Wal-Mart.  Mostly  I bought a bunch of the smallish, regular sized eggs, but I did get some of the larger eggs too.  I used the larger eggs for this freebie literacy activity, because they hold the magnet letters better. 

 

 

For this activity, you can put either magnet letters or paper letters inside the eggs.  The letters should spell a word from your word wall when it is "unscrambled".  (hehe)  Once the kids have the word wall word figured out, they will record it on the recording sheet.  You can either make 9 or 18 eggs, as I have the recording sheets for both.  I made 18, cause I have some super fast, super smart firsties that need the extra challenge.  :)  Click on the picture below to grab this freebie for your classroom, and don't forget...comments=love. :) 

 Last, I wanted to share a picture of what my firsties got when they got back from spring break today.  They were so excited, and it made our first day back so much more fun!  Have a great week!

Friday Freebie: Spin and Add February Style

I'm just so excited that it's Friday, y'all.  The weeks are getting longer, but I know it will be summer before I know it.  For now, I am just going to bask in the glory of all things pink and Valentine-licious.  I just love February!  We are always trying to make games and activities for our firsties to practice their math facts, and so I created this little guy here for my favorite month!  It's a spin and add game.  Simple...they just spin and add.  :)  Spin the first spinner with a pencil and a paper clip, then spin the second spinner, and then add the two numbers together.  They record the number sentence on the recording sheet.  Easy peasy.  I included pictures of the candy hearts in the spinner for the sweet babies that need to count 'em up, but I will encourage others to count on with their fingers or use the facts they already know.  You could also give them some candy hearts to count up if you're feeling up to it.  :)  Just click on the picture to download a free copy and feel free to leave me a comment if you enjoy it!  Happy Friday!

Also, you can check out some other fabulous freebies at over at Teaching First.  Click the button below to check it out.

A Little Unit for Firsties at Halloween

So, after a couple of weeks of school I was ready to create some math tub activites that were Halloween themed.  I used what we have already been doing in our classroom, so that the activities would be a good review for my kids.  This is a 53-page unit that has a math tub for time to the hour, place value to 50, comparing numbers, and a spin and graph activity.  I also made a noun and verb sort, an ABC order activity, a fact and opinion sort, a making words activity and two litte seasonal writing pages.  You can buy it in my TPT store here. :)