Building Number Sense

Working on number sense is very important.  We do daily number talks to help us understand how others understand math concepts and to expand our own thinking.

I also like to give my kids many opportunities to build number sense.  Here we are playing a favorite game called "Bears in Caves".  It's from the Math Their Way curriculum and I've been using it for years and years and years.  It is a fantastic activity for working on composing and decomposing numbers.

To play the game: Each child gets 5 bears, a bowl to serve as the cave, and a wall to shield the players as they set up their caves.  One student holds up the wall and they each player chooses an amount of bears to put inside the cave and to leave outside.  I have my kids put the bears on top of the bowl so they can see them easier.  When both players are ready, the wall gets removed and the students study the other player's cave deciding how many bears are hiding inside the cave based on how many they see outside.  They ask each other, "How many bears are in the cave?" and lift the cave showing the amount after the other player answers the question.

My kids could play this for hours.  In kindergarten we expect number sense mastery to five so this game really helps build that for my kiddos.  

After they have a firm grasp of number concept to five, then I will add 5 more bears and we will work on composing and decomposing numbers to 10.  You can take this simple activity and adapt it for centers or add a recording sheet, but I like to keep it pure.  I always have the bears and caves materials in a handy location and I will deploy this game if we have a few extra minutes in our busy schedules.  It's a great sponge activity with tons of learning packed inside.

Leave a Comment Common Core, Fun Stuff, Math

Top 3 Wish-listed Items- Linky Party

Here are my top 3 Wish-listed items in my store- on sale for 28% off during TpT's Cyber Sale.

Are you looking for engaging reading passages to use for Close Reading?  I looked far and wide and decided to create these passages to use with my higher level readers.  Kids love animals so I made a list and asked my husband (who is really a big kid at heart) which animals he would like to read about.    I used his top picks and made challenging yet not too difficult reading passages for my kiddos.  I used them in my reading groups before putting them on TpT.  (After all, if I don't think it's a great product- it's not making it in my store!)

Next we have a great report writing resource that combines learning about farm animals with writing about them.  

I made these to use during our Farm Animal Unit.  

As you know, kids come in all sizes, shapes and levels.  I made this differentiated to scaffold the writing for my struggling students and very open ended for my confident writers.  There are directions for directed drawings of the animals, close reading passages to get information, differentiated rough draft and final copy pages, and so much more.  

These are a great introduction to report writing and research.  

And finally, here is my top wish listed science activity.

These activities are hands-on and really make the kids think.  They are given basic information about pushes, pulls and force and then they are challenged to complete different activities.  

These are perfect for cooperative groups!  Kids really need to work together to problem solve and come up with the solutions.

Click here to take a closer look.

Thanks for stopping by and taking a look at some of my most sought after products.  

Head back to Daisy Designs for more great TpT authors and the fun Linky Party!

Cheryl Irick

Leave a Comment Common Core, Linky Party, Literacy Actvities, Science, Writing

Starting School and Stocking Up Sale

Have you started your school year already?  Some friends of mine have, but I still have a week to set up my classroom and attend district meetings.  I've spent some time over the summer planning for the new school year, but I mostly gave myself the summer off to recharge my batteries.

With school starting one short week away, I've got my head back in the game and I'm busy prepping and planning my heart out.  With that being said, I've been scouring TpT and making a HUGE wishlist of items that I think will be perfect for this year.

You can imagine how excited I was to hear that TpT is having a one day sale- TOMORROW!!

I'm going to use that sale to my advantage and get some of the things on my wishlist.  Hooray!!

Of course, I've set everything in my own store at 20% off as well so stop by and take a look.

My Animal Facts Comprehension Sheets are great for young readers.  They are filled with fun facts about different animals and they have two different comprehension sheets to go along with each non-fiction reading passage.  My high readers are really engaged and ask for them all the time.

You might also like my Just a Dot- Not a Lot Pack.  It's full of fun songs and chants to help with classroom management.  We sing the songs when we are lining up, walking down the hall, glueing projects, coming to the rug, etc.  I have the songs posted in different areas of my room so substitutes can sing them as well.  I find that helps the day run more smoothly when I'm gone.

Even though it's sale time, I have a ton of great free stuff as well.  Looking to get organized this school year?  Try these great binders labels.  Organize by month and planning is a breeze, just grab the binder for the month and everything is at your fingertips!

Leave a Comment Back to School, Common Core, Literacy Actvities

Helping Emergent Writers With Spacing

I love teaching writing to new writers.  It's so fun to watch them move through the writing process.   I've been teaching writing FOREVER so I have a lot of tricks up my sleeve.  One of my "tricks" is Spaghetti and Meatball Spaces.

What are those you ask?  Well, I have cute posters that I hang up in my writing center and sheets that I put in their writing folders to help kids learn how to space letters both in words and between words.
It's a fun recipe for success.  (yeah, I went there)

This is a poster that I put in the writing center

To begin, I use a stick of spaghetti to show how the letters in a word are right next to each other, but they don't actually touch.  These small spaces are called spaghetti spaces.  We then practice spaghetti spaces by writing our names a few times on white boards.  We squish the letters together, we spread the letters out, we use perfect "spaghetti" spacing.  It's a fun mini-lesson.

This is the sheet that I put in their writing folders.

For another mini-lesson, I write a sentence or two with no spaces between the words and I have kids try to read it.  We look for high frequency words, sounds that might make a word, etc.  It's really fun and really tough, but it demonstrates the need for spaces between the words.

Once that the kids understand how important spacing is, I give them their very own Meatball Stick.  They keep this in their writing folders and I have a small basket of them by my small group table.  I show the kids how to place the meatball after a word to help them leave the big (but not too big) space between the words.

These Meatball Sticks are super easy to make.  Just take a box of large craft sticks (tongue depressors) and glue a brown pom pom on the end.  The pom pom is the meatball.

Kids love the novelty of using the Meatball Sticks and find them very helpful when they are learning to write.  I can   quickly remind them to use the Meatball Stick and then they are practicing the skill the entire time they are writing.

You can click on any photo to get these posters for your own classroom.  

Thanks for stopping by!

Leave a Comment Common Core, Writing

Building Letter/Sound Fluency

As you know by now, I'm teaching EAK- Early Admission Kindergarten to the kiddos in my district that turn 5 between December and March.  We are working very hard on learning our letters and sounds and believe it or not, a handful of my little ones are just beginning to decode simple CVC words!

Kindergarten is such an exciting grade.  I LOVE teaching kids how to read and write!

Here is a fun game that I play with my small groups to help everyone learn their letters and sounds.

You can play it multiple ways, depending on what skills your kids need.  Usually we do it looking for the names of the letters, but sometimes we will play it saying the letter's sound.  By mixing it up, it keeps it new and exciting- AND- versatile!

Just click here or on either of the photos to grab your FREE copy of this game.

There will be a big Teacher Appreciation Sale on TpT this week so stop by and grab the things on your wish list.  All of my items will be 20% off along with the TpT additional 10% discount.  Use the promo code: CELEBRATE to get all your discounts!

Thanks for stopping by!

Leave a Comment Back to School, Common Core, Fun Stuff, Literacy Actvities

Rhyming Fun with Green Eggs and Ham

Rhyming is so important as a pre-reading skill so we work on it a lot in my classroom.  I love March because I love Dr. Seuss.  His books are so engaging for young kids and I love the messages within.  They touch on so many deep concepts and really get discussions flowing.  But that's not the reason for this post (stay focused Cheryl).  

I want to share with you one of my kiddos favorite literacy center activities- my Green Eggs and Ham Rhyming Center.  I call it a center because kids can work independently if they can decode CVC words, but you can also do it as a small group activity (which is what I'm going to do this year with my TK kiddos as many of them aren't decoding yet).  

It's a ton of fun.  Kids use a real spatula to scoop up an egg and place it into a small frying pan.  (I use a small plastic frypan from my kitchen housekeeping center).  They read the word on the egg then look for the ham that rhymes with it.  When they find that, they scoop that ham up with the spatula and place it into the frying pan to "cook."  When the eggs and ham are done cooking, the kids remove them and write the words on the recording sheet.  They can then put those two rhymes aside and start again on a new egg/ham match.

This activity is awesome because they are reading simple CVC words, listening for rhymes (phonemic awareness), and writing!    You can grab this at my TpT store.  It's simple to prep and easy to store.  I keep mine in a gallon ziplock bag.

This is a great activity to have set up when you are cooking green eggs and ham with your class.

Leave a Comment Common Core, Fun Stuff, Literacy Actvities, Literacy Centers, Writing

Glyphs

Do you use glyphs in your classroom?  I love to use glyphs in my classroom.  Why?  Well, glyphs are a great way to collect data about my class.  I ask kids some questions, and based on their answers they build a cute art project.  You display this art in your math center and go back to the art to collect and analyze the data.  Here is my view of what a glyph is in a nutshell...

I make seasonal glyphs:

I connect glyphs to my units of study.

I also love to make glyphs just for the fun of it.

My kindergartners always need more cutting activities to strengthen their fine motor muscles and glyphs are a great (and fun) way to do that.

Here is my latest glyph... a Teddy Bear Glyph.

It comes with all this and will be available for only $1 for the next 3 days.  

If you have never made a glyph before, this is the perfect opportunity to give one a try.  Kids love them, they make an adorable bulletin board, and the bulletin board is not static; you will revisit it time and time again to collect and analyze the data displayed.  Administrators love it!

Leave a Comment Bulletin Boards, Common Core, Fun Stuff, Glyphs, Math

Oh Snap! It's Almost October!

I'm linking up with the fantastic bloggers over at Teacher Deals and Dollar $teals for their fun (and helpful) Oh Snap! It's Almost October! linky party.

I know that school just started, but it's already the middle of September and that means that October is right around the corner, (YIKES) so it's time to start prepping and planning for next month. (Some people might find that a chore- but I secretly love it!)

Here is one of my favorite activities for October.

I love having my kids work on Logic Puzzles.  It helps them with critical thinking skills and problem solving.  My kiddos love it because they only have to read simple words and follow the picture clues. The cards are self-checking so when they are done they just need to turn the card over to check to see if they got it right.

I also love this activity for October because the Wild Kids are dressed in costumes (like Halloween) but it's connected to literature so it's not Halloweeny (is that a real word?).  So if you aren't allowed to do Halloween related things, you can still do this!  Win-Win!

Pop on over to my store to grab this for yourself.

Once you use these logic puzzles, you will want them all.  

I keep one of my math center bins filled with logic puzzles.  I change them out to keep it fresh and interesting for the kids, but the beauty of this task is that you only have to explain it once and they can do them all!  Just change the theme of the puzzles and you've got a new center- voila!  Easy peasy!

And the best part is that you can grab these for only $1 for the next two days.
That's the perfect way to try them out to see if you like them.

Thanks for stopping by!
Click here to head back over to the linky party.

Leave a Comment Common Core, Linky Party, Math, Math Centers, Teacher Deals and Dollar Steals

Oh Snap! It's Almost August!

Can you believe that it's almost August?  Where has the summer gone?

If you are like me, you are starting to plan for the upcoming school year.  Join this fun link up and find some great resources for the upcoming school year.

The wonderful bloggers at 

are starting a monthly link up where we can all share our favorite resource for the upcoming month.  Isn't that perfect?!  It's just what I need to stay ahead of the curve and on my game.  

Since it is almost August, I'm thinking about the start of the new school year.  I contemplate what worked well last year and what things can be improved.  

Last year I really LOVED my calendar wall.  Why, you ask?  Well, I took my old standard calendar and updated it with more math stuff.  I began with the standard monthly calendar where we turn the cards over each day to reveal the number and the pattern.  We do Yesterday was ____, Today is ____, and Tomorrow will be ___, (those are the teddy bears).  I also have the daily add a straw count that groups ones, tens and hundreds.  I have the months of the year (train) and the days of the week.  The teddy bears in the trains are the kid's birthdays (they each decorated a die cut teddy bear and I put them in the train far for the month).  And of course we have the 100 chart and the weather.

Most of the items were purchased at teacher stores, but I got the weather from here and the day, month, year strips and the days in school from this website.

The number of the day and the shapes are part of my Calendar Companion.  I also have worksheets that my students use to learn about the different parts of the calendar.  

I also have a daily schedule cards that we review in the morning so the kids know what things we will be covering that day.  You can grab these for just $1 for the next 3 days!  I laminated these and put them on velcro.  I can rearrange them based on the day and the things that we will be doing. (The schedule cards are the pencil shaped cards that are hanging under the clock).

I encourage you to browse around the links to see what things you can add to your calendar wall.

Click here for a FREEBIE!  It's just one small part of my Calendar Companion.

Just slide it in a page protector and staple it to your calendar wall.  Use a dry erase marker to count the number of girls and boys at school each day.  I have my calendar helper do this each day.

Check my Freebies section for more fun FREE stuff.

Thanks for stopping by my blog!  Hop on over to the next great blog and get more great STEALS AND DEALS for August.  Link up your own great product/tip for August.  Enjoy the rest of your summer!

An InLinkz Link-up

Leave a Comment Back to School, Bulletin Boards, Classroom Set Up, Common Core, Math, Teacher Deals and Dollar Steals

Informational Writing with Kindergartners- Farm Animal Reports

Kindergartners love non-fiction text.  They LOVE learning about animals and can store many facts in their little brains.  They are like fact sponges.

The challenge is how to get all the knowledge from their little brains to the page.  My Farm Animal Report Unit will help with that!

Kindergartners can write reports.  Really!  They just need the structure and the scaffolding to do so.

I'm so pleased with how these reports turned out.  Writing them was so simple and the kids were guided through the process step by step.

Each animal had a Close Read passage and the kids loved underlining, highlighting, and drawing their notes.






To show you how cute my farm animal reports turned out this year,  I just picked one at random and took a photo of each page in the book.

I just love how the directed drawings of the animals turned out.  They look so cute on the page next to the report.

I have a TON of non-fiction books on different farm animals.  We read them ALL when we are studying about the farm and the kids love to find discrepancies among texts.  For instance, many texts say that pigs like to roll in mud, but in reality (as my kids have learned) pigs like to stay cool and prefer to go in clean water, but will resort to mud if that is the best available cooling source.

My kiddos also learned that cows are always female.   You might have already know that fact, but for city folk like us, that was news to most, if not ALL of my kids!   We routinely call all cattle "cows" and sadly, I'm no exception.

It's those fun little facts that spark kid's interest and those are the fact that they include in their reports.  My kids will be taking their reports home tomorrow and are so excited to share them with their parents.

 You can find these in my TpT store.  Just click on this link and it will take you there.

This report was written by a different student, but I just love how the cow is peeking around the barn, so I had to take a picture to show you guys.  Such personality!

I hope you enjoy these as much as I have.  The kids are pretty proud of them too!

1 comment Common Core, Literacy Actvities, Science, Writing