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Showing posts with label Kindergarten Common Core. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Kindergarten Common Core. Show all posts

First Day Fun!

Today was our first day of kindergarten for the 2013-2014! It was so much fun!  The children were all sweet and excited to be here.  Today they were strangers, but I know by the end of the year we will be family.

For me, the first day of school is always unique every year.  I try to follow the same plan every year, but I always find something new and different to do.  Like a new management system for lunches or a new way to line up.  Today it was a new way to start off the year writing.

The school that I teach at has very strong academic expectations, especially in writing, which  fits well with the new Common Core emphasis on writing.  This year in my Back-To-School packet I created, I added a writing activity, which now turned into our first class book!  I love doing the class books and especially love at the end of the year when I raffle off the different ones to the students.  What a precious keepsake to have for your lifetime!  Anyway, back to the class book.  I am sharing it with you all, because it was so easy to do and the results were fantastic!

We read the book, Miss Bindergarten Gets Ready For Kindergarten.  It is a great first day of school book to read!  I love it because the pictures are so detailed about all the different things people do to get ready for school!  Plus, the author uses alphabet order for each character, which is really fun as well. After we read the story, I had the class go to free play centers which consisted of legos, books, puzzles, and a special color sheet on which they traced the lines using markers, practicing the fine motor skills.  While the free play centers were happening, I called small groups over to work on the writing page.  I had them draw the pictures describing step by step their own getting ready for kindergarten process.  Then I wrote the caption underneath as they dictated to me what happened.

The results are below!  They did a great job drawing pictures to describe how they got ready for kindergarten that morning.  There were lots of teeth being brushed, lots of pancakes eaten, lots of new backpacks, and lots of car rides to school!  They loved connecting their real-life experience with the book!  Here are the pictures:







I hope you enjoyed seeing their work as much as I did!  I am so excited for this year! Go try this activity with your students!  Happy Writing!


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Am I worried about school starting? Goodness, No! I wear my school shoes, I wear my school shoes....

Happy Thursday y'all!

Today's theme that I uploaded to Miss Amy's Schoolhouse Store is based upon one of my favorite series of books: Pete the Cat!  I love Pete because he tackles fears and worries.  He doesn't let the small stuff get to him because he knows in the end, it will all be good.  It is a great series!  Check out the author's website! Watch this video below:




Because of how awesome Pete is, I just had to create some math and language arts activities based on this book!  Every year, I always have a few kids that love Pete.  Last year, I had a little boy love Pete so much that was all he would listen to in the listening center.  In fact, his friends stop going with him there because they couldn't listen to Pete one more time.  :-)  Here are a sample of the activities:


 


   I created a math activity that orders Pete's guitars from biggest smallest, a mystery picture about the number 4, and in the bottom picture, you can see the parts to make a book report puppet.  I saw the idea for the book report puppet many year ago when I did an author study on Kevin Henkes with my 2nd graders.  I never thought the idea would work well with kindergarten until I started reading more about the Common Core skills.  Here are the directions for assembling the puppet:

Directions:
1.  Have the children complete the “My Favorite Place Pete Rocked His School Shoes Was…”  They can draw the picture of the story and then have an adult write the caption.
2.  (It helps if you can precut all the pieces before giving them to the children.)  Hold the bag like a puppet.  Have them glue the head to the flap created by the bottom of the sack.  
3.  Glue the arms and legs to the bag, followed by gluing on the hands and shoes.
4.  Glue the tail on the back.
5.  Now glue “My Favorite Place Pete Rocked His School Shoes…” paper to Pete’s Belly.
6.  Have the children each stand up in the circle with their puppet on their hand and then tell the class what  about their favorite part of the story

What makes this great for kindergarten is the element of allowing them to DRAW about the book.  When reading the beginning expectations for writing according to Common Core, a light bulb went off.  Of course they can do the book report puppet!  Have them draw and then dictate to the teacher about the picture.  Then they can use the puppet to build those speaking and listening skills by telling the class about their favorite part of the book.  Perfect!  Sometimes the simplest solutions are often complicated by over thinking!

Anyway, I hope that you will check out my theme!  I would love your feedback!  AND I hope that you take time to read to your class Pete the Cat: Rocking In My School Shoes this year as school starts!

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It is Back to School with Common Core!

I finally finished my whole TpT Back-to School theme using the Common Core Skills.  What is a really neat feature just added to TpT is that you can now find items by the exact common core skill!  Makes searching for that perfect lesson or activity that much quicker!  Here are some previews from the theme:



This theme was a lot of fun to make!  I've included all the math activities that I posted about last week, and added several language art activities.  My favorite things in the unit are a Back-To-School version of "I Have, Who Has" and a 4-Square writing activity sorting out school items.   If you have never played "I Have, Who Has," it is a great way to build those speaking and listening skills that not only are required by Common Core, but are also important as a life skill.  Plus, since this version relies heavily on pictures, it is great for emergent readers! Each child is given a card and they say, "I have a____," filling in with the 1st picture on the card.  The child then says, "Who has a ______?" asking the class for the card with the 2nd picture.  Play continues until the end of the cards.  I love using the 4-Square writing method to teach my kindergarteners how to become awesome writers.  The first step is sorting out pictures around a topic.  Since this will be the first one they will do, I've kept it very simple to build confidence and also understanding of the task.  You can visit my store here:  http://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Store/Miss-Amys-Schoolhouse

Today we also find out what little friends we will have in our classrooms this year!  I'm excited to get a brand new crop of eager boys and girls!  School starts on August 14th with an information day, followed by the first full day of school on August 15th! It is coming soon!  When does school start for you?


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Back to School Time: Kindergarten Math Common Core Practice Sheets

     Hello!!! It is that time of year again!  The time I love to walk through Wal-Mart, and Target and see all the fresh new school supplies!  I've always loved buying school supplies, so I guess it is only fitting I became a teacher!  Yesterday I bought myself some NEON Ticonderoga pencils at Target!  They are so fun and only $2.00 for ten!  Miss Amy will have some very special teacher pencils this year!  (By the way, Ticonderoga pencils are the BEST out there.  They are more pricey, but I promise they are more durable than any other brand.  And I should know, after all I teach kindergarten.  They can be pretty destructive!)
    Anyway, also in exciting news, I've finally opened my very own Teacher Pay Teacher store.  I'm starting off small.  My first thing to offer this week is a series of Math activities that are perfect for individual work, whole group work, or even center activities, all around a Back-to-School theme!  It is great to fill in those days before curriculum starts (which we all know can be a headache to try to plan), as a supplement to curriculum, and especially for new teachers to begin to create center activities!  Here are some sample pictures of the activities:



Here is a list of the activities and the corresponding common core skills:
1.Time for Class:  Counting with numbers 1-4. K.CC.1a, K.CC.3a, K.CC.4a)
2.How Many Pencils: Counting and writing numbers 1-4. K.CC.1a, K.CC.3a, K.CC.4a, K.CC.4b)
3.Make a Group of Four: Practice counting to four and adding missing items to create four.  K.CC.4a., K.CC.$4.b-1
4.Count the Kids: Counting and Sorting into a groups practicing numbers 1-4. K.CC.3.a., K.CC.4a, K.CC.4.c
5.Write the Word and Number:  Writing the number and the word for numbers 1-4.
6.Math Vocabulary Anchor Chart cards over Ones and Tens. K.CC1.b
7.&Counting Ones:  Practice counting groups of Ones. K.CC.1.b
8.Making a Ten:  Using cut and paste to make a tens rod. K.CC.1.b
9.  Math Vocabulary Anchor Chart over the Word Above. K.G.1.c
10.Above the Bookcase:  Circling the things “above” in the classroom picture. K.G.1.c
11.Biggest to Smallest:  Sorting and placing items in order from biggest to smallest. K.MD.3.a
12.How Do You Go To School?: Graphing activity with the whole group to find out how the students go to school. K.MD.3.b.
13.All About Squares: Anchor Chart to show the basic attributes of a square. K.G.1.a, K.G.4.a
14.Find the Squares: Students will circle the items that are square shapes. K.G.1.a, K.G.1.b, K.G..2
15.Draw a Square: Students can draw their own object that is a square shape. K.G.1.a, K.G.1.b, K.G.5.a
Come and check out my TpT store at Miss Amy's Schoolhouse! I'm currently offering the whole math theme at a discounted price for August, and if you aren't ready to commit, I have a free sample available as well!  Happy Back-to School shopping!

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