Taking care of business!

Morning business that is!  That is what we call our morning routine.  Hi!  This is Hilary from Second Grade is out of This World and I am here to share our morning business routine with you today.

This is the poster that I made of our routine.  These are the things that the kiddos need to work on before the announcements come on.

After the announcements are over, I play our gathering song:

I have the video saved to my ipad.  As soon as the kiddos hear the song they know to gather in a circle on the carpet for our morning meeting.

We start by passing around our class mascot Dwight and sharing something.  It varies daily.

After sharing time, we go through our "Dailies".  Word of the day, number of the day, and then the last skill varies.  In the picture we worked on analogies.  If you would like to see more options, click the picture.

Then, we read our Poem of the Week:

We end our morning meeting (usually) with a story.  Sometimes it is a just for fun story, sometime it is the book that I plan to use for the day for our reading and/or writing lesson.  All of this usually takes 20-30 minutes.

How does your class take care of business?

Pointers!

I love using pointers in my classroom!  

It helps my kiddos stay engaged in the reading AND helps me keep my sanity! 

Over the years I've used lots of things for pointers, but have found a few that I really LOVE!  I know plain old fingers work well too….but for some reason they just don't hold the same appeal as these other ideas! ;-)

One of my favorite pointers is a finger laser light.  They are small and bright, and students simply slip it on their finger.  It provides novelty and motivation, and my students know if they don't use it correctly--they don't use it.  

A super easy pointer can be found by picking up drink stirrers from most party stores. 

I found these plastic drink stirrers at the Dollar Tree!

Last year, during the week of Valentine's Day…. students used Dum Dums & other suckers as a special pointer.  Students kept the same "pointer" all week…..and at the end of the week…..

they were able to take it home as a special treat.  

 For reluctant readers, I will sometimes allow them to use my teacher pointer.  It is huge compared to the normal student pointers I have, so it provides a little laugh and seems to help students feel more confident about reading.  It's silly, but they seem to like it!

You know those plastic bubble wands?  They make great pointers too.  

They are especially handy to help students highlight or find words in their text.

And sometimes….when we're feeling super silly……we might just use a little dot of glue….and a googly eye….and turn our plain old finger into an amazing pointer to help us keep our "eye" on our reading!!  Try it---Your kids will love it!

 There are tons more ideas on Pinterest!  Just do a search for reading pointers and I'll bet you can find lots of creative ideas to use in your own classroom.

Tackling Tricky Sounds ~ Silent e & Bossy R

I introduce r-controlled vowels as "Bossy R" because the R always bosses the vowels around. In Kindergarten, this idea is much more fun than calling them r-controlled vowels. :) I found this video on YouTube by Preschool Prep Company called Controlling R Song. It's has a catchy tune for the kids to pick up on and remember what the job of Bossy R is. I use this video when introducing this concept. 

Since this is a difficult skill, especially in Kindergarten, I decided to make up my own Bossy R Bundle full of games. I used these cards in my pocket chart when working as a whole group on Bossy R.  I passed out the word cards, students had to read them, and come up and match it to the picture in the pocket chart. Now they can play this game independently at centers or they can turn it into a memory game. 

To see if my students are actually reading Bossy R words, I made up this worksheet so they have to draw the picture after they read the word. I have a lot of kids that love to draw, so this way I can incorporate that into their literacy time. 

I put this game in centers for students to practice reading the Bossy R word or saying what Bossy R sound they hear in the picture. They can then roll the dice and move around the game board. 

To work on filling in the correct sound, students would use these popsicle sticks and place the correct sound in the middle of the word. I put the answer on the back, so these can be self-checking. 

When introducing silent e (as I call it), I tell them that silent e has to remain quiet, gets mad that he can't talk, so he pinches the vowel and makes it say its name. I found this Silent e Song on YouTube also by Preschool Prep Company. It's another fun way to teach students that the e at the end of the word, makes the vowel say it's name.

I also made a Silent e Bundle to use in our literacy centers as well. Many of the games are very similar to the Bossy R Bundle, so students will already know the game format. For the game below, students have to read the word before they can roll the dice and move around the game board. 

We used these cards in our pocket chart as a whole group, just as we did for Bossy R. Now they are in centers as well.

My students have a lot of fun using these pointers to turn CVC words into CVCe words. 

To get some more practice with Silent e and Bossy R, I use Starfall's "Learn to Read" page that has games for both skills! These games have students fill in the missing sounds to spell the word that matches the picture shown. 

You can grab the Bossy R and Silent e Bundles in my TPT store by clicking the pictures below! 

  

Reusing for Earth Day

Earth Day is coming up this week so I thought I would share with you one way we reuse in my classroom. I just used these in my classroom on Friday when we were doing art so it is fresh in my mind.

I am not sure exactly when I had this idea but I know that it has made painting in my classroom a whole lot easier and clutter free. Being a teacher I like to "collect" many old things. Yup you know the saying "a teacher can find use out of someone else's garbage." Well that is exactly what I do.

Many of my students bring in lunchables for lunch time and there is SOOOO much garbage. One day I thought there has to be a use for them. Well there is !!! I have my students save them and we use them as paint containers. Genius I know :) Of course the paper outer wrap goes in the recycling.

Instead of students carefully putting multiple containers of paint on their desk or table and hoping it doesn't get knocked over all they have is ONE container with multiple paint colors in it. Yay! Less mess. These containers usually come with 3 or 4 compartments in them. 

The plastic containers are super easy to clean and stack nicely in the cupboard. I have used both tempera and acrylic paints in the containers and they both wash out easily. I love finding useful tools and even better that this one can be recycled and avoid the landfills for a little longer !

I hope this tip helps keep your art time a little less cluttered and your garbage cans emptier.

Cheers,

Build A Bunny!

Happy Spring!

I'm Deirdre here from A Burst of First.

We had a blast building these adorable bunnies last week!

I had to share them with you!

All the template freebies are at the end!

Grab all the templates for this craft {here}.

Once our bunnies were complete we wrote 

about them on this "Find My Bunny" page. 

At our Open House the kids will read this to 

their families and try to have them find their bunny. 

There are two prompt pages for easy differentiation. 

Grab these {here}.

One last final peek at these super cuties!

I'd love for you to visit me at my blog 

A Burst of First 

for more fun tips, tricks and ideas!

A few Apps that will make your job easier

Hello Friends from Who's Whoville.  

I'm Deniece from This Little Piggy Reads.

Teachers are always sharing APPS that will help student achievement and increase engagement. Don't get me wrong, I love those, I even collect them.  But, today I want to share a few APPS that might make your job as a teacher a little easier. Disclaimer: I am NOT representing any of the following companies, nor am I being reimbursed financially in any way. 

So, the first APP I am excited to share is Running Record Calculator.  If you do Running Records, you know that they can be time consuming, but a necessary evil.  Running Record Calculator has a FREE & paid version.  The paid version costs about $4.  The major difference I notice is that you can email the results of the paid APP. You could train parents and volunteers to use this APP.  This will definitely cut down on your time with tedious math.  I think it's worth the $4 investment.

Stick Pick is a really cool APP that replaces the buckets full of craft sticks (that somehow end up on the floor daily).  It also has an amazing feature...it gives you Question Stems (ESL, Bloom's, etc...).  It also lets you track data...YES, you heard me!  TRACK DATA.  I think $4 is a bargain for this APP.  

This last APP is called Air Projector.  If you don't have an ELMO (like me), this will be your new BFF, I promise.  It allows you to project what is on your iPhone or iPad to your computer screen, thus onto your projector.  Yes, I know....it's wonderful, but wait...it's FREE!!  

This Little Piggy wants to know, have you found any APP's that help with your job?

3 TIPS for Kinder Math Success

Hi EVERYONE!  It’s Kimberly from Loving Kinders!  I am very grateful to be posting as a guest author today at Who’s Who and New.   I LOVE THIS blog.  It gives us so many amazing tips and tricks.  So, today I wanted to share with you my tips when teaching math!

#1 Engage THE Learner

I find Interactive Notebooks are a great way to ENGAGE my students.  Actually, they are a HUGE hit in my class. 

This is why:

I put the students in charge. -They LOVE THIS! I use a document camera and allow one student to be the “teacher model” and they assemble the page for the class. We note ALL of the steps on the board and the students take off on their page.

Now… Be AWARE!

I will tell you that Interactive Notebooks in kindergarten are NOT easy so don’t get involved if you don’t want to take TIME to TEACH each child how to assemble the pages and to show them your OWN expectations. For instance, we cut triangles on each page for bookmarks, we ONLY use glue sticks, and we NEVER rush with our work.

My students are experts now!

Now, every TUESDAY we have our interactive notebook time and my kinders are

ENGAGED and PROUD!

#2 EVERYONE needs to respond

I am sure that you agree, when teaching any subject area if you only call on one person for an answer then only ONE person is engaged. That is why I always use

TURN AND TALK

OR

-my new FAV-

LEAN AND TELL

with everything MATH lesson.  The key is now how to use it.  TURN and TALK is ONLY for longer answers where there needs to be discussion.  LEAN and TELL is a one-word only answer.  My kids love using both during our lessons.  Today I taught time and we made clocks.  The kinders walked around the room turning and talking with neighbors for about 12 minutes.  I stood back and watched the magic happen.

#True teacher moment

#3 Memorization

With so many teaching styles and the ever-changing student population, sometimes we fail to remember that memorization is a skill that needs to be developed, especially with math facts.  I have a daughter with dyslexia and when she was learning her math facts it was very important for her to have her math facts memorized.

This only assisted her math development.  I use math fact rings.  I make them for the students and they take them home for on-going practice.  I often have “bag checks” and review facts with my kinders. This helps with fact fluency.

I hope you were able to take some ideas with you and I thank you for reading and teaching!

Until Next time... 

Here are the products I used.