Disguise a Turkey and Another Freebie

My grade level participated in the "Disguise a Turkey" activity this year. It was h-i-l-a-r-i-o-u-s to see some of the ideas the kids and their parents came up with!! We just sent a note and a blank turkey home with each student. Here are a few honorable mentions:

Gotta love the hairy chest!!

Blurry, but you get the idea.

My favorite one! A KISS turkey!!! Bahahahaha!

A sweet little Christmas tree! :)

Da-na-na-na-na-na-na-na Batman!!

Silly clown! :P

I am diggin' the dress!

And I know that it is past Thanksgiving, but feel free to download this Thanksgiving activity we did and file it away for next year! The cute turkey is from Lettering Delights. Click on the image to download the document.

MORE Writing Freebies!

Happy Saturday evening!!

I hope you had a chance to comment and win a FREE copy of my Magic e Activity Pack! If not, click here to head on over to the post.

Speaking of free, I have some freebie writing activities to share with you. You may recall this Finger Spacing Sort I posted a few months ago. Well, I created one just like it when we introduced capital letters at the beginning of sentences. It was a nice and quick assessment of their understanding. Grab your copy below!

Also, I made a Personal Word Wall to go into our Writer's Notebooks. The students will add names and other words that they frequently use. It serves as a quick reference for them. (My students were very excited about this, by the way! So excited that we now have to go back and reinforce the importance of spelling the words correctly when you add them to the page!) :) You can grab a copy of this as well! It is meant to be copied front-to-back and then hole-punched, so I adjusted the margins accordingly.

Oh, and don't forget about the TN sale and the TPT sale!! You can save all sorts of money! And my shops are both 20% off! :)

Magic e Activity Pack!

Well, it has been a month since my last post. In this past month, I have logged into Blogger maybe 4 or 5 times. The other day I actually visited a few blogs and even left comments!! I am finally into the swing of things at school BUT I have packed one house and moved into another in the last 2 months!! What a not-so pleasant experience!!!!

Anyway, I was struck with inspiration last night and went with it! I created a NEW pack that has NOTHING to do with math! {insert sounds of shock and awe here} I have actually created a Magic e Activity Pack!! I am REALLY loving teaching phonics and have all sorts of ideas for products to create. I hope you enjoy this first one.

It includes:
-word slider
-poem
-mystery picture coloring page
-magic e mat
-wand activity
-word stamp
-practice pages
-magic e minibook

BONUS: ActivInspire flipchart (Promethean) with Magic e practice

I have not shared any flipcharts yet, but I really hope to start soon because I can make a meeeeaaannnnn flipchart! (If I do say so myself...)

Check out the products by clicking below:

Leave your name and email below and I will send a FREE copy of my Magic e Activity Pack to three randomly chosen people.  Winners have been notified. Thanks for entering! :)

Thanks for sticking with me!! ;)


And please take advantage of these super sales!! I am having a 20% off sale in both of my stores!! :)

Patterns Fun!!

Alright, here goes--first real post in a LOOOONG time!! :) Yay!! :)

So we have done a BUNCH of awesome little activities in first grade so far! I wish I had time to share all of them with you!!! I have been snapping pictures like crazy so I will have to share at least some of them!

First up--we began our patterns unit last week. The kids always get REALLY excited when we talk about anything that has to do patterns (or pat-er-rens, as they tend to say!). On Friday afternoon, we practiced extending a pattern and identifying a pattern's core. I gave the kids a strip of paper with a pattern on it and they replicated and extended it using macaroni noodles and a sentence strip to put the macaroni on. We also practiced identifying the pattern's core and separated it using a popsicle stick. Of course, I have no pictures of this portion of our activity...or any part of it all, actually! I snapped the following ones at home! :/ After we practiced that for a while, I decided to let them have a little Friday afternoon fun and come up with their own patterns! Here are some of the good ones:

The kids labeled the patterns with letters (A, B, etc.) and circled the core of their pattern (kind of hard to see). Aren't they good?? ;)

They also got a fine motor skills workout--this proved to be quite the task for some of them.

I plan on using this activity as one of our math stations during our daily math rotations, so I whipped up a little recording sheet to use. I thought I would share it with you patient/awesome readers out there! 

Enjoy the freebie!

Click one of the links to download this freebie!

And this brings me to my newest products--I spent most of Saturday evening creating this first one and I am very happy with it! I'm printing my copy tomorrow so I can use it in my own classroom. :) This pack includes anchor charts, word wall words, several games, and even a little minibook for the students to make. It is meant to complement your awesome patterns unit! 

Click one of the links to purchase this pack!

The next one is this little shape book that my students actually completed last week. I love how they came out and the kids were ecstatic over them!

Click one of the links to purchase this activity!

Alright, since you have stuck with me this long, feel free to comment below to win a copy of my new products! Tomorrow, I will randomly choose 3 people to win a copy of both new products!

Don't forget to leave your email address!! :)

Pointers!

Again, still not back. One day, one day, my friends..... :/

I did want to share these cute little pointers that I developed a slight obsession for! I don't even have all of the pictures of them--I have made SOOOO many!!

(Other than being adorable, the best thing about the wooden shapes is that they cost about 50 cents each!!!)

These are a HUGE hit with my students (and my own child, haha!). We use them on the word wall, Promethean Board, during calendar time--the possibilities are endless :)

Spooky Shape Spin

I am still not back, but am alive and working!!!

Enjoy this lil' shape freebie I just made--I combined graphing, comparing numbers, and shape recognition into one Halloween-themed activity! This will be one activity we will do during our daily math skill practice time. :)

Click one of the links to download this freebie!

Writing Freebie!!

I want you to know that I am still alive, though I am drowning in everything 1st grade!!! First grade is keeping me WAYYYY busy! And know that I have TONS of your emails that have been starred for me to respond to.....one day. I'll be back soon, I guess. ;)

Thanks for your patience!! :)

I wanted to stop by and at least offer you a freebie! I am loving 1st grade, especially math (of course) and writing, the two subjects I plan for my grade level. Please enjoy this writing freebie--I hope you are able to use it (or pass it on to someone who can)!! :)

We are using the following page next week to accompany a minilesson on finger spacing. Click on the page to grab a copy:

Thanks and enjoy!!! See you soon(ish)!!! :)

Simple, Fun Counting Activity

Well, I'm kind of back in blog land. I even visited/commented on three blogs today! I'm still super busy with school and still very overwhelmed with everything, BUT it is getting better, day by day. Can't wait for life to slow down just a little bit!!! By the way, I'll have some pictures of my finished classroom for you very soon!! I just l-o-v-e how it came out.

I did want to stop by and share something of worth with you! Here is a math activity that me and my team have planned to do this week with our 1st graders. By the way, 1st grade has been AWESOME so far! I have 21 kids in my class. We just finished week 1 of school and in this week, I have given at least 20 hugs a day (WAY more than the 1-2 per week in 4th grade), talked to lots of parents, have wanted to pull my hair out only once or twice, sang LOTS of songs, read LOTS of books, and have done more phonics than I even have thought about since college. I'm in a good place and I think it will be a GREAT year!! My kids are SO sweet and are totally enamored with how fast I can write and color, and how AWESOME my drawings are (lol). It's the simple things...

The activity I am sharing with you is an adaptation from one of the ones I learned at Math Camp. (Check out my other Math Camp posts here!!) I was able to prepare for this activity and will use it without having to spend any money at all! (Well...any new money. I already had all of the supplies at home.) Here is what you need:

Materials:

• scrapbook paper (or fabric) with many objects in the print
• colored paper plates
• scissors
• unifix cubes

After the activity go over how many objects the students counted and what exactly they counted. Be sure to instruct students to only connect cubes that make sets of ten. When they share results they will tell how many tens and ones they have, and then the total count. Example: "I counted the whole polka dots in the circle. I have 1 ten and 2 ones--12." 

Hope you enjoy and are able to use this activity! I think we will have fun with it--I'll let you know after Wednesday. ;) See you SOON (though not sure how soon...)! 

You all are awesome.

I received such an overwhelming response to my last post (in a good way!!). Thank you all SO much. I can't even begin to describe how great it is to have so much support from people I've never "met". I started to reply to all of your sweet comments and emails in a timely manner--and then we went out of town. And then school started--aahhh!! I am forcing myself to be on hiatus right now but will be back very SOON, I hope. To say this week has been nuts is an understatement--I almost didn't even have time (or energy!!!!!!) to celebrate my own birthday today!!! :O
I leave you with a few more classroom pics--I must finish before Thursday!!!!
















Almost there--wish me luck!

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