Five for Friday (April 10)

I can't believe it's Friday again!  This week went by speedy quick!  We are linking up with Doodle Bugs Teaching for Five for Friday.

Here are five quick random things from this week in my kindergarten classroom.

 

1.) I am so excited about my new classroom rug!!  Thank you Donor's Choose.  I read where they are currently funding half for Professional Development through the Bill and Melinda Gates Fund. 

2.)  I sent home letter naming fluency sheets with each of my students.  They are free in my TpT store.

  3.)  We studied plants this week.  My kinder kids planted beans in a Ziploc baggie, labeled a plant, and read many books.

4.) However, their favorite part was learning about carrots.  I used Sherri Caballero's Creepy Carrot Unit.

5.) For Word Work, students used newspapers to highlight sight words.

Stephany has a Newspaper Unit in her TpT store that would be great to use with kindergarten students.

Endless Possibilities,
Stephanie

Dinosaur Eggs!

We have had fun for the past couple of weeks learning about dinosaurs.  I have a student who is totally obsessed with everything dinosaur so I promised we would do a dinosaur unit!  This will be one post out of two to cover all of our dinosaur adventures!

Always up for a huge, fun sloppy mess I decided to let the students paper mache their own eggs.  Before I blew up the balloons I placed a little dinosaur inside.  I got these at the Dollar Tree.  They are squishy and fit right in the balloon.  They come in three different dinosaurs (Triceratops, Stegosaurus, T-Rex).

We used the flour & water recipe to make the paste.  It didn't take too long for them to cover the balloons.  I suggest keeping them on the smaller side, the larger balloons weren't as sturdy once they dried, plus you want to make sure that there aren't any little holes in the eggs where the dinosaur can fall out.  After they were dried, I let them paint their egg.  

Once the eggs were dried, I popped the balloon.  The balloon will shrivel up inside of the paper mache which is actually great because it makes it harder for the dinosaur to fall out of any holes that may be in the eggs from the students not covering them all of the way.

We have been researching different kinds of dinosaurs.  We used these QR code cards in our listening center... they are connected to Safe Share YouTube videos that are fun and informative.  We also used the information sheets to learn about each dinosaur.

Students wrote three facts about the dinosaur in their egg, practiced reading their facts and then read them aloud while being recorded.  I took the videos and made QR codes, attached them to the eggs and made a listening center recording sheet.  Now students can scan an egg, listen to the recording and guess the dinosaur in their classmates' egg.   So many speaking and listening standards covered, as well as fluency practice. 

I plan on having a reveal to see how many students correctly guessed the dinosaurs in their classmates' eggs.  I'll let the kids take their eggs home and hatch them with their parents!

This was such a fun activity!  It's good to get a little messy every once in a while!  You can grab up the the QR codes, information sheets and much more in my All About Dinosaurs unit!

Stephany

Interactive Math Notebooks for Time {Half Hour and Hour}

Learning time to the hour and half hour is one of the first grade standards that students seem to pick up super fast or struggle with. Interactive notebooks are always a great way to practice! 

Students sort clocks into the correct pockets. They can pull them out at anytime and practice sorting them again and again!

Students write the time under each of the flaps.  They can continue to practice the skill by guessing the time and checking the answer by looking under the flap.

Students match the digital, analog and how we "say" the time.

Students match the clocks to the digital time.

Students write the digital time under the clocks.

Students write the time under the clock flap.

All of these activities include an hour, half hour, and hour/half hour mixed version.  We teach hour first and then move on to half hour so you can mix and match these activities to whatever suits your curriculum!  How do you teach time in your classroom?

You can grab these activities up in my store by clicking below...

Or you can grab up the bundle by clicking on the image below!

Stephany