Proud to be an American..and St. Louisan :-)

So this week we finished up our President unit.  We talked about being an American, the freedoms we are given, our founding fathers, and presidency.  We were doing an activity that started with the question:  If you could be president, would you?  So immediately every hand goes up as a "yes" to this, right?  Then we talked as a class about what would be really neat about being president, and what would be not-so-neat about it.  We tied in some opinion writing earlier in the day about this, and did this project in the afternoon: 

We talked about what they wanted to do when they got older, and we made caricatures to match.  I teach at a school in Illinois, but we are only 20 min away from St. Louis, Mo, so I had to show my STL pride here (and obviously the pride of this student)..

Where are my phonetic speller pro's?  Can you read that? I Could Be President, but I think I'll Be.... a CARDINAL'S PLAYER!  I love it!!  

Here are some other President activities we did this week:

I always enjoy this unit, partially because of its material, but also because it always seems that the writing my Kinder's do shine in this unit.  We do creative writing, writing to a prompt, opinion writing, and 4 block writing, and I'm always impressed with how it turns out--how far their writing has developed.  

Just as Good as My Coffee...

Anyone who knows me, knows how much I love my coffee.  I *NEED* my coffee!  Being a momma to 3 young kids who have needs (many) that need to be met, well, I don't have to tell any of you how exhausting that can sometimes be.  Throw in being a full time teacher and you can understand my slight addiction to coffee.  I love every aspect of my life and would not change it for the world, but sometimes, "momma's just tired"!  So coffee has become a staple of my morning.  
The other morning, though, I got this first thing from one of my students, and let me tell you, it was my "coffee" for the day.  This motivates me more than my "large mocha/nonfat milk" ever does.  It was so random, not expected at all, and just gave me what I needed to start off the day.  We get notes like these as teachers from time to time, and let me tell you, not a one of them goes unnoticed by me.  So thank you for my "coffee" this particular day, kindergartner.  It was much appreciated!! :)  

Happy Valentine's Day!

Today was so fun!  It was only a half day of school, so we had a lot to get in.  We started with our calendar routine and I was so impressed with the amount of enthusiasm with our songs and such that we quickly moved to dancing!  YEP! What good is a Friday Fun Day without some moves, right?  We cut a rug like nobody's business today!  I should have got my camera out for that, but didn't think about it.  I promise I'll get our dancing on camera one of these days.  

When it was time for our Valentine's Party, we decorated our Valentine holders with some fun foamies.  Then they passed out their Valentine's and had a snack, and then we were out of time!  I can't believe how fast that went.  I had a fun little game planned that we did not get to.  That's ok, I can always use it for a down time moment.  

Here are some pics of them decorating their bags:

Teaming Together

Ha ha!  This is what a temp of "feels like -8" looks like.  Last night I spent my evening with my little man, looking (and him playing), with different educational apps for the classroom.  Tablets came in for the teachers to try out and find tools so our students can use soon!  There is so much out there, it is very exciting!  Of course, my tech buddy here gave his stamp of approval for most of what I found!  :)  

100th Day Activities

Can any of you believe we have been in school for 100 days already?  It went fast, that's for sure!  I always have to make sure I spend time talking about how the 100th day does not mean it's the last day of school.  Every year, I have a Kinder think that, and they are disappointed to find out that they are not off the rest of the year! :)  Here are some of our activities we had today:

These 2 are switching their cards in their Calendar Journals to match 100, how exciting!!

Fruit Loop Necklaces!  We start by putting 100 fruit loops on a hundreds chart so we don't lose track, and then string them on a necklace.  When they are finished they are 100 Fruit Loops happier! :)

                     100 day headbands!

It was a fun filled day with many 100's activities.  It is so fun to see the excitement they have about this day!

President's Day Goodies

We still have one more week of Dinosaurs, so I will be posting more activities with that as we go.  Tomorrow is the 100th day of school!  SOOOOOOOO exciting!  I love celebrating that day with the students, it's a big milestone!  So, I will try to have those pictures in the next day or two.  But for today, well, it was yet another snow day.  Ugh!  So I sat down this evening to create my President's Day materials.  Please check it out on my TPT store at:

http://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Store/Becky-Lowe    
I love, love, LOVE Melonheadz Illustrations for clip art.  They are so stinkin' CUTE!  www.melonheadzillustrating.blogspot.com 

I really am liking this whole "blog" thing so far.  The most difficult part for me was creating the blog itself.  Now its pretty easy peasy!  I'm enjoying it.  Til next time...

Dinosaur Week

Dinosaur week is always one of my favorites!  The kids are always so excited to explore this theme.  Here is a fun center we do to build on our knowledge of word families.  I just took one of the "Biggie Patterns" from Scholastic and copied it onto various colored paper.  The pattern came as a stegosaurus, so I just cut off the spines and wrote individual letters in those, and the word family on the dinosaur.  I made a record sheet and viola, there we have it.  We have been working on nonsense vs real words, so in this center, I only have them write the real words.  

Here are some pictures of us at centers this week.  We did the above center and then also did a "sight word find" with magnifying glasses to help us find those tiny tiny sight words on our dinosaur picture. We are working hard on sentence expanding.  I thought it turned out really, really well.   

A New Journey

Today I joined the wonderful world of blogging.

  Why?  There are many reasons.

  1.  I view blogging as an online journal of sorts, and I have a lot to say.  :)

  2.  I think it will be very neat and beneficial to look back upon my teaching and reflect on different aspects of it.

 3.  I am constantly looking for ways to share with my parents, what we do in our classroom. 

4.  I have gotten sooooooooo many great ideas from other educators blog, if I can contribute anything to help anyone else, that will make me happy. 

So there you have it.  Let's start this journey together and bear with me as I learn the ins and outs of blogging.