the many uses of a divided tray...

Ok, so this week I find myself swamped in work! --Not for this year though, I'm already thinking of new things to implement, new ideas to try, and with three small kids, the more organized I can get now, the easier it makes my life come August.  I'm working on reading groups activities/organization, I am working on a new behavior system that makes misbehavior less of a guessing game for the parents, a new classroom makeover, my minds justa' adding on to the already large "to do" list.  When I'm trying something new though-that I think will benefit the kids, its not even like work, I get all excited. Thankfully, I've got some awesome co workers that inspire me to try new things.   Anyway, that's what I've been up to this week.  

Here is a center we have going on this week.  

If I have any advice for primary teachers, it  is BUY THESE TRAYS!  I use them for SOOO many activities!!  We do CVC work with them, we make CVC words from our names...a ton with them.  And they are only $1!!  I got mine from Walmart a few years ago during the spring/summer.  

In this particular center there are spring caterpillars, each a certain word family, and they make those word family words in their trays with magnetic letters (or whatever letters you have available).  I had them take a Dry Erase marker and write them on the caterpillar instead of using the recording sheet.  The recording sheet would be great for first grade, though.  

Here's me with my plug:  (cough, cough): The caterpillars and the recording sheet are part of Spring Bundle unit on TPT.  Click here to see it.  Have a good rest of the week, everyone! 

Spring Has Sprung!

Hello all!   Spring is in the air here in KB!  Color me happy about it too-- I love to see all the bright colors and have outdoor recesses again!  
This week we have been working on some creative writing.  "If I were a kite, I would go _________."  I've said it a million times, but it excites me so to see how far they have come in their writing.  The last one took the words right out of my mouth! :)

I love the mawtins=mountains, and the grosh re=grocery. :)  I should invent some sort of game where you have to interpret phonetic spelling.  It'd be fun to watch!  

Here are some centers we worked on this week.  Completing the sentences and also craft stick word families.  They are REALLY easy to make and were just what we needed as a nice review this week. Craft stick word families are craft sticks that have Velcro on both ends, you can swap out initial letters and word family letters as well.  I color coded mine, so the students knew which set was theirs.  

These acrostic caterpillars brightened up our hallways.  We spent some time talking about how to make this type of poetry. It took some practice to understand the concept, but then we were on our way.  We started with the acrostic on paper and brainstormed some possible choices as a class.  Then they spent one day writing their choice words on the paper, and the next day converted those to the caterpillar craft.  I wish I could have taken a picture of what the kids wrote on theirs, but I have yet to learn how to cloud out the names of the kinders.  :(  But they all had really "Springy" answers, I was impressed!  
The acrostic caterpillar template is just part of my "Spring Bundle" product I have on my TPT store.  Click here to check out the full product.  

Next week is Plants.  I can't wait-it's one of my favorites!  Stay tuned. :-)