Watch Me Grow!

We made our first entry in our "Watch Me Grow" self-portrait scrap book today!

Each month, we will be drawing a picture of ourselves.
I always enjoy seeing how the students' drawings develop over the school year!
This book makes a great addition to the 'ole "keep-sake" box.

Here's a sneak-peak at a few of our entries!

"Tt" is for...

Towers! We are making patterns......

Learning about AB patterns.......Made these all by ourselves!!!

Our weekly "In my name/Not in my name" game...
We only have one student with a Tt in their name!

Trays of Playdoh!!!

We couldn't get enough of the Playdoh this week...

Alex's "constellations..."

Tonight  I made trays of coloured rice for 

a new sensory table centre!!!

The only problem is that my son is having a lot of fun with it and he's gonna be sad to see it leave this house!

"Tt" is for:

Too much fun in this JK class......

High Five Letters and Nursery Rhymes

I'm all for games and active activities to drill and practice our letter sounds, so my High Five Letter chart is another tool that helps us rehearse the sounds we are learning.

The chart is posted right by the door so that when we pass-by to leave the class and go out for recess we can all high-five the letter-hands and say our sounds. 

The hand cutouts are from Carson-Dellosa. 

I added the letters, laminated them, and attached Velcro to the back so that each week I can easily switch them up.

Fantabulous, simple activity that takes just a few seconds but helps reinforce those initial sounds!

We have been focusing on Nursery Rhymes during the month of September. The class has had a lot of fun reciting, singing and acting them out together......we are quite the acting troupe!!!

We focused on a new nursery rhyme every school day in September, and after having fun playing around with the rhymes, we also worked on a colouring page in our colouring book.

Next month we will start our book-of-the-week program!

You can find the FREE book cover {here} or {here}. 

I compiled several different colouring pages, but many of them you can find at  Education.com.

Ants on the Apples!!! Ahh!

Yep...we got 'em...

ants on our apples...

Yuck!!!

Autumn Math Activities & Sale Time

With the official arrival of autumn this weekend, I thought it was time to crack out some fall-themed activities.

The first two are great for small groups or individual math centre work.

All you need are some clothes-pins! 

This item can be found {here} or {here}. 

Clip a clothes-pin onto the next picture in the pattern.

This item can be found {here} or {here}. 

Count the items and clip a clothes-pin on the correct number.

Today we started working on a number booklet that I put together.

After doing several hands-on counting activities with fruit from our house centre, I introduced the children to "rainbow writing".  We took out the crayons and got right to work on "rainbow writing" the number one.

SALE TIME:

In honour of the official arrival of "AUTUMN", I am throwing a

STORE-WIDE SALE at both my TPT and Teacher's Notebook stores.

Follow the links HERE or HERE. :)

Happy Autumn

&

Happy Shopping!!!

Letter of the Week (LOTW)

There are a wide variety of resources that I use in my JK literacy program, but here are a few mainstays or anchors that I absolutely love!

 We generally focus on one letter a week (with a few review weeks thrown in for good measure). 

Last year, I primarily used the Jolly Phonics program, as well as the animal alphabet friends cards from Abeka. The Jolly Phonics program is a great multi-sensory approach to teaching literacy. Each week, we learn the Jolly Phonics songs and actions and slowly build up our repertoire of phonics sounds. We are blending and making words in no time! 

The animal alphabet cards are a resource that I used when I homeschooled my own children for preschool and kindergarten. 

I introduce the children to a new animal friend with each new letter of the alphabet. Each card has wonderful stories full of non-fiction information about each animal as well as comprehension questions.

This year, I've also added a fun new resource from Scholastic that the kids and I are truly enjoying. It is an ABC sing-along flip chart with a CD that has an entertaining and catchy song for every letter.

On Fridays, children have the opportunity to bring in an item from home for show and tell that begins with our LOTW.  This gives me more time to reinforce the letter sounds and gives the children a fantastic chance to practice speaking in front of a group as well as share something special from home. This past week, we looked at the letter "Ss" and children brought in a snake (a toy one), a spiderman costume, a snow-plow and some sunglasses. 

We also play our "In My Name/Not In My Name" pocket chart game to work on our name and letter recognition skills. The game goes as follows: I have an extra set of name flashcards, randomly pick a card, children identify their own name, and then place their name on the appropriate side of the pocket chart. If they have the LOTW in their name, they put their name on the "in my name" side. I always give the children an opportunity to guess which side is going to win before we even begin.  They get rather excited about this one......something about seeing your name in print!!! :)

For our handwriting curriculum, I use the Handwriting Without Tears (HWT) program which has fabulous tools and activities to help the children as they learn how to form the letters. The HWT program involves the use of a variety of hands-on materials (wooden letter pieces, magnetic stamp & see screens, roll-a-dough letters, etc.) The children make use of these tools to practice forming their letters even before they put a pencil to paper. 

To top off our LOTW activities, we also learn a Bible verse for each letter.

You can find the memory verse resource HERE.

Art Gallery

I have quite a few bulletin boards in my new classroom, so this year I actually have an "Art Gallery"!

I decided to make use of a Pinterest inspired idea, to hot glue thumb tacks onto clothes pins and then stick them up on the bulletin board. It makes it super easy to switch out our art items!

The Art Gallery was filled after the first day of school because we did my JK First Day of school self portrait page, and then I hung them up for everyone to enjoy!

You can find this freebie {here} or {here}.

I think it looks pretty sweet!  I have quite the artists again this year!

Organizational Helps

I am all about being organized, so here are a few of my favourite organizational helps that are used on a regular basis.

There are several permanent centres in our JK classroom and most have signs labelling what the centre is. One of the smartest things that I've done in past years (which I have NOT yet done this fall) is to add pictures for the children, so that when it comes time to clean up, they know what each centre should look like.  It really helps the children keep things tidier and organized.......visual aids go a looooong way! 

When we choose centres, I use my centre signs with stick people. Each child has a clothespin with their name on it, and after they choose a centre we put it on the sign and the children know exactly how many students are at or can be at a centre at any given time. (Works like a charm!)

The Centres board is actually a magnetic chalk board (a delicious old green one......yuck) that I covered with paper, so I use my magnetic clips to change/add/remove the signs.

Septembers always seem to be all about learning procedures and routines. Actually, if I'm going to be honest, I feel like a bit of a drill sergeant much longer than just the month of September......practice, practice......

There is something that I use in the classroom to help us when it comes to lining up for all of our in-school travels (to the washroom, library, gym, etc). I made number labels and stuck them to the floor to show where the children need to stand. Every student is assigned a number (their name is there as well). There is never any question about who stands beside whom and they are also spaced out enough so that they don't need to crowd, shove, or push each other.

Each day, a new student is given the "line-leader" job and they are in charge of leading their classmates through the hallway. (The leader stands on the designated "Line Leader" spot). They are expected to set an example of leadership, to demonstrate how to travel with "walking feet" and to keep very quiet so as not to disturb the other classes.

Besides getting the leading role when travelling through the hallways, the line leader is also my special helper during the day and I ask them to do a variety of different things for me. He/she is also given the privilege of occupying the "Circus Tent" during quiet-rest time, library, and silent reading times.

Another helpful tool is my, "What do I do first" visual aid that is hanging on the wall close to our work-tables area.

It's great for kids who are having trouble following directions or remembering the order of things.

The picture labels are interchangeable, with velcro on the back, so that the order can be switched around depending on what activity we might be doing.

The classroom might be organized, but unfortunately my house doesn't organize itself......time to get back to the dreaded Saturday clean up.
Have a blessed weekend! :)

Exploration Time

I love the beginning of the year when things are fresh and new, and the children are exploring all the wonderful exciting things in the classroom.

During our math time in September, we do a lot of free exploration with the math manipulatives.
I enjoy seeing what the children can do when given open time to do whatever they like with what you put in front of them.
I have been impressed with what I've seen so far!

"I made a caterpillar!"

"Look at my army of sword fish!"

GTKY Time

We began our GTKY (Getting to Know You) time yesterday, and to kick it off, I thought it might be nice to start with ME!

Last year, I felt rather sorry for the children were were up first for this activity, because each child brings home the pictures that their classmates make of them and let's just say that there were a number that really didn't resemble a person at all.  In light of that experience, I thought that this time around we'd better practice on Mrs. Schenk first and get in a little more extra drawing time before we send home classmate portraits!  :)

(I've adapted and "copied" Anita Bremer's wonderful activity, which you can find explained here.)

It's great fun at the beginning of the year when we're getting to know each other and learn our names.

I explained the activity to the children and they enjoyed cheering my name and learning a little bit about their teacher.

Yes, and I quote....... "42 IS A BIG NUMBER!"

After the interviewing process, the children are given an opportunity to draw our special GTKY person of the day. 

In my class, we use "Mat Man", (from Handwriting Without Tears) to help us learn how to draw people.

If you don't know about him, you can check it out here.

We are still learning the song, but I think it really does help the children think about all the parts involved in drawing a person!

After singing the song and demonstrating how we would draw as we listen to the song, the children went to the tables and got right to work drawing Mrs. Schenk!

I think I'm looking pretty good for 42!

We've Moved!

This summer, the great "move-across-the-hall" went down and now I am starting to settle into the new JK classroom. 

Last year, I had 21 motivated, animated, energetic, jovial, fired-up darlings in my class, and this fall I have 10, so my wonderful colleague Michelle (SK) now has need of the "big" room!

When the last of the furniture arrives, I will finish setting up and will be able to give the children more options during centre time. 

Right now, some of the centres that I would like to make more permanent are being set up and then taken down because our new tables have not yet arrived. 

I am trying to be patient......

So, although we are up and running,

 my class is not quite as I would like it to be.

It is a work in progress.

Aren't we all?!?

Here's a sneak peak of our JK adventure land as it is today!

Nap anyone?!?