Shaking Words

Hello everyone!  It has been a while.....a long while since I have been in touch.  But I do have a FREEBIE for you to kick the New Year off.  My kids absolutely love to do the Making Words, Word Work activity that we use.  It is major competition to see who builds the most words.  However, lately I've had a group of kids, whose focus has switched to just trying to figure out the mystery word!!  Soooooo, I decided to create this little baby, which eliminates a mystery word and focuses solely on the process of building words with given letters.  You can download it here FREE from my google docs.  I hope that you will get much needed rest and relaxation during your break.  Happy Holidays!

SHAKING WORDS

SALE!

Hello all!  My school year is off to a great start!  This is my 1st year teaching 3rd grade, and I'm excited and nervous!  I just wanted to let you all know that my TPT store will have all items on sale for the big B2S extravaganza! You can save 28% if you enter the code BTS13 when you checkout!  I can't wait to go shopping myself! 

I also wanted to share with you some bookmarks that I use with my students.  This will my 3rd attempt at implementing the CAFE in my classroom.  I always start out SUPER strong, then branch away from it.  The one difference that I do, is that I don't have the students put sticky notes on the class CAFE display board.  Each student has their own bookmark/checklist that they can refer to, and always know what their goal/focus is.  So, since Melonheadz (one of my new favorite clip art artists) posted some adorable little kiddos, I redid my bookmarks.  You can find them here for FREE!  Enjoy the rest of your weekend!

 

In color

 

 

 

 

And black & white

 

Work on Writing center

I remember seeing this idea on Pinterest, and falling in love with it!  I do Daily 5 in my classroom and my Work on Writing station is always the most dreaded.  So I'm constantly thinking of ways to spice it up.  The writing during Daily 5 is completely separate from my normal writing block, and this little writing center idea has been a life saver.  I created one that I felt would work great with my group.  I start with modeling each of the choices on different occasions, and then adding it to my "I can Write a...." wall.  For each of the choices, I have at least 2 choices of stationary or paper to complete the writing.  My pack includes 9 writing choices: 

 

POSTCARDS

RECIPES

RESPONSE TO LITERATURE

STORY

CARD

BOOK

POEM

LETTER

JOURNAL ENTRY (for whole class journals)

 



Here are a few pictures from the file. 

 

 

 

 

Do you do Daily 5 in your classrooms?  What do your kids do during the Work on Writing time?  How do you keep it from being the most dreaded rotations of all?  I would like to offer this file to the first three followers to comment answering the questions above!  Don't forget to leave your email address!  

 

 

Sale & a FREEBIE!

Hello everyone!  To help celebrate the 4th of July, I am having a sale on ALL of my TPT products!!  Go ahead and grab some fabulous, common core aligned products to start your year off right!  Also, all of my "I CAN" statements are FREE til' Friday!  Wooohoo!  They are perfect for pocket charts and/or objective boards!!  Thank you for continuing to follow me on this journey!  Enjoy the holiday! 

Exit Tickets & a FREEBIE!

Hello all!  I am truly enjoying my summer break.  I've been doing a whole lot of nothing!  I HAVE however, been working on a little project that is taking FOREVER to finish.  I am switching grades, next year.  Moving on up to 3rd grade, so I had to take some time to familiarize myself with the standards.  THEN, I realized, I have ZERO resources for 3rd grade!  So I started making some exit tickets.  A personal goal of mine is to do more little check for understandings throughout the week.  These tickets I'm hoping will do the trick!  It has also given me the opportunity to get to know what I need to teach next year.  I have 4 tickets per page.  Each page has the standard it addresses in the corner, and there are up to 6 different exit tickets for each standard!!  Check them out! 

EXIT TICKETS 3RD GRADE

 

 

 

I am happy with the product so far, I wish I had my class right now to test them out on!  I am almost done with the other domains and will post them as soon as they are ready!  I would like to offer you my set of 3rd grade Geometry exit tickets!  Click on the picture below to get them! 

 

 

 

 

SMARTBOARD WRITING GIVEAWAY!

Whoa has it really been that long since I posted?  I'm so sorry, I will do better!  I hope that you are enjoying your summer break or getting ready to enjoy it, for those of you still on the clock!  I came on today to let you know about a former colleague of mine who has FINALLY started to upload his products to TPT.  We worked next door to each other for 6 years, and let's just say, he can do amazing things with the SMARTBOARD!  I am really excited about his 101 Story Starters (yep, 101!) notebook.  You or your students can select a genre and be taken to a wealth of prompts that will spark interest and creativity during what could be a dreadful writing block!  There is just something about variety and choice that makes my heart sing.  This product could be a great addition to your Work on Writing resources.   A lucky few of you will be able to test this product out.



                                    

 Just head on over to his TPT store, follow his store, and then download one of his wonderful freebies that he already has posted.  He is just getting started, so you will definitely want to know when new things are added!  Then, come back and comment on this post which product you downloaded, along with your email and you will receive this monster file of common core aligned writing prompts!  Happy Summer!

Do you EDMODO?

Our school "Geek Squad" introduced me to this fantastic way for my students to communicate with each other for educational purposes.  EDMODO is a free service, and requires each child to have a username and password, but they call all sign in by being invited from you, by giving them a group code to sign up, so you don't have to worry about each having an email address which can get crazy!

 

So far, I have used this site to give my students simple polls, that can later be used for data & graphing which we are studying right now. 

 

 

I could also create an assignment, where students have to submit it directly to me instead of just replying to a post.  This is an assignment turned in, the question was What is the difference between a fact and an opinion.  I have the ability to assign a grade and also leave a response to their answer.

 

  The post below was a picture of our caterpillars (which didn't show up for this snapshot), but you can see the student responses below it. 

 

Lastly, students are also able to create post!   That is where you have to set the guidelines, otherwise, they turn it into a mini Facebook!  Make it very clear that the site is used for educational purposes.

As you can see, my kids are STILL struggling with regrouping.  Sigh.... and most likely the others just copied the previous response.

  What I like about the site, is that it is easy to navigate through.  I have 2nd graders, and they log on and can respond to my assignments within minutes!  EDMODO is a great tool for teachers to network.  I  have my personal account and then the one I use for my classroom.  There is an app for your smartphones as well, which is where I took these pics from!  You should check it out!

MENTOR TEXT LINKY-language arts

Hello all!  I'm linking up with the Cuties again!  This week's topic is language arts. 

 

 

My book choice is VOICES IN THE PARK by Anthony Browne. 

 

 

It is an absolute perfect choice for teaching Point of View and Character Traits.  There are 4 very distinct "voices".  A little boy, his mother, a little girl, and her father and also the dogs. 

 

Each voice tells a story about a day in the park.  All four voices are in the park at the exact same time, but all have completely different perspectives of the days events.  This book is excellent for character traits, as the different points of view lend themselves to different analysis of the characters!  It was a hit in my room!  I had the kids list the traits they felt described each character and their point of view.  Many kids had connections to similar park experiences they have had. 

 

 

Do you INSTAGRAM?



CLICK TO FOLLOW ME!

 

 

Do you take a boat load of pictures throughout the day, but don't want to type up an entire blog post about it?  INSTAGRAM is a great outlet to share those pics and great things that are happening in your day!  I just signed on a few weeks ago and it's been pretty fun! I created an INSTAGRAM for my blog from my phone. I'm joining WHAT THE TEACHER WANTS! Instagram Talk about it Tuesdays! Hop on over to see the details and  link up, and also find some of your favorite bloggers on INSTAGRAM!

 

 

Picture Prompt Writing, Bird reports, & countdown

Happy Sunday all!  If your days are anything like mine, you have spent it cleaning, shopping, drinking high-priced coffee, lesson creating/planning and of course blog stalking.  I personally wouldn't have it any other way.  Well except for the fact that Monday is...well....tomorrow :(

My lovely class just finished up a two week unit on Bird Research!  Students were required to:

1.  choose a bird

 

 

2.  locate information via text or online

 

 

3.  list their sources

 

 

4.  strengthen their writing (these were my examples)

Then, they had to do their own!

 

5.  revising & editing with a peer

 

Let me tell you, it was a challenge!  But to top off the unit, I had my students incorporate measurement in with the writing, by asking them to build life-size versions of their bird.  This was probably the ONLY motivation that got most of them to complete all the steps for this report! 

6.  measurements

 

 

HERE ARE A FEW OF MY FINAL PRODUCTS!!

(hummingbird, penguin, roadrunner & a Dodo)

 

 

 

Next up, is my Picture Writing Prompt Packet

 

Hot off the press is my picture prompt writing packet.  At this point in the year, kids should have mastery of the 3 most focused genres of writing in 2nd grade.  Because its the end of the year, I'm giving my kids a little freedom, and allowing them to choose the style of writing they want to do.  So with each picture, there are 3 different prompts to write about, one of each genre.  Check it out!

 

 

 

 

 

   I apologize for the extra long post, but it is FORBIDDEN to post twice in one day!!  The last thing I want to say is that, I have 29 days of school left.  That's all. I will give 3 of these packets away to the first 3 followers to comment and tell me how many days you have left!   Have a great week!