Let's Tackle Math! {Freebie included!}

Any football fans out there?  Believe me I've got a room full of them!  In celebration of the upcoming "Super Sunday" I created this pack to help us practice some of those important CCSS math skills.

It includes 10 math activities:

-What's the Score? Counting How Many CCSS K.CC.5

-Game Time! Comparing Numbers - CCSS K.CC4a, K.CC.4b, K.CC4c, K.CC.6

-Touchdown 10's: Combining Numbers to Make 10 CCSS K.OA.4

-Tackle Those Tens! Decomposing 10 into Pairs in Multiple Ways CCSS K.OA.3

-Team Player Poof! Addition Fact Fluency to 5 CCSS K.OA.5

-Touchdown Time (Hour and Half Hour) CCSS 1.MD.3

-Megaphone Measurement (Length) CCSS K.MD.2, 1.MD.2

-Kicking Off with Tens and Ones (Place Value 10-19) CCSS K.NBT.1, 1.NBT.1

-Cards for Counting by 1's, 2's, 5's, 10's CCSS K.CC.1

-Matching Number Words to Symbols (1-10)

Make sure to download the FREE PREVIEW FILE (red button) to snag one of the activities for free! :)

I'd love to hear your thoughts on this one.  Are you going to bring football into your lessons this week? I'll send the whole pack to the first 2 people who comment below for FREE! (Don't forget your e-mail!)

Winter Cardinals Art Project

A few weeks ago I saw some beautiful cardinals that our art teacher was helping a class of older students create.  I'll admit...I was a little jealous.  I wanted my kinders to create those gorgeous birdies too!  I decided to go for it and gave a little impromptu drawing lesson that afternoon.  Let's just say our first attempt was a disaster.  Our red cardinals looked a little more like a blood bath of red paint scattered everywhere.  Eekk!  We fed those beauties to the recycle bin and started again...
This time we took the easy route and used handprints for our birds.  Much better!

We began by "dotting" our snow using white paint and q-tips.  Then we free-styled our brown trees and tree limbs.  Once our background was dry, we added the red handprint birds.  Final touches to the bird included black and orange construction paper triangles for the face and eyes drawn in with a white crayon.

We tied our art lesson into literature with the help of this book by Keith Baker:

No Two Alike

We used the last few lines of his book for our writing component.
I think they turned out just darling!  I'll definitely add this to my winter activities must-do list.  :)

Focus...Click! 2D/3D Shapes in the Environment!

Remember my environmental print alphabet posters?  Well...I decided to stick with my new camera and take a few more pictures for a new pack.  This time I've gone SHAPE HAPPY! :)  I've been snapping pictures of 2-D and 3-D shapes in the environment all over the place.  Stores, drive-thrus, airports.....call me crazy but taking pictures can be a little addictive!  I narrowed down my photos to a mere 88 pictures that I compiled into this brand new creation.

The pack includes: 79 photo cards, 8 shape scene cards, 3-In-a-Row game (8 game mats), 26 sorting cards, 2 Spin and Graph games, "I Can" and "Math Talk" task cards

Make sure and download the FREE PREVIEW FILE to grab your "sample" activity.  Click {here}.

I've been testing the activities out in my own classroom over the last 6 weeks and things have gone great!  My kids have really enjoyed connecting their shape knowledge with the environment (thank you CCSS).  I am happy to report that we officially have the shape fever.  Seriously.  It is impossible to look at anything these days without analyzing the shapes within it.  Plus, we have gotten really good at composing and decomposing those suckers.  I found a few tent building kits on clearance at Kohl's after the holidays.  Instant shape building activity, right?!?  I turned it into a team building exercise as an added bonus.  Let me tell you...building giant size 3-D shapes is not as easy as it looks.  Nonetheless we had a blast!  We followed up with some toothpick and marshmallow creations that were much easier to build (and assess!).  Never a dull moment....   :)

I'll be back soon with a recap of our winter birds art project.

Collaborative Community Announcement!

BIG announcement!!

I am a part of a wonderful collective group of kindergarten/early primary teachers-bloggers who strive to learn and grow with one another.  The group has several "extensions" such as a collaborative blog and our recent Pinterest board called Kinderland Collaborative.
We've been exploring with ways that we can communicate and collaborate with teachers from everywhere.  Today we are launching a brand new Google + community that you are definitely going to want to be apart of. {Isn't technology amazing?} We have this new Kinderland Collaborative Community available to serve as a meeting place for ALL kinder teachers ......bloggers and non-bloggers alike. If you are interested in all things kinder - you will want to join. It's a place to get to know other kinder teachers from around the world, get to know your favorite kinder bloggers (and learn about new ones)......ask questions, bounce ideas off others, etc. I have a feeling that this group is going to take off quickly- it is amazing what happens when we all work together!  There will be perks too, of course....like sections for freebies and the occasional giveaways.  Mainly it is a fantastic way to communicate and collaborate.  I hope you will join us.  Oh, and it is free! :)

Why Google+?

It is similar to Facebook, but has a nice layout that allows us to create threads for different topics. We can even have hangouts (where you can video/audio chat with other kinder teachers and bloggers). 

Click the button below to join!!!

Scavenger Hunt Fun!

Are you up for some scavenger hunt fun?
There are some great prizes involved! :)

Join us on Facebook this Sunday (Jan. 6th) at 3:00pm!

Here is what you need to know:

There are 16 bloggers participating and each is donating a fan-ta-bu-lous prize!  To win all you have to do is follow the clues and leave a comment on that person's FB page with the correct answer.

Shuna from Pocket Full of Kinders will give the first clue on her FB page here at 3 p.m. central time on Sunday. Once you figure out what fabulous blogger her clue refers to... leave their name or link in the comments! 

*All fans who answer the clue correctly will be entered into the individual drawing as well as the big drawing!*

To find the next clue you will hop over to that person's FB page and read your next clue (you can get to it by visiting their blog and clicking on the FB button in the sidebar).

There are 16 clues so that is 16 chances to win

There will be a winner for each clue 

Each winner will then be put into the big drawing where they will have a chance to win it all!

Before we look at the prizes here are the rules

* you must follow each person's FB page!

( You can do this before hand but we will check to make sure that you are a follower!)

* You can only comment once to each clue {So make it good}

*You can comment between the times 3p.m. central time and 7p.m. central time

*Winners will be announced at 8p.m.

( If the random number thingy chooses you as a winner and you have not followed each FB
another winner will be chosen)

Take a look at the prizes that will go into the big drawing

Pst, this may or may not be your little cheat sheet

:)

Here is what I am donating:

I hope you will join us tomorrow!